Locking yourself out is no fun

Well this weekend was quite interesting. I was actually extremely busy and stressed at some points.



Friday after work a bunch of people from school went out for Happy Hour. It was one of the teachers birthdays. The place was nice and I had a good time getting to know my co-workers. I had to go home early though due to the fact that we had the entering into 1st grade ceremony on Saturday morning.



This was interesting. In Germany it is a big deal for kids to start 1st grade. Traditionally you have a ceremony and the students get presents. We had it in a big fancy performance house. It was a little over the top, but it was neat to see the students all excited about it. We then walked 1/2 a mile back with the students (no parents) to the school where we went to the room and had a snack, took a class photo and did a lesson. This was when it got hairy. The parents were down in the lobby and on the playground drinking champagne (which is very fancy or posh as they say it here) and mingling. The problem with this was that the students knew this was going on and so, in the middle of a read aloud, they began chanting outside, outside, and so on. This was not a good start to the year. However this did prepare me for Monday. I knew I was going to have to lay down the law. The parents then came and picked up the students and hung around for a while longer. Everyone seemed quite nice but it was a mad house in my room. I wanted to take pictures, but there wasn't even time for that. So when this was finished I was exhausted.



Later that night I was invited to one of the teacher's houses for dinner. It was a very good home cooked meal and it was nice to hang out. I was with my friend from school Amy, she teaches 1st grade as well. After this I had to run home to feed the cats, then I was off to Amy's house to stay with her for the night. That's when it happened... I shut my apartment door behind me and did not have my keys. Now this usually isn't a problem, but my roommate is in Vienna for the weekend and so there was no other way to get back into the house. I started to stress. I decided not to take care of it that night, but to wait until the next day. I went to Amy's flat and crashed.

The next day me and 3 other teachers did a 10K walk around the center part of Berlin. It was actually cool to see everything, but of course I forgot to bring my camera with me. I got to see part of the wall, plus various other Berlin things. I plan to go back to this area so I will post some pictures when I get them.

When this walk was finished, I had my friend call the locksmith for me. He only spoke German and arranged for a time to meet me at my house. When I got there I was about 10 minutes late so I was so worried that I missed him, and I couldn't call him because he spoke no English, so I began to panic. Luckily the lady that owns the wine bar under my flat was unloading some wine and came over to see if I was ok. She knows my roommate so she helped me out and called the locksmith for me. He had not come yet and was on his way. I was so thankful for her.

He finally arrived and got into my flat in less than 30 seconds. Serious 30 seconds of work and it cost over 100 euro. I couldn't believe it. Now I always make sure I have my keys on me.

After this long exhausting weekend, I was able to just sit back and relax for the rest of the weekend. Which was all I really wanted to do.

As always I miss you all, and hope all is well at home. Please update me on how you are doing.