Fashion Victims – In Tracksuits and Leggings

Although fashion has become increasingly homogenous and international, the Irish seem to dress a bit different than the rest of us – or at least us Continental Europeans. I saw most of these phenomena around the place I lived, which is called Killinarden. Those of you who know where Killinarden is probably know that it is a rather shabby area. Tallaght itself is not that beautiful, but Killinarden (and Jobstown) could be called the ghetto of Tallaght. Of course, not all the Irish dress like they do in Killinarden. But let me nevertheless list a couple of faux-pas which I often encountered.

If you're going to Milan (Be sure to wear...good shoes) Part 1

The Milan furniture fair took place last month. While this event has probably passed you unnoticed, it sends a tingle up the spine of interior designers everywhere each year around Easter. So naturally, I had April 12^th-17^th marked bright red in my calendar. There are a couple of international furniture fairs all around the globe, but the Salone Internazionale del Mobili is by far the biggest and most important one in furniture business. It’s also pretty influential; companies present their new products for the first time and very often the reception of the product decides whether it’s ever going to be produced or not. It’s like the fashion week in New York, or Milan for that matter. The LA Times calls it “a design frenzy that dwarfs this city's famed fashion week in size.” True. I was there in 2006 and, unless you’ve seen it with your own eyes, you won’t believe how big it is. This year there were nearly 2.3 million sq. ft. for you to explore and furniture exhibits by more than 2,700 companies to marvel at. Luckily enough, the LA Times has broken this down for us: 2.3 million sq. ft. is a space larger than 39 football fields or 482 pro basketball courts.

Imagine walking all this. Sounds fun, huh? Let’s instead have a look at this year’s highlights right here on our computer screen.

Watching Soccer Is Not Just Being A Spectator

For many German men, including myself, playing soccer is a popular pastime. I consider myself very lucky to have been able to turn my hobby into a profession. I´ve never cut a fine figure on the pitch, however. Instead, I write about what´s happening on the field, especially about “my” team, Wacker Burghausen, a German third division club, whose home field is close to the Austrian border, approximately 60 kilometers northwest of Salzburg.

Coffee Beans Are Feminist

Imagine you’re in a meeting: the room is hot and fuggy, the cooling fan moves from right to left and from left to right so that you need to hold your sheets down to the desk every eight to ten seconds, and you try to concentrate for long enough to deal with the new complex projects that need to be prepared. On the side, you also keep in mind that your next appointment begins in one hour, your kids need to be picked up from school and you certainly mustn’t forget to call your mother-in-law to thank her for the lovely birthday present.

The thing you want, need, crave for is coffee. Whether its caffeine reaches you in the form of a cappuccino, latte macchiato or espresso doesn’t matter. Making it through the day is all you want, and coffee has been you’re ally whenever you needed a concentration-boost. Because that’s what coffee does, isn’t it?

Breakfast 6 km… Death 4 km (Part one)

In 2008 I graduated school. After the examinations most of my friends started looking for a job but I decided to hit the books again at university instead. Back then I wasn’t really sure what direction my life would take and I also didn’t exactly know which degree programme would be best for me. The only thing I knew was that the coming summer holidays were going to be my last before university started, so I wanted to do something special. One of my best friends and I agreed to take a trip and the only question left was where to go. To this day, we still don’t really know how we came up with the idea but it took us no longer than a few minutes to decide that our trip was heading to Bilbao, Spain. 

Cuisine Irelandaise

It is probably a well-known fact that the inhabitants of the British Isles have very interesting culinary tastes. It’s not only the drinking tea with milk or having baked beans for breakfast, but also other food habits that foreigners might consider peculiar. It seems as if the Irish follow a certain nutrition guideline, which I liked to refer to as the “seefood diet”: They see food and they eat it.

Why our university is not the best place to learn Spanish

After having studied for five years in the Spanish Department at the University of Salzburg, I have come to the following conclusion: If you really want to learn the language, this is probably not the best place to do so. Let me explain why:

The main reason is that you’re hardly ever asked to speak Spanish.  German is the main language at the department. At least two thirds of all courses are held in German, seminar papers are in German; my diploma thesis was only the third (!) paper I wrote in Spanish. Also, native speakers are very scarce in the department, which doesn´t really give us the chance to practice our skills in authentic situations. Once, I took a course with a native speaker but interestingly enough she decided to speak German. In short, we have absolutely no possibilities to exercise our Spanish skills. But I have read Don Quijote three times and I know who El Cid is. What more is there to know? With this knowledge I am prepared for any challenge that may arise when I enter the classroom. Or so the Spanish Department must think. This is why half of the students are just not able to speak Spanish fluently. But are they to blame? 

Does university really prepare us for our future professional life?

I think I’m not the only student who keeps asking this question. Every time I am sitting in the library writing a seminar paper about metaphors or the wilderness in literature, for instance, the very same question comes up again. 

Most students in our department are in the teacher-training program, those who don’t typically envisage working in the field of adult education or for a corporation, where their main task would be communicating with foreign countries or translating company documents. So, will one of their pupils ask them later about how to differentiate between a conceptual and absolute metaphor? Or, will anyone in your the future workplace ever want to know how the conception of the English garden in literature has developed throughout history? No, they will want to know how to express themselves in English, how to pronounce words correctly, and how to apply certain rules of grammar. And most companies will ask for a reliable translator and communicator with a perfect knowledge of the foreign language. 

When Eating Becomes A Torture

Each time a new restaurant celebrates its grand opening, I´m very keen on going. Restaurant reviews aren´t part of my job as a newspaper journalist, it´s more of a hobby. My friends and I hadn´t heard too many good things about this particular new “Bavarian restaurant” beforehand, but we wanted to give it a try anyway. After all, you should always draw your own conclusions, my grandma always tells me. Though, her advice turns out to be right most of the time, in the case of this restaurant it wasn´t.