392 - My First Trip to Europe IX

On Wednesday morning, Bernd and I said goodbye to Jean-Philippe and Hubert and headed out to Douai (not sure on the spelling) France to a very small office where it took me a couple of hours to do the upgrades I needed.

We drove on in the afternoon to Ubach-Palenberg, Germany, where we had a large engineering office (where Bernd worked). The German countryside was breathtakingly beautiful, with lots of flowers everywhere. I met up with a bunch of my co-workers at this office who had already been there doing other projects. We made plans for dinner that night.

Now, I have to say outright that I had a pre-conceived notion that the German people would dislike Americans, because of World War II (I know, it was a stupid assumption). Nothing could be further from the truth, the German people were the friendliest, kindest people I had ever met.

I hadn’t even checked into a hotel yet, so Bernd and I left a bit early to get me checked into the Hotel Weydenhof. Note the slight hill in front of the hotel.. it’ll play some significance later. *S*

I found it odd, that I was the only person from the US staying there, but the hotel everyone else was in was booked solid with no rooms available. The owner, Charles was very nice, and he spoke English very well.

I checked into a nice, albeit small room, freshened up and waited at the bar for Bernd to pick me up to go to dinner. As I sat at the bar, I noticed how old this place was, with dark, rich wood on the bar that belied it’s age. The barmaid was young, maybe 18 or so, very beautiful with blonde hair and blue eyes. She smiled as I said in my best German “ein bier bitte”, to which she now said something I didn’t understand. Darn, I’d used up almost all of my German in one shot and now was stumped. She spoke no English, but pointed to the taps and I figured out there was “pils” or “alt” (amber). I said to her (hoping I got this right) “ein alt bitte”, and she carefully poured my beer. Now, there’s an art form to pouring a beer in Germany. Each brand of beer has it’s own glass, and it’s poured to nearly full, allowed to rest a moment so the foam doesn’t overflow, then with a knife like tool she scrapes the foam off, and tops off the beer before delivering.

It was at this point I realized… I had no German Marks (money). Embarassed, and trying to think quickly I held up my room key and dangled it hoping she could put it on my room tab. Well, this MUST have been the wrong thing to do, as she blushed beet red and chuckled to herself. I realized what she must have thought and in trying to do damage control, said “no no no” before someone else at the bar who spoke English came over and helped me out.

Did I mention the bowling alley in the hotel?

More on Friday…. !