The Tale of My Time in Augsburg
Jan. 2nd, 2006 06:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trooper6I got on the train on a Friday evening and started my six hour journey down to Augsburg, my other home town, for Christmas. When I emerged into the cold Bavarian air, I was greeted warmly by my BGX. It was 1:30am and instead of going home, we drove to the area where the American Kasernes were--now empty after the American military departure. It was strange to see my old military haunts abandoned. The bars and shops that the GI's liked to frequent gone...except for Kalka's Military Supply Store and the Kentucky Fried Chicken. I used to go to Kalka's to get my uniforms pressed with heavy, heavy starch. The KFC? Not so much. We drove around the old neighborhood where BGX and I lived to see the old stomping grounds, the apartment we lived in together, my old soccer club. Apparently there had been a very bad flood a few years earlier, and the old wooden Goggeles Bridge over the Wertach River was almost washed away...it was moved to the Augsburg Zoo. It was strange looking out over the Wertach and seeing no bridge where there had always been one. We stayed up late talking. Everything seemed like it had been before. It was as if no time had passed.
The next day was Christmas Eve. I got to visit my BGX's Brother, his wife, and their daughter. It was great seeing them. They have always been people I've always really cared for, and their daughter took to me right away. D, the Brother, asked me the question I would get over and over again during my time in Augsburg--was I going to get a job in Augsburg after my PhD? I said...who knows if the Augsburg University would want a radical Pop Musicologist? Musicology in general is not that liberal, and German Musicology especially not. Then it was off to a Christmas Party where I got to meet all the people that my BGX hangs out with now. Her current girlfriend (the Costumer) is super-awesome (an ex-straight woman)...and dating her has radically expanded the social circle my BGX runs in--which is good. She now hangs out with a mixed group of genders and sexualities. There were even gay men hanging out (and my BGX never had use for gay men back in her all-lesbian, all-the-time days. Lots of the group met in a family reconstruction therapy retreat in Bali...and there was quite a bit of New Ageyness about the whole evening. But I was dead tired. The next day I hung out with the Leo...and that was also really cool. On Monday, I hung out with the DJ. Leaving was really sad, but I knew that I'd be back down in a week.
I've just come back from being down there for New Years. That was a short weekend. I spent Saturday playing tour guide for some friends of the Costumer. Wandering around Augsburg reminded just how much this city is a part of me. How many little bits of history...how many cafes and hang-outs I know...then I missed the city even more. Then it was the New Years Eve party. Again...just an awesome mix of people. Really cool folks. Including this one German woman who lives in New York who was soooooo hot! Her boyfriend is a Salsa teacher and when those two danced--my oh my! The next day was lunch at my favorite steakhouse and then a bit of hanging out with the DJ and BGX before off I went back to Berlin.
Now I'm back here with only a few days left before I fly back to the states and the mountain of work that awaits me. I'm reflecting a bit on my time. I love my BGX a lot. But she did those things that she always did that always made me a uncomfortable--the strange exoticist things. She even said...which I always hated...how much she hated her pale skin tone and how she thinks that dark skin tones are just so much better looking and so on. We had a few disagreements about politics, and she still is just as biphobic as she always has been....I don't know if biphobic is really good way of phrasing it...more like, she just refuseds to recognize bisexuality as being a reality. So there were annoyances. But despite the things that made me angry and uncomfortable, I still have a very deep soft spot for her--because she is just such a genuine and special person. And my time here in Augsburg made me realize how much I also have in my other friends from that time...especially the DJ and the Leo...but also The Brother. BGX has promised to visit LA with the Costumer--who I would like to get to know better...and that would be really cool. I think it would be neat for them meet all my LA circle. They all want me to come back...and yeah, I do want to come back to visit Germany more often. But I don't think I could move back to Germany permanently (unless I have to flee the US because it has become a police state)--which is strange...because I really have very close friends here in Augsburg, basically family...and it was such a formative space for me. But I feel like I need to settle somewhere else. When I graduate from UCLA...I think I need to be...somewhere more diverse...I think I need to be closer to my parents and sister. I think I need to be in New York City...or the Pacific Northwest...or in the exceedingly unlikely event that a job opens up in the Bay Area...then I think I need to be there. Or LA (which I think is about as unlikely as me getting a job in the Bay Area). I think I need to be in a big liberal city full of exceedingly stylish people from all sorts of backgrounds. And then I need to visit Germany a lot. Even though they all smoke like fiends! Why? Why do they do that?
