Deutsche Abenteuer

German Summer Fashion Trends

2010-07-03T15:50:00.000-07:00

Socks with sandals (a classic)
Harem pants with a 30" inseam
Forgetting to put on pants/shorts/skirt and just wearing a button-down shirt
Manpris
Not wearing shoes on public transportation
Dressing in all one color (white shirt & pants, brown tank top & skirt...)
Dogs

Pictures describe castles better than words

2010-07-02T09:57:00.000-07:00

A couple weeks ago, my friend Julia and I rented a car and took a road trip up the Rhein to see some castles and visit one of my friends in Bad Godesberg. It was amazing and definitely one of the best weekends I've had here yet. We drove on the Autobahn - most places actually do have a speed limit, but it's about 80 mph, and in the few places that don't have speed limits people go faster than 90 - climbed up lots of stairs and hills, saw suits of armor, ate Apfelstrudel, rode a ferry (in our car) across the Rhein, ran around the ruins of Rheinfels, bought souvenir bottles of Rhein wine, sang along to Justin Bieber on the road (uh I mean what?), pretended to be princesses and planned our weddings in the rose garden at Rheinstein, drove through countless little towns with blind corners and two-way streets wide enough for one car, learned how gas stations in Germany work (jk, only Julia did that), took tours of castles in German and were excited that we could understand everything, mostly avoided hordes of tourists, and made it home in one piece. All in all it was a very exciting weekend.

Burg Eltz

Marksburg

St. Goar/Loreley

Loreley Statue
The previously-mentioned Apfelstrudel
Adorable resturant in which Apfelstrudel was eaten (outside pictured below)

Rheinfels (castle ruins!)
Note: it would be awesome to come here as a 13-year-old boy with a sword/nerf guns and friends with swords/nerf guns. There were so many fun secret passages to explore and things to climb!

Rheinstein
It had a drawbridge!!! And one of those gates, just like in the Disney Robin Hood movie!
The sky was like 6 different shades of blue on the way home, and it was really cool.
Our trusty car!

So, yeah. If you are ever in Germany, do this trip!

'54, '74, '90, 2010!

2010-06-15T04:59:00.000-07:00

Until this week, I'd seen maybe one professional soccer game in my life. Then the Weltmeisterschaft (WM / World Cup) started, and it's such a big huge deal here that it's like all I've done all week. Every bar in town has put up TVs so that people can watch the games, and the big grassy field across the street from the train station has been turned into a "WM-Park" - there lots of large picnic tables, semi-permanent stands selling beer and wurst, and a HUGE screen at the front of the park so that everyone can see the game, even from hundreds of feet away.

This picture is Germany in a nutshell.

I went there to watch the US-England game on Saturday, and it was pretty cool, but there weren't many people there because it was a game early in the tournament that didn't involve Germany. On Sunday I went to the Irish pub in town to watch the Germany-Australia game, which Germany ended up winning 4-0, and it was absolutely CRAZY. Everyone was all decked out in German flags, colors, and facepaint, and after the game the town just went nuts. The Neckarbrücke, one of the only bridges over the river, was so packed full of people celebrating that no traffic could get through, so I couldn't get a bus home for a long time. People were running up and down the main street waving German flags, and other people were driving up and down this same main street honking their horns, singing, and just generally partying for over an hour after the game ended. And that was only Germany's first game, in the preliminary round! I'm really excited that I'm here this month, because it's cool to see how things go down in a country that actually cares about soccer and has a decent team. Relatedly, I've been hearing this song a lot lately. It's basically about how Germany is going to win the WM.

Other than soccer craziness, nothing unusual is really happening here. One fun thing I did recently was go to the annual Stocherkahn race in the Neckar, and even though it was rainy and gross that day, there were still a ton of people there and it was a lot of fun. Stocherkahns are these boats that are kind of like canoe-gondola hybrids; most dorms in town have them, and on sunny weekend days there are always a lot of people relaxing on them, drifting down the river. Pictured below are two of the boats from the day of the race and what the finish line looked like.

So yeah, that was pretty neat!

Because I like organizing my thoughts in list form, here are some lists I have thought of that relate to me being here in Germany.

Things that I have tried to explain to Germans, but I don't think they really got it:
Marching band/drumline
Big Ten football
saltine crackers
chili

Nights that were fantastically memorable, even though I didn't really do anything special:
Grilling with my roommates and then allowing myself to be convinced to come out with a few of them, which turned out to be a great choice because it was "Rock Night" at the bar we went to, and not many things are better than German boys singing and dancing to "Barbara Ann" by the Beach Boys

Things that are going to kill me when I come home:
4 classes + NUMB + SAI at Northwestern
open container laws

Now I'm going to go take a nap, because last night I stayed up too late writing a paper that I should have started before midnight, and I had to wake up for class earlier this morning.

2010-05-29T09:51:00.000-07:00

Well, hey there. Sorry about another monthlong hiatus... I promise I have a good reason this time! I can now say I've experienced the health care system in Germany pretty thoroughly - I had mono this month, so I was pretty out of commission for the past 3 weeks. But they know me real well at the doctor's office and the local apothekes now. I would also like to say that German health care is awesome. Back when my doctor thought I had strep and prescribed me antibiotics, they only cost 5 euros. And although I went to this doctor like 6 times in the span of 2 weeks and had blood tests done twice, and ended up at the ER one Sunday night when everything else was closed, I never paid for any of it. Wooo socialized medicine! When it got bad enough that I couldn't make food for myself or even really get out of bed, my dad came over and took care of me (he just left 2 days ago), so that was AWESOME and helped a lot. Thanks daddy! :)

So, as far as things I've been doing this month, there haven't been tooo many... before my dad left I was feeling good enough to get out of my room for a while, so we took a day trip to Rothenburg ob der Tauber in Bayern, and that was really fun and super cute. Rothenburg is very, very medievally German, and also quite touristy. It's not high season yet, though, so we didn't have to deal with the 'hordes' of tourists that Rick Steves warned us about. Apparently they have both a traditional Christmas market during both Christmastime and in July, for those who can't handle rural Germany in the winter. I'm sure it must be a mess. But anyway, what we saw was pretty cool. The entirety of the old part of the city is surrounded by a wall, and they let you walk on top of parts of it, which gives a great view of some of the houses and old buildings. All the houses are SO cute and SO German - half-timbered, pastel colored, flowerboxes in every window, ivy creeping along the corners and also through some now structurally unsound walls. It was great.

You don't get more cute and German than this.

We had dinner in a restaurant directly off of the Marktplatz, a tourist-oriented place specializing in Fränkisch and Bavarian food. It was tasty - I had a deliciously manly meal of fried potatoes and a pork steak in bacon-onion-beer sauce. But please, please, don't ever be like the people who were sitting at the table next to us. Topics of their very overhearable conversation ranged from overpopulation of deer, to bringing their dogs with them on their next vacation, to whether they were in Bayern (yes), whether the Schwäbisch region is a state (no), and whether Baden-Württemberg is a state or a cultural region (the former). I also learned from them that Bayern is the German equivalent of Texas. I think what bothered me most is that the 'leader' of this small group did speak some German and was talking about the country as if he was an expert on it, yet didn't really seem to know anything. So I guess they could have been way worse... I just don't like people who are simultaneously arrogant and ignorant.

Other than that day trip, I've pretty much spent the past week eating ice cream, sitting outside in various cafes, and procrastinating on doing anything remotely productive for school. There were no classes this week because of Pentecost - guess a lack of separation of church and state isn't ALWAYS bad. It's interesting that there are so many national religious holidays here (we got a day off in May for Ascension, and classes are canceled again next Thursday for Corpus Christi), because everyone here is wayyy less religious than at home. Baden-Württemberg is even supposed to be the most religious region of Germany, but it's really not that visible.

As long as I'm talking about differences between Germany and home, here's another big one I've noticed in the time I've been over here: personal responsibility. Here, you and only you determine how your life goes. It ranges from little things, like the lack of screens on windows that fully open, to preparing yourself for university exams. You're stupid enough to lean over too far out that open window? That's your problem, buddy. You fail a final? You haven't learned enough yet, so you'll move on when you personally are ready, and retake the class. I'm not 100% informed on how the legal system works here, but I get the feeling that lawsuits must be much less common here, because there are no warning labels on the coffee cups that the beverage you are about to enjoy may be extremely hot. I like it, because it makes me feel like the Powers That Be don't assume that everyone in the country is stupid and lawsuit-ready. That's why there's no speed limit on the Autobahn - you drive as fast as you can handle, and don't be stupid about it. Within my dorm, it's the same thing - the kitchen is shared between 14 people, so everyone's expected to do their dishes right away and clean up the stove after cooking. There are rules like that for probably every shared kitchen everywhere, but here, it actually works.

