Our morning walks to Kita were long, with foot dragging and bakery bribes, and we were often the last to arrive. One day, a sign went up on the noticeboard that I sensed was addressed directly to me and was not – despite the lavish application of love hearts and flowery lettering – altogether friendly. 

 

 

I took a photo of it on my phone and then went home to translate it. 

 

 

The next day we were, as usual, running late. Unable to face the sign, I gave Rafa a day off and we went to the Zoo, where we saw white wolves and snowdrops, or Schneeglockchen, pushing through the carpet of brown oak leaves and veined ivy. Spring was getting closer; soon this first German winter would be over. In the playground the shadows were long, the trees covered in early white blossom. Rafa ordered me to watch his every move: scaling a wooden house with an orange rope, swinging along the monkey bars, bouncing on a black rubber trampoline, stepping along a green wall with cut outs for his feet. He looked back at me frequently with a smile, as if checking that I was still there. And then he drew a love heart in the grey playground sand and gazed up at me. 

A few days later, a new sign went up in the Kita. This one was handwritten in an extravagant pink pen, with an ominous flurry of exclamation marks dotted with hearts instead of circles. I approached it with trepidation and read it slowly, absorbing the key message. 

Shoes, for the street, are wonderful. In the group room, no, was the jist of it. Along with the last line: they don't belong here. The Sie, in this final sentence, meant they, but it could also mean she. And I knew, without a doubt, that it had been pinned up with me, the witless Mutter von Australien and her muddy boots in mind. The staff member und die Kinder were its signatories. My face, already hot in the overheated fug of the hallway, flushed even more. Of course, I should have known not to walk into the kids' room with my boots on. But why didn't she just tell me, weeks ago? 

Another Monday morning. Weak, cold sun and, for the first time in months, birdsong. 

‘Rafa! I said. ‘The birds are back. Telling each other about their holidays.'

We rang the doorbell to the Kita and arrived in the dressing room on time, with lots of other kids struggling out of their boots and mittens and putting on their house shoes. Down the hallway wafted the smell of lunch cooking, a mix of soupy vegetables and stewed meat, and on the noticeboard was a brand new sign. After a steady, deep inhalation, as I'd been taught in a long-ago mindfulness class, I approached it. 

 

 

I felt a strange mix of emotions when I read this note. A quiet pride, because I could read and understand every word, and didn't need to photograph the note and translate it back at home. But also a familiar dread. Of course, I thought. Of course it would be the sodding Nit Note that transcended cultural and geographical borders. And I really didn't need to be dealing with Lauser on top of everything else. 

 

For a moment, remembering former nit infestations in Australia, I panicked. Had we unknowingly imported Australian nits, which had mated with their German counterparts and created a super-resistant Uber-Nit? But these nits could not be pinned on me. We'd been here too long. And the kids hadn't been scratching their heads. So I relaxed, and carried the phrase home with me, repeating it to myself through the day.

 

 

My first full German sentence.