Author Archives: Anne-Kathrin

I Scream, You Scream, Museum of Ice Cream

Posted on October 11, 2017 | Leave a comment

I SCREAM, YOU SCREAM, MUSEUM OF ICE CREAM

Remember those museums where it is all about “don’t touch, just look” and “no photography”? Luckily, since a couple of months now, there is a new fun and interactive place in town, where touching and making Instagram memories are highly encouraged (at least for the most part). Welcome to the Museum of Ice Cream!

Located right in the heart of the Arts District in Downtown Los Angeles, this interactive place of discovery totally defies the meaning of a traditional museum. The fun already starts before you even enter the place. Visitors are guided into a cute little garden right next to the facility, which is equipped with fun games like Cornhole and Jenga. The music is blasting, and you can’t help it but get in a happy mood.

The staff at this place is doing a wonderful job at keeping the crowds entertained and forgetting about everyday life at least for one afternoon. Once visitors are called to line up by the entrance, a certain amount of people are encouraged to participate in a Hula Hoop contest. After all the hoops have touched the ground, it is finally time to enter the holy halls of the actual museum, but not without a quick briefing by one of the employees.

In my friend’s and my case, who had the honor of visiting this trending spot recently, this person had the funky name of Sprinkle Steve, a handsome twenty-something Zach Efron look-alike. After a quick reminder that people are allowed to touch everything except the popsicles and bananas, the really fun part starts: exploring the museum.

While I don’t want to give too much away in case some of you, dear readers, are anticipating visiting the Museum of Ice Cream yourself, I’d like to tell you this:

1) Your sweet tooth will definitely be satisfied. With samples of chocolate, ice cream, and gummy bears in almost every of the exhibit rooms, your taste buds will not be disappointed.

2) If you are a fan of photography and Instagram, this is the place to be. Every room in the museum offers unique photo opportunities thanks to a ton of fun and interactive props.

3) This museum is very well organized and only lets a manageable amount of group sizes in at once. Thanks to specific time slots you get when you purchase your ticket, the exhibit never feels too crowded, and you don’t have to wait in line for ever to capture the fun in pictures.

4) Be advised that tickets are currently sold out and, if they are available, sell out quickly. It took me two tries until I was finally able to purchase tickets after I missed the newsletter announcement once.

If you are like me and like the out of the ordinary, then this is the place for you. You will experience an afternoon where you are allowed to be a kid again in the colorful world of candy.

Life is short, eat that ice cream!

Images: Anne-Kathrin Schulte

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Anne-Kathrin Schulte, is a contributor for CaliforniaGermans.com. She writes on her personal experience of the American Dream as well as on working as an au pair in CA. She was born and grew up in Düsseldorf, Germany, where she completed her degree as a state-approved Kindergarten teacher. After her au pair engagement in the US and a quick return to Germany she decided to attend university in California and moved back to the United States. She has been living in Southern California since 2011.

If you would like to contact Anne-Kathrin, please send an email to californiagermans(at)gmail.com and place her name in the subject line.

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Oktoberfest in Germany Versus California

Posted on September 27, 2017 | Leave a comment

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OKTOBERFEST IN GERMANY VERSUS CALIFORNIA

For many Germans, the most wonderful time of the year is back – the German Oktoberfest. For two weeks, from September 16th till October 3rd, people from all over the world will be visiting the most well-known German festival in Munich. From 1810, when the Oktoberfest was founded until today, the festival has become one of the most popular ones around the world.

Visitors in traditional Trachten (women in Dirndls and men in Lederhosen) can enjoy the atmosphere in various big and small beer tents that serve the notorious Mass, a one liter beer. I have been to the original Oktoberfest once when I was 18. One of my best friends from High School and I decided to do a road trip to Stuttgart, where my friend had relatives.

Those relatives happened to have plans to visit the Oktoberfest that year, and so they invited us along. Before that day, I only had caught glimpses and impressions of the festival from magazines and documentaries on TV. Since I knew that a lot of German celebrities attended the event each year, I was intrigued to check out the hype myself.

