Three is NOT the Magic Number

School House Rocks was wrong:  three is NOT the magic number. In fact, I've discovered that the magic number is somewhere in the neighborhood of seven to twelve. Seven to 12 months is how long it took to gain a foothold on getting to know our flatmates (neighbors in the sense I'm using the word as I know Brits use 'flatmate' to indicate a roommate).

Our building houses approximately seven flats and, I'm convinced, all of the Ausländer (foreigners) in our small village: Palestinians, Poles and us (along with several German couples). For the first seven months we lived in the flat, we were regularly addressed by only one flatmate, Christof, who happens to be our landlord's son. The only other contact we'd had with flatmates heretofore was with the Palestinians, who gave the children beautifully wrapped chocolates at Christmas. Just let the irony of my last statement sink in: the only flatmates who reached out to us (let alone at Christmas time) were the Sunni Muslims (with whom we now have a simpatico relationship).

I would see other flatmates near daily but was never addressed with a, 'Hallo,' or the, 'Wie gehts?' I was taught was an integral part of German conversation (completely false) in my German class. The kiddos and I would pile into the van mere feet from one of our neighbors who likes to tinker with his car and never make eye contact: it was like living in a bubble. When we first moved in, I would allow myself to break into a broad smile at the sight of one of our flatmates and have a greeting on the ready but never got a chance to use it as eye contact was, generally speaking, never made. Initially, it was a difficult transition (after all, I hail from the South where strangers rocking on their porches wave to you as you drive by and clerks at Supermarkets can divulge their life stories in the time it takes to ring up Lipton iced tea and moonpies), and eventually I adapted to my environment: when in Germany, do as the Germans do! Truthfully, the whole don't-make-eye-contact or speak-to-me air took root in me, and I discovered how quickly I could accomplish errands without the interruption of someone asking me how I was doing or telling me that their boyfriend burned a hole in the car's upholstery with a cigarette (which is something I learned from Darlene, a clerk at Publix, while I visited family in the States last month). In adapting, I found I was also spared the effort of trying to respond to such inquiries with a dignified response: 'I'm great, thanks' (the generic response) or 'Oh, I think JoAnn's sells upholstery repair kits!'

J and I threw in the proverbial towel and rolled with the punches. We had come to refer to our neighbors by names like, 'Guy who likes to work on his car,' and, 'the older lady downstairs,' or simply by their last names which are posted on the doorbells. It was seven months after moving in that I actually saw, for the FIRST time, one of the flatmates who was known only as, 'Guy who leaves his black tennis shoes on the mat in front of his door.' We knew that a woman who lived below us wore a flowery, heady perfume that hung in the stairwell for ages after she left the building in the mornings. Another neighbor has a penchant for curries, another smell that pervaded the building. Knowledge of the people with whom we share the most personal of spaces stopped there. J's garrulous, outgoing nature didn't make any chinks in the seemingly steely facades of our neighbors, and my shy nature was perfectly suited to such an environment.

So, imagine how nonplussed I was to be sitting across from a flatmate at my dining room table last night discussing what time our building should hold a barbecue on Sunday afternoon! Our flatmate, Katherina, spoke beautiful English and only very rarely got caught on a German word whose English equivalent she did not readily know (cemetery and under construction: don't ask how such words were part of a conversation about a barbecue). She and her boyfriend are East Germans, and she spoke of how her mother cried as the wall came down 20 years ago. Personal details equate to real headway in meeting Germans, who I consider to be reserved.

Kathe asked if I could make ribs 'American-style' for the barbecue and maybe a pie with a lattice top. Though I usually don't do lattice work, I'm going to give it a hell of a go. The last pie on which I attempted to basket-weave uneven strips of too sticky crust ended up looking like a child's version of Cat's Cradle gone terribly awry in tangles of knots. Luckily, I have a trusted ribs recipe that produces sweet and smoky results.

If you have a sure-fire method for lattice topped pies (or a pie recipe to shame all others), please share: it could make for the bursting of our bubbles!