The next day was Christmas Eve. I got to visit my BGX's Brother, his wife, and their daughter. It was great seeing them. They have always been people I've always really cared for, and their daughter took to me right away. D, the Brother, asked me the question I would get over and over again during my time in Augsburg--was I going to get a job in Augsburg after my PhD? I said...who knows if the Augsburg University would want a radical Pop Musicologist? Musicology in general is not that liberal, and German Musicology especially not. Then it was off to a Christmas Party where I got to meet all the people that my BGX hangs out with now. Her current girlfriend (the Costumer) is super-awesome (an ex-straight woman)...and dating her has radically expanded the social circle my BGX runs in--which is good. She now hangs out with a mixed group of genders and sexualities. There were even gay men hanging out (and my BGX never had use for gay men back in her all-lesbian, all-the-time days. Lots of the group met in a family reconstruction therapy retreat in Bali...and there was quite a bit of New Ageyness about the whole evening. But I was dead tired. The next day I hung out with the Leo...and that was also really cool. On Monday, I hung out with the DJ. Leaving was really sad, but I knew that I'd be back down in a week.
I've just come back from being down there for New Years. That was a short weekend. I spent Saturday playing tour guide for some friends of the Costumer. Wandering around Augsburg reminded just how much this city is a part of me. How many little bits of history...how many cafes and hang-outs I know...then I missed the city even more. Then it was the New Years Eve party. Again...just an awesome mix of people. Really cool folks. Including this one German woman who lives in New York who was soooooo hot! Her boyfriend is a Salsa teacher and when those two danced--my oh my! The next day was lunch at my favorite steakhouse and then a bit of hanging out with the DJ and BGX before off I went back to Berlin.
Now I'm back here with only a few days left before I fly back to the states and the mountain of work that awaits me. I'm reflecting a bit on my time. I love my BGX a lot. But she did those things that she always did that always made me a uncomfortable--the strange exoticist things. She even said...which I always hated...how much she hated her pale skin tone and how she thinks that dark skin tones are just so much better looking and so on. We had a few disagreements about politics, and she still is just as biphobic as she always has been....I don't know if biphobic is really good way of phrasing it...more like, she just refuseds to recognize bisexuality as being a reality. So there were annoyances. But despite the things that made me angry and uncomfortable, I still have a very deep soft spot for her--because she is just such a genuine and special person. And my time here in Augsburg made me realize how much I also have in my other friends from that time...especially the DJ and the Leo...but also The Brother. BGX has promised to visit LA with the Costumer--who I would like to get to know better...and that would be really cool. I think it would be neat for them meet all my LA circle. They all want me to come back...and yeah, I do want to come back to visit Germany more often. But I don't think I could move back to Germany permanently (unless I have to flee the US because it has become a police state)--which is strange...because I really have very close friends here in Augsburg, basically family...and it was such a formative space for me. But I feel like I need to settle somewhere else. When I graduate from UCLA...I think I need to be...somewhere more diverse...I think I need to be closer to my parents and sister. I think I need to be in New York City...or the Pacific Northwest...or in the exceedingly unlikely event that a job opens up in the Bay Area...then I think I need to be there. Or LA (which I think is about as unlikely as me getting a job in the Bay Area). I think I need to be in a big liberal city full of exceedingly stylish people from all sorts of backgrounds. And then I need to visit Germany a lot. Even though they all smoke like fiends! Why? Why do they do that?
