For a couple of months now, I've been on the verge of officially closing down this blog. My first three years in the Free State, as they like to call it here, are nearly up. I've regaled you with hundreds of strange and occasionally funny anecdotes. Each year follows its pattern, the seasons merging into one another, marked by this or that festival, the cows going outside, the cows going back in, et cetera, et cetera. But something has stopped me from making this definitive move. Every now and again, something will occur to make me think ooh, I have to put that in the blog. Just when I think life is in danger of becoming humdrum, I will chance upon something so bizarre that I have to share it. Like yesterday. When you are bored in Bovinia and it is Sunday afternoon and you don't know what to do, fear not! You can hang out out the local swimming pond, where the Bovinians are holding their annual pig trough race - (Sautrogrennen, so literally sow trough) - which involves, no less, pairs of villagers rowing their craft - a trough - across the pond and round the little island and back again, to the sound of Bavarian 'hits'. I had seen it advertised last year and the one before, but had somehow always had a prior engagement - perhaps watching paint dry, I forget now what. Yesterday, though, I decided to give it a whirl, so to speak. I took Titus along. As with any kind of event in Bovinia, there were already hordes of people milling around or sitting at those uncomfortable beer tables. The stench - sorry, aroma - of bratwurst pervaded the air. Benches had been set up around the pond and were already lined with enthusiastic spectators, fanning themselves with their dirndl aprons.Titus and I were forced to sit in the sun, not something I usually mind, but it was extremely hot and there were numerous flies who were also trying to watch, annoyingly from the same spot we were sitting at. Anyway, the race commenced. It was frighteningly uneventful. The only amusement factor I could derive was that the participants were mostly 'quite chubby', as Titus has been taught to say, and struggled to keep their troughs from capsizing. Sadly, they succeeded. Having established it wasn't going to get any better, and been bitten three times by horseflies, I told T we were off back home.
Hours later I cycled past the pond, on my way up the mountain to find peace and maybe myself. They were all still at it, sausage chomping and beer swilling, although by now the troughs lay forgotten and upturned on the muddy bank. Until next year, of course.
So that was something and nothing, mostly nothing, but I had to admire their creativity and, as always, the gung ho with with they approach any kind of public event.
The other reason I don't want to stop blogging is PSFT, or people saying funny things, which they always do, and which in my opinion should be noted. No matter how much I think I will remember something, my capacity is slowly dwindling, and I find that if I don't write that thing down immediately, it will, at some point, be gone, never to return.
Here's today's funny thing: CG sent me an email from work, in response to my hi how are you kind of wifely missive. In it, he told me (among other things) that his assistant is off sick with VD, following a trip to Morocco. I was shocked. The guy in question is a devout Christian, a married man with five grown-up children, who travels 60 miles just to worship at the church he feels most at home in. I write back, how awful, are you absolutely sure? (Because let's face it, even if you have VD, do you really tell your employer??) To which CG replied, well, he's got whatever you call it when you can't stop vomiting and going to the toilet. Ah! You mean D&V, I wrote, hope you didn't tell too many people, his reputation will be in shreds. Luckily for the stricken man, CG hadn't told a soul. You bloody Brits with your silly abbreviations, he wrote back to me. No wonder the Empire is on its last legs! I laughed fondly. Brit-bashing is a popular pastime over here in the Fatherland. Secretly, they are just jealous, having no such things as scones or Kate Middleton's pending baby to boast about.
Hours later I cycled past the pond, on my way up the mountain to find peace and maybe myself. They were all still at it, sausage chomping and beer swilling, although by now the troughs lay forgotten and upturned on the muddy bank. Until next year, of course.
So that was something and nothing, mostly nothing, but I had to admire their creativity and, as always, the gung ho with with they approach any kind of public event.
The other reason I don't want to stop blogging is PSFT, or people saying funny things, which they always do, and which in my opinion should be noted. No matter how much I think I will remember something, my capacity is slowly dwindling, and I find that if I don't write that thing down immediately, it will, at some point, be gone, never to return.
Here's today's funny thing: CG sent me an email from work, in response to my hi how are you kind of wifely missive. In it, he told me (among other things) that his assistant is off sick with VD, following a trip to Morocco. I was shocked. The guy in question is a devout Christian, a married man with five grown-up children, who travels 60 miles just to worship at the church he feels most at home in. I write back, how awful, are you absolutely sure? (Because let's face it, even if you have VD, do you really tell your employer??) To which CG replied, well, he's got whatever you call it when you can't stop vomiting and going to the toilet. Ah! You mean D&V, I wrote, hope you didn't tell too many people, his reputation will be in shreds. Luckily for the stricken man, CG hadn't told a soul. You bloody Brits with your silly abbreviations, he wrote back to me. No wonder the Empire is on its last legs! I laughed fondly. Brit-bashing is a popular pastime over here in the Fatherland. Secretly, they are just jealous, having no such things as scones or Kate Middleton's pending baby to boast about.
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