Surviving life in Germany
Home economics
At home I can happily rely on my mum to cook for me about four nights a week, bacon and eggs gets me through the rest. Unfortunately Germany has not figured out how to make good bacon, so I had to force myself to cook a slightly wider variety of meals. While there are supermarkets here so many things are impossible to find even with google translate and the shop attendant. Therefore Stuart and I have resorted to the basics, spag bowl, fried rice and plenty of variations in between. As I cook every night I am in charge of the shopping so I have to make sure we are not spending too much on food. Mince is cheap and so is pasta -but even cheaper is beer. A case retails for about $15 AUD and by consuming freely before and during dinner all of my cooking tastes awesome.
Delegation a key role of leadership
To ensure I don’t have to do the cooking and washing up like my mother, I have delegated that job to room-mate Stuart Archibald who, after day three, had already been given the name 'Wifey' - thanks to his cleaning up skills. Although cooking takes a bit longer than the cleaning up it is much easier to use as leverage to blackmail Stuart into jobs I don’t want to do … I am a really nice guy!
Get used to rain!
While the first month here was basically all sunshine, the last month has been not nearly as comforting. Despite the fact it likes to rain at least once every day I still remain in a good mood. Probably having four indoors to choose from at work makes ‘riding in the rain’ much more enjoyable. As the Germans complain about the weather, I am just happy to have an indoor to ride in for once, when the weather takes a turn. While coming over here with no raincoats might have seemed to some like a stupid idea, for me it was all part of a plan. Save room for any impulsive shopping I do and also try and scam some free gear. Well both have worked out so I now have matching jumper, vest and jackets from work to keep me warm and dry. Winning.
Driving on the wrong side of the road
Pulling out of a driveway onto the right hand side of the road ... yes totally wrong but apparently that’s the way it happens over here. It was a bit weird at first but the autobahn more than makes up for any transitional difficulties. What 21yo male doesn’t want to drive as fast as possible, being legal is just a bonus. Luckily EA has supplied us with transportation to help get to and from work and to visit the shows in the area. Car pictured not supplied by EA ... we just wanted to steal it.
Horse shopping
I’m getting used to looking at so many nice horses that I cannot buy. This photo was taken at the ESI auction, which is run by the Klatte's at the family stable. They had just over 40 foals and 18 jumping horses go through the ring, with approximately 400 people in attendance it was a good night for the auction. Luckily they cater for all those without enough money to buy a horse, so a bar and DJ is located 10 metres from the indoor with the party going well into sunday morning. So although we have been trying to get as much training and exposure to the horse industry over here, it seems ‘show-discos’ are a part of nearly every competition … unfortunately it is really hard to AVOID these parties.
On a more horse related note, things have been going really well with the Boss who was away at Zangersheide for the World Young Horse Champs. On his 6yo stallion Christian he had a rail down in the first round and clear in the second, which placed him 74 out of over 200. Just one mistake and it was impossible to finish on the podium. With him and all the other riders away for shows or holiday at the end of the last week I was able to ride a few new horses which was plenty of fun and after one of my rides was sold I have been giving a 3yo stallion to prepare for his 30 day licensing test and he is probably the easiest to ride out of all ‘my horses’ at the moment. They haven’t given me anything to crazy although I am breaking in this one horse which 'bucks', I usually let it have a buck or two just for a bit of action and that seems to make the Germans thinks that Aussies are even crazier than they thought before. Everyone always give show jumpers a hard time about their flatwork and although plenty of the horses here go really well on the flat most would struggle to make it around a dressage test. Two Portugese dressage riders have just moved into one of the barns to base themselves here. All their horses are great to watch and have been observing a lot of their training for piaffe/passage, which is cool and interestingly enough several of the really nice horses are by Jumping sires such as Catoki or Baloubet da Rouet.
Well I could write another couple pages about life over here but I know most riders have short attention spans so this will have to do.
Catch you later
Charlie
