Long Time No See

Well hello there!  It has indeed been a while but I wanted to wait until I had enough to tell to make it interesting to read.  This entry dates back a while because between then and now its just been a lot of school and routine which is fun for me but boring as hell to read.  Anyway, on to the action!

One Tuesday evening we all went (all AiB students as well as the Texas kids) to the Germany/Australian soccer game.  Good news and bad news; bad news, we lost.  Good news, it was really exciting and experiencing a game from the stadium was awesome.  Everyone got super into it which was a blast.

A couple weeks later we went on an excursion to Aachen and Maastricht which started off dull but got awesome later on.  To start, we went to a church with a lot of relics and the likes which was, in retrospect, pretty cool but at the time it didn't seem that substantial.  The building was old, as you can imagine, and had been built in several different steps which showed in the different architecture styles used throughout it but it wasn't jaw dropping.  Also doesn't help that I forgot my camera again which has turned into the theme of this trip unfortunately.  Next we went to the point where Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium meet and, after taking a couple quick pictures, we all went and played at the playground for about 20 minutes.  There were all sorts of cool structures and such that we'd never played on before so it was an exciting time for all of us.

From there we went to Maastricht to tour some caves and stumbled upon the greatest tour guide of all time.  His name was Cornelius (plus like 6 middle/last names) but he asked us to call him Cor.  He was about 65 and loved giving these tours which made it all the more awesome.  After getting out of the creepy, pitch black tunnels we got some free time to roam the city where a small group of us went to get fries and walk around the city.  About 30 minutes before we had to meet back up to go we decided to go get some pancakes which turned out to be a delicious choice.  At 6:30 we met at the bus and headed home.

Friday night, the night after, I ended up playing Activity with my host parents and their game night friends.  I dare say that of all nights in Germany, playing pictionary/taboo/the one where you pantomime the word all in one game with Germans was probably the best one so far.  I don't think that sentence flowed as well as I intended it to so what I'm saying is that it was awesome.  We played in English but the cards were still in German so I had to use my host dad's iPad to translate the words.  The night ended at around 2 when most people went home, one guy stayed (didn't like going home I guess) so I played chess against him.  He owned me but the fact that I played chess against a German guy at 2am is a cool story on its own.

Finally, to end with a bang Phantasialand.  Germany's 6 flags.  It was fucking awesome.  There were tons of roller coasters that no one else wanted to go on but I loved, no surprise there.  I'll post pictures taken and a video my host dad took of me on one of the rides to my Facebook soon.  Anyway, it was super fun to get some adrenaline pumping for a few hours.  Park opened at 9am so we got there at 8:30 and closed at around 7 but we were all done by 6.  All in all a successful day.

Oh yea, and I played tennis with/against my host dad and sister the other day.  It was really fun to get back into it and run around again.  If any of you at home are mediocre tennis players and want to rally for a bit let me know, it'd be fun to casually get back into it.

That's all folks!  I'm off to take my last final then relax before packing to go to London, Ireland and Scotland before returning back to the States.  PEACE!

Spain!

Made it back, I have.  Spain was the second and final long group excursion we got to go on and it was quite enjoyable, to say the least.  It consisted of Madrid and Barcelona which were both very cool cities though I liked the former more than the latter, less sketchy.  Anyway, lets get this summary post on the road!

We met at the AiB at 10:15 on Sunday morning and got taxis to the airport.  The journey to Madrid, 2 hour flight, and all that was nothing special so I'm not gonna add anymore about it.  Once we got to Madrid, we met with our guide for the week, Diana, who, much to the enjoyment of the guys in our group, was very cute (mid to late 20's).  We went straight to the hotel to drop our stuff off through the insanely complex subway system, there are like 3 or 4 levels of tunnels underground.  Anyway, after dropping off our bags we met at 5pm for the walking tour of the city where we got to see a bunch of historic buildings and the likes, as we do.  We stopped around dinner time and a group of us got dinner in a little restaurant which was meh, not the best food I've had but not the worst either.  At around 10 I met up with Brittany, friend from LMU and we went to McDonald's so she could eat (her choice) where we sat and talked for a couple hours.  At 11:30 we got kicked out so we moved over to a bar where we chilled till about 12:30.  On our way out we saw both LMU groups in the bar we were in (Bonn and Madrid groups) and were invited to go out with them but neither of us were feelin' so we decided to call it a night.

