Shopping at Lidl

In Germany there are places which are as German as German gets and one of those places is the discount retailer called Lidl. Since a Lidl outlet is right next to where I live, I shop there often. But before I begin I must warn you dear reader. You read at your discretion since this tale is not for the faint of heart.

So even before you enter the shop you sense an air of urgency about that place. When you are inside there are sales women whom I have never seen walk, they only run. Sometimes they drive that little in-store shopping cart for carriage purposes. This makes them even faster. I am sure they love it. On hindsight I think that’s what those women do. Lidl has no sales people. They dont understand what they are used for. 

I remember the first time that I was here. In Pakistan grocery items like bread, jam, butter etc are labeled both in English and Urdu. So if one does not read and understand Urdu one can read English. When I came to Germany this is exactly the impression that I had. I was thinking hey I cant understand German but I am sure I can get around with the rudimentary English language prowess that I posses. But as luck would have it, the first shop that I went to was Lidl. And not only do they never speak English in Lidl (I have never heard English inside a Lidl store, I am fairly certain its not allowed), not only do the items never have anything written in English but also the saleswomen, who travel at Marc 3, inside the store, will be absolutely apathetical towards your presence in her vicinity.  It is therefore with this desire in your mind that you shop at Lidl that one day maybe one day she will stop by you, look at you with those beautiful blue eyes and proceed to shouting something in German at you. Something like “Du hunde sheise! was brauchst du hier jeder mal, wann ich hier bin?”But so far I must admit that has not transpired.

There is one thing that I think people who wish to travel to Germany or want to live here should know. I want to mention this because this breed of person does not get as much attention in the media as the person deserves. I am of course talking about the lady at the counter at Lidl. Like everyone else in the world I have heard stories about you-know-who (in the German context) but I am fairly certain the counter lady is meaner. I will gladly let Superman torch me with his laser eyes than be stared at by the counter lady at Lidl. This typically happens when all my stuff has been through her, I have paid the bills and now apparently all the matter in the universe is waiting for me to put my things in my bag. It is then that she just glares at me. And I wish that if she would just take out a chainsaw(used in the massacring industry), and chop my hand off instead, that would be so much nicer of her and I would thank her.  I swear to all things I hold dear and sacred, that on such times I honestly want to run back to Pakistan. 

Against all censorship

Recently( this means for the last 5 years or so) I have been watching with some consistency, new and old stand up comedians, and trying to take life's real lessons from things they say. It is no surprise that what they say is filled not just with irony and satire, but also with truth and honesty. I have however stumbled upon something which qualifies for a post in this blog.

I am sure that when these comedian guys sit and write their routine, they always ask themselves as to what is it that they can say that that will most offend their listeners. and then they proceed to say just that. Much of stand up comedy(pronounced life) is based on saying things that people think about but yet cant never bring themselves about to saying them. It is left on the shoulders of the stand up comedian therefore, to try to think of those things and then say them. This also charges right through the domain of self expression and freedom of speech. But what is freedom of speech really. I mean at what point does an idea becomes so uncivil that it is definitely, absolutely, completely, totally, wholly, and utterly inappropriate to voice? In other words, at what point does an idea NOT fall under the umbrella term freedom of expression. or is there never a time like that. Maybe everything falls under freedom of speech. Lets take a sweet journey down an idea lane to check to see at what point is it definitely wrong to say something.

Being supportive of the LGBT rights

One race of people is superior to another (brown people are inferior to yellow people for example)

Being Supportive of the Nazi regime

Claiming that slavery is justified and being all up for its reinstatement.

Being generally or specifically profane and godless

Being up for human limb mutilation

Being up for incest

Being in favour of a Nuclear holocaust.
.

Or is it that just about everything that I can think of, I can say? because after all, ideas are bulletproof.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSLeuTvRPdI

On education

It transpired when I was in a café sipping my coffee waiting for a friend of mine to join me who was uncharacteristically late. So I was just sitting sipping coffee, having a look at people on the other tables. On most tables the conversation was in German so I didn’t pay much attention to that (This is such a euphemism since paying attention would have hardly helped improve comprehension). But there was one table where there were a couple of teenagers speaking English and I was naturally drawn to that. I was not so much interested in what they were talking about as I was in how the body language of the speakers changed and reacted to what they or the other person was saying. I could clearly see that in social contexts, one of the simplest way that people show their approval of what is being said to them or the group at large is to laugh or smile as a reaction. I could see that when people at the table laughed, the speaker got more energy to continue with whatever he or she was saying (because the person had clear approval to continue). It looked to me that the way social groups encourage certain types of behavior is by laughing at things.