Speaking of being responsible for yourself, I'm hungry, which means I gotta go make some dinner!

Go 'Cats,
Christina

2010-04-27T14:03:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone! Sorry I've been bad at writing about my life this month. I've been busy doing daily life boring things, which means that even when I do have time to write, I don't feel like I really have anything to talk about. This social psychology reading I'm supposed to be doing right now is not the most interesting, though (sample sentence: "Notably, the selective accessibility consequences of comparisons are faily ubiquitous and robust and have been demonstrated to result from different types of comparison." The whole chapter is just the author being stupidly full of himself.), so in this case blog wins out.

So, the month of April... what did I do?
-Dad came to Freiburg for a conference during my break, so I visited him for a few days (and went to the baths in Bad Krozingen while I was waiting for his train from Prague to get in!). It was cool to go back to Freiburg and try to remember where everything was, see the wurst guys in the Münsterplatz, and get a delicious vegetarische Yufka from my favorite Döner place in town. It would have been better if I hadn't been feeling sick and ended up taking a 3-hour nap in his hotel room for an afternoon, but sometimes life is just lifey like that. At the end of the week, he visited me in Tübingen for a day and we did all sorts of exciting things like eating lunch, ice cream, and dinner! Then this volcano blew piles and piles of ash into the air and he was stuck in Europe til the following Tuesday.

-Classes started 2 weeks ago, which means that at this point I have been to most of them once or twice now, because they only meet once a week. I'm taking a speech/language development seminar (here, seminars are smaller, discussion-heavy classes for people of a particular major) which has a 3-page essay due every week but is still awesome, a social information processing seminar which is less awesome, an evolutionary ethics lecture, and a lecture about European history 1050-1200. I can more or less understand everything that goes on, except in the history class, because the professor talks into his podium and is boring.

- Every so often, some of the people from my language program last month get together and cook dinner at one person's apartment. A couple weeks ago I had everyone over here, and we made chicken curry with rice and then had Belgian chocolate fondue for dessert. I don't think I'm ever going to leave Europe.

- I've been watching unnecessary amounts of Veronica Mars. But it's so good, and every episode is a cliffhanger... what else can I do?

- I went to the German equivalent of a frat party a few weeks ago, which is more like going to a club in someone's house as opposed to an American frat party. You had to buy a ticket to get in (7 euro, but my roommate gave me a free one), buy a 10 euro card to be able to get drinks, and pay for drinks at different bars they had set up in the house. These things are a much bigger deal here and need lots more preparation, apparently - all the walls of the house were covered in black tarp (to prevent damage, presumably), and they had a coat check, security, and a real DJ. It was pretty fun, but I'm glad I didn't have to pay to get in, or else it would have been a rather expensive evening.

- I finally gathered everything I needed for the "get the people at the Bürgeramt to give you a visa" scavenger hunt and gave it to them today, so I should be legal to stay here until August soon!

- Everyone from Northwestern who has been here since September is back from break now, so I've been hanging out with them a little bit since then. It's so good to see familiar faces! One of the girls, Julia, and I have made like 800 plans for the summer, including but not limited to: going to Heidelberg, Munich, the Rhein region, going on a bike adventure or hike and picnic in the forest behind my building, having pancakes and watching Mad Men on a Sunday morning, her giving me a culinary tour of Tübingen, and finding the cheapest place to buy a Longchamp purse (since they are substantially less expensive here). Hopefully we will be successful in all of our endeavors!

I think that's about all my attention span can handle right now. In summary, I am still alive and still having tons of fun in Germany!

Go 'Cats.

Frohe Ostern, or, Germans Are Really Nice!

2010-04-04T09:52:00.001-07:00

Happy Easter, everybody! I hope you bit the head off of a delicious chocolate rabbit this morning. I personally did not, but I did have a Kinder Egg, which was almost the same.

I went to church this morning with my friend Philip from my German class. I didn't like the service so much (it was one of those song lyrics projected on a screen/we have a drumset churches), but the people were really amazingly nice. We stayed for probably an hour after the service just talking to everyone, and they were super friendly and were excited that we could speak German so well. Some people even invited us to have lunch with them, so we did - free food is always good!

After I got home, I found two notes on my door - one that I have cleaning duty this week (woohoo!) and that I should ask the girl next door if I have any questions, and the other saying that I should follow the trail of arrows and golden eggs starting at my door to find an Easter surprise! It led to the kitchen, where there was a basket of eggs on the table, each of them decorated like a person on the floor. Super cute! Then I had pancakes with my roommates, who were in the kitchen when I found my egg, and actually had a conversation with them for I think the first time ever. I was never really around my dorm this past month because of my German class, so I never really got to talk to anyone, especially because it's break and most people are gone. It was really good to talk to them today though - they're really nice! We went on a walk after that, and saw lots of neat things, like a double rainbow (worth being poured on for the 10 minutes beforehand) and squirrels (apparently they are not common here) and a 6-inch long slug (one girl said this sort can grow to be 1 meter long? ewwwww).

Later we're gonna watch Matrix: Reloaded cause it's on TV - happy Easter?

So this holiday has been somewhat untraditional, but fun nonetheless.

Also, I just want to say that German children are adorable, and I might have to find one and bring it home as a souvenir. (this statement prompted by how many there were at church this morning)

Saturday Morning German Lessons

2010-03-27T04:12:00.000-07:00

Instead of talking about what I've been up to these days, the main point of this post is to teach you all some things I have been learning! This lesson will include Schwäbisch vocabulary, phrases, and some songs.

Schwäbisch words:

Däddääle - someone unhelpful and squeamish
Giftnudel - an angry woman (literal translation: poisonous noodle)
Schnookehuschter - someone who is afraid of everything

Other German words:

das Techtelmechtel - small love affair - like a fling
das Blablabla - empty/meaningless words
das Wischiwaschi - someone who can't decide what they want
der Schickimicki - someone who is really trendy, to the point of they look like they are trying too hard
der Schnickschnack - knick-knacks
etepetete - OCD about attention to detail; pedantic
der Krimskrams - clutter
der Hickhack - a discussion that could turn into an argument, but isn't yet

Ways to say that you are drunk: (seriously, we learned this in class one day)
betrunken, blau, besoffen, breit, abgestürzt, berauscht

Idioms:

du gehst mir auf den Keks - you get on my nerves ("you walk on my crackers")
das ist kalter Kaffee - no one is interested in that anymore; it's old news ("that's cold coffee")
es geht um die Wurst - to do with an important decision ("it's about the wurst")
das ist mir Wurst - I don't care ("to me, it's wurst")
das ist nicht dein Bier - that's none of your business ("that's not your beer")
dir muss man ja alle Würmer aus der Nase ziehen - said to someone who only answers the question he's asked and doesn't provide any additional information ("one has to pull all of the worms out of your nose")
ich geh auf dem Zahnfleisch - I'm exhausted ("I'm going on the meat of my teeth")
ich hab viel um die Ohren - I have lots to do ("I have a lot around my ears")
da hat er aber Schwein gehabt - he was lucky ("he had a pig")
blau machen - to skip school or work ("to make blue")
die Hosen anhaben - to have power in a relationship (literally "to wear the pants")
einen Clown gefrühstückt haben - to make terrible jokes ("to have eaten a clown for breakfast")
im gleichen Boot sitzen - to have the same problem as someone else ("to sit in the same boat")
nicht alle Tassen im Schrank haben - to be a little crazy ("doesn't have all the cups in the cupboard")
seinen Senf dazugeben - someone who always has to say their own comment about a situation ("his mustard has to be there")

Zungenbrecher (tongue twisters! also did this in class one day):]

Wenn viele Fliegen hinter vielen Fliegen fliegen, fliegen viele Fliegen vielen fliegen nach.
Russische Russen rutschen rutschend russische Rutschen russisch runter.
Zwanzig Zwerge ziegen Handstand, zehn im Wandschrank, zehn am Sandstrand.
In Ulm, um Ulm, und um Ulm herum.
Zwischen zwei Zwetschgenzwiegen sitzen zwei zechenschwarze tschechisch zwitschernde Zwergschwalben.
Im dichten Fichtendickicht sind dicke Fichten wichtig.
Schnecken erschrecken, wenn Schnecken an Schnecken schlecken, weil zum Schrecken vieler Schnecken, Schnecken nicht Schmecken.

