No, not the Veterinarian

I put some old people to sleep last weekend. No, I didn't take them to the veterinarian, but in the case of my mother-in-law I'm sometimes tempted. No, basically I just fed them and for some people that's all it takes.

My wife's parents have some friends that they've known pretty much since they moved to Germany over 50 years ago. They have a daughter who is my wife's age and those two grew up together, went to school together, etc, etc. They used to all get together at least once per year for a small garden party but they stopped doing that about 5 years ago when most of them gave up driving. Yeah, they're that old.

My wife was recently in touch with her old friend for some unrelated things and they hatched this plan to do another garden party. My in-laws are in their late 80's, and the parents of my wife's friend are in their 90's. They might not get another chance to do this.

My mother-in-law had all sorts of objections but that's normal for her. Like I said, sometimes I'm tempted. We sorted her out because she wouldn't have to cook or clean anything. I cooked and my wife and her friend took care of everything else. I've actually been going out to my in-laws place to help them with their shopping and cleaning and cooking about once per week lately, so this wasn't hard for me.

It was interesting to hear some of their old family stories, and they all wanted to meet me of course. My wife's friend told me afterward that her parents weren't sure if they wanted to meet a "chronically unemployed foreigner who had moved in with the daughter of old friends". Sounds bad when you put that way.

Anyway, I was my charming best and now they're sure that I'm "good enough" for their friends daughter. "He makes a good potato salad too", was the other comment.

Well, if that's all it takes?

Singapore Revisited

Did I ever mention that I like Singapore? Oh yeah, I did. Well, I still do. We stopped in on the way home from the dive trip in the Philippines. It is like a breath of fresh air to be back in an organized, clean and green modern city, after being an impoverished backwater like Mindoro.

We didn't do much of the cultural stuff like we did in the last couple of trips. Mostly we just shopped and took in a couple of movies. Star Trek, and Wolverine Origins actually. It's a treat for me because they are shown in the original English and it's not very often I get that. Actually, on the flights to and from Singapore I watched the last two Bond movies as well, again in English.

Otherwise we just did some shopping. I've got a new pair of shoes for the gym and my wife bought her favorite perfume because it was quite a bit cheaper there. I picked up a couple electronic bits and pieces and a copy of the Civilization IV game with all the expansion packs. I couldn't get that in English around here either.

The food was just as good as ever and if you're going to Singapore try No. 52 Boat Quay. I couldn't tell you the name of the place because it was in Chinese script. The food they serve is authentic and hot as hell Chinese. We ordered several dishes just to try a variety and even with numerous cold Tiger beers our bill only came to 70 Sing dollars, about 35 Euros.

We often had our breakfast at the food courts that seem to be on every block. Again we could sample several dishes for very little money. Lastly, I've gotten a new appreciation for McDonalds. No, you don't eat in McDonalds in Singapore. It just seems to be one of the few places where I could find a really good cup of coffee for a reasonable price. My wife and I both need our coffee in the morning.

New Astronauts

I mentioned a while ago that my wife was asked by the European Space Agency to be their consultant for gynecological matters with their new recruits. The agency didn't get near as many applications from women as they would have liked, and very few of those got past the aptitude tests or the general physical conditioning tests. That didn't leave very much for my wife to do. In fact, only 3 candidates made it to the stage where the medical evaluations were done.

Of those three only one made the final grade, and it just happens that she was my wife's favorite of the three. Along with a few others Samantha Cristoforetti is now an astronaut in training with ESA, and have a look at her wikipedia page. It's not a wonder she was selected. It looks likes she planned her entire life around the idea of getting to space some day.

She's even a Lieutenant in the Italian Air Force. I bet she'll be getting a promotion very soon.

It's been a few days...

Ok, weeks. I've been slacking.

Now I'm actually sick, or it feels like it. In my travels around the world I've had dengue fever a couple of times and let me tell you, it hurts. It hurts everywhere; hands, feet, back, all the major muscle groups and it's a migraine royal right behind the eyes. And that's what this feels like, since Tuesday.

It's not possible for a guy to get dengue in Germany, even in summer time.

I'm feeling better tonight, but I've still got the headache. I hope this improves dramatically in the next day. Alemannia is playing the first game of the season tomorrow night and I would like to go watch the game.

I miss WalMart

I know, not everyone is going to agree with me on this topic. WalMart is after all, not the most progressive company when it comes to their employees or the communities where those big box stores are sitting. But go ahead, try living without one once you get a taste.

WalMart pulled out of Germany a couple of years ago, not long after we moved back to Aachen and I could finally shop there. It was great! They had stuff that can be really hard to find in this country. Like Cheddar Cheese. I love cheddar cheese but you won't find it in most grocery stores. I know, not good for the diet, but I grew up on that stuff and every once in a while you want some.

