May 2, 2012
I should start off by saying that I finally met one of my
roommates last night, right after taking my contacts out so I couldn't see very
well as I didn't have my glasses with me, and I don't have the easiest time
remembering English names, so remembering German names is a real challenge and
I can't remember his name. I then met another one this morning right after I
got out of the shower, I have great timing. I passed a third roommate as I was leaving to
grab to the bus at 7am, and she had just woke up so I didn't really meet her
until after I got back from work.
I got to the bus stop with little time to spare, got on the
bus with no idea how much it cost. I held out the money in my hand feeling like
an idiot asking how much, the bus driver could not understand a word of
English. I then proceeded to ask the whole bus if anyone spoke English, not
much of a response. The guy sitting near the front of the bus was young so I
asked him and he started to take some of the money out of my hand but the
driver indicated that it wasn't right. The problem was that it costs different
amounts depending on how many zones you are travelling through, and I didn't
say where I was going, everyone else had a pass. I was travelling through 3
zones, which cost 4€, I thought it was a bit expensive. I managed to use the
GPS on my phone to figure out where I should get off the bus, which I caught at
7:10am and arrived very close to where I'll be working 20 minutes later. I got
off the bus, but not before hitting my head on a bar, I was off to a great
start... I planned to have a 25 minute walk from the bus station, but because
there is a stop so close to work I was an hour early. I didn't want to go in
being that early, knowing that people probably had stuff to get done before I
arrived and didn't want to start out being inconveniently early. I walked down
the street in this industrial park, and saw a sign for a McDonalds 500m
away. I thought that was pretty odd and
I still had 45 minutes so I went to check it out. It didn't open until 8, so I
waited 10 minutes and went in to get an orange juice, not knowing if it would
take too long to order food. After paying for the orange juice, the guy
proceeded to tell me there was no orange juice, so I asked for apple juice, he
had no idea what I meant. I later learned that apple is apfel, so it's pretty
close. He got the manager, who seemed very happy to speak English, and he gave
me two drinks that were 30% orange juice, it was a bit strange. I drank one of
those and headed back to the office.
I didn't really know what to expect at all, or how well
anyone would speak English. I was surprised to learn that the one person in the
place, of 140 people, who spoke English as a first language would be my supervisor.
He's an engineer from England who has been in Germany for 7 or 8 years, and is
only maybe 5 or 6 years older than me. I had a quick tour of the offices, met a
bunch of people whose names I also can't remember, went through the 3 plants,
and then went back to meet with a guy from sales who explained all about the
company, what type of products they make, and what they're used for. It was
very informative, since I wasn't exactly sure what they did, I thought it was
all about making electromagnetic car parts, but it turns out the automotive
aspect of the company is located in Villingen, the twin town of Schwenningen.
Where I'm working makes electromagnetic parts, or solenoids, for over a 1000
applications. I think had a lesson on the theory behind solenoids, a few things
were what I had learned at Carleton years ago.
Admittedly not my favorite topic
back then, but to see it in a real world application is much more interesting.
We went for lunch at the cafeteria type restaurant just down the road and had
extremely salty, but good, french fries, and a skewer with meat (lamb or pork I
guess) and onions. It was pretty good. I haven't had anything I've disliked
here yet, other than the bubbly water. We went back to the office, finished up
the presentation, and then went on a detailed tour of the whole places, seeing
most of the processes involved in the manufacturing and testing of the
products. I was then shown my computer, which is all in German, so I have to
learn it now, and I think everyone at work thinks I should too. We managed to
change Outlook Express and Solid Works, which is the CAD program I guess I'll
be doing most of my work on, to English, but everything else is German. Google
translate is going to become my best friend. Around 5, my supervisor drove me
down to the Busbahnhof, which is the bus and train station, in hopes of being
able to buy the student bus pass. The guy said it could only be bought in
Villingen, so we drove there to learn that it had closed at 4:30pm, I felt bad
for making the guy drive so much since he still had an hour drive to get home.
He drove me back to Schwenningen and said that we could leave work early
tomorrow and try to get the pass. It was unlikely that they would have accepted
Visa, so I'll have to take cash tomorrow.
I came back to my place and found all three roommates that I
previously said hi to in the kitchen so I was able to explain who I was and
what I was doing there. They all seem very friendly and one guy said he was
cooking tonight and invited me to eat with them. Once they learned I was from
Canada, one of the first questions was whether or not it is really legal to
smoke marijuana in Canada because according to the Simpsons it is. I had to
laugh at that one. Dinner was excellent, we had a salad and Spanish tortilla,
which consists of eggs, cheese, potato, onion, and a few other things I think.
We ate late, so we didn't finish dinner until around 10pm. I then headed to
this student night at a club to try to meet up with the other German student
that I have been paired up with, I failed miserably. I figured I would
recognize him from facebook, I didn't, so I ended up paying to get in, and then
I went to leave and the female bouncer gave me a slap on the arm, and of course
no one who was working spoke English . I had to pay again to leave, I was pretty
shocked at that. It was probably I good thing
I had such bad luck as I otherwise would have had a hard time getting up at
6:30am.
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