My friend’s relatives luckily had a table reserved in the VIP area of one of the beer tents. Unlike the majority of guests, we weren’t dressed up at all. I can still remember the anticipation I felt walking up to the beer tent, feeling somewhat special due to the fact we wouldn’t have to wait in line like the poor souls who weren’t blessed with a table reservation like us.

But once we entered the sacred inside, I felt a slight breeze of disappointment coming my way. It was crowded. It was stuffy. It was loud. Don’t get me wrong- of course I knew that there would be a ton of people, which would automatically result in a lot of noise.

But for me, it was just too over the top. I didn’t catch a glimpse of any hot and poppin’ celebrities because there were none there (I guess our tent wasn’t really a hotspot for the stars) nor did I get into the German folklore music that was blasting out of the speakers.

Once we were seated at our table, I felt a little bit more comfortable since it was way back in the corner of the tent, and we weren’t surrounded by the immense crowds of people. The moment my mood improved for the better was when we decided to get food.

I have always been a foodie, so it was a no brainer for me to give the traditional Munich cuisine a try. I went with one of the typical Bavarian dishes: white sausage with sweet mustard and pretzel. Once the food was served I started to enjoy the atmosphere a little.

The food was delicious, and I was fascinated by how the Oktoberfest servers managed to carry about ten Mass at the same time while squeezing through the tight crowds. I personally declined to drink one of the famous one liter beers, but I was impressed by how others were able to chug them down. After a while, my friend and I had soaked in enough of the beer tent experience and decided to partake in the hustle and bustle outside.

Besides the many beer tents, the Oktoberfest also hosted a fair with carnival rides, games, and food booths. While I am usually a big advocate for these things, I wasn’t feeling it at all that day. It was just too crowded, and the fact that the side lawns were occupied by drunkards who were passed out on the grass just killed the vibe for us. We eventually decided to take off and declared the Oktoberfest as a personal no-go.

I never returned to the original event in Germany, but I decided to give an American Oktoberfest in Orange County a chance. This time, I only went with Americans. And what can I say; I ended up having a blast. The event started out slow in the beginning, but we had arrived fairly early to avoid the entrance fee, and not many people had showed up yet.

But as the night progressed, the event got busier (not as crazy as the uber-crowded tents in Munich) and my friends and I enjoyed participating in activities such as the chicken dance and the polonaise. I first was hesitant about joining in the dancing fun until one fellow German guy came up to me and asked me to dance. It turned out that he was living and working in Irvine, and we had an instant connection.

The rest of the night felt like it was progressing in fast forward. As they say, time does fly by when you are having fun. The band that played German folklore kept an upbeat rhythm all night, and games such as beer chug kept the crowd entertained. My newfound German friend and I enjoyed dancing and talking together, and we later on exchanged information to set up a date aside from the Oktoberfest.

I did return another year, that time with a couple German friends in tow. They were all a little hesitant of what to think about the Americanized version, but we still had a good time together. As of now, that was the last time I attended any kind of Oktoberfest. But I hope all of you who are going to the original one in Munich or here in the U.S. are going to have a wonderful time and get to experience this well-known part of German culture if you wish so.

A little fun fact: The term O’ Zapft is translated means “it’s tapped. According to the Oxford Dictionary, “At noon on the first day of Oktoberfest, the Mayor of Munich traditionally taps the first keg of beer, exclaiming the above phrase, which marks the official opening of the festival,” (http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com)

Images: pixabay.com

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Anne-Kathrin Schulte, is a contributor for CaliforniaGermans.com. She writes on her personal experience of the American Dream as well as on working as an au pair in CA. She was born and grew up in Düsseldorf, Germany, where she completed her degree as a state-approved Kindergarten teacher. After her au pair engagement in the US and a quick return to Germany she decided to attend university in California and moved back to the United States. She has been living in Southern California since 2011.

If you would like to contact Anne-Kathrin, please send an email to californiagermans(at)gmail.com and place her name in the subject line.

