Germans at mealtime

One other thing I forgot to mention - Germans have what seems to me to be an odd eating schedule. They eat a small breakfast, a GIANT lunch, and a small dinner. When I say a giant lunch, I'm not kidding - I am generally incapable of putting away as much food in one sitting as they consume at lunch. One time we decided to get pizza for lunch, and each person ate an entire pizza - an entire pizza! I ate my pizza along with everyone else, then tried to fight the oncoming coma.
Also, apparently they can drink a lot more than I can, as evidenced by my still lack of ability to function, two days later, after the holiday party. The funny part is, everyone kept talking about how the night ended really early this time (I left at midnight and I was definitely in the first third of people to leave). They blamed it on the poor drinking planning - the party committee kept shoving alcohol down our throats, so that the pattern went: gluehwein, beer, schnapps, beer, champagne, wine, schnapps, beer, stumble home (well, that was my pattern anyway). Simply a recipe for disaster if you ask me (and it would also explain my having the worst hangover I've had in years, from which I am still not recovered). I did, however, have a great time and spent a lot of time talking to one of the facilities guys, who speaks only slightly more English than my German. A lot of time this is the foreign guy version of the one-night-stand; you meet up with him the next day and wonder how on earth you communicated at all; it's not like you regret it or anything, but it's not something you would normally do, and it's a little awkward the next day trying to make small talk. I guess the inhibitions that alcohol removes include shyness about trying to speak another language.