On Monday, we had to get up at 7:15 so we could be in the lobby ready to go at 8:30.  Breakfast was simple (not enough for some people) but I thought it was good, just a roll and a de-licious croissant. Our first stop of the day was an art museum with a ton of different artists showcased.  I got a new appreciation for Dali while there, his paintings are way more involved than I thought and I was legitimately impressed with his work which is rare, don't appreciate art as much as I probably should but whatever.  We then went to Toledo and walked around exploring it, very beautiful city.  The streets seemed to be lined with Mid-eval shops with swords and suits of armor literally every 50 feet.  There were a couple gorgeous churches and since Diana is an art history major she knew all sorts of information about them which was bonus.  Another cool stop we made was the oldest synagogue in the world which was, unfortunately, no longer in use but was still fun to walk around in.  We got back to the hotel at 6 and relaxed for a couple hours before meeting at 8 to go to the flamenco dancing show.  The only word that seems to fit the experience is passionate.  Both the music and the dancing were awesome and all the artists got really into the music/experience which I enjoyed.  It ended at 12:30 and I was not the only one who was wiped out and decided not to go out.

Tuesday started early again with a visit to the Prado Museum for about 4 hours which was legit.  Got to see a lot of paintings I'd only seen pictures of before and even though we spent 4 hours there we only saw a fraction of the collection, that museum is packed with stuff.  Lunch was a little sandwich-like shop which was by far the best food I had on the entire trip.  They were like hot pockets full of meat or mushrooms and cut in half, kinda hard to describe but the important part is they were delicious.  From there we went on a tour of the royal palace which was beyond beautiful but I wasn't allowed to take pictures unfortunately.  Our tour guide was more pretentious than even the royal family but all is well, it was still cool to see the palace.  With my free time I went with the shopping group to Zara where I finally got a leather jacket as I'd been looking for for ages then roamed back to the hotel to relax.  Dinner was with Ian and his friend and Mike from my group, we went to a little cafe then to churros and chocolate which was delicious.  The night then turned into bar hopping and Brittany and her friend joined us at around 10.  At 3am Brittany and Ian both called it a night so Mike and I headed to the club where the rest of the group was.  At around 4 we left with one of the members of our group who was done, to put it nicely.  Mike and I stayed up till 5:30 to make sure she was ok (kept getting called back by her roommates to come help with her).

Wednesday was supposed to start at 6:30 because we had to meet at 7:30 to leave but unfortunately none of our alarms went off so we all woke up at 7:30 to a call from Victoria at the front desk.  Needless to say we panicked and threw our stuff in our bags and sprinted out.  I, in my rush, forgot my newly acquired jacket so I had to run up and get it.  By the time I got out of the hotel they were no where to be found (I was about 10 minutes late), so I sprinted to the metro and thankfully found a sympathetic guy that spoke just enough English to point me in the right direction after he let me use his phone to call my group (I had run out of money).  Finally made it to the group and relaxed a little then passed out on the train to Barcelona.  When we got there we went straight to the hotel to drop stuff off then some people went out for lunch or to the beach but I felt awful so I stayed in.  As it turned out I threw up twice that day, never made it out of the hotel, and slept for a total of about 16 hours by the next morning.  I missed the bus tour of the city which I am still kicking myself over but lesson learned on that whole ordeal, that's for sure.

Thursday started off much better than Wednesday seeing as I was feeling much better and was an hour early as opposed to 10 minutes late to breakfast.  We went to Montserrat to visit the church on the mountain which was beautiful.  We got to hear the all boy's choir which is the oldest in the world, they were damn impressive. At 4 we got back to the hotel then at 6:15 we took an optional walking tour of the city, only about 6 of us went, which ended at the outdoor market and I got to have some delicious fresh fruit which I was very happy about.  The tour ended at the hotel where we picked up the rest of the group for dinner (the farewell dinner) which was paella, it was pretty good but again, not as good as I had hoped.  After Mike, Steven, Emily and I headed back to the hotel to watch an episode of Portlandia which was hilarious then crashed at around 11.

Friday was a relaxed morning, we didn't meet until 9:30 when we checked out and put our bags into storage. Most of us then went to the Picasso museum which was very cool.  I'm not really a fan of his later work but his early work, from when he was 14-17 or so is absolutely amazing.  He painted better than most do in their entire life by the age of 14.  Our tour ended at 11:30ish and Eric, Kara, Mike and I went to the aquarium where I learned that Eric knows fucking everything about fish.  Sorry about the profanity but literally at every tank we walked up to he had something to say about every fish and could name all of them.  It was a small aquarium so it only lasted about 2 hours and we had 4 to kill so we then roamed back into the city to explore and get lunch.  Ultimately we ended back at the market where we roamed around for a while looking at all the stuff available for sale, some of which was pretty gross (lamb's heads, cow tongues, pig heads/feet, the likes). At 4 we left the hotel for the airport and got there without any eventful situations.  I made it back to my house at 11pm where I promptly fell asleep.

All in all, a great trip.  It was much more relaxed than the Berlin/Prague trip which was nice but it was still eventful enough for my taste.  After emptying my camera I realized I never posted the pictures from Switzerland that I took nor the ones from Karneval on my Facebook so I'll be sure to do that.  Gotta sort through em first though, make sure nothing is too incriminating or too blurry =)

Karneval and Mainz Weekends

Once again it seems I have let time get ahead of me and I'm two weeks behind on an update.  Fortunately, the events were so memorable this will still be a complete entry so fear not my young compatriots.

