Really, Germany?

Here, there are Christmas Markets all over the place, starting from the last weekend of November and lasting until either the day before Christmas eve or Christmas eve itself. The biggest one is in Nuremberg, and I wanted to see it before it shut down. So a few friends and I decided to hit it up on Christmas Eve morning. It's only open until two in the afternoon Christmas Eve, so we decided to take the early train and get there when it opened. We woke up to meet at 6:10 and caught the 7:04 train from the Munich Main Station.

The ticket we used was a Bavaria Ticket. On weekdays it's good from 9 in the morning until 3 the next morning, but on weekends and holidays it's good from when the day begins at midnight the night before. Now, where I am in Germany, Christmas Eve is celebrated as the biggest Holiday of the year-- more important than Christmas. So we were a little surprised when we got our ticket checked halfway there and were told that it wasn't valid. I asked what we should do, and she said we had to pay 31.50 each for the fare from Munich to Nuremburg. Since the ticket was going to be valid in less than an hour and it was obviously a misunderstanding, I asked if we could just de-board and get back on when it was valid. She said we could, if we pay the partial fare from Munich to where we were. Since it was a lose-lose situation, we paid the 31.50. Then the train changed route and arrived in Nuremburg late.

So when we finally got to the Christmas market I drank two glasses of Glühwein with shots in them. Didn't make me happy, but made me forget the pain. Well, sort of. . . until it started raining. . .

Worst Christmas Eve ever!!!

Do I have a twisted sense of Humor?

This is fairly unrelated to the rest of the blog, but somehow I started talking about the book Lolita, and my friend Ana said that she had seen the movie (by Kubrick). I was real excited-- 'Wasn't it great?' I said, 'wasn't it hilarious?' and she gave me one of the weirdest looks she's given me so far and said, 'No!'.

She thinks it's a tragic love story, I think it's hilarious. Does anyone else who's seen it have anything to say?

PS Another thing I think is hilarious is garfieldminusgarfield.net. I showed it to her and laughed out loud at several of the strips. She laughed too, quietly, and afterwards admitted she was only laughing because I was.

My Job

For all those I talk to on a day to day basis, please ignore this note, as you've probably heard everything contained within more than once.

For those who don't live in Germany with me, I figured that it's been a while since my last blog post, and since nothing too interesting has happened lately, I'd talk about my internship.

That's right. I have an internship. In Germany. Be impressed.

Or not, because I'm basically an office girl. I work for a small Sprachschule in Munich, and do all the things that they need me to do. Eventually, that might mean doing creative things like writing newsletters, making language activities, and even teaching classes, but as of yet, the other intern that works there has been conveniently present whenever anything that requires a brain needs to be done, and I am left to make copies.

It's really okay with me, though. My boss/superviser is cool, as well as all the other people who work there. I also have now officially had three jobs, which means that I can now fill out all three blanks on job applications. And I get to practice my German a little (but only a little, since it's a Sprachschule and therefore everyone who works there is at least fluent in English and German).

I had a change in duties, though, since the Christmas season started. For the last three times I worked, I did nothing but stuff envelopes with the Christmas letters and flyers. No wait, that's not exactly true-- I stamped the envelopes, too.

My favorite part about my job, though, are the little perks. If I had known before they'd hired me that I was going to get access to so many cool things, I would have wet my pants in excitement. You see, there's an espresso machine at my work. I love espresso, but I always feel guilty buying expensive coffee drinks. So when I work, I always get to drink a latte or two. 

But that's not all-- there's also a fridge filled with mineral water, both still and sparkly! That I get to drink as much of as I like! And a cupboard filled with chocolate. I don't know if I'm supposed to eat the chocolate, but I usually eat a piece or two anyway.

Well, I have to leave now and go to Prague (traveling around Europe is also a part of my day-to-day life, suckas) so I will write more after the weekend. If you were ever wondering, though, what it's like to be me... now you know a little better.

Bis später!

Ingrid

Motor Psycho

This past weekend I was on a class trip to Weimar and Berlin. It was fun, but also one of the stranger weekends I've experienced. So, if I even get to describing everything, they will be broken up into many blog posts. 

Last night, my trip was made complete when Hans Peter Söder, our professor and chaperone, decided to buy a DVD at a truck stop for us to watch during the long journey home. The movie was called "Motor Psycho" and he chose it because it was supposed to be a movie about a motorcycle band, fitting in with our class theme about traveling and experience. The movie opens with a shot of a very busty woman asleep on a towel on the side of the road. Her husband or boyfriend is down a little trail that leads to a lake, fishing. She wants to kiss him a little, but he's busy, so she goes back to sleep.

Then it cuts to a crotch shot of a guy on a motorcycle. It zooms out to reveal two other guys on motorcycles, and they drive down the road until they spot her. The leader of the gang is intrigued, and they pull over and watch her for a bit before the leader decides to lean down and kiss her.

