Adventures in Bavaria or ... The Oil Pump

PxHere

A long, long time ago, in a country far away, I was a newly minted Master Sergeant in the United States Air Force assigned to NATO at Geilenkirchen AB in the Bundesrepublik Deutschland. Upon my ascension to this lofty station I was no longer fated to carry a rifle during NATO exercises, I had graduated to the Nuclear-Biological-Chemical Decontamination Team, or NBC team for short.

My job henceforth, during exercises and real world contingencies (i.e. all out war, nuclear combat toe to toe with the Rooskies), it would be my job, along with select other individuals, to decontaminate individuals and vehicles which had been exposed (or suspected to be exposed) to NBC contamination.

In order to perform said tasks, I would be required to go to a NATO school. So I was told.

"Where is the school?" I asked.

"It's in Oberammergau which is in ..."

"Ah, I know where Oberammergau is, Bavaria. It's the home of the Passion Play which is put on every ten years and has been since 1634."

"Okay, you know more about Oberammergau than I do," said Senior Master Sergeant Hayes. (A damned fine man, retired as a Chief Master Sergeant. One of the very few really good senior NCOs I met in my 24 year career.)

So after doing all of the necessary planning and paperwork, I loaded The Missus Herself and our kids into the Volkswagen Jetta and we set out for Bavaria.

Now you might be wondering at taking the family on a school assignment which was only a week long. Well, it was NATO. I'd be staying in a very nice apartment anyway, so why not bring the family? We found lodging for our cats Pat and Tiger, as I was told, "Sorry, no pets." I doubt they would have tolerated the trip anyway. Cats and automobiles not getting along all that well, especially for eight hours. One way.

The kids received scholastic dispensation for missing school for a week, "They will have to write a report about their trip," we were told, which for our scholarly inclined progeny wasn't a big deal. As The Nuke said (I think it was her), "Beats sitting in class all day."

Off we went. Discovered that the oil pump in my Jetta was on the cusp of dying, such fun, but we made it.

Now what sparked this reminiscence?

Whilst casting about for a topic to post about, usually I do this by looking at pictures, sometimes starting at PxHere (which has a lot of great photos free for use in a non-commercial setting, as the blog makes zero dollars, this qualifies). I entered the search term "weather" as it's been wet and cool here as of late and the photo above was presented.

I immediately remembered when we pulled up to our apartment building (which may or may not have been a Wehrmacht¹ barracks in the mid 1940s). As we were unloading the car I heard cow bells (no, it wasn't Don't Fear the Reaper by Blue Öyster Cult) in the distance. Looking up I saw a scene very similar to that in the picture.

Though it was a fairly clear day, there was mist in the hills and the wind was pushing it up the hillside. Much like in the photo.

The shining sun, the mist in the hills, and the cow bells ringing as some farmer was moving his herd, all combined to take my breath away. The area around Oberammergau is very beautiful as we discovered during our week there. The Missus Herself and the kids had more fun than I as NATO arranged bus trips for the families when the active duty types were in school. She took full advantage of those, even getting down to Austria. I did get a Thursday off where we took my ailing Jetta to see Neuschwanstein. That too was breathtaking, just because of the castle itself but because we also walked up the hill upon which the castle sits. They had horse carriages which would take you up, but The Missus Herself felt sorry for the horses. (She lost that feeling when we got to the top, "Damn it, we should've taken the horse cart!")

See that hill in the background of the next picture? The NATO school was near the base of that hill. Like I said, a beautiful place.

Leupoldstraße, Oberammergau, Germany
Looking in the direction of the NATO school
(Source)

Eventually, as all good things do, our trip ended and we had to return home. Along the way we had to call ADAC, the German equivalent of AAA (no, juvat, not anti-aircraft artillery) as my oil pump died. I had attempted to convince a number of German mechanics that my oil pump was failing, to no avail.

"Ah, you have not enough oil in your car!" said one.

"Ah, you have too much oil in your car!" cried another.

When I finally broke down (figuratively, the car would still run okay at slow speeds) and called ADAC, they sent a little old dude in an Audi to help. He was actually dressed in Lederhosen, which I thought cool. He listened to my plaintive tale and promptly said "Ölpumpe!"²

He directed us to the nearest Volkswagen garage (next town) which was getting ready to close and had absolutely no desire to help us. After demanding to use his phone, and being as ugly an American as I could be, the manager relented and let me call ADAC. Again. He acted like he wanted me to pay for the use of his phone. I just shook my head and berated him in front of his minions. My German was good enough in those days to do that.

Now I thought the guy was an Arschloch, apparently some of his employees agreed as I spotted a couple of grins during my lecture to him on the need to assist travelers in need and "where oh where" was that well-known and celebrated Bavarian Gemütlichkeit?³

I think he actually blushed when I said that.

Anyhoo, after a wait of several hours, during which we sat in our car in front of the garage, something I asked if it was okay to do and to which the manager almost said no, then thought better of it, a big van towing a trailer showed up to haul us back to Waldfeucht, our little town in Nordrhein-Westfalen.

Now on the trip back the German driver and his minion refused to listen to my directions on how to get to my house. We went on an hour long detour before the guy relented and turned to me, asking, "Now where is it do you live?"

Now home, safe and sound, the next day I went to the local Volkswagen place where they didn't believe me that my oil pump was bad. They had to take it out and test it. After about thirty minutes the mechanic returned, looking somewhat chagrined.

With an evil grin, I asked him, in German of course, what was wrong with my car.

"Ölpumpe." he said, rather sheepishly.

He didn't speak much English, I gathered, because he didn't even blink when I offered calmly and succinctly, "No shit, Sherlock."

Really, I should have been a diplomat, I am so good with people.

¹ The Wehrmacht was the German armed forces during WWII.

² Oil pump.

³ Gemütlichkeit is a German word used to convey the idea of a state or feeling of warmth, friendliness, and good cheer.