As you can imagine, anything following the skydiving weekend will seem rather bland by comparison.  Fortunately this was not as prevalent as I thought it would be as the next weekend was Karneval, a huge celebration which entails getting in costume, partying and watching a parade while people throw candy at you.  Now whoever came up with getting a bunch of people drunk then throwing candy at them must've been a genius and I wish I could shake his hand but I have a feeling he is no longer alive.  Anyway, so the back story of Karneval, it is a celebration right before Ash Wednesday as a way to binge on all the things you're supposed to give up for Lent and just generally have a good time.  Obviously there is drinking involved but, much to my surprise, even with a large portion of the city drunk it was not rowdy.  Quite the opposite, actually, it was a very friendly environment with people just enjoying themselves.  I'm sure there were some angry drunks somewhere but I never ran into any which is good.  Thursday we started the celebration in the AiB then walked as a group across the Rhine to where the parade was.  After the parade we all went to the old part of town back on our side of the Rhine to celebrate.  I was planning on having a liquid blanket on for a majority of the day because I was dressed up in my MC Hammer costume and it was about 40 degrees out.  This plan did not follow through, didn't really feel like drinking more when I got to the deciding point so I sobered up and, surprisingly, was not that cold for the day.  Anyway, Thursday ended fairly early since we all started at 10am so by 6 most of us had crashed (couple people stayed out till 3am O.o).

For the majority of the weekend everyone else in the group went to Paris but I needed a weekend to myself (and I was too late to get a spot in the hostel/get a train ticket).  I had a comfortable relaxed weekend which was needed for sure.  Hopefully I get to Paris at some point later but I'm not too worried about it.  Yea, I should go see it while I'm here but I'd prefer to go to the places that are less touristy, I can come back later in life and hit the big ones (Paris, Munich, Rome, etc).

Anyway, Karneval goes on all weekend including Monday so all the Paris people came back for that and we all went to Cologne because that's where the big parade took place.  We arrived in Cologne at about noon and walked around to find a good spot to watch the parade from.  To start we were a group of about 10 but Brandon and I both agreed we were tired of trying to maneuver a big group so we slowly held back until we broke off and went to find a place to watch the parade from on our own; it turned out to be a great idea.  The parade itself was as anyone would expect, thousands of people walking past or riding floats in costume throwing candy.  After 4 hours of standing and watching (at around 5pm) we decided we'd seen enough and walked around the city exploring some of the crazy party spots to see what it was like.  As the sun was still up the parties weren't too insane but the streets were still packed.  On that Monday, there were 1.5 million people there from other parts of the world but it didn't really feel overwhelming because the city is so big.  As you can imagine, dressed up in a very thin costume in the cold got me a lot of interesting looks and asking "bist du kalt??" (are you cold?) but, surprisingly I was warmer than I was on Monday, totally sober.  Once the sun dipped it started to get very cold so we decided to head back to Bonn and call it a day.

The next week was uneventful but the Saturday after that we went to Mainz for the day.  On the whole I didn't really enjoy the day because there was no reason for us to be there (as I saw it) but it was mandatory for my World Religions class to I toughed out.  One thing I did enjoy about the day is we got to go to the Gutenberg museum which was awesome.  Got to see ancient books as well as the methods they used to use and a bunch of different presses.  One of the gems of the museum was three Gutenberg bibles with different levels of embellishment.  Also, I volunteered to learn how to use the press (very simple) and I got to print a page of the Bible which the tour guide then wrapped up and gave to me which I enjoyed a lot.  For lunch we were on our own then got a tour of the city and cathedral in town (it's over 1000 years old) then at 5pm we all hopped back on the bus and drove home.

Quick side note, a couple days ago my host family made Mexican food for dinner which was delicious.  It was the first Mexican food I've had since coming here and I was craving it to no end.  Just thought I'd let you know =)

Auf Wiedersehen!

Up and Running

So this is my new official blog site but, once again, I've run into the problem of not enough space for free accounts to hold all my pictures so I'm just going to revert to my Facebook.  All of you reading this have access to it (or should) so you'll be able to see my photos there.  Sorry about the inconvenience of multiple sites but this is my best option.

On to more important things:
Switzerland!

