Football and Zumba

Well I haven't been blogging much lately as you might have noticed. Sometimes life just takes over. What have I been up to? Well, as a couple, our social life has taken off a lot recently, which has been great. When we moved here, neither of us knew anyone so it has been challenging building up a circle of friends, and it takes time. But lately we have even had to turn down invites!

I have started a Zumba class. Zumba is the new craze which recently arrived in Germany. It is a mixture of dance and aerobics. There are Salsa elements, hip hop, line dancing and some parts that even resemble Irish dancing. It's surprisingly good fun and a really good workout! You will be covered in sweat by the end of the one hour class. My Zumba teacher is a mad German woman who whoops and cheers the whole time and gets really into it. She told us that one of the women in her classes lost 7 kilos in one month from doing Zumba twice a week! 7 Kilos is over one stone!

We also had visitors. Family and a friend from Ireland. The weather was lovely and sunny and everyone had a great time. By this stage, nearly two years living here I also know all the best places to show people- beautiful lakes for swimming, great views, restaurants with delicious food and of course the best pubs!

I also have a busy (and expensive!) Summer ahead of me with lots of weekend trips planed back to Ireland- for two hen parties, for a wedding, for my Dad's 60th birthday, and then of course I'll also go back for Christmas. The GerMann and I are also hoping to go away together for a sun holiday at some stage. Probably to Mallorca, also known as Germany's 17th federal state, as so many Germans holiday there! I guess we'll have to get up really early and put our beach towels on all the pool chairs just to keep the stereotype going!

Everyone has been going European cup crazy here. Or Europa-Meisterschaft as it's called. It's impossible not to get sucked into the excitement a little! All over the place, there are these so called "public viewings" where a big screen or TV is put up and you can watch the game with lots of other people. Whenever Germany were playing and when they scored, people blew horns and cheered, and when Germany won a match there were fireworks and people doing an "autokorso".

When some Germans first explained the term to me, I actually thought they were talking about joy riding! But actually there is nothing illegal about auto-kursing, it's basically when they get into their cars and drive around blowing the horn at passers by and waving the German flag and generally celebrating. In the car.

Unfortunately Ireland lost all our matches and got knocked out of the tournament fairly early. During the match against Italy, I was flying home. When the plane landed the pilot told us all that we were "2 nil" down. It took me only a few minutes to leave the airport and get to the bus area where the aircoach ticket seller told me the score was then "4-nil". So that was disappointing!

The football is over now and in case you are living in a cave and didn't hear, Spain won. The next big football competition will be the World Cup n 2014. Hopefully Thierry Henry's hand won't prevent Ireland from qualifying for the World Cup next time around! By that stage maybe we'll have a car, and if Ireland win a match I can go "autokorson" around the neighbourhood!