The Eckhart Effect

Apologies everyone for not posting sooner. It's been quite the mixed bag over the last couple of weeks settling into our new life here in Berlin. On one hand it's been days filled taking in the city of Berlin - sitting in cafes eating kuchen (delicious, amazing, mouth-watering cake to you and me, I will be blogging on this I promise), checking out the different neighbourhoods and taking in all the usual tourist sights. And on the other hand we've also been trying to make ourselves more at home here, which entailed sorting out things like our broadband issues at home and our resident's permits, all with my very limited German (being both an aid and a hindrance).

Firstly, let me dispel the myth that all German's speak great English. This is what we thought coming over - a mix of English-speaker's arrogance and over-confidence in the German education system I think. What we have found is that maybe one in ten people we have met speak English, and most were under 40. And not having the language has made things a lot harder such as dealing with the Immigration office or the telephone company helpline. We are so looking forward to our German language class, which starts next week. I think it will really make a difference to our stay here. It will be great to be able to say more than usual please, thank you, can I have another piece of cake?

That's not to say that we haven't found the people here very friendly and helpful, which we have. But I must say we did a little victory dance when Eric finally got his resident's visa last week. Because I am an Irish citizen mine was no hassle, but Eric's took two day's of queuing, filling out forms and trying to talk in pigeon German with very stern Immigration officers. My sympathy goes out to all who through it every day around the world. There was one woman who just plain scared the living daylights out of me.

However, at the end of it all, when they found out he was married to an Irish citizen we got herded into this lovely bright room where a very nice woman promptly gave Eric a resident's visa more or less on the spot. And for five years, which apparently unheard of. We think the Eckhart name may have helped things along. Later we realised that Eric is now the first Eckhart from the family to have moved back to Germany since his family left in 1840s. The thought just kind of made us pause a moment.