Emma and Leonie's visit
Whoa what a tiring weekend. Spending 24 hours a day with some who gets on your nerves is exhausting!
Emma and Leonie came up for the long weekend. We’ve had today and yesterday off to mark the anniversary of the reunification of Germany. All in all though it was a good weekend, I’m just glad of some me time now.
Harriet and I met Emma at the train station on Friday night. She was staying with a relative of the family she’s living with in a town near Düsseldorf. He came to meet Emma too and we all went back with him to drop Emma’s things off. He and his wife were lovely but they were a bit overpowering lol, they cooked us tea and everything and insisted that they do everything for us. Claus, the man, had even arranged to take us on a sight - seeing tour of Hamburg on Saturday afternoon after picking Leonie up. It took us ages to get out of there on Friday night because they just kept on talking to us!
We met up with Huw at Sternschanze for a drink in Frank und Freie where Emma introduced us to Federwasser, a wine which is really sweet and tastes like fruit juice! It was delicious but they only make it summer. Huw gets really animated when he’s talking and he started flinging his arms about and accidentally knocked Harriets wine all over her! She had to spend the rest of the night with a wet patch on her jeans, like she’d wet herself, bless her! Afterwards we went to another little bar in Sternschanze and were just sat talking and giggling, when a woman from the next table told us to be quiet as we were talking too loud! How rude! Luckily a big table became free so we proceeded to sit there instead and talked as loudly as we wanted! A few of the other assistants joined us but we left early as we were going to have a bigger night on Saturday.
I met Emma and Claus at the S-Bahn at 11:50am to meet Leonie at the central station. After we’d met her, Claus took us on his famous tour which wasn’t really that interesting, lol bless him, and his heart was in the right place though! We were much more interested in going shopping though, which is what we did after we’d dropped Leonie’s things off at mine. I managed to buy quite a lot! We’d gotten paid on Friday and I just wanted to spend it! I bought a bag from H&M, a top from Vero Moda, and some shoes from a shop called Tack but they are gorgeous! I didn’t know whether I like them or not but spent ages just walked around the shop in them, which I’ve come to learnt is a sign that I need them!
All over Hamburg there are blue goals, which held the big screens during the world cup. They were left up though after the tournament had finished because they looked pretty when illuminated but on Saturday night they were being turned off and taken down. There was a little ceremony with fireworks to mark the occasion which we went to watch!
We went out that night with the intention of staying out late enough to go the fish market for breakfast but we were all so tired that we didn’t manage to make it and only went to a few bars instead. We ate in Frank und Freie because we couldn’t be bothered to find anywhere else and then headed on down to the Reeperbahn. We took them into sex shop to have laugh like we always do on a weekend but Leonie clearly wasn’t amusing. She just turned her nose and looked disgusted at everything! It is pretty minging to be fair but you need to have a sense of humour about you and you can’t take it seriously. We went to a bar on Grosse Freiheit after that which was pretty much the end of our night. We stayed for one cocktail and Leonie was whinging so much that there was no point in staying out.
Harriet was moving into her house on Sunday so I showed Emma and Leonie around whilst she was busy sorting her things out. I took them to the Rathaus and then we had a look around the flea market that was just off Jungfernstieg. I’m going to have to go to the flea markets more often; they have some really nice vintage type things. I bought a really nice little clutch purse. Emma was driving me crazy though. We were all hungry so decided to find a little café to eat in. Everyone we went in was either too expensive or it didn’t have anything she liked. We finally settled on Alex’s where I had a salami and cheese baguette. It was absolutely gorgeous and huge!
After that we made our way down to Harriet’s new flat. We were a bit wary of her new flatmate though. Harriet is not allowed more than one guest per month and even then they are only allowed to stay on a Friday and Saturday night. Also Harriet had to pay the rent for October and November upfront but then the a few days ago, the woman had the cheek to email her and ask for Decembers rent because her car had a few problems and she couldn’t afford to get it fixed. At Harriet’s we just looked at Leonie’s photos which was ok, a little boring because she photos of random stupid things and some weren’t even interesting.