Conversely when someone said something that did not make the group laugh or smile, the speaker is subtly discouraged to continue with his or her tirade. Such a speaker may often be considered boring or uninteresting.

Thereby there is at least a small causal relationship between social behavior (body language used, words used, the type of jokes told etc) and what people laugh at. This makes the reason as to what makes people giggle, laugh, grin, smile, and chuckle at the very heart of human behavior. Hence it is important to find what exactly what it is that people laugh at. As per my experience I feel that what people laugh at is associated with the amount and type of knowledge that they have acquired in their lives. That’s why people in Pakistan will laugh at things which people in Germany may consider lame and what people Germany may laugh about is what people in Pakistan can consider immoral. The difference is the amount of education that they have had. The knowledge they have received acquired or information that was generally disseminated to them. So in order to improve social behavior, educate people.

“So I didn’t get stood up after all” I tell him, as he finally shows up
“Da kann nicht seinJ” he says

Erkaltung

Ever since I have lived in Berlin, I have been going to this doctor (Aerztin). She does not speak English at all so its always a a lot of work in trying to tell her how I feel. I went to her when I had been in Berlin for 3 months, then 6 months and now yesteryday when I went to her, I have lived here for almost a year. Being able to talk to her is the litmus test for my German speaking abilities.

Every time that  I have been to a doctor in my life, I have come back with load full of medicinal drugs that I have had to take day in and day out to get well again. So yesterday when I went to the doctor I was wondering if she would give me Augmentin the anti biotic or some standard paracetamol. But what she did was to tell me a total of three German sayings which I feel I should translate here

“Erkaltung. 3 tage kommst es, 3 tage bleibt es, und 3 tage geht es”
“Cold. For 3 days it comes, for 3 days it stays and another 3 days it leaves”

“Manchmal weniger ist mehr als mehr”
“Sometime, less is more”

She told me that I have the common cold and since it’s a viral infection there is no medicine for it. And that I have to rest it away.So here I am sitting at home since yesterday, bored out of my wits and thinking that getting sick in a foreign country sucks really bad. Makes you miss your mom the most. 

Inside the mind of old people lies history

Apparently the old people in Berlin have something against urban rails and underground trains and have a thing for trams and buses. I say this with a reasonable amount of certainty after having watched a bus full of really old people, a countless number of times. Today was also one such day. The laziness that I personify, I was taking a bus to a place where I could have easily walked to. But this post is neither about the commuting habits of old people in Berlin nor of my laziness in general, but instead about what I think when I see so many old people in this city.

Germany in general and Berlin in particular is brimming with history, and here when I say history I don t mean something that happened thousands of years ago but of things that happened a few decades ago. Once the capital of Prussia, then the capital of the Third Reich, then the divided city (and capital of the eastern bloc) and finally becoming the capital of  unified Germany, Berlin is a gem for people who are even remotely interested in anything related to history. These old people are a living testimony to those times. So come to think of it, these people were actually there when Europe was  ravaged by the second world war. Some were IN BERLIN when the red army invaded Berlin and Germany unconditionally surrendered. Some of them might even be in Berlin when Hitler committed suicide. They might just be a few blocks away from where that happened. They must remember a lot that would be valuable to historians.

Then this city was divided and there was a wall, a real actual literal wall that separated the city. and passing to the other side was, for all practical purposes, impossible. All these old people must remember how it was to have family on the other side of the wall. and then how it must have felt when the wall came down. Some must have been happy, some must have been sad but it was a historic moment and all of these would remember it.