And finally, some songs!
http://www.youtube.com/watch#!v=xr1y7J_x-Oc&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93bjNi8qIf0

Döners and Sunday Markets

2010-03-21T13:28:00.000-07:00

If you ever come visit me in Germany, here are some things I miss and would very much like to have:
Anything spicy, because that sort of food does not exist here (at least, not very frequently)
Popcorn
Macaroni & cheese
Beef jerky

On a related note, if you are ever in Germany, here is a list of food you need to eat:
Spätzle
Schnitzel (any sort)
Bratkartoffeln
Weißwurst (with a Hefeweizen and a Brezel, of course)
Maultaschen (specific to the southwest)
Ice cream (especially in the spring/summer)
Pommes with mayo
Döner and/or Yufka

As you may have noticed, Döner is very much not a German word. It is also not a German food - it's Turkish! There are imbiss (fast food) cafes EVERYWHERE in Germany, and what they mostly sell are Döners and variations of them. What is a Döner, you ask? Basically, it is pita-like bread filled with awesomeness. In this case 'awesomeness' means meat, lettuce, cabbage (we are in Germany, after all), something like tzatziki sauce, and tomatoes. It's a little bit like gyros, only with more options for what you can put on it. And every Monday, they are €1.50 at the restaurant by the train station. Last Monday, about 20 of us from my language program went to this restaurant and overwhelmed them a little, since it is a pretty small place with only 2 tables. It was a nice evening, though, so we ate outside and all was well. Hopefully people will want to go again tomorrow, because it is super tasty and cheap! There's also a bar that has karaoke every Monday, which we went to last week as well (highlight: 4 of my male friends singing Poker Face). Monday nights around here are pretty awesome.

On Thursday after class I went for a walk/run in the area where my dorm is, and did a neat bit of exploring. As it turns out, my dorm is about 20 feet from a farm - like legit plowed fields and everything. This farm is a cool farm, because there is a paved path going through it between the fields, and people can walk or ride bikes or horses (definitely saw that) along it. It must be about a mile and a half in perimeter, because it took me about 25 minutes to go through the whole thing. There were other path options that looked like they headed further towards the forest behind the farm, so maybe one nice summer day I will explore those paths as well.

Today was also pretty awesome, because 1) Sundays = no class, thus 2) I have time to 2a) sleep in and 2b) cook a good lunch. Yay! And this Sunday was especially cool, because in the Altstadt was the annual Frühjahrsmarkt! What that means is that there a jillion little market stalls not only in the Marktplatz (like every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday), but also through several other streets and alleys. When I got off the bus near the area where the market was I could even smell that something was different today, because so many people were selling and cooking sweet things on the spot that the air smelled like sugar and candy. The other market stalls sold things like soap, candles, honey, cheese, olives, wurst, wooden toys, traditional Schwäbisch food, bread, and tons of plants and flowers. What was really out of the ordinary about today was that the regular stores in the Altstadt were allowed to be open too - on Sundays, normally everything is closed. There are only 3 Sundays out of the year where normal stores can be open, and this was one of them! So that was pretty cool, too. It definitely made my Sunday a lot less boring! I bought some flowers for my room, a Zuckerhase (rabbit made of melted/caramelized sugar that is then poured into a mold - did they mention how much they love Easter here?), some goat cheese, and candied almonds. Germany is delicious.

Blaubeuren

2010-03-12T08:25:00.000-08:00

I just got back today from a week in Blaubeuren (well, 5 days - we went there on Sunday). Nothing super exciting happened, but I felt like I should write something anyway because I have been away from the outside world for so long that I don't want to forget how to talk to people.

Blaubeuren is a little town about an hour away from Tübingen, on (in?) the Schwäbische Alb (Swabian Highlands). It has about 4,000 people, I think. On the first day we got there we had to do a 'Stadtspiel', where we were given a list of questions about Blaubeuren (who is the most famous athlete from Blaubeuren, what is the Blautopf, who is the schöne Lau, etc.), and we had to go into town in teams of 4 and ask people on the street or in shops/cafes/etc if they could help us answer the questions. It was actually pretty fun, and I understood most of what everyone said, except for an old man who had a really heavy Schwäbisch accent.

(Answers: I forget his name, but the athlete from Blaubeuren won the 5000 m race in some Olympics in the 90s; the Blautopf is a spring behind the old cloister that is really pretty and blue; and the schöne Lau is a character in a fairy tale who was imprisoned in the Blautopf because she was so sad because couldn't have children and she will only be let go when she laughs wholeheartedly 5 times)

In Blaubeuren we sort of kept our normal schedule - class from 9-12:30 every day, lunch, and tutorium in the afternoons. We also had group theater projects (I played the role of Oma in a skit about a Schwäbisch family trying to decide what to watch on tv on a Saturday night), and every night there was a German film we could watch.

Before I say more about the adventures we had, I would just like to say that the food in Blaubeuren was AMAZING. We stayed at the Heinrich-Fabri-Institut, which is owned by the Uni Tübingen and seminar classes and programs like mine go there for retreats and stuff. There are 2 buildings of bedrooms and then one building where the classrooms and dining hall are. And the food in this dining hall was fabulous. Every morning for breakfast there was lunchmeat, cheese, fresh bread, orange juice, cereal, and yogurt, and also NUTELLA, and for every lunch and dinner there was a great salad bar with really fresh vegetables and usually German potato salad. The meals we had were things like schnitzel, maultaschen, wurst with spätzle, frikadelles, and other delicious German things. Food-wise, I think southwest Germany is my favorite region.

So, anyway, back to the adventures - this is why I ate so much of said food.

On Tuesday, instead of tutorium (which, I don't think I've explained, is where the uni students who help with the program teach us useful things about living in Germany, like how to separate the trash and how young people talk to each other), we went on a hike to some (seemingly) nearby ruins. On this day, it was about -8 °C and had just snowed a few days before, so it still felt like winter. We picked up the trail from behind the Blautopf, and at first it was fine - kind of narrow, so we had to go single file, because if two people tried to walk next to each other one would have fallen off the trail down the side of the mountain, and kind of icy, but not too tough. Parts of it were really icy, but there were convenient trees to grab onto in order not to fall. At the top of this part, we crossed the road going up the mountain, and went on to the next. This trail was wider, and less icy, but instead a lot steeper. It reminded me of the hike I did to Festung Königstein because it was easy at first, but by the end (20 minutes later), we were all out of breath. Once the whole group got up there (I think there about 30 of us that went on this expedition), we continued walking through the (thankfully now flat) forest towards these ruins that we wanted to visit. There was lots of snow. I kept trying to keep the snow from sticking on my boots and thus making them wet, but eventually I just gave up. My boots are not waterproof. I wish they were. Suddenly the forest ended and there was a huge flat plain covered in about 2 feet of snow, and it was colder and windier than the lakefill in January. There was so much snow, in fact, that we couldn't tell where the trail went. There was a small town at the top of this mountain as well, so we weren't completely lost in the middle of nowhere, but it took us about 10 minutes and 3 wrong turns (through LOTS of snow) to finally find the way to the ruins, even though the guys leading our group had hiked this way before. Eventually, after more steep hills and then some stairs, we got to the ruins of an old castle that had been built in the 11th century, you know, nbd. There wasn't a whooole lot to see there, so we didn't stay very long... it was more about the journey than the destination :) We took a different way back that was more direct, but much steeper and more ice-covered. It was probably the hardest hike I have ever done - in some parts you had to go backwards down the hill because it was so steep and it was easier to find rocks that way, and there was one part that was so icy that I just put my hands down behind me and pushed my way down the ice using my feet as a sled-like thing. By the time we got back down to the bottom (ca. 3 hours after we had started) we were all slightly wet, either from sweat or non waterproof boots or both, freezing, and ready to go home. I think the best feeling of that day was when I got to my room, stripped off my wet clothes, and got into bed and watched tv for a half hour before dinner.