That night we just had a quiet night and went bowling which was so funny! I won the first game but came second to last in the second game! We all bowl so funny! Apparently I proper chuck the balls down the lane, like I’m really angry at the pins! Leonie bowls so slowly, her ball takes ages to reach the pins, when Harriet bowls; she nearly goes down the lane with the ball and then Emma’s ball nearly ended up in the next lane!
We had Monday and Tuesday off work because they were bank holidays as it was so many years since the reunification of Germany.
We were going to go up in the hot balloon on Monday but it was too windy for any trips so instead we went to the top of St Michaelis church. The views were spectacular but once you’d walked round the top of the tower a few times it was a bit boring! After that we went and sat in greasy café before going to the waxwork museum. The waxwork museum was ok. It was quite small and some of the sculptures were a little off i.e. they didn’t really look like who they were supposed to be. It was a good laugh though.
We were going to go to the cinema on Monday night to see World Trade Centre but we were too late for the showing! Instead we went back to the bowling and played pool for an hour which again was hilarious! The lights went down really low and the music came on really loud so we just danced about being stupid! I won the first game I played against Harriet but then lost against Leonie because I potted black! We then played a game of doubles, Harriet and I against Leonie and Emma, it was Hamburg v. the rest of Germany! Hamburg won but only with a little help! We potted white/their balls a few times but because they didn’t notice we just took them out of the pocket and carried on as if nothing happened! We went to a bar afterwards because they had happy hour and all cocktails were €4.40! We all had two each and due to the large alcohol content in them, they went straight to our heads!
I was so tired yesterday and really didn’t want to get out of bed! I had to finally drag myself out though as Leonie and I were meeting Harriet and Emma at 11am to go into town again as they were getting their respective trains home. We tried going up in the balloon again but the weather still wasn’t right. Instead we just sat in cafes until they got their trains.
I know it sounds horrible but I was quite glad that they’d gone. Yeah they’re my friends but they were beginning to drive me crazy and being with Leonie 24/7 was quite smothering.
Emma was the most whingiest person ever. She reminded me of Nikki from Big Brother at times! At least once an hour we had to stop so she could go to the toilet, which was quite frustrating as if there wasn’t one nearby we’d have to find one and then constantly wait around. She felt ill nearly the whole trip, but I’m sure most of it is psychosomatic, i.e. she imagines it to the point where she is ill. She moaned about nearly everything, from the prices of restaurants, the food when it arrived, what we were doing, the assignments we have to do whilst we are here - argh, the list is endless!
Leonie was just as bad. She basically said she thought her choice of working was better than doing an assistantship because she was constantly learning German whereas we were speaking English most of the time! I think she was just bitter though because she is getting paid €500 a month for working 8am - 4pm each day whereas we work 12 hours a week and get paid €703! And to be fair, her German didn’t seem any better than ours. She constantly had to know what we were doing, for example when we were sat in cafes she’d constantly ask what we were doing next and what we were doing that night. The both of them did my head in on the tubes too, constantly saying how they could never get used to them and whinging that to get places you had to go by tube everywhere. So yeah, I was quite relieved when they went home!
After they’d gone I went to an Internet café so I could talk to Andy on the internet and book my train tickets to Hull from Stanstead for when I go home. It only cost £13.95 for a single from Stanstead to Hull! I didn’t think that was bad and it only takes 3 hours and 45 minutes. I arrive in Hull at 15:07 so not too late, which is good; I can go straight to Primark! You seriously have no idea how much I’ve missed English shops!
I got in last night and just crashed out. I was so tired. It was good to finally have my bed back to myself! I finally got my rent sorted. I’m paying €200 per month which is so cheap! Hamburg is equivalent to London so imagine paying the equivalent of £35 a month for rent in London! I pay her at the end of each month which is good; it means I can pay when I get my wages from the British council.
I only had one lesson at school today. I’ve got none tomorrow, as one of the teachers is ill and in the other class I’m not needed! I have two on Friday. I’ve worked out that, in total, I’m working 7 days all together in October after weekends, holidays etc. That means I get paid €100 a day! Not too bad is it!
Anyway, I’d better go now. I’ve written far too much and I’m meeting Harriet soon for a few drinks.
