Day 7
Day 7
More observations: the Germans love gambling and porn. There are many “Las Vegas spiehalls” here in Mannheim. The funny thing is, I guess city code requires them to block out their windows so pedestrians can’t see inside. According to the signs, there is darts, arcade, gambling, and more inside. Interesting huh? Also, there are a lot of erotica shops here. Again, the windows into the actual store are blacked out, but they have some window displays of the lingerie sold there as well as pictures of models wearing said lingerie (and no, they do not airbrush out anything here). Also, when I was up late one night, I decided to see what was on TV (most of the time, I would catch a few minutes of the music video channel or CNN because those were the only two that had English). Flipping through, at least 3 of the 20 channels had one commercial after another for phone sex places. Sometimes, there would be one of the girls on, half naked dancing around. It was soooo weird. Plus, like any hotel, they had pay movies. What they would do would be give you a 2 minute preview of what was showing. Superman Returns in German is very odd. The other channel would be the porn movie that was on. Again, just plain odd. I also caught a minute of the German version of “Deal or No Deal” (their host is blond, though it’s short) and the show from the 80’s or 90’s called “Step by Step” (with Patrick Duffy and Suzanne Sommers). Then of course, there were three channels dedicated for soccer.
Last night, we decided to stick close to the hotel for dinner and lo and behold there was a pizzeria right down the block. Now I know all of you are thinking, “how good could pizza in Germany be?” The answer: really good. Almost as good as NY pizza. Why? Because the person that owns said pizzeria - and most of the other Italian restaurants here - are 1st generation Italians. Here, we’re getting the real deal. The dough is paper thin and the cheese is different (supposedly Germany cheese is one of the best), but it’s nummy. What was funny was ordering the stuff. My German is minimal and trying to decipher the various toppings almost impossible. So, there I am skimming through the menu when I saw “peperoni.” That I knew. I love pepperoni pizza, so I ordered it. Note to self: pepperoni in German does not mean pepperoni. It means peppers; of the jalapeno kind. They weren’t that strong, so the pizza was good anyway.
Onto Frankfurt. We took the ICE train to Frankfurt, cutting our time in half. It’s a very comfortable train with a restaurant car and these huge bathrooms. I wasn’t sure I’d recognize my Aunt, but she hadn’t changed since I last saw her. She took us around the main city for about 40 minutes or so. They have some gorgeous architecture there. Of course, we took many pictures. After, we went to their apartment to spend the rest of our day there. Their little apartment is actually pretty big and absolutely gorgeous. From what my aunt says, it’s insanely expensive to buy real estate where she lives (a house could cost 1 million Euro), so most people rent. I’d rent too if houses in NY were that highly priced! Seeing my Uncle did give me a bit of a start, but I knew that. It was a great visit though, especially catching up with my cousin and asking them about some differences between the US and Germany (for example, here they have to pay for Kindergarten). I would have to look away from my Uncle once in awhile, but I am still glad I went.
On the way back to the train station, I saw my first gas station. Yianni and I had remarked to each others that we had no idea how these people got gas and there were three gas stations back to back! We decided to walk back to the hotel from the main train station (bad idea - it was cold out there!) and made it to bed. I crashed late (around 1:30 or so) because of reading. I have to say though, my trip here and my trip to upstate NY has confirmed for me that I need to move from Long Island. I didn’t have any really bad allergy days here and the two times my belly bothered me, it went quickly away. I’ve actually felt pretty healthy body-wise my entire trip here (I don’t count my knee hurting or aching muscles - those are from all the walking I’ve been doing. One of the days in Heidelberg, hubby and I estimated that we walked about 10 miles). Tomorrow is our relax day before leaving for NY on Tuesday.
More observations: the Germans love gambling and porn. There are many “Las Vegas spiehalls” here in Mannheim. The funny thing is, I guess city code requires them to block out their windows so pedestrians can’t see inside. According to the signs, there is darts, arcade, gambling, and more inside. Interesting huh? Also, there are a lot of erotica shops here. Again, the windows into the actual store are blacked out, but they have some window displays of the lingerie sold there as well as pictures of models wearing said lingerie (and no, they do not airbrush out anything here). Also, when I was up late one night, I decided to see what was on TV (most of the time, I would catch a few minutes of the music video channel or CNN because those were the only two that had English). Flipping through, at least 3 of the 20 channels had one commercial after another for phone sex places. Sometimes, there would be one of the girls on, half naked dancing around. It was soooo weird. Plus, like any hotel, they had pay movies. What they would do would be give you a 2 minute preview of what was showing. Superman Returns in German is very odd. The other channel would be the porn movie that was on. Again, just plain odd. I also caught a minute of the German version of “Deal or No Deal” (their host is blond, though it’s short) and the show from the 80’s or 90’s called “Step by Step” (with Patrick Duffy and Suzanne Sommers). Then of course, there were three channels dedicated for soccer.
Last night, we decided to stick close to the hotel for dinner and lo and behold there was a pizzeria right down the block. Now I know all of you are thinking, “how good could pizza in Germany be?” The answer: really good. Almost as good as NY pizza. Why? Because the person that owns said pizzeria - and most of the other Italian restaurants here - are 1st generation Italians. Here, we’re getting the real deal. The dough is paper thin and the cheese is different (supposedly Germany cheese is one of the best), but it’s nummy. What was funny was ordering the stuff. My German is minimal and trying to decipher the various toppings almost impossible. So, there I am skimming through the menu when I saw “peperoni.” That I knew. I love pepperoni pizza, so I ordered it. Note to self: pepperoni in German does not mean pepperoni. It means peppers; of the jalapeno kind. They weren’t that strong, so the pizza was good anyway.
Onto Frankfurt. We took the ICE train to Frankfurt, cutting our time in half. It’s a very comfortable train with a restaurant car and these huge bathrooms. I wasn’t sure I’d recognize my Aunt, but she hadn’t changed since I last saw her. She took us around the main city for about 40 minutes or so. They have some gorgeous architecture there. Of course, we took many pictures. After, we went to their apartment to spend the rest of our day there. Their little apartment is actually pretty big and absolutely gorgeous. From what my aunt says, it’s insanely expensive to buy real estate where she lives (a house could cost 1 million Euro), so most people rent. I’d rent too if houses in NY were that highly priced! Seeing my Uncle did give me a bit of a start, but I knew that. It was a great visit though, especially catching up with my cousin and asking them about some differences between the US and Germany (for example, here they have to pay for Kindergarten). I would have to look away from my Uncle once in awhile, but I am still glad I went.
On the way back to the train station, I saw my first gas station. Yianni and I had remarked to each others that we had no idea how these people got gas and there were three gas stations back to back! We decided to walk back to the hotel from the main train station (bad idea - it was cold out there!) and made it to bed. I crashed late (around 1:30 or so) because of reading. I have to say though, my trip here and my trip to upstate NY has confirmed for me that I need to move from Long Island. I didn’t have any really bad allergy days here and the two times my belly bothered me, it went quickly away. I’ve actually felt pretty healthy body-wise my entire trip here (I don’t count my knee hurting or aching muscles - those are from all the walking I’ve been doing. One of the days in Heidelberg, hubby and I estimated that we walked about 10 miles). Tomorrow is our relax day before leaving for NY on Tuesday.