She enjoys it until she opens her eyes and realizes it's not her boyfriend/husband, and screams for him to come save her. He runs over and fights the motorcycle gang until they beat him unconscious. She starts screaming uncontrollably and trying to check if her husband's okay, but the leader of the gang pulls her up and continues where he left off.

It then cuts to a man and a very pretty woman in a Jeep. The woman gets out of the Jeep and walks down the road, and there is another crotch shot of the motorcycle leader riding his motorcycle. They spot her and start to harass her, circling her on their motorcycles. Her husband, however, is able to stop them. She joins him in the Jeep and they drive away, while the camera zooms ominously in on the license plate. . .

We watched about a minute more (the man and his wife safe in their house-- but for how long?!) before Hans Peter shut it off and said there were technical difficulties. Definitely not the movie he had expected. I sat there, wondering how the rest of the movie would have gone (does the motorcycle gang just rape different women the entire movie?) and then decided to ask to see the movie case.

H. P. handed me the case and started talking about it. He said that he bought it because the cover looked very cool and sixties, and then showed me the inside of the case, which had a row of sixties movies along the bottom, and asked me if I knew the director. "He must have been pretty famous, because he directed this whole series of movies-- Bosomania". I took the case back to my seat and read the back and then looked at the inside.

The back of the cover was completely normal, "A band of motorcycle delinquents terrorizes the country side, but their fate changes when a doctor, whose wife they had hurt very badly, decides to take matters into his own hands" (Approximately; it was in German and I also shortened it).

But then I realized that Bosomania is the combination of the words Bosom and Mania. A closer look at the row of sixties movies at the bottom and I realized that a few of them had names like "Super Vixens" and naked ladies on the front.

When I told H. P. he laughed, got embarrassed, and then said he got it. "But the cover looked so cool!" he said, "we should use it as the cover of our yearbook."

I can only imagine what the cashier was thinking as this normal-looking man with a group of 20 year olds picked out and purchased this DVD.

¡Viva España!

As many people know, I went to Madrid this past weekend in order to visit my friend Annie. And, of course, to see Spain. It's so nice being in Europe, surrounded by different countries and cultures. I just feel so cool when people ask me what I'm doing for the weekend and I answer with, "Oh, you know, just hopping over to Spain (or France, or Austria). . .". The semester break is going to be so cool. I feel sorry for my friends who are only here for half the year. They're all frantic, trying to see as many places as they can over the few weekends they have left. Suckas.

What can I say about Spain? It's interesting because even though I'm American, living in Germany for the past few months has colored my perspective on things, so I experienced the weekend differently than I would have otherwise.

The first thing that got me was the fact that when I boarded the metro, Annie asked if I had anything important in any of my outer pockets and told me to watch my surroundings. This should be common sense, but since I've been living in the safest city in Germany (and possibly Europe, though I'm not sure) I've lost all sense of fear and danger. I guess I didn't pay enough attention, because sure enough, when we switched trains Annie noticed that my outer backpack pocket was open. There wasn't anything in there but pens, but I was irked that someone would try to pickpocket me.

The Agenda for the night was, of course, to party, because that's what they do in Spain. I hadn't brought any 'clubbing clothes', so Annie dressed me in some of hers. I ended up wearing a short, form-fitting not quite zebra printed dress and purple leggings. . . but it looked good, I swear. We went to a club and danced all night, and then went to one of her friend's houses at 5:30 because the Metro didn't open until 6. They all had a wonderful time, but I found a blanket and fell asleep on the couch. It was still fun, though :). At 9 I returned to my hostel and passed out.

I was supposed to meet Annie sometime I can't remember, but I was a half hour late because I didn't wake up. We had a relaxing evening of walking around the city, window shopping, and eating tapas (which I thought were small plates, but were not that small since we could not finish the three that we split). Then we were really tired and had to go to sleep. See what a night of partying will do to you?

Saturday was pretty sweet because we went to two museums. The first one was free for students all the time (apparently a lot of them are, so jealous) and the second one was all fancy and cost 5 euro. It was awesome. I love the crazy european art that came out of the first half of the 20th century, and there was lots of it: Picasso, Dali, Miró, etc. Afterwards, we went to a little café in order to consume what Annie referred to as hot chocolate and churros, but was actually this strange steaming chocolate pudding like concoction in a coffee mug and things that were like churros, but weren't actually churros (they had ran out). Don't get me wrong, it was delicious. It was also an experience ("Dude, how are you supposed to drink this? It's so thick" "Whatever, Ingrid, I drink it all the time" "Don't believe it" "Just watch me. . ." *Annie attempts to drink* ". . . yeah, today it's just hard to drink because it's thicker than usual. . .")

It was perfect for dipping the churro-like pastries in.

Then we partied until 1:30. I had to leave early so that I was able to catch my morning plane. Made it, by the way.