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Cake Disaster Part Three

Posted on August 30, 2017 | Comments Off

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CAKE DISASTER PART THREE

When I first decided to share my cake disaster, I didn’t intend to make a three part series out of it. But when I started writing down this disastrous memory (I know I am a tad bit overly dramatic here), I realized that it would turn into a novel if I wouldn’t break it up.

Since my attention span doesn’t last too long and I personally get discouraged reading an article that is more than about half a page, I figured it would be best to split this story up (oh how I wish this really was just a fictional event and not a real-life experience.) But anyways, let’s continue where I left of last time.

Luckily, my boss was very understanding of the situation and tried to calm my crying self down. After all, I still had to go face the wedding planner and her entourage, trying to deliver a broken cake to them. In that moment, I wish I was still a little kid whom it would be easily forgiven if it would have dropped a cake (maybe not a wedding cake, point taken, but who would give a wedding cake into a child’s hand anyways.)

I still had some driving time ahead of me before arriving at the venue, and I kept telling myself that somehow, the wedding staff would be empathetic and able to fix the cake. Eventually, my tears had dried and I turned onto the windy road up to the Malibu Mountains.

The scenery was really beautiful: deserted windy roads, surrounded by meadows, the mountains, and wineries. It took me a little to figure out the way to the venue, which made me arrive even later. But that was the least problem I encountered that day.

Once I had securely parked my car I somehow managed to step out, still trying to convince myself that “everything would be fine.” I carried the cake over to a table close by, where I then called the wedding planner. She soon came walking over to me and spotted the disaster. I explained the situation to her, hoping for the best.

It was no surprise that she wasn’t too thrilled about the situation. She asked me in all seriousness if I could “just drive back, get the cake fixed, and bring it back.” I am sorry, lady, but it took me almost three hours to get there, and the cake would obviously not make it back in time.

So that option was crossed out quickly. I then suggested to her that maybe the florist would be able to do something about it. The wedding planner was ok with that and directed me and the cake towards the main venue.

Unfortunately, it was very windy on this given day. I had to walk really careful and slow, but I still felt the cake moving a tiny bit from the gust whirling around us. I did manage to carry the cake over to the florist with no further incidents (thanks God.)

She inspected it and was not too happy about what she saw, but she wanted to give it a shot and sent me up to a small cottage with a kitchen where the cake was supposed to be stowed.

Again, I fought the gusty winds, balancing the cake on my hands. Once I had reached the cottage and put the cake on a table, I let out a sigh of relief. Relief that I didn’t drop it again, and relief that I was about to get out of this uncomfortable situation failry soon.

While waiting for the florist to make her way up, I looked around the room. I saw wooden signs with the name of the bride and groom. I felt horrible just imagining if it was my special day and I had to hear the news of a broken cake. I was quickly ripped away from that thought when the florist entered the room.

She kneeled in front of the cake, inspecting it while she bombarded me with questions and comments: “Why did you not bring cake tools?” “Aren’t you a baker?” “THIS is the cake they wanted? Looks so simple, you can barely see the colors,” and so on and so on. I patiently and uncomfortably answered her everything, stating that I am just a coordinator and neither a delivery person or baker. She eventually set me free by saying that she got this and that I could leave.

I wanted to scream my relief out, but instead I just walked quietly and fast down the meadow towards my car, jumped in it and drove off. I called my boss and gave her the rundown of what just happened at the venue. We both put it down as a learning experience and moved on from it. I couldn’t wait to be back in Orange County, join my friends for my girlfriend’s birthday and get a drink in my hand.

The whole trip took me seven hours. Seven hours! That was a clear turning point for me. From that moment on I did not fulfill any more deliveries. And, to be honest, I think my boss liked it that way, too.

Images: pixabay.com

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Anne-Kathrin Schulte, is a contributor for CaliforniaGermans.com. She writes on her personal experience of the American Dream as well as on working as an au pair in CA. She was born and grew up in Düsseldorf, Germany, where she completed her degree as a state-approved Kindergarten teacher. After her au pair engagement in the US and a quick return to Germany she decided to attend university in California and moved back to the United States. She has been living in Southern California since 2011.

