Settling In

Pretty common parallel
parking situation here

There's not been much new to report here, except that we are trying to settle in and figure out how to be residents here and not just tourists. A few examples:

- We've been playing (indoor) soccer with people from Joe's work. There's a group that gets together once a week to reserve an indoor soccer court. Typically there's been about 10 people who show up, us included, and we just play 5 v. 5 soccer for about an hour and a half. It's been pretty fun and everyone seems to be around the same skill level, which is good news for us. We've gone a couple of times and really enjoyed it.

Coffee and Blueberry cake at "Zimt & Zucker"

-We've finally started discovering a few new restaurants and trying out some different things. Luckily there is a lot to try near where we live. For example, all within a block or two of our apartment, we've tried the Pho at Ha Noi bistro, pizza at Il Mulino, and Sarah even managed to try a burrito from a Chipotle-style place called "Pureburrito." A bit further out are some new döner restaurants, authentic Chinese food at Yi Nong, and quite a selection of bakeries. Sarah's first donut purchase (she has a slight donut obsession) was a powdered donut with a surprise apricot filling. Bread here is made fresh daily. In fact, if a bakery sells out before "closing time" they'll just close early! Bread is also a point of pride for the Germans, not just the pretzels, and is not worth eating if it's not fresh.

Found "Hedwig" street. Thought of Harry Potter!

- Sarah's been job hunting and meeting people through various Expat groups, since German is still a language barrier. She's met up in various outings- movies, coffee, cocktails, lunches. The main group is quite a fun gathering of ladies who are mostly moms and new moms looking to mingle and get out of the house. Maternity leave is a BIG deal here, as most Bavarians will judge you for taking anything less than a year off of work when you're on maternity leave. So there's a large pocket of parents and especially new parents who have gone from a busy work environment to having quite a bit of free time and are looking to socialize. They've been helpful both for keeping busy and for those questions about insurance and visas and boring paperwork things that we haven't figured out yet.

- We met up with some of these new Expat friends at an American bar, called "The Keg," for Halloween! We didn't really dress up much, but we had a nice night out meeting people and chatting. Halloween is not quite as big a deal here as it is in the USA. There are costumes and Halloween events, but they are only recently becoming popular. From what we've heard, "celebrating" Halloween is more about going out for a few drinks since November 1 is a state holiday and everyone has off work...

Walking around the Olympic Park on a nice Sunday afternoon

That's about it for now. We're hoping to go somewhere interesting this weekend, so perhaps there will be more to update next week :)

Lastly, smoke detectors are now legally required in Munich. Apparently that's a new policy. So we had THREE installed in our tiny apartment and we got this handy visual to help us understand fire safety...