I think it's called Comfort Food.

Well, enter Edeka. It's a grocery chain here and they've started to open some larger floor space outlets, with a better selection that includes Cheddar Cheese! As a matter of fact their newest store in Aachen is in the location where WalMart was. Go figure.

They also put out some cute commercials from time to time. This one features their cheese selection with the guy behind the glass counter naming each and every cheese the little kid points at, including the country where the cheese comes from. Ok, it's in German but it's only 20 seconds long. Watch it through to the end. The guy behind the counter knows where everything comes from...


...including "Frau Wiesener from Steinstrasse". Cute commercial, and whoever said Germans have no sense of humor?

The citizenship test

The German government has introduced a "citizenship test" to the process of becoming a German citizen. The test is just a part of the process, but there is an awful lot of pissing and moaning coming from some of the socialist politicians, particularly the SPD. More than a few immigrant groups are complaining too and I don't see what the problem is.

One of the complaints from the Turkish immigrant groups is that the test is "insensitive to Muslim culture", and they point to one particular question that asks a fairly pointed question about marriage. Islam allows a man to have up to 4 wives, so long as he treats them equally. Polygamy isn't allowed in Germany and this test makes that point fairly clear. According to The New Encyclopedia of Islam the practice is fairly rare these days, so I'm not sure how this is "insensitive".

I think the politicians are the worst of the complainers. Sebastian Edathy is an SPD member of the Bundestag and is himself from an immigrant family. His complaint is that the hurdles are already high enough, and besides he says, "many Germans couldn't pass this test".

I don't understand that comment at all. I passed the test with a score of 27/33 and it looks like a few Americans did too. The test is only in German, but that is sort of the point. I'm not German. I wasn't born here, I didn't grow up here, and I didn't learn German until I came to live here. I imagine most of the Americans on that Expat website are in the same situation.

If we can pass this test? How could a German not pass this thing? For that matter, how could the Turks who are here, were born here, raised here, went to school here, and learned German as children not pass this test?

As for the whole idea of the test being "insensitive", more than a few of the immigrants to this country could give less of a shit about the laws in Germany, never mind the culture. Almost half of all violent crimes in Germany are commited by young men from immigrant families. That fact has started yet another round of political discussion on the topic of deporting immigrant criminals who don't happen to be citizens.

If deportations become law I'm sure we'll see rush of people wanting to take this test. I bet Murat Kurnaz wishes he had taken German citizenship before he set out on Jihad to Afghanistan.

Euro 2008 is over

I must admit, I don't mind. It's been three weeks of soccer on television almost every night of the week. For the first two weeks it was two games per night. I've heard the national anthems sung so many times that I could probably sing all of them, even the Spanish anthem, and that one doesn't even have any words.

The one thing I did miss though was "God Save the Queen". England didn't qualify for this tournament, so we didn't get to hear the British hooligans singing that song three or four times per game. But then none of them got arrested for anything either, so maybe that's a good thing?

Spain won, and they deserved to win. They had more scoring chances than Germany, and better chances too. In a few days, when the UEFA internet police give up terrorising youtube.com, I'll look for a highlights clip. Spain had a beautiful goal shot that went off the post and the ball went back in to play. I was sitting in the pub for this game and I'm sure that a couple of people near me were close to a heart attack with that shot.

Still, a lot of commentators were saying that things are looking up for the German national team. Hey, they came third in the World Cup two years ago, and now they placed second in the European Championship. In reality the best soccer is played in Europe, so this was an important tournament. In international play the Argentine and Brazilian teams are powerful, but most of their players play for European clubs. The German team can compete with all of them.

I saw the interviews with a few of the German players, the coach Jogi Loew, and even Angela Merkel. Yeah, they're disappointed, but they're all talking positive and it's obvious that the next step will be the World Cup in 2010 in South Africa. We aren't facing a National Mental Melt Down over this. Which is a good thing, because when Germany goes NMMD, it's not a good day in the neighborhood.

The guy I feel sorry for is Michael Ballack. He is the national team Captain for Germany and he has been there for quite a while now. He plays in England for Chelsea FC at the club level. Between his record with Germany and Chelsea, he has come second or third in almost every major title that he has played for, for the last three years.

I'm serious. The World Cup, the English Premiere League, the League Cup, the UEFA Champions League, and now the European Championship. Although to be fair, Chelsea won the English League cup in 2007. They came 2nd in 2008.

Michael Ballack has to be asking himself, "What does it take?" But he's only 31 years old and I'm sure he'll be around for the World Cup 2010.

ed. note; it's midnight. I'll update this with links and video sometime tomorrow.

Arribas, Espania.

The second round

Russia beat Sweden last night, in the last of the group play games, and have advanced to the quarter-finals along with Portugal and Germany, Croatia and Turkey, Spain and Italy, and Russia will be playing against The Netherlands for their quarter-final game.