On Wednesday, after lecture we went into Ulm, which is about a 15 minute train ride from Blaubeuren. When we first got there it looked kind of icky and dirty around the train station, but the old part of the city by the Münster is really cute. Since our muscles weren't tired enough from the hike the day before, we decided it would be a great idea to go to the top of the Münster tower, which is a journey of 768 steps, which is a lot more than it sounded like. We couldn't even go to the top, only about halfway, because the top of the tower was too icy for them to clean off and let people in. That worked out okay... I don't think I would have made it. 400 steps is a lot, and 768 is a LOT more. After that we got Kaffee und Kuchen in a cafe, stayed there and talked for a while, and then I went shopping a little bit. I had found this shoestore that sells 'übergröße' shoes, Diechmann, online, and it said they had a location in Ulm. As it turns out, it was right in the center of town along with everything else, so I went there and found a pair of boots in my size!!! I am so excited because they are cute and look European and are comfortable and I can wear them with anything.

I'm really glad the program organized this trip, because it was a really good way to get to know the other students - since we live all over town, it is kind of hard to spontaneously hang out with new people, because everything has to be planned. Living together for a week was good, but now I am definitely happy to be back in Tübingen with my own room and the ability to do laundry and use the internet.

Paris, Tübingen, and everything in between

2010-03-06T03:19:00.000-08:00

Ohhhhh my gosh this week has been crazy ridiculous. I left Dresden last Thursday and met my mom in Paris that night (after crazy amounts of delays and missed connections and cancellations for both of us). Yay!

On Friday we did, um, everything. We got up at like 10 and went downstairs for breakfast, which was super delicious and super cute. Our hotel was built in like the 1700s or something so the basement/breakfast room had brick arches and a fireplace and no windows. The food included cheeses, fresh squeezed orange juice, lunchmeat, fruit, and the BEST baguettes and croissants I have ever had. and also delicious, delicious hot chocolate. After that we walked to Notre Dame, since it was like literally a couple blocks away, and looked at the outside for a while, and then looked at the inside, which was really pretty. They had a mass going on while we were there so we got to hear lots of religious French being spoken and also some things being sung.

After Notre Dame we took a water bus/taxi down the Seine to the Eiffel Tower. It was sunny mostly (except in the morning when it rained) but really, REALLY windy all day, like 20-30 mph Chicago style, so we didn't go up because it would have been windier and worse. So, we took the water taxi again and went to the Musee D'Orsay and looked at lots and lots of art. The impressionist wing was under construction so they had moved all the paintings to temporary halls and not everything was on display, but overall we got to see a lot... it was just a little disorganized. I decided that I really like impressionism and post-impressionism, especially compared to realism. We had lunch in a cafe there when we got there since it was like 3 pm, looked at art for a while, and then had coffee in a different cafe around 5.

Since we hadn't seen enough art yet we walked to the Louvre (this was around 6 pm - they are open late on fridays)! It was really empty (comparatively speaing) and we didn't have to wait or push through crowds or anything to see the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo. Then we walked through part of one floor of the egyptian collection, which was really cool, and then it had gotten kind of late so we decided we wanted to go home and get dinner. Going home proved to be a bit challenging since we couldn't find our way out of the museum - we tried to go based on the map instead of the signs pointing towards the exit, because the signs pointed towards the direction we had just come from and we didn't want to backtrack, but that was a poor choice. Eventually we found our way out. The outside of the Louvre is gorgeous at night, especially because if you look the other way you can see the Eiffel Tower!

For dinner, which we started around 9:30, we went to this restaurant about a block away from our hotel that my mom had gone to with her mom when they were here like 25 years ago. It was expensive, but there was SO MUCH FOOD it was definitely worth it. The first course was a basket of crudites, and I tried new foods like endive and cabbage (ok yes i have eaten cabbage before but not by itself and not that voluntarily), and they had delicious homemade dressing and bread. The next part was a buffet-style area that had all sorts of different kinds of dried sausages and things like corn, pasta salad, olives, other food I didn't recognize, pate, and I think duck confiture? It was all really delicious. I had never had pate or confiture before and now I think I am spoiled and will never be able to go home. That and the fact that a bottle of Evian is like 50 cents here. Anyway, I'm pretty sure that during this part of the meal I said something like "mm, this wine goes really well with the pate", because it did... never thought I'd hear those words come out of my mouth. After that we had a choice of steak, leg of lamb, some kind of lamb cutlet, or salmon. I got steak and my mom got lamb, which also came with a potato and more salad. After that the waiter brought us an assortment of fine French cheeses, followed by a basket of all kinds of fruit like pears and clementines and kiwis. Everything was really really fresh and ripe and delicious! Finally there was dessert, which was a choice of chocolate mousse, creme carmel, or creme anglais. Man, what a meal.

On Saturday, it was bright and sunny when we woke up so we decided to go to Versailles! It was ridiculous. Like, where did all this gold and money and art even come from? Like the museums on Friday, it was relatively uncrowded, so we could walk through at our own pace and actually see the rooms because they weren't jammed with people. After walking through the palace (ps, the hall of mirrors is completely worth all the hype), we went out back to the gardens. It was a little disappointing because since it's the middle of winter, nothing is really growing except for the evergreen bushes. But now I have an excuse to go back there! By this point in the day it had clouded up and gotten cold and windy so we decided to head back home. The Eiffel Tower was right on the way back to our hotel, so we stopped there and actually went up in it this time. It had gotten really windy so we just went up to the second floor instead of the top, which was perfectly fine. We were there at dusk so I got to see a bird's eye view of Paris in the daytime and at night! While we were up there we saw a guy who had just proposed to his girlfriend (like she was saying yes as we walked past) and it was super cute.

For dinner that night we went to a gourmet restaurant on our street. The food was good but I felt like it was a test of manners and wine knowledge more than a meal.

On Sunday, our train didn't leave for Germany until 3 pm, so in the morning and early afternoon we walked around Ile Saint-Louis (where our hotel was) and went into the cute little shops that lined the streets. We got onion soup and crepes for lunch, since we hadn't eaten any in Paris yet, and tasty gelato for dessert.

The trip back to Germany was interesting. All the flights out of Paris had been canceled due to REALLY windy crazy bad weather, so the train was jammed (luckily, we had seat reservations). We had to stop a few times to let bad weather pass, and later we found out that during Saturday and Sunday they had had the worst storm in 10 years - around 50 people died, and 900,000 people in France were left without power. The only way it really effected us was that it made our train an hour late, but it could have been a lot worse.

So. Now I'm in Tübingen! It's kind of weird but mostly nice to know that I'm FINALLY done moving around, until August when I come back home. The town is really cute and is exactly what you think a German town near the Black Forest would be like - lots of cobblestoney streets, little shops and cafes, and hills. My goodness are there hills. My dorm is on top of a hill on the northern edge of town and when I look out my window I can see pretty far. I am really excited that I'm going to be here during the summer because that means things like biergartens and outdoor cafes will be open, and near the university buildings there is a big huge park that I can definitely see myself hanging out in a lot.

I haven't met many students or even my floormates yet because right now the university is on break (classes run from October-February, break for March, and then start up again on April 12th and end in late July). The few people who are around that I've met have been nice, but it's hard to get to know anyone yet because we all have single rooms and I am almost never home. My German class (this time it's through the university so on top of teaching you German they also teach you about the town, young student culture, classes, etc.) goes from 9 am to 3:30 every day. There's a 1 1/2 hour break for lunch from 12:30-2 but I live so far away from where class is that I just eat lunch in the cafeteria here and then hang out til class starts again. After class I come to the library to use the internet because you can't get it in your room without a number and password, which you only get after you matriculate, and we all just turned in our papers yesterday, and it takes about a week. So, anyway, I use the internet here, then go grocery shopping, and so far this week I have met up with other students from my class after dinner for drinks or a movie or general hanging out. Last night we saw The Men Who Stare At Goats (or, auf Deutsch, Männer, die auf Ziegen Starren). It was good and I liked it but it was so weird that I couldn't follow all of the German, so I'm not 100% sure about some things that happened.

The kids in my program are mostly pretty cool. There are sort of 2 main groups of people that I hang out with - the rowdy Americans who just got here and so they want to go out and party all the time and I sometimes go with them when they invite me because they are entertaining; and the people that are more like me (i.e. laid-back and understanding of other cultures) that I would actually call up and do something with voluntarily. In that group there are a couple Americans, two girls from Denmark, a girl from Belgium, a couple guys from Brazil, and a girl from the Faroe Islands. They're a lot of fun and we all speak German pretty well so it's good practice to hang out with them.

