Pub Med, Part After

Where we last parted was inside the slightly sleazy, definitely dirty pub, where I was standing with all around fabulous W. and The Nice Guy trying to sort out the mess The Thwumf and I had left behind. When I started to seriously lose interest in a way that I was not able to control or conceal anymore, I took a trip to the bathroom to at least clear my head a little. To get to the bathrooms you have to walk to the back of the pub past the foosball table and down the stairs. When I came back up the stairs I heard English being spoken near the foosball table. I was intrigued but not so much so that I immediately took a detour there. I wanted to check what was happening with the group of people I was a part of for that night at least. W. and The Nice Guy were still talking about The Thwumf, which did nothing for me. So I stood around for about two seconds and then turned around and went back to the foosball table where I thought I had overheard some people speak English. And I wasn't wrong: three guys were standing next to the foosball table chatting in conversational though recognizably non-native English. I don't recall exactly how but I did start a conversation with the guys, probably something remarkably unremarkable like "Why are you guys speaking English are you from the US?". Two of them were, in fact, German, and the third one they said was actually able to understand and speak German but they were talking in English nonetheless. One of them, the chattiest one, immediately proceeded to inform me that they were physicists with academic career paths, himself having already finished his doctorate and pursuing a post-doctorate at the moment, and the other two being a few years his juniors and working on their respective doctorates still. I exchanged a few interested but rather polite sentences with him when the other German of the bunch suddenly jumped in and said something about me being after their money and since they were academics there wasn't any to be after just so that I knew. He wasn't quite as elaborate as that. He was much more on point. I was dumbstruck and couldn't quite come up with an adequate response. I think I just asked why in the world he would think I was after their money (I mean, this was a sleazy pub in Kreuzberg, nobody there seemed to be rich in the strictest sense of the word, and I was still myself, so not really the ideal pre-requisites for me turning into a gold-digger). He said something about me asking about their degrees and appearantly, that is all it takes for a guy to think a woman is after his money: her asking about his academic degree. Never mind the fact that a Ph.D. is by no means a guarantee for a money-machine, quite the opposite, acutally. And never mind the fact that even a medical degree or a law degree or any of the traditionally well-paid degrees does not have the same ooomph anymore. And also never mind the fact that I did not ask about their degrees but that the huge Bavarian baritone offered them up himself quite readily.

To the other guy's credit he seemed appropriately embarrassed when I briefly explained the situation. I guess he did in fact mishear or misjudge the whole exchange. So all was well for about three seconds. Until the huge Bavarian post-doc physicist baritone asked me if I wanted to go have sex with him in the bathroom in the basement. I thought he was joking, albeit in a rather crude way, and good-naturedly replied something friendly but unmistakably negative. He seemed a little peeved and after a quick back-and-forth repeated his generous offer. I got noticeably more serious and replied in the negative again. At that point the other two left us and went to the bar. I was a little confused, must have looked it and also expressed this confusion and my beginning testiness at his insistence. He grew even more peeved, especially when I mentioned the fact that I did not think this funny and did not like being treated like a prostitute. To which his reply was: "I didn't offer you any money." There you go. I wasn't being treated like a prostitute, I was being treated like a daft prostitute who couldn't run her business because she was too busy giving it away for free to anybody who asked half-nicely.

After that I was on my way to the front of the pub to see about the rest of the birthday group when I passed the other two guys at the bar. I stopped briefly to tell them what a prick their friend was being, to which they didn't seem to know how to react and thus did nothing. Their huge, Bavarian friend, however, seemed to have had enough of this obnoxious, argumentative cunt and left. I have no idea how and when the other German who had mistaken me for a gold-digger left but very quickly and very suddenly I found myself alone with the blonde, blue-eyed, pretty 28-year-old Estonian. Boy, was he pretty. And blonde. And blue-eyed. And 28. Boy oh boy.