Ballade in G Minor

I snagged the following off a bathroom wall. Also listed were stereotypes for pretty much every other major European country, as well as America and Canada. None of them were all that great (the reasons for being American all centered around a corrupt presidency), but I appreciated the German one... just cuz. #10 would have been helpful to realize a bit earlier.

TOP 10 REASONS FOR BEING GERMAN :
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

Give them a second chance :
1. Oktoberfest.
2. Oktoberfest-beer.
3. BMW.
4. VW.
5. Audi.
6. Mercedes.
7. On a highway you can travel at a speed that would bring you to jail in any other country of the world.
8. You do not have to learn German as a foreign language.
9. You think Sauerkraut is delicious.
10. Contrary to common belief laughing is not forbidden by law (yet).

It did just strike me, as I was reading this, that I've stopped smiling at people in the street. I don't think I was ever fully-loony about it before, but you know, its a nice thing to do. When a stranger smiles at you, generally speaking, its just sort of like a friendly there are lots of good things in life reminder. But since being in Germany I've completely stopped doing it. I am shocked if someone even holds a door open for me anymore.

We were talking about this in my vocabulary class a week or two ago. It makes me sound like I'm in 5th grade, but we were talking about the difference between politeness (die Hoeflichkeit) and tact (der Takt). That led into a discussion about what good manners are considered in our home countries opposed to Germany. It was somewhat of a relief to find that Poles, Ukranians, Czechs and other assorted Europeans find Germans to be a little lacking on the politeness scale. People run into you in the street and don't say anything, no one holds open doors, and I've had people run into me while on my bike and though it was completely their fault, not said a word. I've seen people get smashed into and made to fall off their bikes, and the perpetrator will just ride on by like nothing happened. I've heard they're nicer down south. Though something I found interesting was that apparently men are supposed to go through the door first, under the guise of holding the door open for the lady. That really doesn't explain anything for me, but there it is anyway.

The thing that boggles my mind is that the concept of lines just doesn't seem to appear in the german vocabulary (figuratively speaking). For such an efficient, organized people, they just don't get it. And if there is some semblance of order, if you aren't able to smell the hair of the person in front of you, someone will come and just stand right between you. It doesn't happen to me as much as I've heard from other people, partly at least I think because I am somewhat aggressive about it, but really. Its just so weird.

But I guess the good thing about it is that when someone does hold open the door, or helps you pick up something you've dropped, its like they are the magical savior of the day. It makes you appreciate it a lot more, I guess.

I think the whole smiling thing came up because I've been reading up on Bangkok a bit recently. Apparently Thai people are big smilers. If plans work out, I might find that out for myself come March.

hemipode

I just want people to know that I am spending the evening bemoaning the lack of quality online information about yachting as a sport of the nobility in 18th century Britain. That sentence alone has got to make you feel better about your life.

Also worth sharing:
"Topiary had enjoyed a certain popularity in England ever since Tudor times. Not everybody had approved of it-- 'images cut out in juniper or other garden stuff: they be for children', growled Francis Bacon crossly. Nevertheless it kept a certain place in the affections of gardeners, who after 1660 began to devote increasing attention to it. A further boost was given to its popularity with the arrival of the House of Orange in 1689, until by 1700 it seems that something very like a topiary mania was sweeping the country." Wilson, William Kent, 1984. [italics and bold my own]

Not that you would, but don't ask me what the House of Orange is, because I don't know either. And the sad part is I actually like the professor a lot, and I feel bad that I am going to let his opinion of Americans down with whatever textual-spew I am able to conjure up within the next couple of days. But gosh I'll be glad when its done. Its amazing what kind of anxiety I get over writing papers. And this one is in english! I should be counting my lucky stars.

Besides getting my history paper (something about the relationship between the aristocracy of 18th century england and nature) written (due wednesday the first), my literature final taken (on wednesday the first), and my writing paper (interpretation of a poem by Bertolt Brecht) written (for which i have a bit more time, for better or worse), not much else is on the plate. I wish I wasn't feeling so stressed out so I could enjoy some good times with the one-semester kids before they ship off, but for the next week I'm sort of booked. And its all relatively silly, because american universities pile on the work so much more than here (and for me, normally only within a quarter's time), but there is something deceptive about studying in another country. You put all your energy into deciphering another culture, and all the daily tasks that one wouldn't even bat an eyelash at at home suddenly turn into week-long confusions, and yet the scholastic work seems to be mostly geared at helping you stutter a little less. But then they, those Surly Academics, turn around and look at you like you've actually been understanding the horrific 8:30am lecture, and suddenly you realize your whole life is a waste and why did you fall asleep last night in your bed and not at some desk in the library?

