Autumn in the park

September 29, 2008 By Leave a Comment

Autumn has arrived, and with it cold weather.  The last week has been really cold, but at the weekend it warmed up enough to go out for a walk in the woods and visit the playground.  It was strange to see that the trees are still green, and yet due to the cold weather they have lost a lot of them and the ground is covered with the brown leaves more typical of autumn.

Having settled into our new flat we are now trying to re-let the old one – not an easy task, especially as it is difficult to find a painter to come and decorate it first!

The weather was good enough for a trip to the playground

The weather was good enough for a trip to the playground

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KiKa Summer Tour in Wiesbaden

August 18, 2008 By 2 Comments

KiKa is a German television channel for Children.  Last week their summer tour visited Wiesbaden, so we took a break from moving into our new flat to go there for the day.

We arrived early enough to get a good view of the main stage and at the very front there was even a special area for children.  After the first few acts we tried to get autographs from the main presenters, but the queues were so long, that by the time we got to the front they were in the process of leaving.

The main presenters - Singa and Juri on stage

The main presenters – Singa and Juri on stage

Although there was plenty on offer, the number of children present meant that anything you wanted to do you had to queue for, which is why in the afternoon we spent 2½ hours queuing for the chance to climb up a giant loaf of bread!

Climbing on Bernd das Brot

Climbing up “Bernd das Brot”

To find out more, listen to the podcast:

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Buying a flat

July 28, 2008 By 4 Comments

Today in the Monday Podcast I talk about our latest adventure: buying a flat.

A few months ago we saw a flat for sale a few streets away, and after going to see it we did not take long to reach a decision – we wanted to buy it.

But buying a flat in Germany is a complex process, which includes not only the seller and the buyer (and the estate agent), but also a lawyer called a Notar as well as various German offices that deal wish issues such as land rights. The Finanzamt also sends you a bill for so-called Grunderwerbsteuer.

Of course, that’s the official side of the business. There is also the financial side so we had to present our case to the bank for a mortgage – not an easy task being self-employed.

The bank and the Notar both presented us with a list of things that we needed to supply, mainly documentation such as proof of building insurance. We spent several weeks getting all of these together, until finally the flat changed hands at the beginning of this month.

Now we are in the process of moving from one flat to another. More about that next month.

To find out more, listen to the podcast:

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Filed Under: Monday Podcasts, Podcasts Tagged With: , , ,

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