Today I am going to IKEA to buy dishes and things to make my room look less depressing (right now it has empty white walls and a cold tile floor), so I gotta go do that and get some lunch before I go. Hopefully the snow won't have messed up the trains too much. They seem to be a lot better at clearing off streets and sidewalks here so it should be fine.

Bis bald!

Another week, another major European capital

2010-02-21T13:43:00.000-08:00

Seriously, I don't even know where this week went. I can't believe I've been in Dresden for 3 weeks already and that I only have 3 more days before I leave to go to Paris and then (finally) Tübingen.

So, what did I do this week?

Tuesday was neat! There was a Goethe-organized trip to Dr. Quendt's, which is a bakery/factory a little bit outside of town. They are well-known throughout this city for a lot of different baked goods, but outside of Dresden they are pretty much just famous for Russian bread (which is actually a type of cookie). The factory visit was fun; it was like watching Unwrapped but in real life. The best part (outside of the free cookies and tea/coffee) was the room where they put the almost-finished cookies into big spinners and spray them with chocolate. Mmm, chocolate spray.

Friday during class was like Christmas Eve, or the last day of school before summer break... class was sooo boring, and seemed to go on forever (though that is also kind of because I got a new teacher who is not as good as the one I used to have... she's nice, but very German...). When it was finally 1:00, I hurried home, ate lunch, and packed for Prague! We took an afternoon train out of Dresden and got to Prague just as it was getting dark. If there was ever a more confusing, twisty-turny wait-do-these-streets-even-have-names-where-are-all-the-signs city, I have yet to see it. That being said, all the little tiny pedestrian-only cobblestone alleys lined with shops and cafes were super cute, especially once we got out of the tourist-heavy areas.

We stayed at a hostel called Hostel Tyn, named for the Tyn Church in Old Town Square that is in front of it. It was a little old, but not run-down at all; everything was really clean and comfortable. Thankfully we were the only ones in our room, which was tiny, but in a charming instead of cramped way. I would definitely stay there again... it was cute and clean but at the same time didn't feel institutional like my room here in Dresden (which has white walls, white kitchen, white sheets, white radiators...) and was off the beaten path of touristiness.

The food in Prague was fantastic. It tasted like my Eastern European ancestry. Breakfast consisted of a ham and cheese croissant and a cappuccino (on both Saturday and Sunday mornings - we went back to the same place because it was delicious and cheap). In Old Town Square there were a lot of street vendors, mostly for the tourists so it was a bit overpriced, but today I caved and bought a sweet dough thing that I don't remember the name of because Czech is impossible. But it was tasty! At the more traditional Czech restaurants we went to (e.g. not the pizza place we hit up for lunch on Saturday) there were a lot of dumplings and potatoes and meat, which was excellent. I think lunch today was the best meal we had. We went to this restaurant called Klub Architektu, which was next to the Bethlehem Chapel and one or two stories underground. It was really dimly lit and the walls and arches were brick so it felt sort of medieval. I had hot apple cider, chicken and vegetable soup, turkey with mushroom sauce and potato dumplings, and a slice of honey/walnut cake. Not only was it fantastic, but the entire meal only cost about 10 euros. Woo! If I ever get back to Prague I am definitely going back to that restaurant.

One of the things that surprised me the most was just how ridiculously touristy Prague is. Granted, we were in the most popular sightseeing neighborhoods, but even when it seemed like we were in less popular areas there were still shops full of keychains, mugs, tshirts, postcards, and the like. It's kind of surprising that all of these stores, selling literally the exact same things, can stay in business.

Prague itself is an absolutely gorgeous city. Like I'm pretty sure I only saw one ugly building. Everything has beautiful ornate facades, and the river runs right through the middle, and there are statues and cobblestones and hills everywhere... as soon as I get better internet, I will definitely put up pictures. We had perfect weather on Saturday - by the time we got to Prague Castle, it was sunny and even kind of warm! The sun made all the churches/cathedrals we visited even better because they weren't all dark and depressing like European churches sometimes are. I've never seen stained glass in such vibrant colors as in St. Vitus's Cathedral in Prague Castle. It was amazing.

Less amazing was the Astronomical Tower in Old Town Square... but in a kind of hilarious way. The tower itself was pretty cool, and it was totally worth the 2 euros/50 crowns to get up there, because you could walk around the whole thing and see the entire city from above. But the famous part about the tower is that every hour on the hour, the bells ring and figures come out and do things. We missed it when we were there on Saturday morning because we were on our way down from the tower itself and by the time we got back to the front of it, it was over. Later that afternoon, after a lot of planning, we decided that we'd go back to our respective hostels, nap, and meet at the tower at 7:50 so that we could see it do its thing at 8:00. The guys wanted to see it more than Alex and I did, so we took our time leaving our room and didn't hurry to get there in time. We ended up getting there at about 7:57 anyway, so we got to see the spectacular 8:00 show!

...which consisted of a couple windows opening and saints passing through them (inside the building - we could just see them through the now-open windows) for 30 seconds or a minute, followed by the closing of the windows and quite possibly the most anticlimactic trumpet sound I have ever heard. We had no choice but to laugh, not at the tower (though the trumpet was pretty funny), but at the hundreds of people watching it with us. The next morning we ended up there at the right time again, and one of the guys hadn't seen it yet, so we watched it again with him, and again laughed at the hundreds of people who had gathered to watch. Good times were had by all.

Festung Koenigstein and Berlin!

2010-02-15T12:32:00.000-08:00

Man, I can't even believe how much I've done in the past 3 days. I'm pretty sure I've walked through, like, all of Berlin and Sachsen.

Friday: After class got out, I went with a few people to Festung Königstein, which is in the Sächsische Schweiz (nearby mountains) and about an hour away by train, in the town of, you guessed it, Königstein. The Festung is built into some sandstone at the top of a large hill/small mountain in the center of town, and it was a fortress in the 18th century (though various establishments have existed there since the 1300s) and used as a prison up until I think WWII. The best way to get there is by using the super steep stairs in the center of town, but they were so covered in snow that we couldn't use them the day that we went. Instead we went up a ramp that went back and forth on the side of the hill... it seemed like it would be easy, but it was probably the hardest hike I have ever been on and more of a workout than anything I ever do in a gym. Because there was so much snow and the incline was so steep (probably about 20 degrees) the whole time, it took us about an hour to get to the top. There were stairs sometimes, but they were so snowy that it was more like just walking up a briefly steeper part of the hill. When we got to the top of the hill and the base of the fortress, we found out that the elevator that goes to the top only operates in summer... so we had to walk up 3 more steep hill chunks to actually get inside the fortress to where all the buildings were. Once we got all the way up it was completely worth it... the view was beautiful and you could walk all around the edge of the fortress and look down on the little towns below. There were some museums and a little cafe so we went into the museums briefly but then decided it would be better to get Glühwein at the cafe. And it definitely was. We took a different way back down, which was easier and less steep, but it also involved walking on the nonexistent shoulder of a highway for 5-10 minutes... so that was a bit scary, but we survived. And I only fell in the snow once!

Friday night we had a small dance party in one of the guys´rooms here, and that was fun, but I didn´t stay too late because...

Saturday: BERLIN!!! We woke up at like 7:30 and took the 9:00 train out of Dresden. Jesus (Colombian dude) brought with Uno cards, so we played that for about half of the 3-hour train ride. Good times were had by all. We had bought sandwiches for breakfast at the bakery, and Jesus brought with tea, sweet bread, and Berliners, and a banana for those of us who got hungry on the train ride... he was pretty much our dad/tour guide for the weekend, haha. We got checked into our hostel by 1:30 and then went to Alexanderplatz in search of food, because by that point we were all starving. We ended up getting burritos at a Chipotle-like restaurant, and they were surprisingly good... it's hard to find things that are spicy in Germany, but that restaurant succeeded.

After Alexanderplatz we walked to the Rotes Rathaus and saw it, the Neptunbrunnen (Neptune fountain), and the Engels and Marx memorial. At the fountain I ran into my friend Emily, who also goes to Northwestern and is studying abroad in Prague for winter/spring. She studies film so she was in Berlin to see the Berlinale film festival, which started this weekend and goes until next weekend. After that, we saw the Berliner Dom (cathedral). Across the street from the Dom was a big open field and people had built hundreds of snowmen of varying sizes on it, so we went over to check that out too. It was like a scene from Calvin and Hobbes! Some snowmen were a couple feet tall, while others were huge - probably 10 feet or so. I have no idea how people could lift snowballs so big and heavy that high, but it was really cool. They were dressed as all sorts of things, like robots and bus drivers.