So soon enough its back to my pages of scribbled notes on oblong gardens and fox-hunting, my desperate pleas for my iBook to help me churn out the minimum number of 1.5 spaced pages so that I can get a decent grade for the one class I am actually taking in my major. It is not entirely surprising that Irony has it so that the one grade I'm concerned about is the only one that really matters.

Because of my personal distaste for the "look that's me in front of a recognizable landmark!" photos, enjoy this. It will be one of the few of this nature you will probably see from my year abroad. (The gang in front of the Brandenburger Tor)

Oh, and this past weekend I spent in der Haupstadt Deutschlands, the majestic-mesmerizing-mollifyingly-moralic Berlin. I met up with Colina and a few of her fellow toe-tappers on Thursday and enjoyed their good company till early Sunday morn. Overall I think Berlin is one of the few places I've been these past months that I really felt like I had a difficult time getting a feel for, as far as the feel of a city goes. I think that is mostly because Berlin is so huge and in a constant state of motion and change. Its just amazing what a wealth of historic awesomeness exists in one fair (read: snowy and slushie) city. We saw a lot in that short time, but not nearly as much as I'd like, so I will have to go back one of these days. Honestly the most of Berlin I saw was its sidewalks, for it was impossible to take your eyes off their iced and slippery exterior if you had the slightest idea of the fragility of the human body. Friday, the 20th of January 2006 was one of the coldest days of my life, period. A good day, but oh I can't even begin to explain. It was kinda fun to be translator for the group, and one of Colina's friends had taken german in high school, so we carried on some pretty decent conversations as well. Because its sort of the thing to do with german, at points they were having a good time making fun of the language, and about that time I realized that I don't really even hear it that way anymore. When you are listening, or talking, you are doing just that. Of course you listen for pronunciation because that is something that always needs to be worked on, and there is only really one way to go about that. But apart from that, its not words I hear anymore but meanings, and it only strikes me when I find someone's accent particularly charming. That isn't to say that I'm one of those super-humans that people seem to expect to emerge from an extended stay in a non-english speaking country. I don't know who came up with the if-you-are-there-then-you-must-be-fluent-or-at-least-almost rule, but I haven't met many people like that. At least, people whose minds aren't trapped in the I'm-better-than-you closet.

And to completely negate what I said in the previous photo's caption, here is a picture of me smiling awkwardly about a few decades of communist oppression. But hey, now it's art! (remnant of the Berlin Wall)

And tomorrow I have a dental appointment. My dental vocabularly doesn't exist far past Zaehne and Kiefer, but as with most things these days, hope for the best and we'll see what happens.

this heart is on fire

Like Any Other Night

wouldn't mama be proud

I just realized that this magical herb I've started putting in everything, of which I've been wondering if I'll be able to buy when I'm back in the States, is actually just basil. And with that realization I figured it was about time I write down something about my eating habits, for all posterity to mull and argue and attack one another's kingdoms over.

