Jump. Jump.

I was recently asked if I had a European driver's license, which I do not, thoug sounds like a super sweet thing to have. The good news is that when having a license from Utah you don't have to take a test, it's more or less a swap. More or less. The bad new is that a "swap" looked like me riding 6 miles north the city to sit in the equivalent of the DMV only to be told that I must first go to the foreign office to have a piece of paper signed stating when I arrived in Germany. Forget the fact that they had my stamped passport sitting in front of them. Then I must go 5 miles south of the city to the ADAC, a club much like AAA, to have my Utah license PHOTOCOPIED and have another paper signed. Again, my license is sitting right in front of them. Then I must return to them in two weeks to apply for the license and will receive it by post in yet another two weeks. (As a gloating point on my end, this was all conducted in German).

Does anyone else feel as dizzy as me.

I visited those places I had to and did what I must. I got the photocopy and then....I didn't get the license back! It was this one piece of information lost in translation that got me upset. I shrugged it off with, "Oh schade. Schönen Tag noch," and walked out. But as I rode away on my bike I was overcome with sadness. I started to cry. It felt as though they had confiscated a piece of my identity.

Still, hours later, I have a bit of sadness residing in my being. It is moments like these that creep up and surprise me about how much I miss home. The people, the place, the beaurocratic hoops one must still jump through but they are at least familiar. I have to laugh too. Usually it is the voice or email of a missed friend, or pictures of home that trigger my homesickness. Today it was a card with a not-so-great picture of me on it.