Days until it’s all over: 147
Days until I go home: 13
Emma and Leonie came up for the long weekend. We’ve had today and yesterday off to mark the anniversary of the reunification of Germany. All in all though it was a good weekend, I’m just glad of some me time now.
Harriet and I met Emma at the train station on Friday night. She was staying with a relative of the family she’s living with in a town near Düsseldorf. He came to meet Emma too and we all went back with him to drop Emma’s things off. He and his wife were lovely but they were a bit overpowering lol, they cooked us tea and everything and insisted that they do everything for us. Claus, the man, had even arranged to take us on a sight - seeing tour of Hamburg on Saturday afternoon after picking Leonie up. It took us ages to get out of there on Friday night because they just kept on talking to us!
We met up with Huw at Sternschanze for a drink in Frank und Freie where Emma introduced us to Federwasser, a wine which is really sweet and tastes like fruit juice! It was delicious but they only make it summer. Huw gets really animated when he’s talking and he started flinging his arms about and accidentally knocked Harriets wine all over her! She had to spend the rest of the night with a wet patch on her jeans, like she’d wet herself, bless her! Afterwards we went to another little bar in Sternschanze and were just sat talking and giggling, when a woman from the next table told us to be quiet as we were talking too loud! How rude! Luckily a big table became free so we proceeded to sit there instead and talked as loudly as we wanted! A few of the other assistants joined us but we left early as we were going to have a bigger night on Saturday.
I met Emma and Claus at the S-Bahn at 11:50am to meet Leonie at the central station. After we’d met her, Claus took us on his famous tour which wasn’t really that interesting, lol bless him, and his heart was in the right place though! We were much more interested in going shopping though, which is what we did after we’d dropped Leonie’s things off at mine. I managed to buy quite a lot! We’d gotten paid on Friday and I just wanted to spend it! I bought a bag from H&M, a top from Vero Moda, and some shoes from a shop called Tack but they are gorgeous! I didn’t know whether I like them or not but spent ages just walked around the shop in them, which I’ve come to learnt is a sign that I need them!
All over Hamburg there are blue goals, which held the big screens during the world cup. They were left up though after the tournament had finished because they looked pretty when illuminated but on Saturday night they were being turned off and taken down. There was a little ceremony with fireworks to mark the occasion which we went to watch!
We went out that night with the intention of staying out late enough to go the fish market for breakfast but we were all so tired that we didn’t manage to make it and only went to a few bars instead. We ate in Frank und Freie because we couldn’t be bothered to find anywhere else and then headed on down to the Reeperbahn. We took them into sex shop to have laugh like we always do on a weekend but Leonie clearly wasn’t amusing. She just turned her nose and looked disgusted at everything! It is pretty minging to be fair but you need to have a sense of humour about you and you can’t take it seriously. We went to a bar on Grosse Freiheit after that which was pretty much the end of our night. We stayed for one cocktail and Leonie was whinging so much that there was no point in staying out.
Harriet was moving into her house on Sunday so I showed Emma and Leonie around whilst she was busy sorting her things out. I took them to the Rathaus and then we had a look around the flea market that was just off Jungfernstieg. I’m going to have to go to the flea markets more often; they have some really nice vintage type things. I bought a really nice little clutch purse. Emma was driving me crazy though. We were all hungry so decided to find a little café to eat in. Everyone we went in was either too expensive or it didn’t have anything she liked. We finally settled on Alex’s where I had a salami and cheese baguette. It was absolutely gorgeous and huge!
After that we made our way down to Harriet’s new flat. We were a bit wary of her new flatmate though. Harriet is not allowed more than one guest per month and even then they are only allowed to stay on a Friday and Saturday night. Also Harriet had to pay the rent for October and November upfront but then the a few days ago, the woman had the cheek to email her and ask for Decembers rent because her car had a few problems and she couldn’t afford to get it fixed. At Harriet’s we just looked at Leonie’s photos which was ok, a little boring because she photos of random stupid things and some weren’t even interesting.