So Madrid, pros and cons:

Cons: 

The crime rate and feeling of fear. I wasn't afraid because I'm not used to it, but Annie was a little nervous sometimes because of the men. They're a little crazy there. We were sitting at a window table in a restaurant, and a group of guys started taking pictures of us. What are they even going to do with those pictures? Doesn't make any sense to me. I mean, there are girls just as pretty as me online, with the frizzy hair and zits airbrushed out. Very strange.

The city seemed dirty to me. Of course, anything would seem dirty after Munich, the magical land in which literally no one litters, but when I got back to my hostel one night after walking around in flip-flops, my feet were disgusting! I had to be careful not to step in any water anywhere because it would have made mud. Icky.

Finally, apparently in Spain you can't just walk in and use the bathrooms in fast food restaurants and such. Which is stupid. What do you expect a tourist to do? I should have peed on the floor. In Munich, you can walk into whatever establishment you want and use their bathroom. Also, I've heard that not letting someone use the bathroom is inhumane (and possibly illegal) as defined by the UN. I didn't need to go very bad, but I felt very indignant about the lack of human rights in this backward country. F***ing Spain.

Pros:

The architecture is beautiful. Also, the buildings are taller and the streets narrower than those in Munich. Gives one the romantic feeling of always walking through alleys.

The Museums are mostly free to students.

The food. The "hot chocolate" was amazing, as were the tapas we ordered. Yummy yummy.

The weather was fantastic! 60 degrees at the end of November. Awesome.

Well, that's all. Sorry the post is so long, but I had a lot to say, I guess. Sort of funny that even though there's 4 pros and 3 cons, it appears from the size of the lists that I really didn't like Spain. But I did! 

Also, re-reading that hot chocolate conversation, I realize that it could not possibly have taken place because it would have been interrupted by about a billion of those "that's what she said" jokes. But you get the drift.

Until next time,

Ingrid

Well, crap

It's about 3:30 in the morning on a Wednesday night/ Thursday morning. Tomorrow is going to be an exciting day, because I'm flying to Madrid to see my friend Annie. It is also going to be a full day because I have classes and such, so I have to leave my room a little before 8:30 in the morning and go directly to the airport when my class ends at 4:30.

I thought that I would get up a bit early to pack (already have a list), do a little homework, and shower so I went to bed around 10:30. I'm most productive in the morning, so it makes sense to do this instead of just staying up really late.

I was sleeping peacefully until 1 in the morning when I bolted up with the urge to do laundry. There were a few articles of clothing that I was planning on bringing with this weekend that were used but definitely still wearable, along with some other clothes that I wasn't planning to bring with but were nevertheless in need of a wash. I figured that it would be a good time, since I was awake and all, and since I figured no one would be doing laundry in the middle of a weekday night. I was right. I put my clothes in, puttered around, took a shower, and then took them out of the washer to bring them up to the dryer room.

I put my clothes in one of the 3 dryers (there were four, but one of them is broken) , chose the settings I wanted, and put in my dryer coin. It didn't start. Tried to get the coin back so I could try another dryer (had only brought one up with me and didn't want to go back down to my room to get another) but I couldn't do that, either. So I went to my room, grabbed a few coins, and headed back up to try again. I put my clothes in the dryer next to the one I had tried a few minutes ago, chose my settings, and put in a coin. It didn't start. I couldn't get this coin back, either, but I wasn't expecting to. 

Ever the optimist, I opened the third and last dryer, only to see a funny piece of machinery (part of the engine, maybe? It was fairly large) just sitting inside of it.

Hence the title of this post. Not only were the clothes I was planning to wear this weekend wet, I was also stuck with a pile of clothes that would mildew if I didn't find a means to dry them.

I tried to call a friend in a different building, but she didn't answer, which is understandable since it was almost 2:30 in the morning. Luckily for me, my buddy three floors above me was still logged into Skype, and I asked if I could borrow her drying rack. Not only did she say yes, she let me use her heater space so that more important clothes could dry faster! What a lifesaver.

So I guess that things are going to be okay. The clothes I was going to wear should be dry tomorrow, and the remaining ones are hanging safely on a drying rack. I just hope that I don't get the runs; a rumored side-effect of overdosing on vitamin C, which I have been taking like crazy since developing a sore throat Monday night (almost better!).

I really shouldn't joke, though. Someone want to knock on wood for me?

Good night!

Ingrid

A Day of Hurrying

The thing about having your blog posts linked to facebook is that people actually read them. Which is good in that your family can keep up with you without having to go through the trouble of actually going to the blog page and checking periodically, but bad in that people that you didn't necessarily expect to read your blog, do (read your blog).

Like this post. Anyone here in Germany knows that I actually went to Neuschwanstein a week and a half ago, and that it's pretty sad that it's taken me this long to post about it. If it wasn't exciting enough to post immediately, why even write about it?

If my blog were not linked to facebook, I wouldn't have this problem. On the other hand, if my blog were not linked to facebook, my own mother probably would not read it.