The first month I was here (August), I sort of didn't eat anything. There is some quote by Jacky I have written down somewhere about "we keep walking and walking and our pants keep getting looser and looser." That is a horrible version of it, but you can rest assured what she actually said was funny. Then Jacky and I started cooking together, and then by October we got too busy to eat together and so I started making up recipes in my own kitchen. At first basically everything revolved around olive oil and mass amounts of vegetables. This got perfected, and then sometimes an egg or two was introduced. Then I learned the magical grilled-cheese (with chicken and a handsome array of fancy european cheeses) recipe from Jacky, and those two dishes pretty much made up my diet for a few months. But as winter was finally upon us, the price of some key vegetable-dish ingredients skyrocketed and so the past month I've been having to make due. Aubergine (eggplant) and zuccinni are both like three or four euro each right now, so that rules them out. I'm left with a carrots, chinese snap peas, these other green beanish sort of things, potatoes, and onions. There has been a not so good crop of eggs this past month, so that has been sort of ruled out as well. The grilled cheese works now and then as well (I made one upon getting home early this morning), but by the time I got back from winter break I was sort of sick of everything I had been making previously. So, thanks once again to Jacky's tutelage, I have incorporated a new dish into my diet. Its pretty much just more vegetables thrown together, hiding under the guise of being a 'sauce', and then pasta added in. I'm actually finishing up tonight's round of that right now. I am also bringing the old favorite of potatoes-and-onions back, and often I just put some cheese, some chicken breast slices (it is like lunch meat, but it says chicken breast... do we have that at home?), fruit (clementines or apples, generally), and some sort of vegetable (usually uncooked green beans or chinese snap peas) on a plate and call it a meal. All in all it sounds pretty healthy.

During the summer and autumn I was drinking a lot of juice (the favorites still being Mango-Maracuja, and Johannisbeer, which I think is black currant), but that waned for awhile, and now its coming back a bit. Mostly I just try to drink a lot of water (my favorite brand is Volvic, which has pictures on the bottles of what appear to be undernourished African children, so my assumption is that somehow by drinking this moderately priced water I am helping throngs of people south of the equator). When Scott and Mom were here I was able to stock up and buy four cases of water, but I'm already two cases down, so the problem of transporting liters of water with only my bike arises once more.

I have just recently started to try to cut out my chocolate intake. With the holiday season and all I had some lying around. But even besides that, a 69 cent chocolate bar is a good way to make a night of translation seem a little more bearable. And it would always be that I'd eat the whole thing in one sitting, because its there and so good and the kitchen is all the way down the hall... yeah. So now I have eradicted all food from my room, so that I won't just sit here and eat idly. My skin has also been terrible the past couple of months, so I am hoping the lack of chocolate will help on that front as well. I could also talk of continuing jaw/teeth problems/worries, but I'd rather not think about it right now.

Its been a good weekend. By now you should have figured that my weekend is a strange and drawn out creature, extending from Wednesday night to Sunday-ish. I have been a bit more productive this weekend than most, but I am not sure how much that is actually saying. I am planning on meeting with up Colina and some of her friends in Berlin this weekend, so I really need to stay inspired and keep on the work so that I don't come back next Sunday fretting about how I am going to write a term paper in less than a week. About that term paper I would like to detail, in utmost bitterness, the struggle its been just to acquire some books, but instead I think I will leave you with the assurance that the library system here makes absolutely no sense. Within the library, to which library you are supposed to go (I have been to four already, all tucked away on campus or within the city), it doesn't matter. The librarians will all tell you different things, will get upset with you for inadvertendly implying that one of the other libraries is better than the one in which they work, might try to help but all in all just end up making things even more confusing. So finally after a week-long goose chase I am praying that the books Rita and I ordered (ordered!) on Thursday will be in the library tomorrow for us to pick up. My worry is that when you order something on Thursday, you have to pick it up on Friday or Saturday (I think I am correctly assuming that the library was closed today, a Sunday) or else they toss it back into the heap they have in some secret chamber. Then the next issue is if the books will even have enough information pertaining to our paper topics... but I guess thats looking too far ahead. Back to the weekend.

Wednesday night I watched Eyes Wide Shut with Droescher and some of his students at Jacky's. Apparently the movie is based off an Austrian play that they had to read for this class, but I got fed up with the movie after awhile so I ended up attempting to make some dinner during the climax. Awhile after that Jacky and I rode into town, only to be shocked to find that no one was out! Luckily we ended up running into Lauren and Scott, who we met up with after some Doener and another chance meeting with another American, Jeremy. So the four of us hung out at Trou for the evening, and it was quite nice because I'd really never gotten a chance to get to know Scott or Lauren. We all got along so famously that we decided to take a train the next night and discover the nightlife of Kassel.