If you would like to contact Anne-Kathrin, please send an email to californiagermans(at)gmail.com and place her name in the subject line.

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Comments Off on Cake Disaster Part Three

Posted in Expat Stories, Life in California

Tagged Column writing, Creative Writing, German Bakery, Germans in California, Germans in Los Angeles, Germans in Orange County, Life experience, Self discovery, Writer-to-be

The Tale of the Traveling Cake Continues

Posted on August 23, 2017 | Comments Off

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THE TALE OF THE TRAVELING CAKE CONTINUES

It was a beautiful Saturday in April of 2017, when one particular wedding cake and I started the journey from Redondo Beach into the deep Malibu Canyon. My boss and I figured that if I left the bakery with the cake at 9 a.m. it would give me plenty of time to arrive at the venue at the appointed 11 a.m.

As we all know, traveling through the LA area usually consists of sitting in traffic at least at some point, if not more. But since it was a Saturday, I had high hopes that the traffic Gods were on my side.

Unfortunately, they were not. In fact, they wanted to test my patience extra hard that day with a three-lane-closure at LAX due to a crash that involved a burned-out vehicle. My hopes of a punctual arrival diminished from minute to minute, and while the cars in front of me still weren’t moving, I decided to give the wedding planner a heads-up about my delay.

Thankfully, she was not too stressed about it (or she was just good at hiding her real feelings). It felt like an eternity, but eventually cars started moving again, and slowly but surely I was ready to continue my route while the cake was still peacefully sitting in its box.

Now is probably a good time to tell you a little bit about the “transport box,” just for an overall better understanding of the situation. This particular box was actually a bigger paper carton with no lid. The cake was securely fastened onto a round shaped cake board, and then just pushed into the box, the open side facing my dashboard. To my defense, it was not my idea to position the cake like this on my passenger seat. You might know now where this story is going.

I was finally able to get out of the whole traffic mess and to speed up to a decent pace; wanting to make sure I hopefully don’t encounter anymore delays. I kept driving on the 405 north for a while before my GPS told me to merge onto the US 101.

I merged onto the outer right lane, slowing down a bit but still holding a steady speed, about to approach the loop towards the 101 freeway. Unsuspecting, I made my way around it, when suddenly the car in front of me hit the brakes hard, resulting me into doing the same thing.

I knew right away what terrible maneuver I just had done. While pushing my foot the hardest I could onto my breaks, I heard a swoosh sound. I looked over to my right side, and in a matter of seconds, I witnessed the precious 12-piece cake slipping out of the box and straight onto the floor.

I will not be able to tell you verbatim what I was exactly yelling out at the moment since it consists of a series of swear words. What I can tell you is that I started to cry hysterically.

I couldn’t contemplate what was worse: the fact that the cake actually dropped on the floor or that I had to call my boss and tell her about it. Well, since there was no way around it, I picked up my phone and anxiously dialed her number.

When she heard that I was crying, she instantly knew that something really bad must have happened. To my relief, she was very understanding and tried to calm me down, which made me sob even more.

Unfortunately, I still had to deliver the cake, hoping that the florist would be able to cover up the damages. “At least the cake wasn’t supposed to be the one eaten,” is what I kept telling myself to calm me down and to prepare me from having to face a pretty uncomfortable situation, but more on that next time. As for now, feel free to enjoy a graphic image of the described disaster.

Images: pixabay.com, Anne-Kathrin Schulte

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Anne-Kathrin Schulte, is a contributor for CaliforniaGermans.com. She writes on her personal experience of the American Dream as well as on working as an au pair in CA. She was born and grew up in Düsseldorf, Germany, where she completed her degree as a state-approved Kindergarten teacher. After her au pair engagement in the US and a quick return to Germany she decided to attend university in California and moved back to the United States. She has been living in Southern California since 2011.

If you would like to contact Anne-Kathrin, please send an email to californiagermans(at)gmail.com and place her name in the subject line.