Annie would, though, because she's too cool for facebook.

Another embarrassing thing about facebook is all those ridiculously addicting farm games. As much as you tell yourself you're not going to get addicted, you always do. And since everyone else is addicted, you all become neighbors. This should make me feel better about it-- after all, I'm obviously not the only one who partakes. But it gets bad when other people who play the game start commenting about how nice my farm looks and how fast I'm leveling up. Like, "Not only does Ingrid play stupid farm games on Facebook, she plays them so much that she levels up faster than other people; furthermore, she obviously spends time rearranging her farm."

It's terrible. Especially when orphaned animals wander on to my farm. I want my other farm friends to be able to adopt them, so I let Farmville post the announcement on my wall. And then the second the poor wild turkey, black sheep, or ugly duckling gets adopted, I erase the post and pretend that it never happened.

There is far too much self-deception in my life. I wish I believed it.

On to my post:

The Saturday before last, a few friends and I went to Neuschwanstein, the famous fairytale castle built by the crazy King Ludwig that was supposedly the model for Disney's Cinderella Castle. The town that it is in is absolutely beautiful; surrounded by mountains and containing at least two picturesque lakes. I can see why King Ludwig and the royal family decided to build their castles there.

The day started with me being late to the meeting point. I hurried out of the elevator and ran into my friend Liz, who informed me that two of the group had just taken the other elevator up to my room to find me. Very nerve wracking, since I had cut things close and if they didn't come down from my room soon we would all miss the train. They came down with two minutes to spare, and because we ran, we made it. 

The train ride to the town of Füßen lasted almost three hours. I don't know why, since the train ride back only lasted two hours, but it was fun. I read most of a play and talked to my delightful travel buddies. The only problem is that the train conductor kept telling us to take our feet off the seats. Whenever we heard anyone coming, everyone would jump a bit and rearrange themselves. There's just no comfortable way to sit on trains without putting your feet up. 

We got to Füßen and took the bus to the village where the castles are. Basically, it's a valley surrounded by crystal clear lakes and forested mountains with castles on them.

The first castle was nice, and we had a little over an hour before the next castle tour, so we decided to get lunch. We knew we were going to be cutting it close, but were hungry. The map said it would take a half hour to get there (it's an uphill hike), but we figured that we were young and all, and that it would really take fifteen minutes. . . (here I am again, lying to myself)

Well, it took us a while to find a restaurant. We didn't want to eat at the closest one (mistake #1) so we wandered down the hill, farther from Neuschwanstein (mistake #2). When we found a restaurant that suited us, we decided to eat there, even though it was busy (mistake #3).

Unfortunately, there was only one waitress. So even though we ordered relatively quickly, by the time the food got there, we only had about 25 minutes until our tour. We ate so fast. Even though the pizza was burning our tongues. We ate a meal in about 5 minutes. While I helped Ana chug her Radler, Elizabeth went up with the two others to pay. We rushed out the door, and then found that in the hurry and cultural confusion, we had only tipped the waitress a little less than one euro ("I thought we were just supposed to round up to the nearest euro!" "For small bills-- for large ones it's supposed to be about 10 percent" "Well, shit")

I was pumped full of adrenaline: "Okay guys, we have 20 minutes. If it takes normal people 30 minutes to get there, we can definitely make it!" And we started charging up the hill. There was a horse carriage in the distance that I eventually caught up to and passed. After about 10 minutes I noticed that I could only see Emir (one of the group) and that we had lost the others. I back tracked a little to try to give them words of encouragement, but was met by frustration ("INGRID WE'RE GOING AS FAST AS WE CAN").

Unfazed, I kept going up the hill. It took Emir and I 18 minutes. "Damn," I said, "that would not take a normal person 30 minutes." It turns out that we had misread the map, and that it actually recommended allotting 40-45 minutes to hike up the path to Neuschwanstein, so we did pretty well.

We missed our tour. A man who worked there took us to a room to check when the next tour we could join was. The next English tour was in half an hour. Or, we could just join the German tour starting now. Excited, I said, "Können wir?" and a worker sort of chuckled at me and complimented my German. In English. I guess that's life.

It was pretty cold out but we were all stripped down to our t-shirts and tank tops because of the work-out we just had. The Germans stared at us. Germans stare at everything, but especially humans that they think might be cold. You have no idea what it's like to be me on the train every morning. I almost exclusively wear flip-flops, and the Germans just stare at my feet. Occasionally one (usually male) will ask if I'm cold. Come on, people, it's still over 50 degrees outside. If it's not raining, why bother with shoes?

 

The rest of the day was very slow and relaxing. All in all, I had a very good experience.

 

Unfortunately, now my friends are afraid to hike with me.

I tried, I really did

So Sunday evening, I went up to my friend Elizabeth's room. The plan was to do yoga for 30-45 minutes and then go back down to my room for a few minutes to freshen up real quick before meeting a friend for church. I had skipped church the previous two weeks, but had enjoyed it the first time I went, and wanted to return.