We invited other people to come, but I think because of our previous knowledge of the train time table everyone ended up flaking. With our student ID's we are able to take the moderately or slow-paced trains anywhere in Niedersachsen (Lower Saxony, the state that Goettingen lies in), so going to and from Kassel was free. The only catch was that the trains back to Goettingen stopped running at 10:45pm, and didn't start back up again until 4:30am. But hey, we are going to see the nightlife, I don't end up coming generally much before that on a normal night in Goettingen, no problem. So Jacky and I arrived at the train station a couple of minutes before our 8:15 train was supposed to leave. Unfortunately Scott and Lauren were late, so we had to wait another hour for the train, but it wasn't a big deal. Then we were on the train, on our way, everything was good. Unfortunately the german train system, though efficient and generally on-time, can be a little close-mouthed, so we ended up getting off at the stop before ours. The problem was that none of us had really been paying attention, and as we pulled into a stop, I looked up onto the little electronic message board, and it said Kassel Hbf, Kassel Hauptbahnhof, or central station. I looked outside but because of our position on the train, all of the signs marking the stop at the station weren't visible, and it was dark and hard to see from the brightly lit inside of the train. So we yelped and ran off, just to turn around and realize this was way too small to be a main train station, and so as I furiously pressed the button on the door to open so we could run back on, the train started chugging and pulled away. Luckily we weren't in a rush, and we had been making jokes the whole previous hour about the adventures we were going to have tonight that everyone else would be missing out on just because they were too wimpy to stay up a couple of extra hours.

The stop we were at was Hannover Muenden, which is a tiny little town I've actually been to before, but with the EAP bus, and not with the train, so I had no idea where we were in relation to the town center.We had an hour and a half until the next train going to Kassel came through, and the train station was closed, so the four of us headed into what looked like the direction of town to see if we could find a bar or somewhere warm to sit for a bit. We ended up at a gas station with the most impressive beer selection I've ever witnessed. We all bought a beer and sat around talking until we figured we should hike back up to the train station. We were all laughing about the situation the whole time, and we were able to catch the next train and then situate ourselves in Kassel to find ourselves at Lolita, a neat little bar. Kassel is also a Uni town, apparently, and bigger than Goettingen, but not nearly as pretty, I would say. This was actually my third time to Kassel (once for an EAP thing, the second only to go to the Ikea located there), and my first time at night. We wandered about and hit some bars and so forth for a couple of hours, until we found ourselves at the Irish Pub. Since we have an irish pub in Goettingen, we decided we had to go. As we entered it looked like they were all on their last round, eventhough it wasn't even two yet. So we ordered and were sitting around talking when a waitress comes by to start stacking up the chairs near us. She hears us speaking english and asks where we're from. It ends up she is Irish, and studied in Germany for a year when she was in college. As all of the other patrons are leaving, we all got in conversations with another couple of the workers, one of which ended up taking us to a Uni party. The Kassel Uni party was much like the ones for the uni here (held at the ZHG, the central lecture hall building), but a little trashier, and obviously without the few recognitions of fellow students I can sometimes make. It ended up being a lot of fun, and there was a huge room that basically seemed to me like a high school auditorium. It was set up with a terrible DJ, lots of smoking/drunk people jumping around, and all of the other little things that present Germans as such an inherently nerdy race. Jacky actually ended up running into a guy she met when we went dancing last week at J.T. Keller for "indie music night", who was only in Goettingen visiting a friend, and so that was fun. We eventually rolled out, and with directions from Sebastian (Jackys 'friend') made our way back to the train station. By the time we got there we had missed the 4:30 train, and so we had to wait for the 5:45. Scott went on a noble search for an open food place while Lauren, Jacky and I huddeled on these benches that are surrounded with enough glass to make it looks like it would be a warm box, but in reality just wasn't cutting it. Just before it was getting about the time we should be boarding the train, Scott arrived victorious with greasy Turkish fast food, and after not too long I was content to doze the hour home to Goettingen. On the way to our bikes we ended up running into a couple of Californians who were heading to Prague for the weekend ("Hey! Where are you guys going?" "Ah, we're just getting home..."). The day finally ended as I creeped into bed at 8am.

Scott and I feigning excitement over having just gotten off at the wrong train stop. Lauren, Scott, Jacky (taking the picture) and I walking in what we think is the direction of "central" Hann Muenden.

