Sad News: Another Celebrity Death

How most people will remember him.

Friday night I was told that one of my favorite young celebrities had died earlier in the week. Knut the Polar Bear has died. He died on the 19th of March at his home in Berlin at the age of 4.

How I'll remember him...scaring a British child who wouldn't
stop banging on the glass.

For those of you who don't know, Knut was a polar bear whose mother refused to take care of him after birth. He was taken care of by Thomas Dorflein (who had to sleep next to Knut for the first couple of months) until Knut got too big to safely play with humans. He quickly became the biggest animal celebrity in Germany. (Even more famous then a soccer match predicting Octopus.)

He was probably more famous then Paul due to being a bit cuter, and loving attention from humans. Due to being raised by humans Knut developed a need for humanity. As he reportedly would cry when people were not outside his enclosure. If you'd like to know more about Knuts short life his wikipedia article is a good place to start.

The reports say his death was caused by an epileptic fit. (You can find videos of his death on youtube, I'm told. I will not be linking to them.)

Farewell Knut, we'll miss you.

One Game Can Change Everything

Let me set the stage. It was the summer of 2002, there was a World Cup going on in South Korea and Japan. I was stationed in Wurzburg, Germany (with the U.S. Army), and I was apathetic to the tournament.

In fact I remember hearing that America would play South Korea, and if America won all the posts in Korea would be "locked down" to avoid incident. (Basically all the Americans would have to stay on base so we wouldn't get drunk and say something stupid.) We were coming back from a range day where we had been qualifying with our rifles. We were riding in the back of a 5-ton (one of our large vehicles) when a German pulled up behind us at a stop light and held up a piece of paper saying Korea 1-USA 1.

I can remember remarking "Thanks, but we don't really care." Some of the people around me laughed. Later one of my Sergeants asked me if I was going to watch the USA vs Mexico match. (We had made it out of the group stage and were going to take on our biggest divisional rival.) I asked him if we even had a shot. And he told me we had beaten Mexico for the 1st time in a long while earlier that year. I didn't watch that game, but America did win, and our team was rewarded by facing Germany in the Quarterfinals.

There are a surprising amount of soccer fans in the Army, this game was shown in our office on the day of the game. I sat and watched my first soccer game from start to finish. (I wish I could find a full video of this game.) The one I have up there is just the highlights, and it's a little biased. But it's good for today's example.

Before this game played we were told that if America won, the base would be locked down. So I went into the game almost cheering for Germany, (I didn't want anything to cut into my weekend freedom/drinking time.) In this game I saw the U.S. National Team scare the Germans and the Teutonic Titans were glad to get a win, in a game that some had predicted would end 3-0 or 4-0.

It ended 1-0, but it was evident at the end that Germany had got lucky. If America would have won they would have gone on to play South Korea in the semi-finals of the World Cup. Korea eventually got 4th place overall. So it's not impossible that America could have played Brazil in the final.

During the game (at about the 89th minute of the game or the 5:20 mark on the video). The phone in our office rang. Because of the angle on the shot we all thought America had scored and we cheered loudly, right as someone answered the phone. The General on the other end was not pleased I was told later.

Germany went on to beat South Korea, and faced Brazil in the finals. Germany lost but I saw Germans celebrating in the streets when their team lost, German fans had not expected a 2nd place finish and were happy with it, even if winning their 4th title would have been better.

These events made me a fan of soccer. Seeing an underdog play on equal terms with one of the game's greats. And seeing a loosing team's fans still celebrate. These are the reason I cheer for soccer to keep gaining popularity in America. That...and the fact that I'd like to see America win the World Cup in my lifetime.

It's a hell of a game, and I swear to you if you give it a fair shot you will not be disappointed.

A Math Nerds' Guide to the EUFA 5 Year Coefficent

Today we focus on part of soccer that would drive most American sports fans nuts, and should be something for the stat counters and math nerds everywhere.

The EUFA 5 Year Coefficient. Seriously if this was in American football I believe most fans would through up their hands and ignore it. There are actually 3 UEFA coefficients but we're going to be focusing on the Association or League Coefficient. This is a mathematical formula that determines what countries get how many spots in the international club tournaments every year. (The top two tournaments in this article, in case you don't remember.)

When will we end the feline on rodent
violence issue in this country?

When I was in college, one of my Professors found us watching Tom and Jerry  on one of the televisions that were in the hallways. (We were doing this while waiting for the classroom to open up.) He couldn't believe we were watching cartoons rather then doing something productive. So I told him that Tom and Jerry is just a metaphor for the immigration issues of the 19th century in America. He probably lost all respect for me there, but  I've made a game out of trying to give things a meaning much deeper then they are.

Today you get to see a part of this. I'm going to tell you about a movie, but I don't want to review them, you know in case Boog wants to do that later. So instead I'm going to tell you about a movie you've never seen and tell you about it's (pseudo-)hidden meaning.

Not this one...

Today I'm going to talk about Bandits...uh not the Bruce Willis movie of 2001, the German movie of the same name made in 1997. I have not seen the 2001 version, but I assume they are not the same movie. This movie was directed by someone you don't know and starring 4 people you don't know. I'm not trying to be rude but seriously here's the IMDB page for the movie. I doubt you know any of them. I've never seen them in anything else, and I watched more then my fair share of Germany's movies while stationed over there.