I knew something wasn't quite right when I got to Liz's door and there were two cute pairs of shoes sitting peacefully outside her door. As far as I knew, Liz kept her shoes in her room, and besides, they were like no shoes that I had seen her wear. I knocked on the door and found it already open. I walked inside, and there were two young Korean women talking to Liz. Liz explained that they were Erasmus students and motioned for me to sit down.

They introduced themselves and the woman I sat next to said she was studying Theology. They said they were from South Korea, and I was like, "Is that the one with Kim Jong Il?" (Yes, I can be a bit ignorant. But asking questions is the way to fix that.) They looked horrified, said he was from North Korea, and started talking about how his atomic tests were terrible and that it was likely he would bomb the whole world in the "Plague by Fire" predicted in the Bible.

It started to get really weird-- they had a book full of things that looked like middle school science hand-outs that they took out and would point at. They turned to a page with an Atom bomb that said, "Plague by Fire". They then turned to a page with a picture of the Sun and the Earth with lots of scary lines coming out of the Sun that said, "Solar Winds." There was also one that had a picture of a catastrophic possible meteor collision with Earth.

But, they made it clear that if we celebrated Passover with them, we would live on because of God's promise. All of this we (Liz and I) understood. However, they kept on bringing up some vocab that we didn't understand over and over. I looked it up using Liz's computer and found that they wanted us to get baptized.

Liz tried to tell them that she was already baptized, but they made a bunch of sad faces and told her that she really wasn't (because she was baptized in the Catholic church) and that she needed to get baptized again. After a while, they asked her if she needed time to think about it and agreed to come back next week.

When I looked at the time, I saw that I had missed church.

Ironic?

I wish I had a better immune system

On Tuesday I caught my second cold of the season (the first one being almost exactly two weeks before), which is ridiculous. I mean, Monday, I wake up, I'm happy, go to class, contribute, yadda yadda; Tuesday, I wake up, I'm fine, and then. . . Tuesday night. . . one side of my throat is swollen, I have a fever, and I end up coughing all night. No fun. At least it only really lasted two days. And it is sort of funny how diseased my study abroad program is. On Wednesday morning, half the people in class were sick, and it was just ridiculous trying to get anything done. The Professor would say something, and only half the people would do it. The others either wouldn't be listening, wouldn't hear, or would forget within seconds what they were supposed to be doing. Our brains were muddled and our motivation was low. The room was a symphony of sniffles.

Other than that the week was pretty cool. It was the first week of classes, which is always very exciting for me. It was different than usual, though, because here almost all the classes only meet once a week for an extended period of time instead of for 3 one hour sessions. I'm not always rushing from one place to another. Something I'll have to get used to.

At this point in time I am class shopping. Meaning, I am taking way too many classes until I start to do badly in some or decide that I don't really care enough to try. I've already decided to give up on the French class, but otherwise I'm taking 1 German grammar class, a mini class about communicating better in German (working on essay writing and speech giving), 'An intro to German Literature', 'Germany: 1945 to the Present', 'Modern Munich Literature; 1900-1950', and 'Goethe's Italian Journey'. All through my program and all in German. I'm also sitting in on two University Physics classes until I decide whether or not I am going to take them: Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity. I really want to take them, and think I understand enough German, but sitting through them this week reminded me that Physics is hard work. I really hope that I give them my all and don't slack off. It would be really wonderful to succeed.

I considered taking a French class, but am now thinking maybe not. I was really embarrassed because I took the French placement test and appeared to have tested into a really low level. But then, I went to the class that I tested into, and was a bit overwhelmed by the rapid French and the intensive grammar review. So confusing! The class was titled 'Cours Elementaire' (translation: 'Elementary course') but maybe I misunderstood. Anyway, seems to be a bit more trouble than it's worth at the moment, and I would rather concentrate on my other classes.

As I said before, I'm on the third day of a cold. I feel fine except for residual congestion, which puts me in a lame situation-- I can't go out, because I want to get completely better; I can't sleep, because of my stuffy nose; and I'm well enough that just sitting around is boring. Ah well, such is life. I'm sure I'll be better by tomorrow and back to enjoying my year in Germany.

Oktoberfest! Another Try

My old room-mate wasn't the only one to visit that weekend; on thursday night, I had to go to the airport to meet an old friend from high school. By the time we got back to my "apartment", it was really late, so we just went to sleep in preparation for the big day.

Sometime in the early morning, we woke up and got ready to go to Oktoberfest. We got there shortly after 9, walked into a beer tent, and asked three german guys around our age if it was okay to sit at their table (at nine in the morning on a weekday, Oktoberfest is already packed and there's no getting a table of one's own-- besides, sitting by germans gives me an excuse to practice). We talked a bit-- they were from northern germany, one of them was working (internship or apprenticeship, can't remember what german word he used and wouldn't know the difference if I did) and two of them were studying mechanical engineering. I think. Might have been the other way around. Luckily, I was sitting closest to them out of everyone at the table, so I got to practice my german quite a bit. I would say something in grammatically incorrect german, and they would reply in english. At ten, the waitresses came by with beers, and the drinking started.

