1) I came home from school one day in the beginning of December and was surprised to find three workers preparing to repaint the entrance and stairwell of my apartment building. Work started fairly slowly, but I gradually got used to waking up those early winter mornings to the noise of their radio and friendly banter and the smell of their cigarette smoke slowly wafting through the building. After a brief break around Christmas they returned and brought out the primer and paint with them, and the lovely smell of oil-based paint was thrown into the mix. Over the next few months I got used to passing them on the stairwell on my way to and from school and various engagements around town. Sometimes, when I was in an good mood or they seemed extra cheerful, I would even offer them coffee and share a few words with the friendly one of the bunch.
One day, as I was rushing out to meet Libby at the Hannover Main Train Station, I even had the pleasure of brushing up against a freshly painted wall when one of the workers almost ran into me. Sadly, I know have a (mostly) ruined black jacket that I'm still trying to salvage. Last Thursday I came home from school and started bounding up the stairs when I noticed something was wrong--the workers were gone. The wet paint signs were missing and the smell of paint was growing faint. Just as soon as I had grown accustomed to their daily presence they were gone. After over three months of daily work on our apartment building (and little daily progress), their departure was definitely bittersweet.
2) In mid-December, I was finishing washing my dishes from breakfast and getting ready to head out the door for school when I was startled by a knock on our apartment door. I opened the door to find a man I had seen once or twice in the building and who introduced himself as the apartment maintenance man. He explained that they had discovered a water leak in one of the apartments and wanted to know if we had noticed anything unusual. I told him I didn't think we had, but he still asked if he could look around really quick. I know what you guys are thinking. If this were a movie you would probably be screaming "Don't let him in!" but Hannover and the neighborhood I live in are quite safe, and I had seen the guy before. Turns out he was definitely legitimate, and there was in fact a water leak. Guess where it was? That's right, my room.
It wasn't a big leak, but he said that sometime after New Years a pipe in the wall would need to be replaced, and that he would call my roommate Poisy (who I rent from) with the details. Nothing was said about this until the second week in January, when, all the sudden, construction started in my room. I had to pack most of my room up, and while I didn't know at the time, I would pretty much be living out of boxes for the next five weeks. January 12th they opened up my wall and replaced the pipe but said the wall needed to be left open to dry before they could fix it. The whole process gave my room a good coating of dust and left it with lots of character. So much character, in fact, that when my upstairs neighbors would stomp around above me, extra character sprinkled from the ceiling. Best part of this day was the new bedding I scored from my roommate while we washed my old bedding. Let's just say that at one point she said I hope you aren't afraid of snakes! Worst part was when it was decided to throw away the couch in my room (regardless of whether I wanted it or not).
After about two weeks, my wall was closed and partially plastered. After a few delays due to very aggravating circumstances that I started writing a post about in early February titled "Hog Legs and Human Legs" that I decided to not post, my wall was completely plastered on February 8th and painted while I was in Düsseldorf on February 15th. This was one chapter of my year in Germany, that I was happy to close.
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