After the snowmen and the Dom we went to the Pergamon Museum, which has all sorts of artifacts from ancient cultures (Greek, Roman, Islamic, Mesopotamian/Assyrian/Persian, etc.), and that was really cool. One of my favorite parts was seeing the exhibit on Greek and Roman currency, because it was fascinating to see how it had evolved over time, and I was surprised at how detailed the coins were so early as 1000 BC. I also really liked the Islamic art exhibit, especially the models of the prayer niches. There were pieces of Greek temples and Roman art, and all kinds of jewelry from the different cultures.

When we left the museum it was about 4:30, so we decided to hit up Schloss Charlottenburg before dinner. It's towards the outskirts of the city, so it took us a bit to get there, and then we had to walk about 2 km because the bus was expensive and we decided it wasn't that far. ...It kind of was, and it was really cold, and by the time we got there it was closed, but it was pretty from the outside! So I guess if I go back to Berlin, that is something I should do. Apparently in the summer there is a really nice garden on the other side. After that we went back into the city center to the Gedachtniskirche, which is a church that was destroyed in WWII and they left it that way as a memorial. Around the church was a small group of tents set up for Carnival, so we got Glühwein and walked around a bit. Then we bought bratwursts from a street vendor and walked around eating them, which is probably the most German thing I have done since getting here. It was great! We had dinner at an Italian restaurant and then went to Potsdamer Platz to see it lit up at night.

I'm exhausted again just thinking about everything we did on Saturday - and that was only day one!

On Sunday morning, after breakfast, we went first to the Brandenburger Tor. It was a little bit disappointing because they had a huge screen and scaffolding set up in front of it, so you could only see the front from an awkward angle off to the side, and you could only see the whole thing from the back. We went to the Reichstag too, but the line to get in was RIDICULOUSLY long, even in the middle of winter on a cold snowy day. If I get back to Berlin, I'd like to go inside that building as well. We went to the Siegessäule, but it was under construction. Normally you can get really close to it and even go up inside of it, but we could only see it from the outside about 20 feet away. Instead of taking the S-Bahn back to Unter den Linden, we walked from Siegessäule back to Brandenburger Tor, which was about 2 km, but we went through the Tiergarten and it was really pretty and snow covered. When we got back to the Tor, we spent some time at the Holocaust memorial as well. After that we walked down all of Unter den Linden and on the way saw Hotel Adlon, the Russian embassy, Humboldt Universität, Sankt Hedwigs Cathedrale, the library, and the Neue Wache (WWI memorial). By that point we were back at the Dom again and got lunch (well, a 2 pm meal) at a Vietnamese restaurant in tourist central. It was a bit expensive, but pretty good. We then went to the Olympic Stadium, which was a little past Charlottenburg (the neighborhood, not the Schloss), and got there at 3:55... and it closed at 4. So we couldn't go in, but we got to see the outside, and it is HUGE.

Maybe next time I go to Berlin I will look up the opening and closing hours for the things I want to see and plan my day around that...

Our train left at 5:30, and I ended up getting home completely exhausted at 9. After dinner and a shower it was really nice to just relax in my own bed. What a weekend!

I'm really glad other people here know Europe better than I do. With Jesus in Berlin, he knew exactly where everything was, and which S-Bahn we should take to get there, and where to transfer, and everything. I don't think he'd been there more than one time before... he just has an amazing memory. He even knew a little bit about most of the things we saw, so it was like having our own free, private tour guide. Next weekend we're going to Prague, and I think Mikel knows his way around there pretty well, so that will be fun too.

I'm glad I've gotten to know the people at the Goethe Institut here better. At the beginning of the month I was a little worried that I wouldn't make any friends because there is no real way to meet people you live with short of knocking on everyone's door and introducing yourself. But everyone knows that, so everyone is more friendly and open and there's a bit more of an effort to make plans to do things during the evenings and on weekends when there isn't a Goethe-organized event. It's really different from Bonn, but I've gotten used to it, and now I'm really glad I'm here.

Mittwoch ist Schnitzeltag!

2010-02-10T13:29:00.000-08:00

Dresden! It's weird to think I've only been here a little over a week, because I know my neighborhood so well now. At the same time, I've barely even ventured into the Altstadt, so I'm glad I have another two weeks here... there's so much I still want to explore!

So this weekend I didn't really do very much, because I got really sick on Thursday. By the time I felt like getting out of bed on Sunday, well, it was Sunday and everything was closed.

Monday is the student party day here, so we went out that night. We ended up just going to the Irish pub because that's what the only person who had an opinion about where we went wanted to do, but it was a lot of fun. We stayed there til midnight or so just hanging out and talking and then went home. Last night was one girl's last night here so we went to a student club called Aquarium (sadly, there were no fish), where the cocktails were cheap and tasty and it happened to be karaoke night. All the songs to choose from were in English, so it was really entertaining to hear them sung with a German accent. Especially when they sang things like Beyonce and Bon Jovi.

I just got back a little while ago from Stammtisch, which is our weekly dinner outing (organized by Goethe). So far we have been to two different breweries/restaurants, so it's been cool to try the different local beers that are available. I don't know if it's a brewery thing, or a Dresden thing, or just a coincidence, but at both restaurants there were also special deals where on Wednesday you could get a schnitzel dinner plus a ,5 liter beer for like 8-9 Euros.

This Saturday there was supposed to be a trip to the Sächsische Schweiz (nearby mountains - Sachsen's version of the Alps, but not as high or famous, but apparently just as beautiful), but it got canceled because there are going to be some sort of demonstrations to do with public transportation on Saturday and Sunday, which is what we would use to get there. So instead, a small group of us decided we should go to Berlin! It's only about 2 hours away, maybe 3 if we take the slow train. We're going to leave Saturday morning and come back Sunday night. I'm really excited, because the last time I was in Berlin I was really jet lagged and didn't know much of anything about the city or its history. Now that I've been in Germany for a month and a half (thus, no jet lag) and took a class about Berlin and gave a presentation about its Sehenswürdigkeiten - ah, I can't think of the English word right now! - last quarter (thus, knowledge!), I think I will have a much better trip.

The weekend after this one we're going to Prague (Friday night-Sunday), which will also be awesome. I don't know as much about Prague or speak any Czech so I have a bit more preparing and planning to do. But I'm really looking forward to it! I've been wanting to get to Prague since I was in Germany a few years ago.

Oh yeah, and sometimes I take a German class. :)

Edit: Ha, so, actually, the demonstrations on Saturday are an annual thing, and it's not about public transportation; I misread the sign, which actually said that we shouldn't use public transportation because of it. February 13th is the day Dresden was bombed during WWII, and the Neonazis (from all over Europe - last year there were about 6,000 people who came to Dresden) use it as a day to congregate in Dresden and march around the city to make people aware of their beliefs. We talked about it at dinner tonight and the German girl we ate with explained what it is. And because the extreme right is doing something, the extreme left will also be there to protest it. Apparently this year it's up for debate whether they should be allowed to demonstrate at all, and the decision will be announced tomorrow. Interesting!

First impressions of Dresden

2010-02-02T13:18:00.000-08:00

(written on Sunday 2/1/10)

Well, I left Bonn yesterday morning. It was a bit sad to leave everyone (that is, the people who were staying another month… a lot of my friends left between Thursday and Saturday) but we will keep in touch through Skype and stuff and maybe see each other again. I think I would like to go back to that area in the spring when all the snow melts and the fortresses on the Rhine are open (most of them are closed from November-March) because it’s really pretty. And if I come back before June, Marcel and Moritz will still be there so I could stay with one of them. After taking the train across the entire country, I am pretty sure that where I was in January is one of the most beautiful regions of Germany. That being said, I’ve never been to the north… but still. The train ride between Bonn and Mainz was gorgeous – we were next to the river for most of it, along with the cute little houses and towns and snow-covered hills/mountains on either side, and castles all over the place.