As I'm sure most of you have heard, I went skydiving in Switzerland a couple weekends ago.  Just as I had hoped and predicted it was amazing.  We couldn't have asked for a more beautiful day (in winter that is) and after a slight delay due to fog we were able to get up in the air.  It was Sam, John, Bianca and I all jumping as a group.  Since the plane was small and there were a number of extras that needed to accompany us for the travel we have to jump in two groups, John and Sam and Bianca and I.  After getting suited up we watched John and Sam go up and leap out (they were tiny little dots in the sky) then gradually grow bigger and bigger.  Upon landing all Sam could say was "that was awesome" and John was speechless from his amazement.  As you can imagine, that just got me more excited so for the entire plane ride up I was smiling like a big idiot anticipating what was to come.  When we were at the right altitude the other jumpers in the plane went through their usual pre-jump routine of giving high fives and the likes then out they went.  Bianca jumped first and hearing her nervous "oh my God's" followed by a scream and a laugh when they jumped made me laugh out loud.  When it was my turn we scooted to the edge of the plane where I got into the position seen in the photos.  Right before we jumped he gave a countdown then leaned out.  We were in free fall for 45 seconds (which is actually a really long time) and I'm pretty sure I was yelling with joy for the entire thing *sorry tandem jumper dude*.  Anyway, it was probably the best experience I've had to date which is quite a statement I know but it's true.  The rest of the day was spent recovering (got back at noon and I was exhausted so I took a nap) then we went out and roamed around the small city enjoying it.  It was a very picturesque town which I had expected but was still shocking in a way.

After a late lunch we all went back to relax before getting picked up again at 6pm to go night sledding.  This was the first time I'd ever been sledding (for real), much less night sledding so it was, once again, awesome.  At the end of the day, it was agreed that that day had been the best ever for everyone in Switzerland.  Sledding took about an hour to get down the hill (though I wish it had been 2) and was ended at a restaurant where we were served cheese fondue and beer then brought back into town.  Some people went out that night but I, for one, was exhausted and didn't want to push myself too far or I wouldn't have loved the day as much as I do.  The next day we didn't train out until 1 in the afternoon so Sam and I did homework on the computers provided which lead to a very relaxed travel experience as well as evening at home.

Again, Facebook for pictures (might have to go through more than just my album to see the sledding ones, I didn't bring my camera).

RAVE

To those of you that don't know, we have now jumped one week in advance since the last post and I spent that Saturday night/Sunday morning at Energy, huge trance rave in the Netherlands.  Don't remember the full lineup but the important ones were ATB and Tiesto.  It. Was. Fucking. Amazing.  There isn't really any other way to describe it.  I didn't bring my camera because I didn't know what the atmosphere would be but O.O

O.O

O.O

It started at 9pm and lasted till 7am Sunday morning so, obviously, I stayed for the full thing.  The whole night I was being shaken by the bass kicks which, as I'm sure most of you reading this know, was indescribably amazing.  This is a short entry because I don't really know how to transfer all the feelings of the rave into words but one last thing I wanted to add is that by the time I got to bed on Sunday night I had been up for 34 hours straight, record for me.  I was loopy as hell and slept like a baby the second my head hit the pillow but made it the whole 10 hours of the rave which I'm quite proud of.

Brussels

So this entry is a couple weeks late *whoops* but better late than never right?  This'll be one of 3 entries today I think to catch up on what I've done these past few days so BUCKLE UP KIDS!

On the Saturday after the Berlin/Prague excursion I got to go to Brussels with my host dad and sister.  I got up at 8:00am which was earlier than I had hoped but it turned out to be well worth it.  We left at around 9:15 and arrived at our first stop, the Tintin Museum at around 11:45.  Tintin, for those youngins who don't remember it is this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Adventures_of_Tintin.  It was cool to see how the characters were introduced into the comic and developed as they went along.  The comic strip was also heavily influenced by film in terms of both content as well as shots and angles used which I hadn't noticed before.  After the museum we drove across town to the brewery where they make beer that doesn't use yeast to ferment.  There is a special kind of spore in just this section of Brussels that ferments the beer on it's own so they have a huge trough that sits out for a few hours so the spores can land in it.  It is then casked into huge wooden barrels for 3 years before it's ready to drink.  Naturally, we got some free samples when we were there then my host dad proceeded to buy 12 bottles of it, 2 of which we enjoyed that night.  There are 4 flavors, original, cherry, raspberry and flower (local flower used for flavoring).  It's hard to pick a favorite but I'd say raspberry was my favorite.

From the brewery we met up with a couple of Michael's (host dad) friends at Moeder Lambic, a bar that has 46 beers on tap.  Both his friends were from the states which made for much easier conversation.  I tried 3 beers while there, which were, again, delicious.  The three I tried were V Cense, Equinox, and Val-Dieu Grand Cru.  The first was a delicious bitter beer followed by a heavier, again bitter Equinox.  The third one made for a great ending point as it was very sweet, like dessert.

After the bar we walked to the old center of town which was beautiful, all the buildings are old and amazing.  Snapped a bunch of pictures then we said goodbye to the Americans and walked around Brussels stopping for a waffle with chocolate and strawberries on it.  Also got to see the famous peeing boy which was a very popular statue, it was surrounded with people taking pictures.  We ended the night roaming around a little more then drove home.  Once there, the beer tasting was still not over, got to try 4 more.  2 of them were from the brewery we went to that day.  The other two were stouts which were delicious.  My favorite one (by both taste and description) was one that had "one out of a dozen ales that is black as hell, filthy rich in the nose and with massive spoiled taste" written on the label.

