Home sweet home?

[gothikmaus]

After two very stressful days, I'm back in Italy.

Monday: I realised my stuff didn't fit in my suitcase and hand luggage and had to buy another duffel bag for the extra stuff. Too bad it was Pfingstmontag and shops were closed. I ended up going to the Hauptbahnhof hoping the shops there would be open; some were, but the only one that sold duffel bags was the Hertha BSC shop, so now I have a duffel bag with Berlin's skyline printed on the sides.

Tuesday: we arrived at the airport quite early and, while we were waiting for our check in to open, my father almost collapsed. I asked if there was a doctor and was told there wasn't. No doctor in an airport?! WTF!? Anyway, the guy I talked to called an ambulance and, even if my dad was feeling a bit better by then, they said it would be better if he went to the hospital. So I had to change our tickets (we could never make it on time for our flight) and find a place for our luggage, then I got in the ambulance with my mum and we drove to the hospital. There I had to fill in some documents and translate everything the nurse said, plus explain what had happened and describe my father's general health conditions (he suffers from high blood pressure and has heart problems, so it's normal if the ECG results aren't regular) and what kind of medicines he takes. And then say it all over again when the doctor arrived. All that in German, of course.

I didn't even have time to realise I was actually leaving Berlin until we were taking off around 10:00 PM. I couldn't stop the tears when I saw the city lights from the plane window, but I was sitting between my parents, so I just closed my eyes and pretended to be tired.

I'm just happy everything turned out well and I didn't panic and was able to talk German the whole time.

A more frivolous entry about my last week in Berlin, including football, later or tomorrow.

Comments

[kiviraat.livejournal.com]

I'm so sorry that your father took ill, but well done on being able to keep your nerve and do all the talking when you're panicking inside!

[gothikmaus.livejournal.com]

I still don't know how I did it. And for some reason I knew almost all the words I needed to explain everything. I think I heard most of them during my first internship and still remember them.

[killer-ameise.livejournal.com]

Oh come on, your German is great, so I'm not surprised you managed to say all that. You can be proud of yourself anyway, though, I'm not sure my Italian would have been so good after 8 months - and more importantly: it's great that you kept calm when someone close to you needed your help.
I'm glad your dad's fine now and sad you left.
But it's true what they say: "man sieht sich immer zwei Mal im Leben!" - and Berlin will still be here waiting for you in case you ever want to come back for however long. :)

[gothikmaus.livejournal.com]

I know my German is quite good, but when I'm nervous I tend to forget everything and I'd never had to talk about medical stuff before, so I was a bit worried. Luckily I'd heard a lot of medical terms during my first Praktikum, that came in handy.

I'll definitely go back one day. I still don't know when, but I will. :)