Hi all - firstly, thanks to everyone who commented on the last post - here's a summary of all the suggestions:
- Visit places of worship
- Take adult learning classes
- Find fun or exciting activities
- Volunteering
- Join a sporting league
- Teach others
For anyone who isn't sure, I'm in Germany - in Cologne, to be specific.
A good list, I have to say. What really surprised me though was that people have such a negative idea of what going to a bar or pub entails - I can't even express to you how confusing that was. Fortunately I have a friend in the US who explained to me that the impression that many people in US have is that a bar or a pub is a place where the primary objective is to go and have a drink or leave drunk. It is very rarely a social atmosphere and probably a rather seedy place to be. In other words, I think the impression of a bar/pub being a "bad" place seems to be a huge cultural difference from my perspective.
I should have perhaps taken a picture to show you, but there are very few restaurants in the area where I live - the majority of establishments are what would be called pubs. They serve amazing food, and yes there is alcohol on sale but that happens at restaurants too, and alcohol and drinking are not the main focus of visiting. They are all completely non-smoking buildings. Most importantly, and I cannot stress this enough: THESE ARE PLACES WHERE PEOPLE BRING THEIR CHILDREN ALONG.
The reason I bring this up is because I signed up for a pub quiz on Monday night via meetup.com. It's a bit like a gameshow - people get together to form teams, answer questions and have a good laugh. Plus I think I have a good general knowledge and this will be a great way to feel some sense of unity with people and be forced to engage without having to think of my own topics of conversation. This is something that sounds like a lot of fun to me, but I think perhaps if I don't take the time to explain, people will get the wrong impression. And yes, people will be bringing their kids along and it will be a completely non-smoking environment.
Pubs and bistros here are extremely common and that is generally where people who don't know people tend to congregate. I also spent quite some time chatting to the owner of one such place and she gave me a good lead on a place to stay, which I will be following up tomorrow. I am really sorry that you guys have such negative impressions of these kinds of places... it's actually quite sad to me, but then, these are just cultural differences - or perhaps I have misunderstood completely and you could explain?
There is another event on meetup.com that is more of a social gathering on Tuesday night in the city, but I can't attend that because I will be viewing a flat, and a place to live is definitely the highest thing on my list of priorities. Once I do that, I will investigate what activities happen in the area where I will be living and work from there. Oh - I am an avid gamer (I usually play alone on my Xbox), and there is a game called Ingress (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ingress_(game)) - I met someone in person through playing that game yesterday so that was a lot of fun - it's great because usually gamers these days are normally very young, and most people stop playing video games before they get to my age, which I also find kind of sad... but not to dwell on that - it's the kind of game that takes you into the fresh air - you have to move around the city and you get to see some really cool things in the process! 🙂
Happy non-smoking day to everyone - you're all my online friends and that is great too!
