Germany!
As a few of you are a aware (a few of you still read this?), I recently went to Germany! I was there from the 27th to the 5th =) It was marvelous!
I got there the afternoon of the 28th (a Tuesday) at the Dusseldorf airport, to be greeted by my marvelous host, Martin. We then had about 1.5 hour train ride to Muenster, the city Martin lives in.
I absolutely fell in love with the city. It's kinda small, but that made it easier for me to learn my way around =) As Martin had class on Wednesday, and invited the person that was giving some sort of fancy-schmancy mathematician lecture on ... Thursday or Friday, I had time to wander around on my own and get hopelessly lost. Smaller sized city was a good thing!
The most practical way to travel in Muenster is by bike. The sidewalks had a freaking bike lane in them! And when that disappeared, bikes were a part of the street traffic. Talk about SCARY! It's ingrained in the culture there, though, that they are a part of traffic, and it constantly surprised me that cars would acknowledge my right of way. Oh yeah, we rented me a bike! I managed to sprain my ankle about a week before I left, so not only did it save my ankle from a lot of walking, and my pride from a lot of embarassment when I didn't know what the hell the bus drivers were saying, but it was faster!
On the buses: I took the bus twice. Neither time were the bus drivers willing to speak English to me. My first bus driver was really irritable at my inability to understand him. The second one was much nicer about it.
I think perhaps my favorite day was the day we got my bike. I spent the day just circling the city on the Promonade, which is actually where the old city wall used to stand. I think it was somewhere around 8 - 11km around the city. There were trees lining both sides of it (except where it passed in front of the castle), and as the previous 3 weeks were sunny and 75, they were in full leaf-age. When the sun came out it shone through the leaves and light the path with that absolutely BEATIFUL green light that happens when sun shines through leaves.
Biking through the center of the city (the old city. The part that got bombed in WWII) was, quite literally, a pain in the ass. It's all cobblestones. Gorgeous, but freaking PAINFUL!
Every Monday and Wednesday (maybe Friday, I don't remember), all through the year, there's a market on the Domplatz (which is in the center of town). It's like a farmer's market, but more awesome. It was asparagus season. I love asparagus. I had never seen white asparagus before then. There was a TON of it! Stacks and STACKS of it!
We went biking one of the days I was there. Martin lives right next to a path. On one side of him is the city, the other side is the country. I learned while biking through the country that it's not odd at all to get off your bike and just walk through someone's field. It's perfectly acceptable. You'd get shot for that here. Speaking of fields, I don't know what these fields were full of -- maybe mustard? -- but some of them were the most beautiful shade of yellow. Like... sunshine. Very vibrant.
We biked down to the lake one day. It was like a fucking POST CARD. There were people out on sailboats, and others on paddleboats. There were people like us sitting out on the lawn -- some even had little grills going -- and then there were people biking and walking around the lake. Fun fact: Munester was voted the most livable city in the world in 2004. I could definitely see it. We spent about 3 hours just sitting there, talking, watching people. If I weren't taken, and if it were actually meant to be taken that way, it would have been the most perfect date EVER.
Let's see... what else did we do... OH! I know! We went to the botanical gardens one day! There were little green houses set up for the more tropical environments -- which were awesome. I guess there used to be little birds in one of the houses, but they weren't there when we went. Then we spent an hour and a half sitting, looking at the pond, observing the rituals of a goose. He had a very particular circut he made, we discovered. He did it once about every 20 minutes.
Martin taught me how to play pool better! Surprisingly enough, once he corrected a couple very small things, and showed me a few more other small things, turns out I'm acutally fairly decent! He says he's been playing for 20 years (I'm not so sure about that... playing pool since 8?), and we actually had some very close games. ... I still only won when he botched it. I'm also pretty sure he botched it on purpose, although he'll never admit it. Whatever. Winner take all game, I took all. I'm still awaiting my tiara.
I learned how to read the menu in German! Or at least, I'll recognize most ingredients. I felt so horrible making Martin read the menu to me every time we were out (which was every night but one). I couldn't tell you the words now, but if I saw them, I would recognize them.
The whole thing made me remember how much I absolutely love language. When I get back to school, I plan on switching my major over to linguistics.
Can't really remember much else... I basically spent the entire week hanging out. I took 1 picture. Of a guy with the BEST mutton chops you will ever see. I'll get that posted on Facebook eventually.
Coming back was a pain in the butt. We were out playing pool until midnight, and then I had to be up at 4:30 so I could bike half an hour to the train station and catch my 5:30 train. Best hug g'bye ever, for the record. I was really worried about catching my connecting train, though. My ticket deal-io said I had about an 8 minute walk from one platform to the other, and the sign to my other platform was obscured by a partially closed door. Totally wasn't even an 8 minute walk, by the by. More like 2. The train went right INTO the airport, which I thought was cool. I spent 20 hours traveling to get home, by the way. On 4 hours sleep. Dear. God. That was exhausting. And then my Mom wanted to go out for her birthday. And I had to work at 5:30 the next morning.
Getting back into the US is A LOT harder than leaving it. All sorts of questions. And they never wanted to believe me when I told them I only had my carry on and that I didn't have anything to declare. "That's all your luggage?" "You didn't bring anyone souveniers??" Oh, you're right. I forgot that bomb on the plane.... hold on a sec. while I just go get that, will, you?
I didn't realize how tense the language barrier had made me, not knowing how to speak any language other than my own, until I heard AMERICAN accents to go along with the English. Although, interesting to note, I found that my Spanish came back to me pretty well while I was in Germany. I found myself thinking "foreign language... foreign language... ok! ...wait, that was Spanish... fuck. That's not going to get me anywhere...." But it WAS a foreign language! Just... not the right one.