Dresden is really cool, though, too. My cab driver from the bahnhof to my hotel was really awesome and pointed out what all the buildings were as we drove past the Altstadt (they are SO PRETTY, and I haven’t even seen them in the daylight yet), and told me where good student hangouts are and where you can go see cheap movies. The Goethe Institut here is on the other side of the Elbe, in the Neustadt, and it’s a fantastic neighborhood. After I moved in and registered and everything this morning, I wandered around for a little bit. As it turns out, I’m really close to the places that my cab driver told me about! Every street I walked down must have had 5 or 10 cafes and bars, and there are also a lot of places to go grocery shopping. I ate lunch at a restaurant called Hot Spoon, and it was DELICIOUS. They have all different sorts of soup – I had some sort of Russian thing with meat, potatoes, peppers, and sour cream, in a thick tomato-based broth, which was exactly what I needed after having walked around outside in the cold for the past hour. It’s really cheap (you can get a bowl of soup big enough for a meal, a drink, and a muffin or piece of cake for about 6 Euros) and amazing, and they have different kinds of soup every day. I’ll definitely be going back there.

Dresden is a lot less pedestrian-friendly than Bonn and Bad Godesberg, in that it is inefficient to walk places because there are a lot of things and it’s all spread out, but they have a really good Straßenbahn system. It’s a lot like Freiburg’s. I was debating whether to buy a monthly train ticket, but when I found out that my Wohnheim is 2 tram stops from Goethe, I figured I’d use it a lot (because it’s like a 20 minute walk otherwise). The trams are so convenient because they go right down the main streets where everything is… almost like they planned that out or something!

The Goethe Institut here is really nice, and a lot bigger than the one in Bad Godesberg. The people who work there seem really nice too, although sadly I don’t think the Zivis are as cute (but I could be wrong – I don’t think I’ve met all of them yet). My room is clean and functional and my roommate’s cool and everything (she’s from Iowa), but it’s a bit depressing because in my building there’s no communal area, not even a kitchen. Instead, I have dishes, a refrigerator and sink, and 2 stove burners in my room. So I don’t know if we will have big huge dinners where we take turns cooking for 10-15 people here the way we did in Bonn. I’m hoping there is some secret part of the building that I don’t know about yet, because I would really like to have an oven and a toaster while I’m here. There is a meeting at 5 tomorrow for everyone living in the dorms to teach us about how internet and laundry, etc. work here, so I guess I’ll learn about all that stuff then. If there isn’t anything else, I might have to go out and buy a water boiler, because I’ve been sufficiently Germanized that I really need one now.

I think class here will be better than in Bad Godesberg. Or more challenging, at least. The guy I had my interview with said that there is no B2.1 class this term (I didn’t catch why…), and that’s what I should be in, so he said I should go to B2.2. So that’ll be interesting. I did B1.1 last month… hopefully there’s not too much that I’ve missed in such a big jump. I told him I’d heard that there was a big difference between B1 and B2 (since that’s what the teachers and my B2 friends in Bonn said), and he said yes, sort of, but it depends on the student. Sooo I should be able to handle it.

The cultural events here look like they will be fun. Tomorrow there is a trip to the Altstadt to look around so that will be a lot of fun. Throughout the month there will be ice skating, movies, etc., but there is also a “learn how to cook German food” thing that I really really want to do, and weekend trips to Leipzig, Meißen, and the Sächsische Schweiz (nearby mountains). I think the weekend of the trip to Meißen I will probably go to Prague instead, because I really really want to go there while I’m so close! Class gets out at 1 every day so I could leave Dresden at like 2:30 or something on a Friday, be there by 4:30, and then come back here on Sunday evening. I’m going to start looking into that ASAP so that it doesn’t get stupidly expensive like Amsterdam did.

Skiing

2010-01-24T04:16:00.000-08:00

1. I just figured out how to switch my keyboard to German! This is super exciting and useful. Now I can use ümläüts, and don't have to think about buying a German keyboard.

2. I went skiing yesterday! It was super super fun but now I hurt a LOT. I had such a good time though that it was definitely worth all the pain.
We left Bad Godesberg around 10, took a couple trains and a bus, and ended up in Neuss at the Skihalle (it was an indoor place) around noon. After crazy amounts of waiting (since there were like 25 of us), we got our skis/snowboards/pants/jackets/shoes. I decided to try skiing (as opposed to snowboarding) because everyone said that would be easier and I'd feel more accomplished at the end of the day. Ski boots are SO HEAVY and once you put them on you can't move your feet or ankles at all, so walking was really hard and awkward. But I guess it makes sense, because it keeps you from doing things like breaking your ankles. Skis are heavy too, but by the time you're wearing them you're on the snow so you don't really have to pick them up and walk.

So the first time I tried going up the beginner slope (after a few runs down the kiddie one, haha), I fell off of the j-bar (pictured) immediately after getting on it, and they had to stop it from running while I crawled to the side and tried to stand up. Happily, things went much better after that, or at least, I learned from all the mistakes that I made. There were a lot of people there when we first started skiing (~1 pm), but by 4 it had cleared out a little bit. I probably went down the beginner slope maybe 10 times? while we were there and after lunch, when Courtney taught me how to actually slow down and stop I even made it down a few times without falling! After 3 times without falling I decided maybe it was time to try the intermediate one (which was just twice as far up the same hill as the beginner one)... that was fun, but may have been a poor choice, as I ended up skiing with my face about halfway down, skidded to a stop in front of a group of people learning how to snowboard, and tried to get up for about 5 minutes before actually succeeding. But I'm glad I tried it! Since so many people are from places where skiing doesn't really exist (Brazil, Saudi Arabia, etc.), I wasn't the only one doing it for the first time, which was nice. Later when we got home we spent probably an hour talking about how much we had fallen and how much dignity we had lost. My legs and abs and shoulders are really really sore today, but I would totally do it again! I should definitely go on Ski Trip during winter break next year.

Today has been nice and relaxing so far. I woke up at 1 pm (yayyy Sundays) and have just been doing emails/Facebook/semi-productive but not stressful things all day. I bought my train ticket to Dresden today... bleh spending money, but yay travel soon! It's going to be a pain to have my suitcases with me, but with the train I booked I only have to change once in Mainz and then spend 6 hours on the ICE the rest of the way to Dresden. If everything goes well I will be there around 6 pm.

Since the last day of class is Wednesday, but I'm not going to Dresden until Sunday, I'm thinking about doing some day trips because I won't be back in this area of Germany for a long time, if ever (at least on this trip). Any suggestions? I'm thinking about maybe going to Düsseldorf for a day, or back to Köln because there's so much there to explore. If there's anything in the Bonn area that I should definitely check out, let me know!

Eishockey!

2010-01-18T06:03:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I went to an ice hockey game in Cologne at an arena about as big as the United Center. The Koelner Haie (sharks) played the Berliner Eisbaeren (polar bears), and since the Haie were the home team, there were a looot of fans there. It was different from the Blackhawks games I've been to... for one thing, there was FIRE in the pre-game show (like when they play music before the team comes out, and stuff). It was awesome. Also, when the team came onto the rink, they skated out through an inflatable shark's mouth. And their mascot was skating around waving a flag. An ice-skating, flag-waving shark is probably the coolest thing I've ever seen.

The game itself was pretty quiet; the only noise in the arena came from fans yelling, which they did a lot, but we were far away and up high in the cheap 15 euro seats. It was neat that all the noise was produced by people though; I think it is the sort of thing the Blackhawks people tried to get the drumline to do last year, except they were dumb about it. At this game there were 3 people with drums sitting in the superfan section and they played a lot and the audience interacted and clapped along and stuff, kind of like how we do cheers at football games, but better. It was also fun how into it everyone was; when the team was coming out, the announcer only said every player's first name and everyone in the arena yelled the last name.

After the game we decided to stay in Cologne and go to a restaurant. Cesar, the Peruvian guy, wanted to go to this Peruvian/Latin American restaurant he had heard about, so we tried to do that. It took about an hour to find the place because first we had to get the address, then take the train to where it was, then ask about 5 people where the street was because we had no map, but none of them had ever even heard of the street or the restaurant, and Cesar had to call the restaurant a few times to ask how to get there... it was annoying and we were all getting kind of cranky, but eventually we found it, and it was REALLY good and REALLY worth it. I tried cevice (which is much tastier than its description makes it sound), chicha morada (a drink made from purple corn), and Inca Cola (soda that is apparently canned in the US, but not sold anywhere I've seen) and they were really good, as was my dinner. It's comforting to know that real Mexican/South American food does exist in Germany, because last time I was here I couldn't find any, except the kind that had peas and corn and carrots in it. Which isn't really that Mexican, except the corn, but even that was Germanified. But this restaurant was really really really good.

