Mishmash of cultural observations

I am just going to write some quick observances because of time demands, but they are:

• Germany beat Costa Rica on Friday 4-2 in the opening World Cup match. World Cup fever has seized Germany like it has most countries in the world. Every city and town and village as far as I know has set up a huge TV screen in a prominent public place for people to watch the entire World Cup series, Schwäbisch Gmünd included. Here, it was initially in the Munsterplatz and now has been moved to the Rathaus. The area is always packed and on Friday especially the crowd was raucous and celebatory.
• Every time we go to a restaurant in and around Gmünd there are always Americans present. This surprises me immensely. I had no idea that I would find so many Americans around here. Gmünd is a tiny town of 60,000 people, who would have thought there would be so many Americans around. Americans were even in small, very out of the way places. Is this a sign that Americans are into good food, that they work at places that give them the income to afford dining out, are they traveling through small German towns, who knows, more to come!
• Today was my first day teaching Business English. I was placed at Ernst & Young, instructing a Lawyer who has signed up for a four week, eight hour a day crash course. She turned out to be from Aalen, which is right down the road from Gmünd, and quite pleasant. She had very interesting observations to make about differences between America and Germany which I will have to elaborate on later. She also had interesting opinions about the Schwäbisch people and culture and about Ernst & Young, how it was comprised of old Arthur Andersen people and old E & Y people and the effects Enron had on the company.

That's it, then. More later.