Here Comes The Euro

Hello again to you all. The year has moved into that stage where the business of getting my life on track has had to take precedent over the sight seeing and general holiday mode enjoyed thus far. February 1st saw the end of my first 6 months here and feels to be something of a major milestone given the inherent difficulties that I have weathered to get this far with the language and bureaucratic barriers.

We have undergone the introduction of the Euro € currency as of January 1st and the ensuing problems of not only the inherent confusion in having two different currencies in circulation but a real increase in the cost of most goods as retailers took advantage of the change over to up their prices. In some cases almost doubling the effective cost. It is at times like this you realise the importance of bodies such as the Department of Fair (Dinkum) Trading in Australia. They don´t seem to have anything like that here and as a result some businesses have gotten away with nothing short of highway robbery. An example is the local dry cleaners whose charges for a pair of trousers jumped from DM4.50 to €4.50, in Australian terms this is about $4.10 to $7.90. Food items have risen in a lot of cases as have alcohol and cigarettes.

Eleven of the twelve member countries in the European Union have changed to the new system, with the exception of the United Kingdom. Each has been able to design one side of the coins released in their country to depict their own national identity. It means that although the denomination side of the coins are the same for all countries the flip sides have different designs. Ireland has the Harp of Erin, Germany the Brandenburg Tor, Holland has Queen Beatrix etc. etc. Banknotes across the board are all identical. The only oddity being the word Euro written in Greek characters under the English word as their lettering does not use the standard English alphabet and hence the EURO is spelt EYPΩ. Nice also to be talking something more familiar in Euros and cents rather than Deutsch Marks and pfennigs. The current exchange rate is about €1.10 to the U.S. dollar and about AUD$1 to € 0.57 cents.

I was sent a news clipping from The Melbourne Age the other day that points out that you will no longer be able to spend a penny when in Europe, from now on you will have too €uro-nate. Very funny, tee hee hah hah !

They have introduced a new tax on tobacco as well that goes to fund anti-terrorism measures. Anyone who is not smoking in Germany is a social reprobate and not doing there bit to fight the forces of evil that threaten our peaceful existence. Tobacco Against Terrorism....Smoking Saves Lives....Butts Not Bombs....Roll Up Against Regimes....Ashtrays Not Ashrams.....interesting twist, heh! I should be in the t-shirt logo business.

On a brighter note I now have my Social Security Registration and Permanent Residents Permit repleat with holgraphic eagle and other funky bits including the most frightening part, my mug shot. This should be a major help in the search for work. The real catch over here is that you can´t get work without the Permit and you can´t get the Permit until you have work. The only way around it is to find an employer who will sponser you from the very beginning aand provide a contract prior to your starting work so that you have the time to apply for the permit. The employer must also prove to the relative governmental department that you are not taking a job that can be filled by a German national citizen. So in reality it is probably my greatest hurdle overcome and a cause for some celebration. Fizzz pop glug!

I have made several trips to Frankfurt in the last few weeks for work interviews and to undertake work tests. They have a very strange system here that means that most employers want you to undertake the proposed tasks required in the new job for an hour or so to make sure that you are capable. The set up is O.K. but it generally means that you end up going to the same place 3 times in the course of securing work. Once for an interview, once for a work test and once to finalise all the formalities by filling in forms and signing the Vertrag or contract. It is quite normal here to have a binding contract between employers and employees.

One of the jobs that I went for was for a part time position with United Parcel Service (UPS), which was only for 3 hours per day Mon-Fri. What I did not realise was that they wanted a minimum twelve month contract to begin with and the option to extend it for a further twelve months. In Germany if you are going to have 2 jobs, by law you must let each employer know about the other. Who ever has the first contract can say no to the second if the hours are likely to conflict with what they have scheduled for you. As UPS have a 3 shift rotating roster around the clock it meant that if I found full time work, I would not be able to accept it as the hours would ultimately conflict with when the second employer wanted me to work. In some ways it is a really stupid arrangement being locked into 3 hours per day for up to 2 years and no way of increasing your weekly income. Then this is Germany. Given that it costs around one third of the money I would make with them just to travel there each day on the train it all became quite laughable. The 10.30pm till 2am shift was another glitch as I would have had to wait for 4 hours after work till the trains began again to get home. To too much. I have another interview next Monday with the Hilton Hotel Group but that is some way off as yet and may prove to be a lucky break. Wait and see is the name of the game.

Another item that bears thinking about is the way the system is structured for the care of the general masses. Wages or salaries here are all paid monthly. From the gross amount you receive approx 42% goes to health care and to the social security to fund unemployment, old age pensions and your own health insurance. Of this 42% the employer pays half which leaves your input at around 21%. This is not however the end of it as you then have to pay your income tax on the overall amount which is a further 20-22%. Given the cost of petrol and public transport even getting to work unless you are fortunate enough to be within push bike distance is a fair chunk of the months income. Frankfurt is 23km away from here and with a discounted weekly ticket for the train it works out at about AUD$70 p.w. or AUD$250 p.m. discounted.

Bettina´s father is in the proccess of installing a new sauna at his house. This of course means that I will be going to Heppenheim to help him put it together when it arives next weekend. He has a heated pool built into the cellar so the sauna will really give it a nice finishing touch. I hope these Scandenavians know what they´re doing as all I need now is to find a suitable birch tree to provide some nice flexible branches so that we can beat each other senseless then steam like a dim sim before plunging into a nearby snow drift to cool off.

As for other building work on the renovations at home, the main body has ground to a halt as it is far to cold in the attic to do any work and in the lower areas where we are plastering the temperature is not high enough for the plaster to cure properly. As a result quite a bit of effort has been going into the garden with the pruning of the citrus, apple, quince and mulberry trees. With the very heavy recent snows we had a large build up on top of the ancient ivy plant which covers the rear wall to the property. The weight of it all became to much and pulled the abundant cover clean off the wall. Branches up to 10cm thick literally just splintered and as a lot of it had grown onto the next door neighbours shed roof and under its eaves, it promptly took a part of that as well. Needless to say there has been a major surplus of ivy to cut up and dispose of as well as the propping up of the remaining sections of the plant. Luckily the neighbour had already been considering the removal of the shed for some time as it was becoming to old and damp to be of any use for storage.

I finally begin my language course at the Volkshochschule on Feb 18th. It runs two nights a week for about 6 months. I hope that the teachers have a reasonable grasp of English so that I may at least ask questions where relevant. When I went down to see the selection panel last week both of the people I spoke to had virtually no English skills and as a result I was left feeling that if the teachers are equally poorly versed in English then I was going to find it quite a hard slog without the aid of elaborate and time consuming charades. Next Monday shall tell all no doubt.