Tonight is the first of those games with Portugal playing Germany. I'm not sure what to think about this one. Portugal has come out as one of the strongest teams so far. Their style is fast, almost acrobatic, and then they get faster. Germany is going to have their work cut out for them. A slow methodical game of "keep away" could be their best option, so this game could be a little bit boring.

Germany will be looking for an opportunity like they had against Austria, where Michael Ballack re-discovered his cannon. Check out the video. The goal keeper had no chance at this one.

I've got the car today!

But I'm not going anywhere...

The second game for Group B

Group A played last night and Portugal have booked their slot in the semi-finals. They played with style and I'm starting to see why Cristiano Ronaldo is considered one of the best players in Europe.

In the rest of the group, Turkey won their game and kept their hopes alive for a semi-final slot, knocking co-host team Switzerland right out of the tournament. The group plays one more game and Turkey will meet the Czech Republic in a must-win game for both. Whoever wins on the 15th will go on to the semi-finals.

Group B plays their second games tonight and Germany is in much the same position as Portugal was last night. If they can beat Croatia they will get a early slot in the next round. Germany is widely expected to win, but there is no certainty about the game. Much like Turkey, almost half of the Croatian players play in the German Bundesliga, so they know the German players, their style, and how the German players are likely to go about their game. I'm going to the pub for this one.

The second game for Group B tonight is co-host Austria against Poland, and both teams lost their first game. Whoever loses that game is effectively out of the tournament.

Anyway, check out this latest trick from Cristiano Ronaldo. I'm sure we'll see this one in a game sometime soon.






Well, I said there was "no certainty" to this game and it didn't look good for Germany right from the start. Croatia played an incredibly dense mid-field from early on, making it very hard for Germany to get into an offensive position. I don't think I've seen that many failed passes yet in this tournament.

Germany had quite a number of scoring options, but just couldn't put the ball into the net, while Croatia made the most of their chances and scored twice.

In the "more bad news" category, Germany took a couple of yellow and red cards as the frustration fouls built up. Bastian Schweinsteiger maybe banned from the next game because of a red card.

The Technorati Monster Escaped Again

A good start

Germany and Portugal both got off to a good start in the Euro 2008 tournament.

Portugal beat Turkey 2-0 on Saturday night, in what looked like a fairly easy win for them. I was a little surprised by that. Just about half the Turkish national team plays in the German Bundesliga. Many of them were actually born here too, and don't even speak Turkish all that well. But they still carry that passport, so they play for Turkey.

Germany trounced Poland 2-0 and that marks the 16th time that Poland could not win. Their record now stands at 12 losses and 4 tied games. One of the commentators last night mentioned that Poland hasn't actually scored a goal against Germany since 1987, and that has got to be pretty frustrating.

It's probably even more frustrating that Lukas Podolski scored both of last nights goals, and he was born in Poland. At one time it was suggested that the Polish national team should sign him up. There was a time when he was still available to them, but their managers and trainers didn't want to sign up a player from Germany who was only playing in the second division of the Bundesliga. Podolski was playing for 1. FC Köln at the time, in the second division.

Anyway, let's watch the goals. These guys make this look like it's routine...



This video may not last long. I'm finding several videos, but they are all getting taken down just about as fast as they can go up. UEFA is asserting copyright, and YouTube.com is giving in to them.

The Group C teams play tonight. That group is widely considered to be the Group of Death because both France and Italy are there. France is playing Romania (poor Romania) in the first game, and Italy will be playing Holland (poor Holland) later. Both games would be incredible upsets if France or Italy should lose. Italy won the last World Cup, and France came second.

For those of you who can't get the games on television, I've found a streaming video website showing all of the Euro 2008 games. I'll test it out tonight, to see if it works.


So much for the "Group of Death". France could only manage a tie with Romania because the Romanians played two games very well. One, they played "kick Ribery down the stairs" for most of the game. And two, keep the ball away from everyone else. They played for a tie, and got it.

As bad that may sound for one of the tournament favorties, Italy got their asses kicked by Holland, 3-0. That will probably be the greatest upset of this tournament.

And that link to live streaming video doesn't work near as well as I would like. I'm glad I've got it on TV.

Euro 2008

No, it's not another silly song contest where the neighboring countries all vote for each other. It's the UEFA European Championship for soccer, and it starts tonight.

For the next few weeks there will be two games a day, from some of the best national teams Europe has to offer. The qualification games last winter knocked out plenty of good teams too. Even the English failed to qualify for this tournament despite the fact that the English cleaned up in European club level competitions. There were two teams from the English Premier League who made it to the final of the Champions League tournament.

Germany is favored to win this tournament. At least that's the way the betting is going. The got a fairly easy draw in the group stage of the tournament.

