This week has had a Germanic theme. It started on Sunday, when I walked down to the shops to return/borrow library books and get some things from the supermarket. Wandering down the hill I noticed a couple of backpackers heading towards the station. Unusual, but we are near a major uni and it wasn't entirely inconceivable that some students were returning and had inadvertently gotten off at the wrong stop.
A bit further down the hill, there was a large group of people walking together, all dressed alike, and all wearing hats. A walking club? In my suburb? Um, why?
Not that there's anything wrong with my suburb, but there's not really any reason for a walking club to be wandering around in it. No historical buildings, no sites of interest, no creek even... bizarre.
Then I got closer to them and realised they were all speaking German. Huh?!
Some of them were also wearing German flags. In the Cronulla style. As capes.
I wasn't until I was almost on top of them that I realised that they were also wearing shirts for the local Catholic church. Pilgrims. All heading off to Sydney for World (Catholic) Youth Day.
(Which does beg the question of who the hell decided to billet them ~800km away for a week. Because that's a bit of a hike to the main event really, even if it did look kind of close on the map.)
Later that evening, returning from soccer, astrocave and I passed Southern Cross/Spencer St station. And found ourselves in the midst of literally hundreds of pilgrims, all catching overnight buses to Sydney. And most of them German, at least as far as I could see. Astrocave said he saw some South Korean flags, but I was too busy driving and trying not to hit anyone to pay that much attention. I know God loves you all, but please don't dash out into the oncoming traffic to prove it. Especially when you're looking in the wrong direction for the cars. The buses won't leave without you (unless you're in hospital, which you will be if you dent my car and scare me enough.)
The final part of the Germanic theme came last night I caught up with a friend I hadn't seen in 5 years and her German husband, who I'd never met. It was a fun evening, with Vietnamese food, and far, far too much red wine. Which finished at 1.30am this morning. 6.30am this morning is when I remembered that while my friend and I could do this with impunity (although not legally) when we first met nearly 20 years ago, now I should really call it a night somewhere around the midnight and end-of-second-bottle-of-wine mark on a school night.
But then again, I probably won't see her for another couple of years, so it was worth it.
A bit further down the hill, there was a large group of people walking together, all dressed alike, and all wearing hats. A walking club? In my suburb? Um, why?
Not that there's anything wrong with my suburb, but there's not really any reason for a walking club to be wandering around in it. No historical buildings, no sites of interest, no creek even... bizarre.
Then I got closer to them and realised they were all speaking German. Huh?!
Some of them were also wearing German flags. In the Cronulla style. As capes.
I wasn't until I was almost on top of them that I realised that they were also wearing shirts for the local Catholic church. Pilgrims. All heading off to Sydney for World (Catholic) Youth Day.
(Which does beg the question of who the hell decided to billet them ~800km away for a week. Because that's a bit of a hike to the main event really, even if it did look kind of close on the map.)
Later that evening, returning from soccer, astrocave and I passed Southern Cross/Spencer St station. And found ourselves in the midst of literally hundreds of pilgrims, all catching overnight buses to Sydney. And most of them German, at least as far as I could see. Astrocave said he saw some South Korean flags, but I was too busy driving and trying not to hit anyone to pay that much attention. I know God loves you all, but please don't dash out into the oncoming traffic to prove it. Especially when you're looking in the wrong direction for the cars. The buses won't leave without you (unless you're in hospital, which you will be if you dent my car and scare me enough.)
The final part of the Germanic theme came last night I caught up with a friend I hadn't seen in 5 years and her German husband, who I'd never met. It was a fun evening, with Vietnamese food, and far, far too much red wine. Which finished at 1.30am this morning. 6.30am this morning is when I remembered that while my friend and I could do this with impunity (although not legally) when we first met nearly 20 years ago, now I should really call it a night somewhere around the midnight and end-of-second-bottle-of-wine mark on a school night.
But then again, I probably won't see her for another couple of years, so it was worth it.
posted by Alison at 5:39 PM
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