All in all, a successful day as you can probably imagine.

Berlin and Prague

Oh man, this is gonna be a long post.  Here goes an hour of typing:

Our trip started early Saturday morning, I had to be at the train station at 8am to catch a 5 hour train to Berlin.  Fortunatly, I caught some sleep on the train so I could fully enjoy the bus tour we took when we got there.  We arrived at around 1 then went on a bus tour of the whole city for avout 4 hours visiting all the main sites.  As you can tell by my album, I got a lot of pictures on this trip and a majority of them were from this first day.  After the tour we got dropped off at our hotel and we had a couple hours to relax before going to get pizza at a really cool restaurant.  On the menu were a couple pizzas with horse meat so, being the adventurous kid I am, decided to try it.  Overall it was pretty good but didn't have much flavor, just generic meat but I'm definitely glad I tried it.  One of the girls on our trip is obsessed with horses so I tried to keep it a seceret that I was ordering it but, as news is difficult to limit, she found out and overracted to say the least.  After dinner some of us were too tired to go out and wanted to save our energy for the next day because it was going to be another full day so we went back and slept.

On Sunday we left the hotel at 7:50am and got a tour of a concentration camp until 1:30.  Our tour guide knew a ton about the camp and the era in general which was awesome.  It was strange to walk in the same camp on the same ground that prisoners had.  Afterwards we got lunch and went for a tour of the parliament building which was quite cool.  That ended around 6 which ended the planned events for the day so we all went back.  Unfortunately, a combination of imperfect directions and our lack of paying full attention lead to us taking the correct bus but in the wrong direction.  After about 40 minutes of bussing around we finally ended up in front of our hotel.  My roommates and I went out to get dinner at a Vietnamese place right next door which was delicious.  At around 9:30 we walked over to an American bar to watch the superbowl (which didn't start until 12:30) and have some drinks.  After half time most of us were done, wasn't invested in either team, so we walked back and passed out at 3:30 only to wake up again at 8:30 the next day.

Monday we left at 9:30 and went to an old Stasi prison from when Germany was split into East and West.  It's inmates were political prisoners or people who tried to escape from East Germany.  Our tour guide was again not only knowledgeable in the subject matter but very fun to listen to.  He was by far the best tour guide we had on the entire trip, in my opinion, because of the way he talked.  He put inflections and pauses in just the right spots to keep our attention.  After the tour we went to the Pergamon museum which was breathtaking.  Unfortunately the first time I added comments to all the pictures the site decided it would crash on me so I'll have to go back a little later to add that in.  Anyway, we got to see the Ishtar gates, the Pergamon from ancient Greece and pieces of the frieze that ran all around it and a Roman gate that was the entrance to the market place.  If anyone gets a chance to visit Berlin and only has time to visit a couple places, the Pergamon has to be one of them.  When we were done in the Pergamon we rushed to get a quick lunch before going to the Jewish museum which showcases German Jewish history for the past couple thousand years.  It was an architectural tour which was quite cool, the building was very interesting and even though the guide struggled immensly with English he gave a very good tour.  At around 5 when we were done with all our tours everyone was beyond exhausted so we went to an Italian place for dinner then hit the hay.

Tuesday was "My Berlin Day" which meant we had picked a topic and would spend the day getting tours and roaming the city learning all we could about it.  I chose multiculturalism and got up early to get breifed on where were to go and the likes.  We ended up in Kreuzberg, a district of Berlin, and got a tour by a lady who had lived there her whole life, she was about 30.  After getting an introduction to the types of people living in Berlin and where and why they came, we walked around and got to see the layout of the area.  In this district there is almost no police presence, most law enforcement is done by the community itself which I thought was very cool.  For example, the subway station in Kreuzberg is known as the area of Berlin where you go if you want to buy or sell drugs so a group of mothers get together to go to the station at night and clean it up so kids don't see the needles when they go to school in the morning.  At midday we went to a Mosque to witness the midday prayer and learn a little about Islam.  That was the conclusion of our tour but we still had 5 hours before we had to go back so we roamed around visiting shops and seeing the city more.  When we got back to the hotel we made our presentation for the rest off the group and gave it.  We were supposed to put together a presentation of some kind telling the other students about what we did during the day.  It wasn't a graded assignment, more so that all of us could experience all the four different options of the day in some reguard.  Since this was our last night in Berlin most of us went out to enjoy a night on the town but, unfortunately, it failed because we were following the lead of someone who claimed to know the city but turned out to just have us walking around finding nothing.  Finally at 2 I got fed up with his lack of knowledge and decided to call it a night.