Friday night Jacky, Jennifer and I went to a house party of Jennifer's boyfriend's friend's, where Jacky and I got to feel somewhat uncomfortable until we discovered the snack table, and later, once everyone else had enough to drink that we didn't feel silly being the only two people dancing. It ended up being a fun night, but I was still pretty beat from the night previous, so once Tony showed up, we had another hour of dancing, and then a nice downhill bike ride to home.

This is actually a picture of Droescher taking a picture of Jacky (and her taking one of him), but you get to imagine the experience of me sitting there talking to Droescher just moments before.

Last night was Droescher's Feuerzangenbowle at Kai's 'living room' at the Dorf. You will remember that Feuerzangenbowle is a German holiday drink, so I am not quite sure why there was a party of such a nature in the middle of January, but I wasn't about to start asking questions. The party was for the folks in Droescher's tutorium (he, like Beilein, teaches one for another lecture, but I'm not in that class), but Droescher invited me when we were all hanging out the weekend previous. It was a small but fun affair, though it was weird because I was hanging out with some of the Californians that I rarely see (mostly because I don't have any classes with them), and everyone was speaking english. The Americans normally speak english with one another, but when we're around our german friends we tend not to... but anyhow. After a failed attempt to watch the 1944 classic Die Feuerzangenbowle, Jacky DJed and we all got to dance to good music for a change. The remants of the party wanted to continue the evening at a club downtown, but I was sort of not in the mood for another long night, so I came back home to finish The Two Towers DVD that I've been stretching out over the past couple of days. I ended up still not being able to sleep until five this morning, but at least that was a little less second-smoke to make my hair smell for the next day.

And now, I need to power down and work, so I can be in Berlin on Thursday night with the full intent of a good weekend.

And, uhm, just for kicks, here's a picture of me with the head of the black, naked chocolate Santa Jacky gave me for Christmas.

in this home on ice

The time is nearing for the one semester students to be leaving for the States soon. Because of that I've been thinking, if I were only staying one semester, what would I be feeling right now?

To put it succintly, its fairly unimaginable. About a month ago I started thinking, what are the things that I am going to miss the most when I leave? And since then I've been trying to enjoy those things even more, and just continuing to take it all in. Its a shame that there is never enough time to fully process anything, because I feel like its all going to be a vague dream in times far from now. But I guess a lot would be lost in the translation (metaphorically speaking), and words are just my attempts at the captions to the memories.

Things are, as always, up and down. Last Sunday my Joy of Life flat-lined, but I think as a result I was able to be a little more inspired the next couple of days. On Tuesday I woke up and went to my creative writing class, read my contribution to our utterly stupid 'class story' and got a decent response, then came back home and spent the entirity of the day writing an essay due the next morning. I spent the majority of Monday reading the article on which I was writing the essay, and at parts on Tuesday I felt like I really had things going. By around 11pm when I finally decided the essay wasn't going to get any better, and just to send it in (email it) then, I decided those moments of inspiration throughout the day had sort of been baseless, but ahwell. I always have a terrible time writing analytical papers, and I'm not really sure why. I would think I have a somewhat analytical mind (not from math grades), but maybe I don't know what I'm talking about. I had read the article pretty closely so I could have some solid points to write from, but it sort of all feels like it falls to pieces once you've spent twelve minutes debating how to word a single sentence. So I end up spending a lot of my time about how it sounds and not exactly what I am actually saying, and when you are writing in another language that is sort of a waste of time, because no matter how you think you are wording it it still doesn't come off like you have a native grasp of the language. When we do our daily writing exercise in my creative writing class I am generally the last to finish and have the least of an actual story/poem/whatever, just because I am wrestling with things. I am sitting there with my dictionary and a bunch of scratched out things and arrows, trying to gauge which word for "comfort" is really what I am trying to say. Its just recently occurred to me that a reason why I might have such trouble with oral fluency is that I don't speak english the way you learn to speak a foreign language. I think this is lessening somewhat, just with the crowdedness of both english and german, but a lot of how I feel I present my personality is in my word usage. I get a sort of offhand pleasure from using words not really in their traditional sense. And I don't think I'm generally misunderstood by other native english speakers, but when I am speaking (in english) to folks who weren't raised speaking english, I have to just drop any colorful language, and its just sort of boring. You never realize how many idioms and sayings you use in your daily speech until you really have to think about how other people are having to translate it.