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Posted in Expat Stories, Life in California, Uncategorized

Tagged Cake, food, German Bakery, Germans in California, Germans in Orange County

You May Have Your Cake, But You Can’t Always Eat It

Posted on August 2, 2017 | 2 comments

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YOU MAY HAVE YOUR CAKE, BUT YOU CAN’T ALWAYS EAT IT

Dear Readers,

I know it’s been a while. Unfortunately, it’s been way too long, and I do feel bad. I missed writing and taking the time to be creative. But, as all of us know, life happens. My life has been extremely busy these past couple months. I am not complaining as I love being busy, I just deeply regret that I didn’t have time to sit down, be inspired, and write.

The thing is I probably could have produced somewhat of an article each week- but it would have felt more as a chore than something that I truly enjoy. Busting out an article because you have to instead of because you want to produces (obviously) different results. But I am finally able to slowly get back into the swing of things.

As I have mentioned in one of my last pieces, I started working with dogs, and I love it! Being with animals is such a stress reliever, and I met so many wonderful people through it as well. But besides this opportunity, I also started working as a coordinator for a baker. One of my friends was doing the job before, but since she started a full time job she was unable to continue the work and recommended me.

The position sounded really great as I was able to work remotely, so it perfectly fit in with my schedule. But, as this happens a lot in life as well, things came different at some point than discussed. In theory, my duties consisted of handling e-mail customer inquiries, a fun and easy task. Of course, it took me a little in the beginning until I got the hang of it, but I eventually was able to spend less than one hour a day working from my computer.

Things started to change about a couple weeks into my job. I knew that my friend handled some of the pastry and cake deliveries in the past as she was living less than five minutes away from the bakery. I, on the other hand, live about an hour away from Redondo Beach, where the shop is located. So I became a little skeptical when my boss started asking me to do deliveries as well.

I might not have minded it that much if it wouldn’t have been on a weekend, but to ask me to come out two days in a row to deliver cakes just didn’t sound too appealing to me, especially since one of the locations included Compton, which I thankfully turned down. As a compromise though and since I didn’t want to seem entitled, I agreed to accomplish the delivery of an ice cake to Marina Del Rey.

The whole way from Redondo Beach to its final destination I felt like I was on my way to Siberia. Since it was an ice cake, I had to put the air conditioning in my car on full blast. Even though I ended up with a cold I am happy to report that the cake made it to the party without any harm.

From that day on, my boss figured she could sign me up for more deliveries. Without even asking me, she concluded that I was in charge of spending one precious Saturday in April driving up to the Malibu Canyons to deliver a wedding cake. If that didn’t already sound bad enough, let me tell you that the notorious cake was only supposed to be used for photography purposes and not to be eaten. Anyways, since my boss was supposed to go out of town that weekend, she told me that I have to do this delivery.

I wasn’t very happy, to say the least, especially since it was my friend’s birthday and I would be missing half of the celebrations. But what was I supposed to do when my boss tells me to do it, even though deliveries were not part of my job description in the first place? I know, I know, I sound like a whiner and unappreciative. Well, you might feel me a little more after I tell you the whole tale of that one fateful day.

It was a warm and sunny Saturday morning. I had come to terms with the fact that I was about to drive the 160 miles round trip to deliver a simple twelve piece cake into the middle of nowhere while my boss was basking in the Palm Springs sun.

To my surprise though, she was still working on the masterpiece when I arrived at the bakery in Redondo Beach. She told me that she had to cancel her girls’ trip since she still had a couple orders to finish. I instantly felt bad and selfish, and I swore to myself to bury any feelings of irritation about my interrupted weekend plans.

We ended up sharing some bonding conversation while she was finishing up the wedding cake. Looking at the clock, I got a little nervous considering that the cake was supposed to arrive in Malibu at 11 a.m. and it was already past nine. Luckily though, she was almost done.

Since I am a pretty clumsy person, I didn’t decline her offer to securely transport the cake to my car. She put it in a carton box and carried it over to my passenger seat, where she positioned it in a way to make it easy for me to pick it up and switch it onto the cake board once I arrived at the destination.

We then exchanged our goodbyes, not knowing what unanticipated turn the whole day would take. But more to that story next time.