Our main Story right now is a soap stable: cheating spouses!
Power couples Bea & Ingo, and Lena & Marian have been planning to build a house together with Ben and Iva, only everything is going wrong and they're losing money fast. The fellas have resorted to stripping (actually not the first time they have done this), and the ladies have speculated on the Stock Market and flirted with phone sex. The final straw comes, though, when Ben pulls out of the build, and Marian admits that he's stolen money from his young adoptive son to make ends meet. Our power couples fight, Bea and Marian get drunk, and.... well, you can guess the rest.
Marian & Bea: whoops!
Bea in particular is racked by guilt and confesses to Ingo, but leaves Marian out of it (kind of under duress from Marian - the bastard!). Poor Bea has suffered the most with this. There's quite a beautiful scene after her confession where she accidentally destroys a gingerbread house (symbolism!!!) and has a bit of a cry to the tune of John Lennon's "Jealous Guy" whilst Ingo rampages in the street.
Is Bea's subconscious trying to tell her something?
Ingo does forgive her, but her suffering doesn't end there. Then come the creepy "shot on shiteo" sepia dreams where she is in hospital, no one is listening to her and there's a creepy animated stuffed monkey in the foreground. Could this have a wider meaning?
Yes, of course it does. She's pregnant! Always use protection, kids!
Vocab:
Wer? - Who?
jemanden vögeln - to shag, to fuck
betrunken - drunk (adjective)
sich an nichts erinnern - to not be able to remember anything
jemanden betrügen - to cheat on someone
sich streiten - to argue, to fight
etwas bereuen - to regret something
in die Kiste hüpfen/in die Kiste steigen - to jump/get into bed (with someone)
die Kiste - literally: a box/crate. Colloquially: bed, "the sack"
der Ausrutscher - a one-off, a slip-up
"bleib locker!" - "be/stay cool!"
die Klappe halten - to keep one's mouth/gob/trap shut
Jenny Steinkamp
In our other stories, Jenny Steinkamp is guilt-tripping her parents into speculating on their assets. After yet another failed marriage and a tequila-fuelled self-pity fest she's now playing the "you've always seen me as a failure" card to convince them to invest in her ideas. So she's now training until-recently paralysed Marie and promising the local press a Gold medal in the upcoming German Nationals. Under these conditions she's convinced a multi-millionaire (who's conveniently currently in the area) to invest in rebuilding the Steinkamp centre's ice rink. She also has aspirations to hold the Nationals there, despite a venue already having been decided upon, but the German Nationals' representative might be interested in more than just her business proposal...
a lot now rests on Marie's shoulders...
Vocab:
allein(e) - alone
der Neuanfang - new start
die Eishalle - ice rink
glücklich sein - to be happy
das Sorgenkind - problem child
der Rückbau - revitalisation (building)
Sylvie: now featuring in Christoph's nightmares
Christoph is still struggling with having seen ex-wife Sylvie shoot herself in the head. He's been on a bit of an adrenaline bender whilst his fiancé Vanessa's been away. The usual: bought a motorbike, did some speeding, got license confiscated, ran a red light without said license, learnt to hold his breath under water for 3 minutes....
OK, so the last one there lost me a little.
Christoph & Vanessa at the crime scene
Vocab:
die rote Ampel - red light
professionelle Hilfe - professional help
zu schnell - too fast
der Tod - death
der Führerschein - driving license
sich zum Affen machen - to make a fool of oneself
der Affe - monkey
der Verräter - snitch, traitor
zurechnungsfähig - sane
Thomas: idiot!
His best friend Thomas has been trying, but failing to keep him on the straight and narrow. Thomas has been a bit preoccupied of late though, trying to assert his masculinity against aforementioned multi-millionaire and love rival Pacheluber for the not-so-fair hand of the manipulative Isabelle. He split up with Isabelle for cheating on him with his own son and lying about having lost her baby during the resulting argument. But now he wants her back.
Isabelle: liar!
The "who can cycle the fastest" competition as the Steinkamp gym was astoundingly subtle, and jumping into bed with town bike, Brigitte Schnell was also a great plan to win the "lovely" Isabelle back.
He's a doctor and should be intelligent enough to know better!
Vocab
provozieren - to provoke
ignorieren - to ignore
der Blumenstrauß - bunch of flowers
sich untersuchen lassen - to get a check-up (there may have been a slight innuendo here)
