The Sweater Girl and The Tank

You must know, my roommate Amalia and I cannot live without a common goal. Silently having abandoned our efforts to score by visiting yet unknown cities (capitals or those with at least 500,000 inhabitants), we noticed that we had something in common that called for immediate action.

We had both become fat in the past year.

Certainly, neither she nor I have been slim in decades. The last time she looked slim, she was twelve and appeared on Cameroon TV in a show called “Keep fit”. As soon as she came to Germany at the age of fifteen, her grandparents made her eat so much unhealthy crap that a year later she had gained more than 10kg and looked like the Michelin man. Her parents were shocked while her German grandparents were happy to see that she looked “healthy”.

The last time I looked slim was …
Actually I don't think I have ever been slim. I inherited my wide hips and strong legs from my mom, and ever since I could think I have had the tendency to be overweight. I was at my worst at the age of 19 when I had almost 95kg. Not doing any sports, you can believe me when I say I looked horrible and hated my body.

When Amalia moved in with me in July 2007 she wasn't exactly slim, and neither was I at my weight of around 85kg. But we were alright with how we looked. The problem came with the cooking. She did it often and extremely well, and I underestimated the impact that the big portions that I had on top of my (admittedly smaller) regular meals had.

To make a long story short, I gained approximately 5kg in the past year, Amalia more than ten.
And we didn't see all the signs that were there. Assuming that it couldn't be my increasing weight I thought the fact that some underpants fit less and less well was due to the fact that I had washed them too often and that they had shrunk. And for a reason beyond my comprehension I didn't notice that some pants fit a lot less comfortably as well. My light brown corduroy suit pants are now so tight that I can hardly shut them or walk in them. A few days ago I tried wearing them at work, and everybody noticed how tight they were, just nobody told me. Something about me seems to tell them that when I wear it it's fashion, no matter how odd it looks. Or insanity; it's hard to tell with my colleagues. Not that it actually makes a difference but that day I looked really stupid anyway because I had incredibly sore leg muscles and could hardly walk anyway.

Although I doubt that it looked worse, the suit I wore during my first law exam felt worse. Recently I wore it for a day, and I swear it was too tight from the shoulders to the knees.
And Amalia wasn't off much better. Her blouses became tighter and tighter, and although most of the time I used to joke when I ironed them I never noticed much difference about her appearance, not even when I saw that one blouse's seams had loosened remarkably. Again I thought it was the low-quality material that had made the seams give.

She had understood even before her vacation that she needed to lose weight, and drawn the only sensible conclusion. “I'll just wear sweaters on top of the blouses so that you don't figure my weight so easily. It's becoming winter anyway; sweaters are inconspicuous.”
Strictly speaking, I had understood the necessity to lose weight as well when I had weighed my suitcases before my California holiday and stepped on the scale once just out of curiosity. 91.something kg. My eyes and tongue almost fell out. And on top, when I saw my ex in Munich again last weekend and gave him a hug, he hesitated and then said something like, “Man, you've become quite a tank, haven't you?” Tank!

No matter how you twist or turn it, Amalia and I need to lose weight. Now. And we wouldn't be the good sports that we are if we didn't come up with a city race contest-like thing again. We haven't figured out the concrete rules but the aim is to determine both our weights every morning, and to measure the weekly weight loss in order to see who lost more. Weight Watchers-style. Clear is also that whoever doesn't reach a certain weight loss has to pay money into a common trust fund. As it is yet almost unused the fund will probably be located in our “asshole piggy bank”. Originally I bought it so that whoever treated the other one badly (“was an asshole”) could exculpate himself by putting a euro coin into it, but it's been sitting there without any filling for months. We are just too nice to each other.

Anyway, if y'all have ideas on how to set up the concrete rules, leave a comment and let us know!

Who you gonna call?
– Weightbusters!

That Stupid City Race Contest

Change was bound to come. When I had made up my mind to fly to San Diego, Amalia was already a point behind in the city race contest. My ex Hartmut had generously delivered London on a plate in July. Then, after my three-week holiday in California I came back in October, with two more points in my pockets: San Diego and Los Angeles. Her holiday in Spain, however, only resulted in one. Valencia. From Amalia's narration of her vacation I could tell that her Valencia point was about as weak as my Los Angeles one but regardless of whether both points counted or not, she was two points behind.

She had sent me a postcard from Spain saying that she hadn't scored a point at all yet but enjoyed just relaxing and hanging out with the girls. Yeah right, that's so her. And on top of the already obvious lie, “hanging out with the girls” actually did mean hanging out here. No drinking or partying because Daisy from the Lüneburger Heide, one of her old school girlfriends that she used to party and booze with, was pregnant and couldn't drink. What else can you do in the middle of nowhere?!? :)

So after her vacation she still hadn't even caught up. My victory, however, didn't feel good at all. It never does when your opponent lags behind a lot. 

Without a word about it, neither of us wanted to talk about the contest any more. She didn't complain, and I didn't rub her face in it. What used to connect us and provide us with tons of laughter until our bellies would hurt, had turned into a meaningless and boring ritual.

Not quite sure how things will look next year, there is a chance that this will have been the last year we're doing the contest.

Back from the San Diego vacation

I know, I've been a bad boy, announcing during my holidays that I'd write more about all the incredible experiences I have been allowed to make and all that, and then not writing a word for weeks.

Truth is, my holidays have been over for about two weeks now, and I haven't even been able to go through all the 500 pictures I took to sort them, to delete the bad ones, level out odd horizon lines, adjust contrast if necessary, add captions or to upload them. And on top of all that, the pertaining report that I wanted to write will probably be crippled to a few pages that'll come along with the pictures. Why that is? Because my vacation turned out a lot different than I had expected, and what started out as a report turned into a very long and intimate diary entry that I don't want to share with all y'all. Not because it would reveal utmost delicate details about me but because there are tons of things in there that don't only affect me.

But I had three very interesting weeks, indeed. Almost every day was different from all the others, if you don't include the days I spent reading at Peet's in Hillcrest. Some experiences were not exactly nice but made me think and learn a lot about myself, while others were extremely nice.

This year I actually didn't even have diarrhea and nausea after my flight back. Adapting to the German time zone took me about a week, and the first week back at work felt extremely odd as a lot of things were changing at the time, and instead of actually working I rather waded through the tasks that had piled up or remained while I was away.

So hold on tight a little more, please. I will write again as soon as I find the peace and quiet to sit down and work on my holiday report to extract the stories that are actually worth telling and that don't reveal any secrets that are not mine to decide upon.

It's very nice to be back and see fall coming. I had my share of summer now, and I welcome the tea weather very much.