Wednesday morning we had to get up early again (6:45) to catch a train for a 4 hour journey to Prague.  When we got there we went straight to the hotel to drop off our bags then got a "tour" of the city by a local who is a friend of one of the directors.  At around 3 the tour was over and we got dinner on our own before going back to the hotel to get ready for the opera.  My friends and I went to a British pub and I got a shepard's pie which was delicious.  At 6:30 we all left for the opera which, much to my surprise, turned out to be a very cool experience.  The first act was painful (literally, the female role kept singing too loud and high pitched and it hurt my ears) but the second and third were very good.  The opera was called La Traviata which is apparently a famous one.  Anyway, back to the important stuff, the building itself was beautiful.  Unfortunately I was only able to get one photo because I checked my jacket and left my camera in the pocket but I'll try to download some other's pictures of the building.

Thursday was our last day in Prague and it started at 8:45 where we met up with our guide from the day before to get a more official tour of the city.  It is a very cool city that was much smaller than I thought it would be.  At around noon we took a break in a coffee shop to get hot chocolate, which was amazing, before continuing on to the castle where the president of the Czech Republic lives.  At around 3 we were again done for the day so we all went to get lunch at a street vendor and Mike and I went souvineer shopping (got something for you Mom).  For better or worse I don't know any Czech so I didn't understand that the sausage I ordered was blood sausage until afterwards when one of my friends told me.  That was the one food I was planning on avoiding because the concept was too gross but it was actually pretty good.  I don't intend to repeat the experience but I'm glad it happened.  After a quick nap we all went out for our goodbye dinner at a very nice restaurant and I got duck and dumplings which was a-mazing.  After dinner we all went back and proceeded to enjoy the last night away from Bonn.  Unfortunately, much like the last night in Berlin, a couple people wanted to find a famous club while most of us wanted to go to the one right down the street but, since no one wanted to make others unhappy, we all ended up roaming around and found nothing.  All in all, I had a good night with my friends so I'm not worried about it.

Friday was a very low key day, all of us were exhausted and ready to be back.  Some, instead of coming back to Bonn, went on to visit Budapest, but that would have been too much for me and several of the others.  After a quick flight and a cab ride I was back in my room in Bonn and mentally released all my thoughts which felt wonderful.

If you made it to the bottom of this article, bravo.  I probably wouldn't have =)

I'll write the article about what I did in Brussels with my host dad and sister in a few days once people have read through this one.  Don't want to flood you guys with too much information!

Food

As I'm sure you are aware, a big part of my life is centered around food and the quality of aforementioned thing.  Before I came here to Germany, I, as one would expect, thought a lot about what I should expect and what I would need to mentally let go.  On the latter list was food.  While I knew it wouldn't be cafeteria food quality I wasn't expecting it to be as good as the home food I was used to.

Oh boy was I wrong.  Put simply, the food here has been delicious and that's putting it mildly.  Every night we've eaten something new and at the end of each meal I find myself thinking "ok, THIS is the best one so far" and every night I get proven wrong.  Mom, since I know you'll read this, you should look into some German recipes.  When I come back I'll see if I can get a list of what we had or better yet, the recipes so we can make it all again.

I can't really do the food justice without writing a full essay on each dish and since I have homework I should be doing this is going to have to be it for this entry.  You may all now sleep well knowing that I am being fed meals better than a king could ask for.

Amsterdam!

Yes!  First weekend trip with friends turns out to be a success.  As you can probably tell from the title, we went to Amsterdam and much chaos ensued.  We arrived Friday night at around 9 then went to our hostel to drop of our stuff.  We stayed on a boat, pictures soon to be uploaded, which was cramped in the room but it didn't matter, we were only in the hostel to sleep anyway so space wasn't required.  After we put our stuff down we went out to explore the town and grab dinner.  We roamed through the red light district for a bit to see what all the fuss was about then ended up at a place called the Grasshopper, a famous coffee shop/restaurant/bar and got a great omlette for dinner.  Afterwards we roamed again for a while going in and out of shops as we got bored finally ending in the Rookery, a really cool coffee shop with an African/Indian feel to it.  At around 12 we went to McDonalds because some of the party were hungry and we decided what to do from there.  In the end we decided to walk back because a lot of us were tired and didn't want to go all out on the first night.  After getting lost for an hour and a half we miraculously made it back to the hostel and promptly fell asleep.

