Adventures in Europe, Day 1: München
Safe arrival in München was quite welcome this morning after 20 hours in transit. The journey over was uneventful for me, though not for the 70 or so people who didn't get seats on the flight from San Francisco to Washington DC (there was a surprise plane change for some reason, resulting in a massive overbooking of the flight.) Other highlights included listening in on the air traffic control chatter - my favorite was when we were over the middle of the Atlantic, and our pilot asked ground control for the results of Rafael Nadal's match at the US Open - and the guy sitting next to me who somehow managed to take both my blanket and his own, and then fall asleep with them wrapped around himself.
Spent today wandering around downtown München, mostly just fighting to keep myself awake. I managed to get all of my administrative tasks taken care of, i.e. getting my rail pass validated and booking the ticket to Bonn for Friday, and in somewhat of a surprise move, I came into online contact with one of my host sisters from Germany from four years ago, and decided to pop down to Lindau to visit my old host family! I'm going down tomorrow afternoon, coming back Thursday. Should be fun - they're really nice people, and I look forward to seeing them all again.
Other principal adventures of today included a first-time visit to the Englischer Garten, which turns out to be München's inland substitute for a nude beach. Tons of people wandering around with absolutely nothing on, apparently just enjoying the Garden-of-Eden atmosphere. I had a lovely nap there, or however much of a nap I was capable of having with so many genitalia flying around. Afterwards, I met a fellow my mom and I have worked with on language learning software, David Stephens, for dinner. We took in the sights of downtown München for a bit and then had a deliciously square German meal at the Hofbräuhaus. Nothing like real legit Käsespätzle to pick you up after a 32-hour day.
Random observation of the day: one of the things I like best about Germany is hearing a different language than English spoken with such a plethora of accents native and foreign.
Spent today wandering around downtown München, mostly just fighting to keep myself awake. I managed to get all of my administrative tasks taken care of, i.e. getting my rail pass validated and booking the ticket to Bonn for Friday, and in somewhat of a surprise move, I came into online contact with one of my host sisters from Germany from four years ago, and decided to pop down to Lindau to visit my old host family! I'm going down tomorrow afternoon, coming back Thursday. Should be fun - they're really nice people, and I look forward to seeing them all again.
Other principal adventures of today included a first-time visit to the Englischer Garten, which turns out to be München's inland substitute for a nude beach. Tons of people wandering around with absolutely nothing on, apparently just enjoying the Garden-of-Eden atmosphere. I had a lovely nap there, or however much of a nap I was capable of having with so many genitalia flying around. Afterwards, I met a fellow my mom and I have worked with on language learning software, David Stephens, for dinner. We took in the sights of downtown München for a bit and then had a deliciously square German meal at the Hofbräuhaus. Nothing like real legit Käsespätzle to pick you up after a 32-hour day.
Random observation of the day: one of the things I like best about Germany is hearing a different language than English spoken with such a plethora of accents native and foreign.