Consider a typical Berliner (person not doughnut),who was growing up in the 30s. This person is bombarded with the 2nd World War propaganda of the time and he/she believes in all the ideals held by the third Reich( I assume here that kids generally don t know or think much and are therefore extremely vulnerable to what they are fed to them in terms of information). Sadly for this person however, Germany would lose the war in 1945. For this person it would be catastrophic because that means that whatever s/he believed was wrong and Germany would not reach the world domination that it so desires to have.. Now consider again that this person lives in the eastern bloc under the communist regime and grows up with this propaganda. At this point s/he finds it difficult to cope with this new found ideals that are being fed to him/her, but does well to inculcate them into his framework of thought. but come the collapse of the Soviet Bloc and this person again has to change everything that s/he believed in and has to adopt a new system of thinking. I can only imagine what that sort of a person would feel. For most people who truly absolutely believe in something, they never change it, I cannot imagine what it would be like to do it twice. Almost sounds impossible.
This is a person I would like to meet and talk to. 

Describing a picture

There are many reasons as to why I like this picture. Top amongst them is the fact the people featured in the picture have made no superficial effort to give out the impression that they are close friends. However, if you look at the picture for 5 seconds you sense that the air between them is those of old friends, who have known each other so well and for so long that even silence between them is comforting. I also like how these two people have made no attempt to pose for the camera whereas both appear to be fully conscious that they are being snapped (assuming of course that the person on the left just stands with his legs crossed). Since we can see the blue sky as well, the impression is that of a relaxed sunny day by the river. This just adds to the overall ambience of peace and quiet where words are a mere stain on silence.

For both these people personally, the logo on top of the building on the right will always remain important, for it is/was their Alma Mater in Berlin. And because of the sadness that comes with getting only one life to live, this name is going to stay with them for the rest of their lives.

There is also a  river on one side, which to me always represents the flow, from one point in life, to another. It symbolizes the unending and quite unnerving constant metamorphosis that our lives are regularly undergoing. The river stretches as far as our eyes can see. Which is just perfect.

The only thing lacking however is that it is coloured, for I have noticed that for a picture to be considered of artistic value, it needs to be black and white. Sadly, this picture isn't.  

Words from everywhere

I have collected some knowledge about people from different countries and cultures over the time period that I have lived in Berlin. One thing that I find myself paying particular attention to these days is how words are constructed in different languages and how some words exist in one language and not in another. Following is a list of words (mostly English sadly) which I think are quite unique.


Weltschmerzen (German)

The beauty in German is that it combines words to form longer words (an "agglutinative" language since we are on the subject of words). So koepf in German means head and schmerzen means ache/pain. So Keopfschmerzen is headache. In much the same way, Welt is world and Weltschmerzen is "the pain of the world".
What it really means is that if you could imagine worrying about everythig in the world, say from hunger and politics to stars and insects to facebook to cars, if you could hypothetically worry about everything, and how temperoary everything is and how meangingful the persuit of happiness is, THEN you truely have Weltscherzen. In essence it the pain associated with just existing and just being alive.


Wanderlust (Loanword from German, now English)

Here we have, something that many young adolescents might associate themselves with. Wanderlust is the desire, the urge, the wish the hope and the lust for travelling to a place, somewhere, anywhere that one has never been to before. It symbolises breaking free from the hustle bustle of mundane life. It is for people who want to seek out "new life and new civilizations"


Alexithemia ( English)


I love words which have a sense of humour about them, and I think alexythemia is one such. This word ( which I am not sure even native speakers of English would even know. I am sure the Americans wouldnt know that , the Brits and others might:p) describes the condition one has when one cant describe emotions in a verbal manner. So they actually have a word, and quite a difficult one at that, for when you cant describe your emotions in a verbal manner. :(



Flaneur ( there is an umlaut on the letter "a" and yes it is a french word)

This word describes a person who wanders around aimlessly BUT enjoyably through life while observing everything that life has in store. All of us have it so some extent I suppose.

Baraye Meharbani ( Urdu)

What do we say when we want someone to do something for us? We say please. this is the Urdu word for please which is made up of two words Baraye ( meaning for the sake of / in order to ) and Meharbani( thankfulness)

So when you combine these two words you have something that would translate in English to "please do something after which I will thank you for doing it)

So if you meet a native speaker of Urdu (like myself) and he/she says please to you. You should picture in your head the following sentence "please do something after which I can thank you"

Adoxography ( English)

and finally I end this blog entry by mentioning a word that means "an elaborate writing on a subject of little or no use whatever" which is quite in itself the description of my blog and this post.