Hey Dudes and Ladies!

The weather is pretty nice again, sunny, no single cloud up in the sky and around 20 degs everyday :-) So what should I use my new waterproof HD camera for? See here:



Have a good one guys, see you soon!

Wow, I passed the 100 days mark and it feels great! One hundret days of pure fun, exciting new stuff and get to know a country that is the way better than it's reputation! I really got to say, as sad as it sounds but it's USA 1:0 Germany.

No, I really mean it, of course I've always been excited about the states and did't cared that much about the politicians here. But seriously if I watch the german news every day, we aren't the way better! After this 100 days I'm really not a tourist any more, I have my scheduled everydays life and know and really settled here. America differs in many ways, but I really got to say in the most differences America scores. So what I want to do in this blog, is pointing out and share some of this experiences I've made with my new life.

"Oh excuse me..." - Respect

That's probably the biggest difference I've experienced here. Everybody treats each other with respect, no matter if you are a manager, a punk kid, a homeless or a 15 year old black kid! You always got the feeling that even if a city in LA wich is crowded like hell, you are SOMEONE, you're not just another invisible whatever, you are THERE! Let's take the Supermarket as an example, you come in, most of the time there is a security guy standing in front of it, asking you how you are today. You're standing in someones way, and you are definitely the person who block the other one, they will excuse them if they want to pass in a narrow situation. And after all is bought and payd they even ask me as a pretty healthy looking kid, if I need any help at my car....so what?!?! I've never been treatened here without respect by anyone, even the 12 year old boys who would spit on the ground in Germany, won't leave you space for passing and probably would have some dumb words for you are just nice here! They ask you whatever they are interested in, say Hy and get out of your way....

"Hey how are you doing" - Smalltalk

You don't answer on this question - WRONG! You will pretty soon figure out if they expect you to answer and tell em how you really do, or just say: Good how about you. But even the question itself is so much more personal than a "Hallo" what you normallywise get by a german service member. And it's a pretty good way to start a conversation, you can start talking to your cashier or whoever, even if it's just smalltalk, why not do it, maybe you find out some similarities, if not, who cares. What I want to say, you feel a lot more welcome everywhere here, cause even talking about the weather can be fun here and it's not that unpersonal and stiff like back home.

"Hey you got a nice haircut, a great ride and an awesome surfboard" - Grants

About this experience I'm acutally not 100% sure, but as far as I can tell it's this way. The thing I always hated about Germany, and I think especially southern Germany is the fact that nobody grants anything anyone. It's always the question, "how can my neighbour effort this new car", "this house must be made with tons of debits" or "look, she went again to get a new haircut and colored it".... SO WHAT!!!!! What is the problem on saying something POSITIVE about someone?!?! What about grant somebody his pool in his garden, his new car or his new surfboard, why always talking bad and expecting bad things about each other?!?!? I just don't get it! I always got the feeling that people in Germany let their happiness depend on others. If we would care more about our own lives and try to get them going the right way and be HAPPY, we would let our neighbours, friends or whoever be happy. Just think about that, tell somebody that you like his haircut, his new sneakers or that you are jealous about his pool, maybe he will tell you that he always wanted to have a wife like yours or whatever, I think you get my point on this one.

"Could you please?" - Help

People really try to help out each other here, its taking and giving and not only in the holiday season. If you need anything, be sure you will somehow get it! It doesn't matter if you know the person a long time, they will be thankfull if you help them out and if you need something you don't have to wait to ask, just do it! As an example, if you take the bus and have a bike with you, there are this special stands in front of the bus you can mount your bike real easy and take it with you. If you are dumb and don't know how to get it, the busdriver will shut down the bus, get out and help you without one single sigh. I always think about how it would be in germany, how a busdriver would get out to help you, let's call this never!

So yeah, that's it for today. I'm not sure if you got all my points, it's really hard to get this to words but I hope it weren't all myths I was talking of. So far these are the differences in life here, I love them but I do know that in a couple of months I have to come back to Germany and right now I'm not sure how I will be able to step back to all the german values, but somehow I'll figure it out!

I've also had a good weekend, I try to blog about it, maybe even video-blog about it this week when my christmas present arrives. And remember, just one week left and my dearest Josie will arrive and we'll hit the road for 2 weeks! This is gonna be sick!

All the best you lousy germans, haha, just kidding!!!
Don

A wonderful good evening folks!

This was ment to be my first video blog entry, sadly my computer screwed it up big time. So be prepared, the next couple of days you will see a very handsome boy showing up on your desktop!

Allrighty, is there anything interesting to mention about my last week?! Yeah to be honest not really, just some other days in paradise! Well there are always some things to mention! Work is still great, not that much going on right now, still working on some annoying features of my architecture website and fixing bugs on existing pages. But Friday was the day boys and girls! I finally saw NOFX!!! One of the oldest and best punkbands ever shown up on this planet! To get to the concert was a nightmare, I tell you! It was again in Pomona, a 35 minute drive (at night, with Toyota at full speed :-), but if you are as smart as me, or don't have another possibility, you drive friday night at 5pm through Los Angeles and it will take you more than 2,5 goddamn hours to get there! :-) But not enough, I had a willcard ticket, what ment that I had to stand in a line for another 30 minutes to get my ticket....got it! But wait, you got to stand another 30 minutes to get in.....HELL YEAH, that's how you get your fans get stoked bout you!


And so I was. Stoked stoked stoked. But before NOFX entered the stage it was time for a band I've listened to a lot in my youth, probably one of my first punk rock bands ever, the MAD CADDIES. They did a great job, and I had a lot of good memories according to their songs. Then it was time for NOFX. Hahaha! These guys are so fucking amazing. They are old as shit, look retarded as possible and are funny like hell. Probably one of the best shows I've ever been to. Lots of good songs, millions of jokes about mexicans and jews (cause they are on of these) and a little musical at the end of the set! Just awesome!


So as my plans to go to Santa Barbara this weekend bursted into air, I decided to do a chill-out weekend combined with surfing. And so I did. Spend lots of time in my bed, talking to my buddies back home, checking the news, listening to some tutorials and checking the surf report. 4 foot waves, perfect for me I thought. Well as always they seemed a lot bigger when you're actually thrown out by them, but anyways. Surfing was kind of good the two days. I didn't really catch these much waves but the ones I did felt very good. What did't feel well was the temperature of the water! BOY, this ocean gets really really cold right now. BRAINFREEZETIME! Big time! The best thing about surfing right now is the feeling afterwards. When you finally, after a hot shower, laying in your bed and watch a movie covered by thousand hoodies, sheets and blankets, love it! For all of you how like dumb college humor, check SUPERBAD, one of the funniest movies I've ever seen.

Yeah, so thats probably it, not that much was going on the last couple of days, but I love to enjoy the pre-christmas time and relax a bit. Lets see what happens next weekend. Santa Barbara, San Francisco, Los Angeles?! Who knows?! Life is good, Kings won tonight, I'm outta here!

Peace and Freedom,
Don

PS: Oh yeah, I just realized that I didn't even mention one word about my title :-) ITS RAINING IN LA! Thats it, wow! Booo!