I kept telling them that they could speak german, and as they started to drink a little they spoke more and more. I don't remember everything we talked about, but it involved a lot of pointing at Annie (friend from high school) and saying that she was the only one at our table that didn't understand german. Over and over again. I don't know why I did it so many times, but it was sort of funny because she didn't understand what I was saying.

Inside the tent was so cool. There were so many people from so many places, all brought together by alcohol. There were drinking songs, people chugging maßs (a liter of Oktoberfest beer), and lots of standing on benches and tables. Also, beer was everywhere, making everything quite slippery.

Sometime in the afternoon some guys from our program came over and convinced me and Annie to go to the funhouse with them. The funhouse wasn't that great, but there was a room that spun around so fast that everyone got stuck to the wall. I don't know who's idea it was to have so many rides at a festival full of drunk people.

We went back to a friend's room and she made us pasta. After that, everyone passed out except for me. Around nine Annie and I got back together with two other girls to hang out, but I left early in order to meet two people from my college who were also visiting me that weekend.

I went to the Hauptbanhof, and Annie went to a club. I met who I was supposed to, a friend from college (Katie) and a guy who I hadn't met yet (Daniel), but who also goes to Wooster and is in the same study abroad in France program as Katie. We got back to my room around 12:30, grabbed a beer each, and went downstairs to see if anything was going on. We talked with a few guys until 2 and then went back up and went to sleep.

We woke up around 7:30 to find that Annie had never come back. I went and knocked on a friend's door to see if she was there, and when she wasn't, figured she was a big girl who could take care of herself.

I left a note saying that I would be back in time to take her to the airport with a few hours to spare, and then left with my college buddies to have a second day at Oktoberfest.

Alpenexkursion

On Wednesday night, the 30th of November, my room-mate from last year came for a visit. Well, kind of. She wanted to visit me, but it was more for Oktoberfest, which is a good thing because I was busy most of the time she was here.

So the next day she went to Oktoberfest and I went on a day trip to the Alps. When we got to the Alps, our professor showed us a map and explained to us that we were not actually hiking in the mountains today, but taking a leisurely stroll up a hill. We then proceeded to walk up into the mountains for an hour and a half.

Most of it wasn't too bad, but there were about three ten minute sections that were very tough mountainous treks-- straight uphill, no breaks, very steep. I like hiking and walking up hills, but many group members felt deceived by our professor's earlier description.

The Alps were beautiful beyond description, so I won't try. When we got to our destination, we ate a hearty lunch-- we were supposed to take a lift down to where we started, so it didn't matter whether or not we ate ourselves into a stupor. Or so we thought. The train was broken that day.

Our professor thought it would be boring to simply retrace our steps and wanted to find an alternate route down. There wasn't really another way back, so we made our own. At one point the hill (there was no trail, by the way) became so steep that we couldn't continue walking-- we sat down on our butts and slid.

At the end of the day, we were sweaty, grass-stained, and thoroughly content.

I'm back!

Sorry I haven't kept up with my blog (if anybody's following it. . .)! This past week and a half was quite busy: Oktoberfest, 4 visitors out-of-city visitors in 3 days, a sickness, a new refrigerator, and a search for a seemingly non-existent bank account. You see, constantly having guests, drinking too much, coughing and worrying when the next meal will be are all activities that can distract one from one's duties. A lot of (hopefully) interesting things happened, and I will describe them in installments. I hope I finish, as I am going to Salzburg tomorrow and have quite a busy weekend.

Tuesday the 29th of September: A Strange Prelude to an Amazing Week

As you may or may not know, my classes for the semester have not yet started and I'm still in Orientation. Orientation is a combination of things: German, learning what's important in Munich, a very brief course in German politics, etc. On Tuesday, our homework was to go out and find a German person that we did not know and interview them. We were divided into groups and instructed to go to either a bar or cafe.

Our group wasn't too exciting; we found a nice young woman downtown who was currently involved in a hotel internship. When we got back to our student housing, we noticed another group sitting at the student bar talking to someone, and a few of us decided to join. The man offered me a place to sit next to him, and I did.

Now, what I didn't know when I sat down was that this man was a) not German, but in fact Romanian, and b) extremely perverse. I did not feel threatened by him in any way (he didn't try to touch me and didn't even really give me any looks that made me uncomfortable), but he would randomly insert sexual things into conversation. Example: I was talking to the girl across from me about how excited I was to go to the Alps that Thursday. "I love hiking!", I exclaimed. He turned his head and said, "What? You love f***ing?". (That was the tamest example I could think of-- didn't want to offend anyone). He also (recognizing that I was too young for him, I guess) tried to set me up with every guy my age that was at the table with us. When I first sat down, he asked me if I liked nice, young American guys and motioned to someone I knew sitting across from me. I was like, "I already know him," and he dropped the subject.

