Alice in Germany

I eagerly looked forward to the International Party at the Volkshochschule. I now had opportunity to cook Pavlova and share my favourite Australian dessert with my fellow classmates, not to mention the other German classes at the Volkshochschule. The memory of my friend Matt lamenting that he had ‘accepted the fact that no Australian girl from his generation would ever know how to cook’ was but a brief cloud on my happy expectations.

Ordinarily Pavlova is quite tricky, but I came to Germany equipped with a number of ‘just add water’ cake mixes so it should have been quite straightforward.

It was a flop. Literally. Due largely to us being too proud (well Bruno being too proud I, suffering from no such ailment, was simply too scared) to ask Ivanka if we could borrow her electric egg beater. Hence Bruno beat the egg white by hand using a whisk. This is not quite as effective a method of fluffing egg whites as an electric beater and as the dish relies almost entirely on the eggs rising ….

Secondly we had no baking paper. As we also had no baking tray I decided to bake it directly onto the presentation platter. This proved to be a good idea as when is came out of the oven it was immovable, which proved helpful the next day when I was running late for school – I found I could move quite quickly without upsetting the Pavlova.

Thirdly there was no fridge at school in which to store the Pavlova so the whipped cream melted during class. In the end the Pavlova was a deflated lump, covered in runny cream that stuck fast to the tray.

When I looked at my disappointing concoction my first impulse was to leave it at home and pretend that I had ‘forgotten’ that the party was today. I have previously (occasionally) been known to follow of Homer’s philosophy*: ‘if at first you don’t succeed destroy all evidence you tried’. However Bruno said I should take it to show I had ‘made an effort’. Apparently this was important. So reminding myself that ‘we are not what we cook’ and that embarrassment ‘is good for the soul, it teaches us humility, makes us stronger as people blah blah’, the Pav. and I arrived together.

Another class had already arrived in the party room, where a long table had been set.

I went to pop the Pav. and Kristy’s pumpkin pie with the other food when a middle aged Frau with the appearance of an old fashioned teacher (which I believe she was) bustled over and said something in German of which I grasped the following words:

Nein

Hinter

Wo

Du

Sitzt

Which, going more by the look on her face than by what she actually said, I loosely translated as ‘wrack off with your mush and pumpkin pie – this food is for my class only’. Her class, having formed a defensive circle around their end of the table glared protectively at their culinary exploits.

Sadly I did not possess the necessary German vocabulary to suggest that her attitude of ‘keeping to ones own’ might, in some places, be considered contrary to the party spirit, not to mention contrary to German governmental policy. It seemed that while ‘integration’ should be practiced by the Turkish-German community there was no need for any of that at the Volkshochschule inter-class international food party.

Two music students, in middle level five German and in their fifth semester of Music school, were produced to play German songs on the piano and flute. Despite their gallant efforts to get people to sing along the room remained sadly stilted. I could not help but think that although their playing was breathtaking and a privilege to listen to that if they wanted people to sing along they would do better off doing a one handed rendition** and producing some alcohol.

I was impressed with my classmates gallant efforts to part the Pav. from its tray and with their thoughtful comments:

‘So what is this made out of?’

‘Oh mostly egg whites’

‘And the crust?’

‘Yes that’s mostly egg whites as well’

‘Hmm interesting texture’

There was no other way of looking at it, I had failed my country.

* I refer of course to the traditional meaning of the word: A performance of a musical or dramatic work and not to the policy of kidnapping someone and taking them to a country where human rights, international covenants etc. are not considered important.

# posted by Alice in Germany @ 5:10 pm