Tonight I was at a house party of Jennifer's (a Californian student here) boyfriend's friend's, and there was this guy there that apparently is dying to study in California, so he came up and had a really excited conversation with a not-so-enthused Jacky and I. He was shocked that we'd want to learn German, that we'd be here to learn it! "But why German, it's so complicated!" And thats the thing that is funny- everyone loves the idea that their native language is one of the most difficult out there. I've heard it from practically everyone, no matter where they are from. I remember being here in Germany only a couple of weeks and talking to a guy in German about what he thought about learning English. I was quite surprised when he said that he thought it was really easy. Really easy?! English! He basically said that English is like German, but with way less complex grammar. Somehow I had grown up in America thinking that English was really difficult, "with all the idioms", or something. And so tonight when Jacky and I just sort of looked at the guy, instead of nodding heartily and agreeing, why yes, German is far too complex for our weak-willed American brains, I responded that, yeah its hard, but pretty much any language would be. There are languages that are easier than others for native English speakers to learn, but every language has its difficulties, and so you can either bemoan french irregular verbs or german adjective endings, but its all sort of the same in the end (though I think prepositions are generally a really difficult thing to master correctly in any language). I'll give you more of these examples in a couple of years.

the cloud prayer

Back.

The two weeks out of Germany were good. Somewhat more stable than the previous weeks I'd spent out of Germany since August, but the trip didn't disappoint--- still managed to produce loads of new things to churn over. I've been 'home' for about four days now, but have been hesitant to write about any of the previous week's proceedings. I had trouble with this when I got back from my first trip, back in October. These sort of things seem like the things that I should spend the most time laboring to define and set down somewhere for progeny's sake, but for some reason its the hardest. Let me ramble on about how much work I should be doing, and I can fill up pages. Ask me about Paris, Brussels, Antwerp, London, Birmingham, Wellesbourne and the conjugation of my traveling heart and I'll point you to some pictures and think that even if I could make the words come out right, it wouldn't be what I wanted.

Nonetheless, I've got to say something. Its trickier here because I am not really writing just for me to read (because that gets boring anyhow), but I'll do my best.



At around 6 in the morning on Thursday, December 15th I left on a german train headed to Cologne. At Cologne I changed for a french train and by 4pm I was in Paris. Luckily I got the Scare of the Trip out of the way early- thinking I was on the wrong train headed for Cologne, and freaking out silently to myself while German Freethinker across from me confidently read the newspaper. After I'd read the complimentary train itinerary that was lying on the seat next to me a good fifteen times, I stopped kicking myself and instead just marvled at my own glorious inability to let myself appear like a dimwit. After Freethinker left, I swallowed my pride, of which I didn't even realize I had any left, and had a nice little chat with a train conductor. I was informed that I was not on the wrong train (because really, I am too smart to get on the wrong train), but merely on the wrong end of the train- that being, at the next stop the train was splitting, and one end was going my way, and the other, not. The importance of looking to see what car number you are in has now been firmly embedded in my consciousness. After that little respite from sanity things went smoothly.

My cotravelers, Colina, her friend Melissa, and Melissa's friend George, were to meet up with me in Paris that night. They ended up not getting in till around, gosh, I don't remember, but not until somewhat late. So the majority of that day I was free to adventure on my own. I began my romantic affair with the urine-soaked Paris Underground, wandered my way around a couple districts, in attempts to find the hostel realized just how bad my leftover high school french was, took way too many "Paris at Night" pictures, fooled some store-owners into thinking I could understand French, and witnessed a couple break up on the bench over from mine. Once the folks joined me, we went out to dinner and wandered around a little before setteling into our drafty low-cost-hotel room (which was pretty much a hostel). If nothing else, it was worth it to stay in that hotel room for three nights just so I could experience the Worlds Smallest Door Entrance. I have to say I've never seen a shower positioned in a room like that.