A guy I knew sat down with us, and when he got up to go use the bathroom, Heraldo (the Romanian) turned to me and said, "Ingrid, I could tell he was devoring you". I was like, "What?". A second later, I figured out that he meant to say 'devouring'.

Well, this Romanian did have a little crush on me so when I got up to leave he ordered the table a round of beers so that I would stay. "Ingrid," he said, "give me two months and I will be falling in love with you." I laughed nervously.

The group that interviewed him made up fictional answers for their presentation the next day. All the ones he gave were too vulgar for mixed company.

Keeping up

I've been doing a lot of things lately; things that are very fun, but also very normal for college kids to do and consequently probably not of much interest. This past weekend I was out late three nights in a row (although when I left a club at 2 on Saturday, the German girl we were with protested, claiming that it was too early and the clubs aren't even that fun until 3), and I think that I'm just not meant to stay up so late so often. Don't get me wrong, I had fun, but the club scene is just not my scene, and now that I know what they are like, I probably will not frequent them.

Sundays here are totally me, though. On Sundays here all the stores, and most other things, are closed. This means that until classes start, I can't even be productive if I want to. It's a day meant for rest. My Sunday included no homework or errands, but instead consisted of 1) a walk in the park 2) the doing of the three dishes that I got dirty and 3) splitting a small pizza with a friend at a cafe. That's all I did. It was great.

That's all I have to say. Hopefully I will do something interesting soon, and then people wanting to keep up with what I'm doing will have something interesting to read.

Good night.

The thing about Germans is . . .

. . . they all speak German. This isn't too big of a problem usually, since the majority of the population prefers to mind their own business and not start conversations. However, the people my age seem to be pretty friendly, and often instigate small-talk if I'm in the elevator with them or walking in the same direction they are. I do want German friends, really, but I'm not very confident about my language skills, and it can be embarrassing when I constantly ask people to repeat what they've said or to talk slower. It's okay though. I just can't wait until I don't have to do that.

The only way to learn is to practice. I just wish it wasn't so hard! I hope that these people that I have painfully slow and simple conversations with actually do like me and aren't annoyed. If I could go out with them, my German will improve immensely.

A Lesson in Manners

In Germany, nobody smiles. Being gregarious is not a cultural value. People just walk around with hard looks on their faces and ignore everyone. Smiles are not trusted and laughing is unacceptable.

Or at least that's how it seems to us Americans. I smile a lot and have a voice that carries, and consequently have been getting dirty looks on the U-Bahn since I've been here. No one I hang out quite understood why, and decided that Germans must just not like happiness.

Our perspective changed tonight. Three of us went out in the city and were taking the U-Bahn back when a whole bunch of loud, drunk Americans boarded. They were falling all over the place, yelling to each other across the train, and laughing at jokes that just weren't funny. My first instinct was to say something to my friend that these people couldn't understand, so I leaned forward in my seat and quietly said something in German. It was then I noticed the completely cold face on my normally friendly companion. As I looked to my side, I noticed our other group member was frowning, too.

Now I understand.

Oktoberfest!

If you know me, then you know how excited I was for the start of Oktoberfest. Not for the drinking, necessarily (who wants to pay 9 euro for a beer?) but for the opening ceremony, during which the mayor of Munich taps the first keg of beer. I mean, could you imagine any American politician kicking off any sort of giant alcoholic party? I was so ready to get there early (gotta get there around 9 in the morning to see the opening at noon).

But last night I felt sick, went to bed at 8, and slept until 11. I went to my friend's room and watched the ceremony on TV.

It was actually better, I think. The beer hall looked so crowded and from everything I've heard, it takes the waitresses an hour or more to get everyone who orders beers at opening what they want.

So we went to scope it out a bit later. Basically, Oktoberfest is like your typical county fair, except huge and filled with beer halls. But it has all the county fair offerings: rides, funhouses, overpriced food, etc. And the beer hall/tent openings were pretty inconspicuous. If it weren't for the occasional person moaning on the ground, I wouldn't have known the difference.

Oh, except that about half the fair-goers were wearing Lederhosen and Dirndls. I had no idea they were so popular-- I gotta get me an outfit like that.

German Hospitality

Last night, I and the people I was with got kicked out of a restaurant for being drunk.
We arrived, sat down outside at the farthest table from the door (all the others were taken), and waited for our server. And waited. Finally, one of us went in and alerted the staff to the fact that we were there, and about 10 minutes later, she came and took our orders-- one beer each. Well, we sat there awhile and drank our one beer a person and were laughing and enjoying ourselves, and after about 15 minutes, our glasses were empty. But we were talking and laughing and having a good time, so we stayed, waiting for our waitress to come back. We must've waited about a half hour when the guy who had previously gone in and alerted the staff decided to go in again and let them know that we were ready for another round. He came back, said it was frustrating that when you spoke german to people here they responded in english, and we waited some more. After 10 minutes, one of the people I was with joked that we should just get up and walk away, but of course we didn't. We should have. About 10 minutes later, the waitress came to our table with a big frown on her face and told us that the chef wanted us to leave because we were drunk. We did, after paying.

