Find me some plumbing to crawl into.

God, I hate us. At this particular moment in time I think my level of dislike for myself and my little family is probably on a par with our landlord’s.

The plumber has just been. The same plumber who was meant to come about a month ago because I reported that we had no hot water in the shower room. But then when he phoned and said he was on his way, I checked the water again and all of a sudden we had hot water, and I thought I better not waste the landlords money by calling the guy out for nothing so I phoned up and cancelled him.

And then the next day we had no hot water again. Felt a bit of a fool then, but today took it a wee bit further. Given our recent falling out with the letting agent and the landlord, things have been a bit tense, so when they agreed to get the plumber back out to look at the hot water, I made sure I was available as soon as the guy could fit us in.

So he’s just been. I told him about the lack of hot water, and also mentioned that the water pressure was down and then yesterday the washing machine decided to start flashing error codes at me which I “gegoogled” (incidentally, that is one of my favourite German words – it’s the past tense of the verb ‘to Google (something)’. Great, isn’t it?). I found out that it meant that there wasn’t enough water getting into the machine.

So he looked, and he went “uh-hmm” and then he stepped into the shower cubicle and turned this big knob a bit.

Ta-crappy-da! All of a sudden we had oodles of roasty-toasty water flowing out of the tap, and I could hear the water-heating box clicking away (which it does as you turn the tap to get hotter) like there was never a problem. Clickety-clickety click. I felt like a total fool. I summed it up with a good “Ach Manno!”, and a bit of a “I bet that was those pesky kids”, and then I felt a little scared about what the landlord and the letting agent were going to say, and I may have let out a rather large groan.

Stevie had told me to watch out for the plumber and to make sure there were absolutely no drying clothes on the radiators causing havoc to the windows, just in case the plumber was a spy for the landlord and would report back on us. As all the wet washing was stuck in the error-flashing washing machine he didn’t have to worry. (plus I think he was being a little paranoid, and it’s put me off giving him any Stasi books to read).
Anyway, as much as I hate us and our general crappness when it comes to plumbing; I do love our plumber. He said (without me asking) that he would lie on the paperwork. He’s going to say that the pipes were ‘constipated’. I know he was saying ‘blockage’, but it’s the same word in German for constipation (=verstopfung). What a relief. And what a perfect tagline for a constipation remedy too.

The one where I deprive the neighbours of heat on the coldest day of the year

I believe we are known as 'the English' by some people in our building. In the same way our previous downstairs neighbours were called 'the Canadians'. It's not so much the name, and who cares about that anyway, cause as Scot's it's not our country that's getting derided. No, it's the tone it's said in. We might as well be 'the Gypsies' or 'the people who don't recycle correctly' - yes, it's that bad.

Our crime in earning this name, was that we complained about the appliances in the apartment to our landlord. I won't go into it. I probably already have many months ago. Anyway, our landlord went straight from our apartment to his best friend's upstairs, and presumably bad-mouthed us for his own failings. I'm not sure what the Canadians did to deserve, in actual fact, worse disdain from the neighbours. I think it might have something to do with wanting a satellite dish. Or maybe simply just having an apartment twice the size of everyone elses, when really as an old snob, you want to be the top dog in the 'Haus'. Certainly, they've never missed an opportunity to tell us that their apartment is bigger than ours because they gain about a square metre due to the position of the stairs.

Anyway, I shall get to my point on this in due course. What happened was that there was a letter posted on the inner door downstairs telling us that there was a leak in the cellar and on such and such a date we would all have to turn our heating off by 8am at the latest while it was repaired. As luck would have it, it was the day we were to experience some of the lowest temperatures this winter: -11 between 6am and 11am and then a slightly warmer -9 to -6 around lunchtime I think. I was dreading it and decided that if the apartment was freezing when I got back from German class and picking up the kids, then we would just go to the KaDeWe and take full advantage of their 3 hours of free, roasty-toasty childcare and expensive coffee.

But when we got back the flat seemed warm enough. Certainly warm enough for my two lovely children to strip off and run around naked as is their want most days. At the time we returned there was no notice up to say that we could put our heating back on, and as I didn't feel we needed it, I didn't even try.

Fast forward 8 hours. There's a banging on the door. The following conversation is very jaggily translated)

Neighbour who organised the repairs: "Are you ok? Are you ok?",

Me: "Sure, we're fine! Why, what's up?".

Neighbour: "None of the other neighbours have any heat. We can't work out the problem. Both the side houses have got heat back on, and have had heat all afternoon, but there is still a problem with our house, and many of the neighbours are worried because they are so cold. Do you have heat coming out of your radiators?"

Me: "...well, I haven't turned them back on yet."

Neighbour: "There was a notice downstairs to say that you must put your heating back on and turn all the radiators to 4".

It's not like I can say, "Ah, but I have 2 kids who won't wear clothes in the afternoon, and I'm not taking them up and down in the lift naked to check for notices".
So I said: "Oh". That seemed to cover it. There was no point in adding that Stevie can't read (and understand) German, so just doesn't even bother trying, so he wouldn't even have seen it when he got home from work.

