OK, I looked like a parrot.
Yellow.
Red.
Yellow, green and red.
From head to toe. Only my face suggested that I wasn’t fully parrot (human, as far as I could tell when I looked in the mirror this morning) – but even that was an unusually bright colour, a mixture of cold air and exertion.
Probably not the outfit you’d choose for a job interview, albeit an impromptu one. Still, it can’t have been too detrimental. I went in to get my skis waxed and came out as a ski instructor. From then on, my winter weekends would be spent on the beginners’ slopes, only an hour by train from Munich.
A few days later, I transform myself into something that more closely resembles a human: navy blue dress and glasses. There are two others in the classroom who also resemble humans. However, for some obscure reason, this species (homo sapiens) has come up with a complicated hierarchy that leaves me feeling lost. Do I call the intimidating head of the company ‘Mr Mustermann’ or – because he’s my student and I’m the teacher – do I call him by his first name? It’s even worse in the German language. What form of address do I use – the informal ‘du’ or the formal ‘Sie’?
My initial compromise is simple: I don’t use his name at all but expect him to know when I am addressing him. It’s not just a lesson in English, but also mind reading.
Eventually, when I have no choice but to address him by name, I err on the side of caution and it seems to be the right thing to do. This is a particularly traditional company. I may have shed my tropical feathers, but it’s still a game of imitation.
After the lesson, I transform myself again. This time, I retain my human form but morph from teacher into student. It’s the last Czech class of the semester and the previous day (on my birthday) we had an exam.
I put the cake onto the table.
‘Oh, this is wonderful!’ says my Czech teacher. ‘Shall we have tea and coffee too?’
Yesterday’s exam is forgotten. Instead, it is a lesson of superlatives.
Káva je dobrá.
Čaj je lepší.
Dort je nejlepší.
(The coffee is good.
The tea is better.
The cake is the best.)
We imitate the foreign sounds the teacher makes, learning to fly Czech-style.
I have to leave the lesson early to catch a train, but the destination couldn’t be more fitting: I’m going to the Czech Republic for a ski race. Needless to say, my bag contains a certain amount of brightly coloured clothing…