The next day, Saturday, we woke up at 10 and went upstairs for breakfast where we chatted with the guy running the hostel over bread with meat and cheese.  At 10:30 we were all ready to go and took the tram over to the Anne Frank house which was awesome.  I had read the book in pieces because of school but going to the house refreshed all I had learned as well as adding some to my memory bank.  Very cool to see and walk through the places Anne describes in her story and read quotes from her book on the walls.  There was also a long case with pages from her actual diary with both Dutch and English translations next to them which was awesome.  After we got out of the museum we ran into another group of people that was there (there were 18 of 20 total LMU kids in Amsterdam plus a couple kids from the Texas group), and we all went to the Heineken brewery.  For 15 Euro we got to go on a walk through with a couple lead parts (employees explaining how things worked) and two free beers at the end.  All in all, it was a really cool tour.  On it I found the most comfortable seat I've ever sat on in my life.  That might have been because I had been walking and standing all morning (probably 5 or 6 hours at that point) but it was still awesome, I took a picture of myself sitting in it through the mirror.

After we got out of the brewery, we all were walking to dinner when we were approached by a guy inviting us to a pub crawl.  A couple people in our group had been on one before and thought we should do it so, after getting the information on where and when to meet we decided to go.  We split off into smaller groups for dinner then going back to freshen up before arriving at the first pub at 9:30.  In total we went to 5 pubs before we decided to head back.  The whole crawl promised to bring us to 5 pubs and a club (the club being the final destination) with free entrance and a free drink at each place but none of us had the energy for the club by 2 am when we left.  We then walked back to the hostel arriving at 3 then, as you probably guessed, passed out almost immediately.

Sunday we woke up again at 10 for breakfast then relaxed until 12 while people got ready at a comfortable pace.  All we had planned for the day was the Van Gogh museum then getting on the train by 9 pm so no one was in a rush which was nice.  The Van Gogh was another good experience, I had no idea that he only painted for 10 years of his life but in those 10 years created something like 500 paintings and 1500 sketches.  The museum has 200 paintings, 1000 sketches and 700 letters he wrote to his brother.  After the museum we roamed around town being touristy for a while taking pictures and looking through gift shops.  Finally we went back to our room to collect our things and headed to the train station to wait for our train.  I finally walked into my room at 1 am, unpacked the bare minimum and fell asleep.

Overdue Update

Now that it's been more than a week I feel like I should get down to this and update my loyal followers of the fantastic goings-on of Deutschland.  The week, as you can imagine, was quite uneventful as it was the first week of classes.  On the whole I think it will be a good semester academically, not too stressful but not a free ride either.  I would post my schedule but, unlike regular school, it is not the same week to week and is able to change up to a couple days before the class is scheduled so it would be far more of a hassle than it's worth.

This weekend was much more low key than the last which is good, if you know me I need relaxed weekends more often than not and with the chaos that was the weekend before and Amsterdam coming up this weekend I needed some me time.  Saturday I was planning on going out with everyone however after dinner my host parents and I started talking about physics and the universe and all sorts of things that are not often discussed at the dinner table over beers.  At 11 I realized that nothing was going to happen with the group and Michael *host dad* offered we go watch Inglorious Bastards because I'd mentioned I wanted to see it.  I thought it was a very good film and before anyone thinks it would be weird to watch it with a German guy, it wasn't.

Sunday was the opening event for the semester where both LMU groups (business and theater) got together with the Texas group (animation, I believe) and basically introduced who we are and what not to our host families.  We then got to go on a tour of a palace on the top of a mountain which was awesome, I'll go through my friends photos and download 'em to my computer so I can upload them here for you to look at.  Sunday night my host family and I went across the street to Liz's host family (girl from LMU) for a group dinner because both families are friends and Liz and I are friendly enough.  I went in expecting a boring old person dinner that, as a kid, I loathed.  It turned out to be a very fun experience, on the contrary, and I hope we get to do it again.

Yesterday was Emily's 21st birthday so a group of us went out to an Irish pub to celebrate which was quite fun.  We started at 9:30 and I got on the 1:30 am bus home.  Fortunately none of us had class the next morning so we didn't have any regrets or reservation on the night.  Today, Tuesday, we're going to meet the mayor of Bonn and become official citizens which is exciting.  Just in case I don't get to updating again for a while (probably will after my Amsterdam visit), tomorrow is a group excursion in Cologne; I'll be sure to bring my camera because there is a cathedral there, as I mentioned before, that is beyond words.  I'll do my best to capture it for you and post some pictures.

Until next time, stay in milk, don't do school and drink your drugs kids.

Weekend and First Day of Class

I am a little overdue on an entry here but fortunately I kept notes on what I did over the weekend so I didn't forget anything.  Saturday started off slow because I was out late on Friday (3am); I woke up at 10 with my alarm but then I turned it off and went straight back to sleep.  Ended waking up at 11:45 and, figuring I had already missed the Cologne trip group had a slow morning.  Made my way downtown to the train station and met up with a few friends.  We headed off to Cologne at around 2:30 once a couple more people showed up.  Once there, the first thing we saw was a huge and beautiful cathedral so obviously we had to go inside (google Cologne or Koln cathedral if you'd like to see what it was before I get some pictures up).  After that we roamed around the shopping district to talk and roam and people watch, no special plans.  At around 6 we went to a little cafe for a late snack (I got an apple pie with hot vanilla sauce) then roamed for another hour or so before heading back to Bonn for dinner.

