GERMAN LOOKING FOR ROOM WITH SHOWER

or alternatively, world domination through blitzkrieg

That is what I saw written on a notice board, a German was looking for a room with shower, and some witty person had written that underneath. At first, I found it so funny, even hilarious and laughed to my heart's content. Then, I thought of the poor German, who was looking for a room. He had put that sign up, and now some person just had to remind him of a past that he really had no hand in...wasn't that funny and witty sentence racist? What if the German was actually a Jew whose grand-parents had all died at concentration camps? What if it was a runaway 19 year old that was in a sensitive situation right now and just needs a damn room....

Well, to get my mind off that notice and the sentence written under it, I wrote this story instead...ehhhh, in a seminar...could not stop thinking of that notice and that sentence underneath...and it still cracks me up...and then I feel bad...



The German
I walked by Janet's desk, she was her usual bubbly self, but today she seemed more bubbly than usual if that was possible. I hated her before I got to her desk. I hated her before she told me why she was so happy, extra smiley, and extra bubbly. Her desk had the usual assortment, fresh flowers, pictures of her family, a box of candy and a small teddy bear. Did she not know that she was over thirty? Had that memo somehow missed her at some point in her life? She was reading the letter out to the other airheads who had nothing better to do on a Tuesday afternoon than listen to her pathetic stories....

"Hey Laura! Have you heard?"

What could I possibly hear? What could be so important in life for me to stop half way on my journey to my cigarettes? There is nothing, nothing that could possibly come between me and my cigarettes...

"The German wrote Janet a letter"

I stopped.

"What? Is that what she is reading?"

"Aha! So now you are interested, come on, Betty is just about to read it out loud"

I walked to her desk where the giggles were already getting to that infectious stage...when women begin to hold hands and play with each other's hair...

"Come Laura, sit here, beside me"

"I don't get it, why are you reading his letter out loud? Should it not be private?" I looked around, for some sort of solidarity.

"Private? Since when?" snorted that ugly cow, Beatrice.

"Is there nobody here who thinks this is just a little bit childish?" I looked at Vivian, she was almost fifty, she might have some sense...

"Not when it comes these freaking idiots in this office, please read it!"

And so, Betty opened the letter sent to Janet by the German and began to read in the most irritating accent possible, a mixture of French and Dutch...a most terrible sound...

My dear Janet,

I have thought about writing this letter a thousand times, every time I have passed by your desk, I have thought of this letter. I can no longer hide my feelings from you, so I can only hope that you read this letter with....

I stood up from the desk, I felt disgusted with everything and everybody...


"Where are you going ja? You don't want to listen Ja?" asked Betty in the accent that now seemed to have turned Russian

"It is pathetic"

I walked out into the cold, where Hans stood, smoking a cigarette. He was the German, transferred from Berlin over a year ago. He was tall, had blonde hair and blue eyes and I had slept with him the week before...

"You did not return my calls"

"I have been too busy"

"You did not even send a text"

"You know how busy I have been, I was going to do so"

"When?"

He looked at me with irritation, and took a last drag out of his cigarette before tossing it expertly at the ashtray.

"I was going to call you today...anyway, we need to talk...I do not want any relationship now anyway...I need to get settled in England properly and you are complicating things now...I do not need any complications now that everything is going so well"

"Okay, see you around then"

I walked back to the desk of giggling girls

"Hey Laura, can you believe that German actually thinks he has a shot with her?" That was the cow, again.

"His name is Hans you know, he has a name"

"He is such a loser, don't you agree?"

"Wholeheartedly"