In the group stage the three-time champions take on Poland, a team they have never lost to in 16 games, followed by Croatia who only beat them once in seven meetings and then co-hosts Austria whose last victory against Germany goes back to 1986.

A couple of the tabloid newspapers in Poland printed some fairly tacky front page images about their first game of the tournament, against Germany. Poland has never won against Germany, and they would dearly love to.

This didn't seem to bother the German team, and I didn't even see a comment from Jogi Loew, despite the fact that it was his head on the front page of one of those newspapers. He has been just as secretive as ever with the team training. I think we'll see a fairly offensive style of play from the German team. In their international friendly last Saturday against Serbia, Jogi showed that the team could shift their style right in the middle of the game.

The normal line up for a German team has 4 men on defense, 4 in the mid-field, with 2 attackers. 4-4-2, as it's called. The fact that there are 4 men on defense is almost religion in this country. I don't recall seeing a game recently that didn't have this arrangement. Against Serbia, Germany was down 1-0 at half time. Jogi pulled Philip Lahm from the defensive chain and replaced him with attacker Lukas Podolski.

Everyone at the pub was going, "Hunh? Podolski doesn't play defense".

Some smartass Canadian in the crowd (uhm, that would be me...) said, " Now there are only three".

And I was right. Jogi Loew moved the whole game into a different place, with a different mentality. Now on the field he had 3-4-3, and Serbia simply wasn't able to defend against an unexpected attacker. Germany scored twice in the second half, even though Podoli himself didn't score.

Showing that attacking strategy before the tournament started meant "letting the cat out of the bag", but it will still be interesting to see it used live. It will be just as interesting to see how the other countries react to the extra attacker. The tournament starts at 6pm (GST+1) tonight with the Swiss playing the Czech Republic in the land of Switzers.

For Germany, the tournament starts tomorrow at 8:45.

The Aachen Cathedral

I've mentioned this very important building a couple of times. It's worth to mention again because today is a fairly important day in its history. The church was one of the first items listed on the Unesco World Heritage List and that was 30 years ago, today.

There are several things going on today in and around the church, and I'm going to have a look for myself. For one, the Church Treasury will open at no charge. Normally they charge a few euros for entry.

Also, there will be guided tours of the church itself, also at no charge. I've actually done the guided tour before, but I've never been through the Treasury. Apparently there are some ancient artifacts there, some of which were collected by Charlemagne himself.

Charlemagne collected a variety of relics during his lifetime, which are still kept in the Aachen Cathedral. The four most important are impressive indeed:

• the cloak of the Blessed Virgin;
• the swaddling-clothes of the Infant Jesus;
• the loin-cloth worn by Christ on the Cross; and
• the cloth on which lay the head of St. John the Baptist after his beheading.

For hundreds of years this cathedral was the tallest church north of the Alps, and it was the location for almost all the coronation ceremonies for the kings of Europe. Charlemagne himself ruled most of Europe from here. His sarcophagus and throne are still there. When you take the guided tour you can get close enough to the throne that you can touch it.

If you're touring this part of Europe I can highly recommend a visit to this cathedral, as well as the Cologne Cathedral, and the Basilica of Saint Serviatus in nearby Maastricht.

Some people would argue that Charlemagne was the first of the Carolingian Emperors, but he is also often referred to as the first of the Holy Roman Emperors. The first of the Holy Roman Emperors is buried in Aachen, and one of the last Emperors is buried in Maastricht (and I'm going to have to go there again, because I remember the name of the guy!)

League play may be over

Yes, the game of soccer again. Or Fussball as it's know here. It really is the only important sport in Europe. And while league play may be over for the season, the game goes on. This year is the European Championship, or Euro 2008 and all the qualified teams are well into their training programs.

Just as interesting is the age group tournaments that are going on. All the league level team trainers are currently watching the U21 and U18 tournament just as intently as the rest of us will be watching the senior national teams play. They are looking for the up and coming young talent. Alemannia player Lewis Holtby got his first start with the senior Alemannia team, in their last game of the season and he must have impressed someone because he was called to the U18 team for their training match against Turkey.

Another Alemannia player, Daniel Brinkman, has from time to time been called to the U21 team but he's not expected to appear again anytime soon. I suspect he wants to concentrate on his club play anyway. His transfer to Alemannia late this season was successful, as he was involved in several goals scored, not just his own.

As for the senior International Teams, Germany plays Belarus tonight in a friendly match, and it should be televised. So, you know where I'll be. The national team management invited Belarus because their playing style is similar to that of Poland. Germany will be playing Poland in Group B of this years Euro 2008 tournament, that starts on June 7.

Update: Belarus tied the game late in the second half, much to the surprise of the German team. One of the things I like about International play is the "winner take all" attitude. This isn't league play.

Something is bugging me