achoo

I’ve had a cold since school started up again last Monday. I spent two days home sick in bed and most of the weekend doing the same, there are dirty tissues (actually toilet paper… ran out of tissues about a week ago) strewn across my apartment floor, and empty cartons of various juices are piling up next to my garbage can.

And yet the excuse to sleep for 10+ hours a night is enough to keep me from wanting to fully recover… the lack of a relaxing winter break has me yearning for being in bed past noon and staying in the same dirty pajamas for multiple days.

I thrive in filth, apparently.

(Also, shipments of American medicines will never be turned down. This country has yet to see the merits of 500 count bottles of ibuprofen.)

 

husten und schnupfen

Over the last ten years or so that I’ve been studying German, the lesson that stands out in my mind most was when we learned about illness in high school (props to Frau Young for making this lesson more interesting than it sounded).  While I’ve always been known to whip out random vocabulary that no one has ever heard of (Fachwerkhäuser would be one of them), this little talent of mine finally came in handy when I went to the Apotheke for the first time.

While in America you may be able to walk into your corner CVS and stock up on any and every over-the-counter drug ever created, in Germany they don’t trust the common man with such volatile substances (Consequently, I’m guessing there’s not a lot of crystal meth in Germany). So, using the few key phrases I was able to remember from high school I explained to the (not very forgiving) pharmacist behind the counter what is wrong with me, going as far as actually sniffling and coughing to give her a demonstration of what I needed.

And I walked out with this.

In Germany 'W' is pronounced 'V'... aha

German DayQuil? I can’t help but wonder if she gave this to me because of my obvious American ties, or because this is actually the best she had to offer my somewhat vague symptoms. I’ll keep chugging this Multi-Vitamin Saft for now, just in case.