This one.

The Bandits we will be talking about is about 4 female prisoners in Germany who start a band in prison. They get a chance to play at a ball for the police and politicians, but break out instead. The movie then becomes a road trip movie. They later seek shelter in a bar, and decide the bar's band sucks enough that they take over the stage. When the cops show up, they take a hostage (one American that the bass player likes, he's named West of all things.) escape the cops, and keep going.
At one point they find out a record producer has put there music on the radio, (they sent a demo tape in while still in prison,) but he doesn't have their permission to do it, so they get him to pay the money, and keep going.

This movie has a server case of WTF going on sometimes in that scenes will sometimes become music videos. There's a scene where they are stuck in traffic on a bridge and one of their songs comes on the radio and a person in the next car notices them. A choreographed dance then breaks out on the bridge only to be interrupted when they get to the front of the traffic jam and find that the jam is to search every car for them. There are several music video-esque scenes in the movie, and most are not too jarring, but it does leave most people going wait what?

So what could the hidden message be according to me? I see the prison as being East Germany, they escape only to find that they really aren't used to this new world and they really can't get comfortable. The love interest being named West is what really does it for me, I think he's supposed to represent the promise of the West, pretty but flawed. He's played by a German male-model. I won't ruin why he's flawed in case anyone does want to see it. There are even times when some of the characters want to go back to prison. Even today there is a chunk of the German population who thinks things were better when the wall was up and want to return to that way of life.

As much as I poke fun of the weirdness of this movie, I really enjoy it the music is catchy, it's interesting, and you'll probably never see anything like it. So give it shot, surprisingly it's not hard to find. It's just pricey.

Weird News

It's official evidently we can't have nice things because North American children are too stupid to be trusted not to swallow everything in front of them. Kinder eggs seized by customs. The woman was told she could have been fined $300. I used to bring these things back from Germany when I'd come home on leave. (50 per trip.) Where else am I going to get a cool toy, awesome chocolate and a conversation piece all in one?

And the first recipients of the Geek Streak Schadenfreude Award are the record labels. I think I'll actually have to photoshop a picture of Nelson Muntz to look like a trophy. I have a feeling we'll be handing out a lot of these.

Court rules bosses can order women to wear bras in Germany. In other news it used to be okay for women to go to work without a bra on.

Sports update

Former St. Pauli player admits to taking bribes in 2008.

America's longest serving national soccer player is retiring. Only American to ever play in 5 World Cups, youngest person to score a goal for the US National Team, oldest person to ever score a goal for the US National Team.

It takes dedication to be part of a winning team. But for Remi all it takes is a jersey and the audacity to sneak onto the field. That's right Remi's back. How is this guy not in jail?

Remember Gifs, yeah. They probably won't be around too much longer. So here are the top animated sports Gifs of 2010. Some of these are great

This is labeled as funny Marathon video, let me tell you if you've ever ran a marathon it's not funny. I just feel sorry for the guy.

Guess the hidden theme of today's post*

Germany's Army changes to an all volunteer force.

Germany targets defeating Europe by 2012, and the world by 2014. Yeah it's about soccer. I know, I know; I did this joke already.

You can make your own jokes about the Mexican Olympic team Ease of climbing the border fence.

*if you guessed there is no theme, just 3 articles and a lack of related material, then you win.

Dinner for One

I was going to post something else, but then I got reminded of the German New Years tradition of watching "Dinner for One."

For those of you who don't know German don't worry, the video is in English, (and I don't mean dubbed). It was recorded in Hamburg originally although it stars two British actors, and strangely enough it is almost unknown in the United Kingdom.

The premise is simple Mrs. Sophie has a dinner party every year, but as time went on the guests all passed away. Now her butler James impersonates them all rather then let tradition die, unfortunately (or fortunately if you like humor) this requires James to drink all the guests alcohol. Add in one horribly placed Tiger skin rug, and well you'll see.

So let your self be a little international this year and give "Dinner for One" a chance.

Also here is an article explaining the details of the video more in depth.

Why Germany thinks we're crazy.

I spent three years in Germany with the U.S. Army, one thing that was surprising was how often Germans would come up and ask our opinions on issues that were unfolding in America. Honestly most of the time they were more well informed then most American's I knew.

So it shouldn't have been any form of surprise when I got back and was annoyed at the apathy I found. No one followed the news, and no one seemed to be trying to influence anything for the better.

This article summarizes a lot of the feelings I felt in 2003, even if it is dealing with issues of 2010/2011. Yes I know it's not identical, but it's the closest I've found in resent years, even if I don't agree with it fully.

See you tomorrow.

Hopefully with a much more cheerful post.

Dogs and Germany

I asked Giz what should I post about today. She said puppies.

So here you go. Prop B. Local news on the Daily Show.

Also due to me finding some of my army friends on Facebook I have decided to repost my photo album from our 2010 trip to Germany. If it asks you for a password and you don't know my wife's nickname, then private message me on facebook. The city names on the left will take you to photos (sorted by city).

Here's the albums