...Can't think of anything else! I'll post more as I think of it, I guess.
I got there the afternoon of the 28th (a Tuesday) at the Dusseldorf airport, to be greeted by my marvelous host, Martin. We then had about 1.5 hour train ride to Muenster, the city Martin lives in.
I absolutely fell in love with the city. It's kinda small, but that made it easier for me to learn my way around =) As Martin had class on Wednesday, and invited the person that was giving some sort of fancy-schmancy mathematician lecture on ... Thursday or Friday, I had time to wander around on my own and get hopelessly lost. Smaller sized city was a good thing!
The most practical way to travel in Muenster is by bike. The sidewalks had a freaking bike lane in them! And when that disappeared, bikes were a part of the street traffic. Talk about SCARY! It's ingrained in the culture there, though, that they are a part of traffic, and it constantly surprised me that cars would acknowledge my right of way. Oh yeah, we rented me a bike! I managed to sprain my ankle about a week before I left, so not only did it save my ankle from a lot of walking, and my pride from a lot of embarassment when I didn't know what the hell the bus drivers were saying, but it was faster!
On the buses: I took the bus twice. Neither time were the bus drivers willing to speak English to me. My first bus driver was really irritable at my inability to understand him. The second one was much nicer about it.
I think perhaps my favorite day was the day we got my bike. I spent the day just circling the city on the Promonade, which is actually where the old city wall used to stand. I think it was somewhere around 8 - 11km around the city. There were trees lining both sides of it (except where it passed in front of the castle), and as the previous 3 weeks were sunny and 75, they were in full leaf-age. When the sun came out it shone through the leaves and light the path with that absolutely BEATIFUL green light that happens when sun shines through leaves.
Biking through the center of the city (the old city. The part that got bombed in WWII) was, quite literally, a pain in the ass. It's all cobblestones. Gorgeous, but freaking PAINFUL!
Every Monday and Wednesday (maybe Friday, I don't remember), all through the year, there's a market on the Domplatz (which is in the center of town). It's like a farmer's market, but more awesome. It was asparagus season. I love asparagus. I had never seen white asparagus before then. There was a TON of it! Stacks and STACKS of it!
We went biking one of the days I was there. Martin lives right next to a path. On one side of him is the city, the other side is the country. I learned while biking through the country that it's not odd at all to get off your bike and just walk through someone's field. It's perfectly acceptable. You'd get shot for that here. Speaking of fields, I don't know what these fields were full of -- maybe mustard? -- but some of them were the most beautiful shade of yellow. Like... sunshine. Very vibrant.
We biked down to the lake one day. It was like a fucking POST CARD. There were people out on sailboats, and others on paddleboats. There were people like us sitting out on the lawn -- some even had little grills going -- and then there were people biking and walking around the lake. Fun fact: Munester was voted the most livable city in the world in 2004. I could definitely see it. We spent about 3 hours just sitting there, talking, watching people. If I weren't taken, and if it were actually meant to be taken that way, it would have been the most perfect date EVER.
Let's see... what else did we do... OH! I know! We went to the botanical gardens one day! There were little green houses set up for the more tropical environments -- which were awesome. I guess there used to be little birds in one of the houses, but they weren't there when we went. Then we spent an hour and a half sitting, looking at the pond, observing the rituals of a goose. He had a very particular circut he made, we discovered. He did it once about every 20 minutes.
Martin taught me how to play pool better! Surprisingly enough, once he corrected a couple very small things, and showed me a few more other small things, turns out I'm acutally fairly decent! He says he's been playing for 20 years (I'm not so sure about that... playing pool since 8?), and we actually had some very close games. ... I still only won when he botched it. I'm also pretty sure he botched it on purpose, although he'll never admit it. Whatever. Winner take all game, I took all. I'm still awaiting my tiara.
I learned how to read the menu in German! Or at least, I'll recognize most ingredients. I felt so horrible making Martin read the menu to me every time we were out (which was every night but one). I couldn't tell you the words now, but if I saw them, I would recognize them.
The whole thing made me remember how much I absolutely love language. When I get back to school, I plan on switching my major over to linguistics.
Can't really remember much else... I basically spent the entire week hanging out. I took 1 picture. Of a guy with the BEST mutton chops you will ever see. I'll get that posted on Facebook eventually.
Coming back was a pain in the butt. We were out playing pool until midnight, and then I had to be up at 4:30 so I could bike half an hour to the train station and catch my 5:30 train. Best hug g'bye ever, for the record. I was really worried about catching my connecting train, though. My ticket deal-io said I had about an 8 minute walk from one platform to the other, and the sign to my other platform was obscured by a partially closed door. Totally wasn't even an 8 minute walk, by the by. More like 2. The train went right INTO the airport, which I thought was cool. I spent 20 hours traveling to get home, by the way. On 4 hours sleep. Dear. God. That was exhausting. And then my Mom wanted to go out for her birthday. And I had to work at 5:30 the next morning.
Getting back into the US is A LOT harder than leaving it. All sorts of questions. And they never wanted to believe me when I told them I only had my carry on and that I didn't have anything to declare. "That's all your luggage?" "You didn't bring anyone souveniers??" Oh, you're right. I forgot that bomb on the plane.... hold on a sec. while I just go get that, will, you?
I didn't realize how tense the language barrier had made me, not knowing how to speak any language other than my own, until I heard AMERICAN accents to go along with the English. Although, interesting to note, I found that my Spanish came back to me pretty well while I was in Germany. I found myself thinking "foreign language... foreign language... ok! ...wait, that was Spanish... fuck. That's not going to get me anywhere...." But it WAS a foreign language! Just... not the right one.
...Can't think of anything else! I'll post more as I think of it, I guess.