The next two days were spent seeing the sights, reaffirming my distaste for the scent of urine, realizing I could understand a lot more french than actually produce it, realizing that next time I come to France I really want to know more french so I don't get kicked out of any more french convience stores or have my food spit in by any ornery french garcons, and yeah, spending a lot more money on necessities than I would have liked. I was aghast by how expensive everything in Paris seemed; this was a problem coming to England in October after having spent two weeks changing currencies throughout bits of Central/Eastern Europe but not really losing all that much money. In hindsight it was just naivite, Paris being not only the french capitol but also one of the biggest tourist destinations in Europe I should have expected it. But gosh.

All in all, Paris was a nice city, but it just sort of left a bad taste in my mouth. Honestly I wasn't prepared for the rudeness we constantly were surrounded with. After not too long we realized it was better for Melissa and I to join our high-school french and try to use that as much as possible. At least with our poor french they were able to swallow their hatred somewhat and show us a little less scorn than if we just spoke english. If I forget about the people, I liked a lot of what I saw in Paris. Since we are still Americans, we set off to see the Eiffel Tower the first morning. In unconscious efforts to be even more touristy, Colina and I yelped when we first caught sight of it from afar (she actually yelped because I was like, ah!, and apparently that was a frightening sound for me to emit). It would have all been a lot more beautiful if we weren't there in the depths of a gray winter, but it was still cool to see. But it just added to my sentiment that Paris just really wasn't what I expected. I'm not even sure what I was expecting, its not like this was my Dream Pilgrimmage Come True, but for being such a hyped up city I was surprised it wasn't filling me with greater wonder. Don't get me wrong, it was still really amazing to see, but I guess Life puts in things to help you be happy where you are- ie, still liking Germany a hell of a lot better.

Anyhow, I think we saw most of the major sites, which was fun (Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, Sacre Coeur, Arc de Triomphe, Champs de l'Elysee, Moulin Rouge, Le Louvre). I guess thats really the first time I've gone somewhere here in Europe and really made an effort to see 'all the things to see.' I think the Notre Dame and the Louvre were my favorites. We spent a whole afternoon in the Louvre. We actually got in for free because there was a worker's strike that afternoon, and so with just a handful of people in front of us, the line was stopped because of the protesting. But we waited it out, and with the help of this french guy in front of us, were able to get in for free.

After my two and a half days in Paris we headed for Brussels. We actually rode first class on the train to Belgium, something about us being under 26 made it cheaper to go first class than second. It was my first time riding first class (correct me if I'm wrong), and it was really nice. The best part was the really good meal we were provided- Lina and I were saying that it might have been the best food we had in France. I was excited to go to Belgium because I had read that the country has three official languages: french, dutch and german, and uh, I was getting tired of looking like the terrible Ami tourist. I'd rather speak somewhat mixed up german any day. Unfortunately, I hadn't taken into account the two cities we were planning on visiting are both located in Flanders, the northern, french speaking section of Belgium. Wallonia, the german speaking portion, has as of yet not seen hide nor hair of me. So, alas, two and a half more days of fighting through french. Luckily it turns out that dutch is just a really nerdy form of german, and so it was actually easier for me to try to read through the dutch and figure things out than mess with the french.

It was also fortunate to find that Brussels, our homebase, was populated with nicer folk than those we had encountered in Paris. As soon as we had emerged from the Brussels Underground and began to wander the streets looking for our hostel, I already was falling in love with the city. I like to use that term somewhat loosely, but Brussels is a really beautiful city. I don't think it'd be too hard to argue that Antwerp is a nicer looking city, but both have the most amazing architecture I've ever seen. I have literally hundreds of pictures of buildings. I could really bleed you to death with my romantic portraits of the architecture, but I'll let you rest assured that I was quite impressed. I got my first glimpse of it as my train to Paris passed through Belgium from Germany, and I was already excited for it then.




Once our packs were off and safely stored in the hostel, we set out to wander the city. Around sunset we found a nice cathedrahl, and outside of it a belgian waffle stand. More wandering. The next day we went back to the city center that we had finally found late the night previous. One of the nights we made friends with some Australians over a game of pool, and one of them, June, wandered about the next day with us. I felt sort of bad for not being more social with her, but I was tired and it seemed like George was handling it. I did have an interesting chat with her about the rioting, or whatever you want to call it, that went down a couple of weeks ago down on the coast by Sydney. Always interesting getting the opinion of a local. On the last day Colina and I were in Belgium (Melissa and George ended up staying in Brussels for another week after we left due to monetary difficulties) we all went to Antwerp for the day. I really liked the city, and visiting it reminded me that it'd be a good idea in the future to visit more towns within a country before moving on. Learning, learning.