So the neighbour demanded that we turn our radiators on to 4, and guess what, all of a sudden everyone elses heating came on too. I like to think that it was a coincidence (ha, ha, ha!), but I have the feeling that more of our neighbours will be referring to us as 'the English'. But at least we've proven what a hardy bunch we Scot's really are!!

A warming Christmas tale

My parents got a new heating system put in in December - new radiators, new combi boiler, new thermostat. But it links in with their old system. Why? Who knows. Another great mystery will remain unsolved. Anyway, new system is great, works a treat! EXCEPT when you turn it down to 8 DEGREES overnight. Then it seems a bit cold, and it takes a while to heat up in the morning/midday/grr.

So ANYWAY...my dad had asked me to bleed his radiator in the kitchen on Christmas Eve, but what with being up to my eyeballs wrapping, still buying (yup, that's how organised I am) and helping to cook, I asked Stevie to do it and he did all the radiatiors. No prob with that, he's done it loads before. Overnight the heating was down at 8 again and as had become our practice we turned it up by a further 10 degrees after my parents were asleep. So here we are, CHRISTMAS DAY MORNING- BEFORE THE KIDS HAVE OPENED THEIR PRESENTS - standing in the hall arguing. Nice!

My dad woke up freezing and discovered that "The HEATING'S not working!!", to which my mum started going off her nut and kept rattling on about how "WE'LL have to get the PLUMBER out! Call him! Call him!"

(Yes, it was a very dramatic time). So Stevie says that everything is ok, and it's just the pressure in the system that's down and he can fix it. To say my parents didn't like the sound of this idea was an understatement. They accused Stevie of breaking their heating by turning it UP!!! Ha, ha, it makes me laugh just writing that. Then I get grilled on whether I have turned up one of the radiators in the bedrooms as this "will unbalance the system, and cause it not to work AT ALL". I like this one. They stand by this argument utterly and completely. They say the plumber balanced the system and told them that they aren't to touch the controls on the radiators. Really? Then why do radiators have them then? I asked. Well, I think I got some rambled answer, but the fundamental is that these are most likely just controls for the plumber to use in his initial setting up...uh...huh...

So my parents were totally frantic and stressed out and my mum was desperate to call this plumber at 7am on Christmas morning and my dad was nearly pegging out at the thought of Stevie manhandling his new boiler, and Stevie was making it worse by trying to reassure them that he "is an Engineer after all", which obviously is no comfort to anyone who knows him. I love him dearly, but I swear if I had a car/motorbike/Vespa in pale blue or boiler that I loved, there's no way I'd be letting him near it. It's a wonder I fly to be honest.

Anyway, while we were arguing about the radiator controls he asked my dad for a knife which he planned on using to adjust the pressure (yes, that'll be why no one has any confidence in his abilities) which actually made my dad laugh (possibly hysterically but I didn't notice as I was laughing too) and then he gave him a screwdriver or whatever it was that he really needed and as quick as a flash the problem was solved, the heating was back on and everyone was happy (ish). Ho, ho, ho, what a Merry Christmas indeed.

a chill wind

The Berlin we have come back to is a different place. The weather has changed. It's around 15c and though this morning is nice and sunny, the past few days have felt grey and cold. Almost as soon as we got back I was feeling chilly and thinking about the heating. We were told that the heating gets turned on in September - as in, for the whole building! Stevie seemed to recall he'd been told that it went on after we'd had 3 consecutive nights of X degrees C or less. The heating is turned on by one of the neighbours, who is an engineer and is the only person able to operate the antiquated system. After 2 days feeling chilly, I was starting to think of knocking on their door and asking when we might be able to have some heat, but our already bad reputation (we complained to our landlord that the appliances weren't working properly, and he told the neighbours, and now they don't speak to us) has prevented me from making such a bold step.

We'd been told that we need not worry much about heat in this place anyway as we have the Canadians below us, but alas, in the time that we've been away they've moved. I feel a little sad that they've gone, they have been a great help to us settling in, but given that their apartment has been rammed full of tradesmen refurbishing the place since they've gone, I am living in hope that the apartment actually belongs to the Canadian Embassy and they might send us some more nice Canadians to be friends with.

Anyway, day 3 of our return and suddenly we had heat. I couldn't have been happier. Stevie of course felt too hot and complained that the place felt like it was in the high 30's. But it turns out I have been feeling chilly for a reason and have come down with Stevie's terrible cold. Today I am having the luxury of lying in bed recuperating while he takes the kids to the aquarium. I've already read a book, 'After the Wall', a fantastic boook by Jana Hensel about being a child of the GDR, and I have managed to catch up with a few blogs.

Which leads me on to the photo. 'Is there a Plan B' has had a fantastic idea of recreating masterpieces. Her mention of Tracey Emin's bed got me thinking I should join in. Our bedroom as usual is a tip. Fortunately though, this is just a small segment of the room - I would be too ashamed to show the rest of it. Oh and I'd just like to say, I didn't choose the orange gingham curtains.