Stupid Stuff

Date: Thu Jun 3 1993

Ok, so people want to know about the SS. Stupid Stuff. ok...

Electric Bills:

I first pay a 200 DM electric fine for the first 2 months. After that, they automatically take 100 DM out of my bank account each month. After a year, they are supposed to give back what you didn't use. (Or pay more). This is a interest free loan to pay for East Germany. Since you don't get a monthly bill or receipt, you have no idea if you are using alot or very little electricity.

Phone Bills:

I just got my first phone bill. 175 DM, most of which was installation. You get a monthly bill, but there is no breakdown of calls. So I have no idea whether the 75 DM in chargeable calls is real or not.

Banks:

Banks have holidays fairly often. This means everything closes. I also don't get a monthly statement from my bank. There is one branch for my bank - downtown. Use another banks cash-machine and it will cost you 3 DM.

Toilets:

I have to be careful what I say here to avoid grossing people out since not everyone on this list is a degenerate like myself.
German toilets are the dumbest designed objects in the world. Really. I can't understand how a civilization that can design such wonderful cars and window/shutter systems can make such stupid toilets. Basically, instead of a large bowl of water, there is a shelf arrangement, sometimes at the back, sometimes at the front, and there is a small hole with water down in the bottom of it. When you flush, water comes racing across the shelf to carry away any weight-loss you had and slams it down the hole. So the shelf and most of the rest of the toilet is not the prettiest thing to look at after one use. You are meant to clean the toilet with a brush thingie after each use.

I have heard that at EMBL, in the womens washroom, the cleaning ladies have put up a sign that says something along the lines of:

"I don't know where you piggy people come from, but here...".

They must think that toilets are like this all over the world and since many people don't scrub and brush after each use, they are total filthy slobs.

There are many times (like now) that my home toilet smells real bad and smells up the whole place for days, even though it's spotless. I can't understand it. This is probably common and why Germans open all windows all day long in all weather, and hang their mattresses out the window. oh - and toilet cleaner liquid stuff here is totally useless. It's basically vinegar and has no effect. It's environmentally friendly - and useless.

Computer Group:

So I have this DECstation, which is unusable since computers need things like disk and memory... (I've only been here 5 months)

Ok, so the head of the Computer Group one day in the Goof-Off lounge area mumbles about needing to borrow a DECstation from somewhere. I ask what he needs and for how long. He needs just the monitor for 12 mins. ok, i say, help yourself to mine which is sitting on the floor in an empty room. So a few days later, I go to use it to test out a new network connection in a office I wanna steal before ripping my Sun apart and moving it. The keyboard is gone! Fri afternoon. I leave a note on the keyboard of the Computer Group Grand-Poobah, who isn't in his office, but he hasn't left yet. He leaves. Message ignored. No e-mail. Nothing. right. Thou shalt only use computers 8am-4pm on weekdays.

Monday is a holiday. Tuesday - still no reply. I wander down and ask one of them if they have my keyboard. So I get this sullen yes response as if I'm pestering them. So the next day I decide to tackle the problem of why this new DECstation can no longer find its one and only disk. So I rip it apart. The disk is gone !! I can't believe it !! Bloody amazing. yeh - like I'd never notice it missing...
Something stupid like this happens all the time.

Large Magnetic Fields are Good for you:

So I decide to grab the above mentioned empty office. It used to contain a mega-large killer-evil magnet. You know the kind where people with pace-makers are not allowed in the same room with. But now the magnet has moved away. I wait about 2 months for the Computer Group to string a ethernet cable from the DEChub on the other side of the wall 6 inches away. I got a lock put on the door. So on the weekend, I move my desk, computer and stuff into the office. It was great. NO people. NO more battles whether the door and windows are open or closed. NO more slamming doors and traffic. It's now < 200 degrees. It has air-conditioning. It's perfect. I'm alone and free.

So I kinda ignored the fact that when the DECstation was powered on, that the screen was totally screwed, since after all, my keyboard was gone and it couldn't find its disk to boot - so I figured someone drop-kicked my monitor too. But my Sun - on the other side of the room was having some problems with its monitor. So now I find out that the evil killer magnet is on the other side of the paper-machet wall in the other room. great! thanx for telling me guys. I bet my DNA is totally scrambled now after working there all weekend. If I put my machine on a cart and wheel it across the room, you can see the monitor get visibly worse until it's unuseable as you get closer to the killer wall. So I've moved back.

Speed Limits:

You guys probably think that we here in Germany go blasting around at unlimited speeds all the time. Ha! I wish. On my way to work, I go through a large section with a speed limit of 30 kph. It's agony. And you better obey it, because you might get nailed by one of the mobile radar traps. You get mailed your ticket. If you claim it wasn't you they will send you back a picture of yourself.

There are many places where I'm not sure what the speed limit is - for cars. I usually know what the speed limit is for tanks (really) on highways. Then there are weird signs (I think for military vehicles also) that imply you can go 100 if you are going in 1 direction, but you can only go 50 if you are going in both directions at once. I dunno...
There are some signs I will never figure out.

Driving Licenses:

The deal used to be that you could get your foreign driving license translated to get a German driving license after you have been here 6 months, but before 12 months since you must have a German drivers license after 12 months of being here. There is a small fee for the translation and eye tests and other beaurocratic stuff.

The rules have changed.

I believe that now I have to take classes for driving, first-aid and so on for a long time (in German of course) and pay large amounts of money. I may be able to do this for 800 DM ($700) but if I have to do the whole thing, it can be 2000 DM or more. The biggest pain is the time and classes. This is ridiculous, since they are saying that we trust you to drive on our roads for 12 months, but after that, we don't care that you've been driving 20 years, you have to pay our big fines and take all these classes.

Subscriptions to stuff:

You know how if you get something like a magazine subscription for a year, you have to renew it if you want to continue? Here, you have to make them stop somehow, otherwise they keep taking your money. So I avoid at all costs ever giving out my bank account # for anything. I think the only people that know it is the electric company.

Hair Cuts:

eeek. Scary stuff. I cut my own hair.

Food:

There is no Classic Coke here. Or cookies. How can a hack survive...

Well, that's all I can think of at 4:30 am. I'm hungry and Germany is closed.