Sunday started early, had to meet at the school at 7:30 to go to a mass service in a monastery which was presented in German with most songs sung in Latin which was pretty cool.  I didn't understand a lick of it but it was still legit to hear.  After the service we drove to an old castle that used to be lived in and is preserved as it was when the state acquired it in the 1900's.  I posted pictures of the out door things like the kitchens and garden (they wouldn't let us take pictures inside).  After the castle we went to a delicious restaurant for lunch followed by a drive to a quaint little town to hike some ruins.  Again, pictures are posted if you'd like to see them.  When we got back a group of us met after dinner to go hang out in a pub for shits and giggles.  We didn't stay out late because of the next paragraph, however.

Today, Monday, was the first day of classes.  I had German 1 from 8:45 till 10:30 then a long lunch followed by Ethics from 2:15 till 5:30.  In the latter class I played devils advocate for our debates because no one was disagreeing; someone had to challenge their views or the conversation would die and I'm really good at being disagreeable =).  After class I went back home and had dinner with my host family.  My host sister went through the English alphabet then made me go through the German one, both sides were entertaining for all parties (some of these letters and words are tough to say).

For better or worse, I'm getting a cold so I am taking a slow night and blogging instead of going out with my friends again.  I'll do my best to post more often with shorter articles so reading them isn't such a time consumer but hey, if you're here you obviously care enough about my life that it probably doesn't matter all that much.

Traveling and First Day

This is my first official entry (Housekeeping doesn't count) as well as my first posting about my Bonn study abroad.  Getting here started at 4am on Tuesday the 11th of January, 2011 (date is important for when I'm an old guy so I can look back and know exactly when it was).  Got to the airport and checked my bags smoothly, said my goodbye to mom and headed off through security.  First flight was from San Francisco to Newark and took about 5 or 6 hours, don't remember because I slept a bunch and played cards with the people sitting on either side of me (they were very nice which was fortunate).  Once in Newark, I stopped for a sandwich for lunch/dinner (it was lunch on my biological clock but 4pm local time).  I then hustled around to make sure my bags made it and get through security, by the time I got to my gate they had just started boarding so I didn't have to wait for very long before getting on the plane.  Sat next to a Dutch guy, who was very friendly and had a few tips about traveling and where to go etc.  Overall I liked the transcontinental flight, it was quite comfortable and I got to watch Lord of the Rings (Fellowship) and Big then play Tetris and Sudoku for about 30 minutes before we landed in Copenhagen.  Getting from my gate to the next one in Copenhagen was a breeze, security was much more lax than TSA without being too easy-going.  I arrived in Dusseldorf at 9am local time (though I hadn't slept since the SFO plane) so I was fairly tired.  Our group didn't meet until 2:15pm so I had some time to kill, I roamed a bit but not too far because carrying all three of my bags was heavy, listened to some music, paid the 3 euros to go on the internet for 30 min and caught up on my internet comics and Reddit.  At 1:45 other people in the program started showing up and we all got on the bus and drove to AIB (the school).

I was only there for about 5 minutes before my host dad showed up and picked me up in a car that looked like the new Mercedes trucks but it was an older car.  It was pretty cool.  When we got home he showed me to my room (I get my own bathroom *score!*) and I unpacked everything before going downstairs to hang out and wait for dinner.  Had a delicious plate of lasagna and salad then went into the family room to watch Futurama, Family Guy and Desperate Housewives all in German.  The first two were still pretty funny (I'd already seen both episodes) and the third was just as confusing as always (though more interesting because it was amusing to hear what voices they did for each character).  After the first episode my host mom got home so I presented the gifts I bought for them (which they loved) and headed off to bed.  I fell asleep almost immediately (it was about 9:30 local time but it felt like 2 am).

So this entry turned out to be way longer than I expected and if you don't read all the way through I totally understand, I certainly wouldn't.  Quickly summarizing today though: got up and had a bowl of German cereal (tasted like sweet granola) which was great then took the bus to school.  Once there we had the welcome meeting followed by going with a couple of the student workers over to the student cafeteria for lunch.  Then we went back and went on a tour of the local area and midtown, took about an hour because Bonn is a small, compact city which is nice.  We all got phones and exchanged numbers then walked over to the store to buy time cards for them.  Later tonight, after dinner, we're all meeting up again to go to a pub (though I intend to break a smaller group off the main one because I don't want to storm a pub as 20 american students, I'd rather go in as a small group of friends who happen to have no idea how to speak German).  If I don't have one already I'll make a pictures section where I can post all the great shots I get.  Already been to the Bonn Cathedral in the center of town but I didn't have my camera =( so I get to go back to take some pictures of it for the rest of you (it was beautiful).