It had been our first beer of the evening, and, needless to say, we were not drunk.

An extreme, but typical example of the german waitress. The wait staff in germany does not work for tips, but for a salary, and so does not try to impress you. At the next restaurant/beerhouse we arrived at, the guy across the table from me got bumped in the head repeatably by trays, filled with beer, carried by uncaring waitresses.

I'm going to uphold the status quo and not tip german waitresses unless they deserve it.

At least it's a good story

Morning, September 17th 2009

After that my day went pretty well. I understood everything at the meeting, got ahold of a towel, and bought some toiletries. The only confusing thing that happened is that it took me a long time to find face wash-- there were things called face peels, bottles of stuff called face water, and a few things that looked like face wash but were labeled face mask. In fact, I had my choice between two items that were called face wash gels. I guess I could've chanced it with the face waters, but didn't want to. It's not as if I had a back-up.

I went out to dinner because I won't have pots and eating utensils until tonight, and got drunk off one beer. Be proud of me, adults-- this is a clear sign that I have not yet consumed enough alcohol to build a tolerance. Or that I'm a fairly slender girl, German beer is stronger and served in bigger glasses, and I had it on an empty stomach.

My internet still doesn't work. I wish I could check today's weather. Oh well.

So here's the deal...

Note: I didn't have internet for a few days, so I will be posting back posts.

Wednesday, September 16th 2009

I just arrived in Munich this morning, at about 7:30 local time. Now it is 10:30. In an hour I'm meeting a few other students to go to our first meeting. In order to get there, we have to take the U-Bahn, and I don't want to go alone.

Right now, I am settling into my unfurnished apartment. Luckily, the nice previous tenant left me some toilet paper, because otherwise I'd be screwed. I know what you're thinking: "Oh, not totally; you'd just have to take a shower after." But, you see, that would be hopeless. I didn't bring any toiletries with me except for my toothpaste, toothbrush, and deodorant, nor did I bring any towels of any kind. Oh wait, I also brought two bottles of nail polish and soap to wash my Diva Cup, for those of you who know what that is.

Speaking of the nail polish, it leaked in my suitcase. It was in a plastic bag, though, so it didn't get on anything except for the other bottle of nail polish. And all over my hands when I thoughtlessly picked it up.

I didn't want to show up to the first meeting as the chick with red nail polish all over her hands, so I started to look for soap. Maybe, I thought, the previous tenant had left some. I didn't find any soap, but under the sink there was toilet bowl cleaner and vinegar. I used vinegar. The toilet bowl cleaner said (or at least I think it did-- everything's in German) that it wasn't suitable for marble, so I figured it wasn't suitable for my hands.

So I'm typing here with hands that smell like vinegar and feet that smell like stinky feet because they were trapped in socks and shoes for the last 20 hours. I didn't get all of the nail polish off my hands, but I got most of it. I've been trying with no success to connect to the internet, so hopefully I will get more information about this at the meeting. If you are reading this, you know I succeeded. 

You may not get many more posts, though-- the plugs are different here, so I have no way to charge my computer. Right now I have the screen on the dimmest setting in an effort to conserve energy.

I'm going to go make a shopping list. At least I already have deodorant. Wish me luck!

Only a few more days. . .

As I was driving today, the dreaded little light came on that means that the car is almost out of gas. I couldn't conserve gas very easily because I was driving up a hill. I made it to my destination safe and sound, but not without a little anxiety.

I also left the lights on when I got there.

I was able to start the car and get home without running out of gas, but I couldn't help thinking to myself: "Oh, how wonderful it will be in four days when I'm in Germany and there's adequate public transportation."

Speaking of public transportation, I got hit on by a BART operator recently. On Monday I was walking to BART to go meet a friend, and while I was in the parking lot, I heard a train leaving. I looked up, and the driver leaned out the window and started yelling, "Hey Baby!". What do BART operators do, anyway? Obviously not drive.

Welcome to my Blog

I'm sorry the name isn't more creative. Usually I don't have to think of names. Usually I just write in my journal, which (hopefully) no one reads except me, and which does not have a name. But a few people requested that I have a little blog, so I'm making one. Don't worry, I'm not so vain that I think people are actually going to read every word, but I figure if all the people who said they'd check it, do, then between the three of them, every word will be read.

Anyway, this is my blog, in which I will describe all my European adventures that will occur between September 16th, 2009 and July 27, 2010. Hope you all enjoy!

Ingie