Today has been nice so far. The sun was out earlier, making today the third day since getting here that I have seen blue sky. So I appreciate it when it happens. I don't really know what else I'm going to do today, because I've already eaten and finished my homework... maybe I'll go wander around town or something.

Tschuss!

2010-01-16T08:00:00.000-08:00

Man, it's hard to believe another week has gone by. Time is so fast here! I didn't do as much because I got sick (along with everyone else I hang out with, because we all spend so much time together...), but here is a quick rundown of this week (note - I have class from 8:30-1 every day and then usually nap, buy groceries, or do homework in the afternoons, so this is mostly about my evenings):

Sunday: Saw Fame (auf Deutsch!) with my roommate. We decided Sunday movies are fun because it's a relaxing way to spend the afternoon, there's nothing else to do because everything else is closed, and we hear more German than if we just hung out at home all day.
Weekdays - class from 8:30-1; pretty much all I'll talk about here is
Monday: nothing too much; stayed in and watched Charlie Bartlett with Pat, Monica, and Courtney after I made dinner for everyone. They'd never seen it before, but they liked it, so yay. This was the day everyone got sick, pretty much.
Tuesday: went bowling! German bowling alleys are so much nicer than American ones. After that we went to the Irish Pub again and Marcel taught me how to play darts.
Wednesday: didn't do very much - just went out for dinner and came home, because everyone was sick and tired. Dinner was delicious though; I had curried chicken with pineapple and rice. I'd like to find a German restaurant around here someday though...
Thursday: Went to the history museum in Bonn after class. It's really really huge and covers German history from WWII-present. I think it would have been more interesting if I knew more German, because pretty much everything involved only reading. It was cool though. Lucia (from Spain) made us Spanish food for dinner.
Friday: After school I went with Courtney and Kevin to this cute little cafe down the street from my house that we have been meaning to visit for a long time. Its sandwiches are quite delicious and I will definitely be going back. It was Pat and Mark's last night in Bad Godesberg (since they were only doing the 2-week program) so we had a party at home and then met up with other people from Goethe in Bonn around midnight. I'm going to miss Mark a lot because we always sit together in class and make fun of each other, but now that won't happen anymore :(
Today (Saturday): Woke up around 10, made some pancakes, then a bunch of us went with Pat to Bonn to say goodbye and then go shopping. Shopped til we got tired and then came back home, where I have been uploading pictures to Facebook and talking to my parents on Skype. I don't think there's much of a plan for tonight, but tomorrow I might go to a hockey game in Cologne.

Ich bin muede, aber Bad Godesberg/Bonn/Koeln sind sehr toll!

2010-01-09T10:04:00.000-08:00

Man, this week has been long. I'm actually glad I have class in the mornings though because then I have the whole afternoon free to wander around town, go grocery shopping, hang out, etc. I went to Bonn a few times this week, once to go to a few bars with Goethe people and the Zivis (CA-like people who live in the dorms and fix any problems we have), and once (yesterday) to see some of the Sehenswuerdigkeiten of the city, like Beethoven's house, the alte Rathaus, and the university. We walked around a lot, got coffee in the student cafe, and I bought some new earrings. I'm really glad I brought my ridiculous Evanston coat because it's been really cold here and everyone with smaller coats has been complaining about being cold all the time.

Last night we went out to dinner and then into Bonn and ended up at this bar that used to be a restaurant. It was super crowded and kind of expensive, but fun. When I woke up at 10 this morning to go to Koeln I wished I hadn't stayed up so late (not like I went to bed at 5 am or anything...), but I'm glad I woke up early and went. The first thing you see when you get there is the Koelner Dom (cathedral), which is really old and really cool. We paid the 2 euros to get into the treasury, which was totally worth it. There are old shiny religious things dating back to like 1400. There was a lot in the exhibits about the church's history too, like how construction began around 1100 but didn't finish until 1850 or so. That's a long project. Koeln has SO MANY STORES, and ALL of them have sales in January. Things in Germany only go on sale twice a year - in January and July. So everything is like 50-70% off, and it's killing me because I don't have any space to buy anything. I guess at least it is saving me money. I wish we'd had more time there because one day isn't nearly enough to see everything - there are so many museums and so much history. Maybe I'll go back sometime. I'll put up some pictures of Koeln and Bonn soon.

Tonight we are going to stay in and I think the Brazilian girls are going to teach us how to dance, because it's cold outside, snowing a lot, and they are good at dancing. Should be fun!

Erste Tage

2010-01-05T09:59:00.001-08:00

Hi everybody! Instead of answering many emails a day about what I'm up to, you guys can just read all about it here.

Yesterday was pretty crazy ridiculous. My plane landed in Frankfurt at 11 after a bumpy flight full of noisy crying children (okay, just one, but he was 2 rows in front of me). I got through baggage claim and passport control at noon, which was kind of a bummer because the nonstop train to Bonn leaves at 11:58 every day. When I went to buy a ticket for the next train, though, the 11:58 train was running 15 minutes late. So I took that and it worked out well, except for the part where I had 2 huge suitcases and all the Europeans judged me. When I got to Bonn I took a cab from the train station to the Goethe Institut in Bad Godesberg (about 15 minutes south) and got all registered and placement tested for class. All the teachers commented on how tired I looked and I didn't do very well on the placement tests, but they might move me up since I explained that I had just flown in from Chicago and hadn't really slept at all. I'll know more after class tomorrow.

My dorm/house is about a 10 minute walk from Goethe, and I think about 10-15 people live here. My room has its own bathroom, which is nice. Last night after the new people got all settled in and unpacked the students who have been here for a few weeks made us dinner and had a party for us. It was a really good time and everyone was really friendly. They got a mini-keg to go with dinner since it was cheaper than bottles of beer and when they tried to open it, it exploded all over everyone in the room... welcome to Germany, here's your beer shower! After dinner we all talked (there were like 15 of us) until about 10, and then my roommate and I were too tired to stay up much longer so we went to bed.

Did I mention my roommate is from Australia? She is. She's really cool. I love how international everyone is here. Last night I met a guy also from Australia, a guy from London, some girls from Brazil, a girl from India (who is 23 and here for an internship with a shoe designer - so cool!! I told her to design some shoes in a size 44), a few guys from Japan and China (they were the ones who made us dinner), and of course some German guys (they work at Goethe). We all felt guilty for speaking English instead of German but whenever anyone would try it was so hard to have a conversation because none of us quite know exactly how to say what we want to say.

Today was the first day of class, which was pretty uneventful. I like German classes because every 1 1/2 hours there is a 15- or 30-minute break. After lunch we went on a walking tour of Bad Godesberg. There's a castle that was built in the 1100s on the hill in the middle of the town, y'know, just hangin out, bein all old and visited. It was destroyed in the 1500s by some Bavarians and never rebuilt but now it's a restaurant and hotel. The stairs were too snowy and steep to climb all the way up, but we're planning on going up there one day. The rest of the town is super cute - there's a Fussgaengerzone like in Freiburg with shops and a movie theater and stuff, and I counted I think 4 ice cream shops while we were walking around. There's also a Tchibo so maybe I'll stop in there and put more money on my phone since there's none on it. There's a T-mobile store right next door so maybe I'll just get a new phone, I dunno (mom and dad - thoughts?).

Tonight the boys at the other dorm (Mark from London and Patrick from Australia) are making everyone dinner so I'll be going over there soon. It's nice not to have to cook but I don't want to go outside... it's coooold. But maybe the heat works over there. It's kind of broken/nonfunctional in this house. Right now I'm wearing slippers, socks, leggings, pants, a sweater, and a blanket, and I'm comfortable but still a little chilly. Anyway. I think after dinner we are going to go out and see if there are any good pubs around... I love Germany. All the people I've met so far are so much fun to hang out with!

We are toying with the idea of visiting Amsterdam this weekend... we'll see if that actually works out or not. I think it'd be a lot of fun and it's so close by train. If we don't do that, there is a trip into Cologne for sightseeing and shopping and stuff so that would be fun too. In a couple weeks there is a ski trip on a Saturday so I'm really excited for that since skiing in Europe was one of the things on my list of things to do.

I'll put up some pictures soon, but not right now, since I haven't taken enough for it to be worth uploading them onto my computer yet.

Go 'Cats.