Blasted

I've mentioned this before, people smoke here a lot.  I'm not particularly bothered by cigarette smoke, but nonetheless, I prefer it out of my face rather than it it.  At the bus stop after traveling, the guy standing in front of me, and facing the other way, took a big puff and... the wind took a huge cloud of smoke right at me.  I flinched, but then to my surprise, it didn't smell half bad.  Turns out it was a tobacco pipe.  So much classier.  I should have asked him what kind of tobacco he had.  I wish all the cigarette smokers would trade in for pipes.  How much more awesome would it be to see hundreds of pipe smokers every day instead of the hundreds of cigarette smokers I usually see.  


ta ta for now.

I just went back in time

What you just saw is the "Trabant." It's not a BMW but it's still German. It was The car of the DDR (Communist Germany). The Berlin wall fell the year I was born, so at least 99% of these cars were made before I was born and are thus at least 22 years old now. Well today one drove past me. It looked identical to the one pictured below. As it came to a stop I notice the older driver smoking a pipe. As it past me I noticed a bumbersticker. You know those ones all over the states that are white ovals with black letters that say "OBX" or "TI" or some other place abbreviation? Well surprise, surprise, this car had one of those stickers with "DDR" on the back! Everything about those 6 seconds were marvelous (including the breezy 55º weather!).

I'll add in a fun fact for you and mention that even though these cars were produced in the DDR, if you wanted to buy one as a resident then you would get on a 12 year waiting list!!! You would have to buy a car for your 4 year old if they wanted to have a car when they were 16! I suppose though that for a car that awesome it's worth the wait.