Water Play for Wordless Wednesday

Isolated

I have said it before and I will say it again, I love living in the country - I love the smell of fresh air, the quietness of the darkest nights and the amazing wildlife.

But it's not always sunshine and lollypops though, there are some down sides too, for example when it rains for weeks, this is the causeway that separates us from the rest of the world:

The water level has come down now but unfortunately the day my husband decided he would be able to make it through it was higher than the picture. The result of that little decision has left me car-less and isolated as he needs to borrow mine to get to work.

If I lived in town then that would be annoying but livable, but when you live 1.5 km from the bus stop, 10km from the village and 40km from the nearest country town with a Woolworth's then its a real pain in the proverbial.

Its also a pain that the local mechanic is yet to call us back on if we should be calling the insurance company or not, in his defence he only has two staff and is suddenly burdened with 28 cars to look at that all made the same mistake that my husband did!

But after swearing about leaving my umbrella in the car that my husband has taken to work today  I was once again grateful that I lived in the country as a neighbour saw me trudging down the road this morning in the pouring rain with four children in tow and kindly gave us a lift to the bus stop and brought me back up.

Its that kindness I love, the always helpful attitude of country folk that you just don't get in the city!

And the sunsets are to die for...

Lost in Translation

So as of this morning we bid *Auf Wiedershern to the Germans. They have vacated the farm, off to the slightly less-green pastures of the city. It was a fun week, full of bonfires, tractor riding, bushwalking and jellybeans, but must say it will be kind of nice to have the house back to normal. I got a little bit lost in translation there for a while, so to be able to understand what is going on in a conversation without copius amounts of hand gestures and primitive style grunting noises will be great. 

We unfortunately didn’t manage to cross any of the items off of my list (Germans are smarter than I thought) but I did find out some interesting facts during their stay:

#1 They don’t have marshmallows in Germany (WTF!?)

Luckily this allowed for the introduction of an amazing tradition: toasting marshmallows over a bonfire. One of the Germans was like a kid in a candy store, he has decided to take them back home, market them and become a millionaire – the other one thinks they taste terrible. "Worse dan ze Vegemite."

#2 Diabetics who are bad enough to require an insulin pump attached to them 24//7 get to eat pretty much anything they want to because the pump just corrects all their insulin levels for them via a blue tooth thingy and a little computer. How cool is that?

#3 Diabetics also know more about Jelly Beans than the average person and keep a stash of pretty damn good ones. I had never had ‘Jelly Belly’s’ before. OMG!!!  Best. Jellybeans. Ever. I have eaten 3 packs in 3 days and could quite likely do a blogpost dedicated entirely to them (did you here that Jelly Belly PR people? Will blog for jelly belly's)

#4 My husband appears to find it easier to speak German than English once he is back around his native language for a while. He keeps talking to me and asking me things in gobbledee-gook then wonders why he is met with a blank stare and a raised eyebrow.

#4 Germans are tolerant. They put up with my awful cooking without complaining for 5 whole nights then they offered to cook for us last night as a thankyou. They made this fancy meatloaf type thing with fancy potato’s and vegetables and for desert they made this divine mouth watering chocolate mousse.  

It turns out one of them was the son of a chef and loves to cook. How embarrassing.

Have you had international visitors stay with you before? How did you communicate? How awesome are Jelly Bellys? Did you know they have a butter popcorn flavour that tastes like butter popcorn!?

*I have no idea how to spell that word but it means goodbye, which I think you had all figured out anyway.

Invaded By The Germans

I am a messy, uni-lingual, Anti domestic goddess who can’t cook to save herself and yells at the children too much. I am also sadly, a ‘Yes’ person.

 Of course this means when my German husband’s cousin asks if he and his mate (who doesn’t speak any English and has severe diabetes) can come and stay with us for a week or two while they are in Australia, I say ‘Sure, no problem!’.  

Sure, no problem. Except that one of you is likely to leave in a diabetic coma cause I have Zero idea of the dietry requirements of a diabetic, and that’s only if the food poisoning from my poor cooking skills doesn’t get you first. My husband and children will be ok as they are used to it, eating at my place is kind of like drinking the water in Bali, you can only do it if you are a local.

The husband has managed to take some time off from his day job and plans to put our visitors to work like slaves, something about digging trenches for the duck coop and chopping firewood..  I’m not really convinced that digging into rock hard clay with a pick axe is the way they will want to spend their holiday.

So while I am rather amused and slightly turned on by the fact that my husband can chat merrily away to people in a foreign language, I am left playing charades for 'do you want a coffee?'  and it brings me to the age old question:

What does one do with two non English speaking, 30 something year old German men in the middle of the bush?

Below are a few simple ideas I have to keep them occupied:

#1) Send them into the bush with the kids to look for Koalas – We don’t get them around here, but they don’t know that and as a bonus it gets the kids out of our hair for a bit!

#2) Give them some shovels and tell them there are Opals about 1.5M down coincidentaly in the same spot where the new duck pond is going...

#3) Let them have fun on the farm with a turn on the tractor! That way they can slash the bottom paddock for us while Hubby & I relax and drink cocktails by the dam.

#4) Give them vegemite on toast and photograph their facial expressions.

 If all else fails, I guess we can always send them off to the pub – With half the locals boycotting it I’m sure the pub could use their business and with them being German, I’m sure they could use the beer.

What would you do with a house full of Germans for two weeks? How would you cope?