That night we just had a quiet night and went bowling which was so funny! I won the first game but came second to last in the second game! We all bowl so funny! Apparently I proper chuck the balls down the lane, like I’m really angry at the pins! Leonie bowls so slowly, her ball takes ages to reach the pins, when Harriet bowls; she nearly goes down the lane with the ball and then Emma’s ball nearly ended up in the next lane!
We had Monday and Tuesday off work because they were bank holidays as it was so many years since the reunification of Germany.
We were going to go up in the hot balloon on Monday but it was too windy for any trips so instead we went to the top of St Michaelis church. The views were spectacular but once you’d walked round the top of the tower a few times it was a bit boring! After that we went and sat in greasy café before going to the waxwork museum. The waxwork museum was ok. It was quite small and some of the sculptures were a little off i.e. they didn’t really look like who they were supposed to be. It was a good laugh though.
We were going to go to the cinema on Monday night to see World Trade Centre but we were too late for the showing! Instead we went back to the bowling and played pool for an hour which again was hilarious! The lights went down really low and the music came on really loud so we just danced about being stupid! I won the first game I played against Harriet but then lost against Leonie because I potted black! We then played a game of doubles, Harriet and I against Leonie and Emma, it was Hamburg v. the rest of Germany! Hamburg won but only with a little help! We potted white/their balls a few times but because they didn’t notice we just took them out of the pocket and carried on as if nothing happened! We went to a bar afterwards because they had happy hour and all cocktails were €4.40! We all had two each and due to the large alcohol content in them, they went straight to our heads!
I was so tired yesterday and really didn’t want to get out of bed! I had to finally drag myself out though as Leonie and I were meeting Harriet and Emma at 11am to go into town again as they were getting their respective trains home. We tried going up in the balloon again but the weather still wasn’t right. Instead we just sat in cafes until they got their trains.
I know it sounds horrible but I was quite glad that they’d gone. Yeah they’re my friends but they were beginning to drive me crazy and being with Leonie 24/7 was quite smothering.
Emma was the most whingiest person ever. She reminded me of Nikki from Big Brother at times! At least once an hour we had to stop so she could go to the toilet, which was quite frustrating as if there wasn’t one nearby we’d have to find one and then constantly wait around. She felt ill nearly the whole trip, but I’m sure most of it is psychosomatic, i.e. she imagines it to the point where she is ill. She moaned about nearly everything, from the prices of restaurants, the food when it arrived, what we were doing, the assignments we have to do whilst we are here - argh, the list is endless!
Leonie was just as bad. She basically said she thought her choice of working was better than doing an assistantship because she was constantly learning German whereas we were speaking English most of the time! I think she was just bitter though because she is getting paid €500 a month for working 8am - 4pm each day whereas we work 12 hours a week and get paid €703! And to be fair, her German didn’t seem any better than ours. She constantly had to know what we were doing, for example when we were sat in cafes she’d constantly ask what we were doing next and what we were doing that night. The both of them did my head in on the tubes too, constantly saying how they could never get used to them and whinging that to get places you had to go by tube everywhere. So yeah, I was quite relieved when they went home!
After they’d gone I went to an Internet café so I could talk to Andy on the internet and book my train tickets to Hull from Stanstead for when I go home. It only cost £13.95 for a single from Stanstead to Hull! I didn’t think that was bad and it only takes 3 hours and 45 minutes. I arrive in Hull at 15:07 so not too late, which is good; I can go straight to Primark! You seriously have no idea how much I’ve missed English shops!
I got in last night and just crashed out. I was so tired. It was good to finally have my bed back to myself! I finally got my rent sorted. I’m paying €200 per month which is so cheap! Hamburg is equivalent to London so imagine paying the equivalent of £35 a month for rent in London! I pay her at the end of each month which is good; it means I can pay when I get my wages from the British council.
I only had one lesson at school today. I’ve got none tomorrow, as one of the teachers is ill and in the other class I’m not needed! I have two on Friday. I’ve worked out that, in total, I’m working 7 days all together in October after weekends, holidays etc. That means I get paid €100 a day! Not too bad is it!
Anyway, I’d better go now. I’ve written far too much and I’m meeting Harriet soon for a few drinks.
Days until it’s all over: 147
Days until I go home: 13