On December 21st Colina and I flew into London Heathrow. We had a couple of hours to wander about London before our coach left to Birmingham, where we were staying for the night. It was cool to be able to see the two versions of da Vinci's Madonna on the Rocks within days of one another (one in the Louvre, the other in London's National Gallery). We got back to Birmingham about 11pm, and got up a couple hours later to meet Colina's family at the train station. From there we all took a train to Leamington Spa, and from there a taxi to Walton Hall, where we were staying the week and spending Christmas.

Walton Hall ended up being way out in the countryside, which was nice for pictures and bad for getting around. I was lucky enough to be able to spend the holiday with one of the families I am closer to in the world, and enjoyed their hospitality for the week I was wedged in a bed with two of their daughters. It was an experience to be part of a family after spending the past five months either by myself or primarily with people my age. And the signifier that I really am older: Christmas really felt like practically any other day for me this year. I don't know if it was the absence of blood-relations, my removal from the country where I've spent the past twenty Christmases or just the travel-tired that begins to follow you around after a couple of days out of your own bed, but it didn't really bother me much until the night of the 25th when I went out into the hall to call family and close friends. It was just one of those times where you feel very, very far away.

A couple of the days during our time at Walton Hall were spent in Birmingham and London. On the day-trip to London with Colina's family I saw all the sights, some for the second time, some for the first. Colina has a love affair with the city which I don't entirely share, mostly because I think I am attached to other places. I really do like England, and London at that, though. I am continually amazed that every person I've met there is really friendly, nice and willing to go out of their way to help you. The accent doesn't cease to be charming, either. I think England would look a little better in that dress if the pound-dollar conversion rate were better, though. Other than that and the fact that the whole stereotype of English food being terrible is one of God's sad truths, I have no bad words to say againist England. All the turn-arounds would make it fairly impossible for me to drive a car and stay somewhat sane, but thats just the southern Californian in me talking.

On the 29th of December my mom and her boyfriend Scott flew into England. Thats the day it started snowing in England, so after a couple morning-hours of running around in the fields ahead of Walton Hall, following geese and throwing logs into frozen rivers, I saw my mom for the first time in five months as I was washing my hands in the bathroom. Sort of surreal and familiar at the same time. That is the longest period of time I've ever gone without seeing my mother, at school I come home at least twice- for Christmas and spring break, and then again for summer.

That day we rested, and the next Mumsie and I went shopping in Birmingham, had her tooth fixed in Coventry, and ate dinner in Leamington Spa. The next day we flew out of London Stanstead to Hamburg-Luebeck, where I actually ran into Melissa and George, who were waiting for their flight back to London. There was some rental car fiasco that required me to throw myself back into german to get the Turkish cabbie to get us to the downtown rental car place. It was superior timing to come into Germany, for it was practically snowstorm weather, and Scott had to fight it the whole three-ish hours from Luebeck to Goettingen. Luckily we made it safe and fine (with the help of the car's navigational system, thank you Technology), and luck was with us again when Jacky was able to secure a hotel room in the hotel that is literally right next to my dorm. I went in a couple of months ago to try to get Mom and Scott a room for their stay here, but they told me they were all booked up, and that the only other hotel in Goettingen was closed for the season. I had somewhat claustrophobic visions of fitting two people in my decidedly one-adult bed, but worries were cleared. We got into Goettingen really late, and coming back to my room was once again strange.

The next day I showed Scott and Mom downtown, and Mom and I ended up doing some truly superior shopping. I'd never done such shopping in Europe! Birmingham disappointed me this time around, because the hordes of post-Christmas shoppers was just too great for me to retain any of my strength, but luckily Goettingen came through for once. We had a nice lunch at Kartoffelhaus, walked around a bit some more and then retreated to the hotel. The next morning as I was walking over to the hotel, the ground was blanketed in crisp white and as I showed them around the Uni and surrounding area the next couple of hours, it provided a beautiful backdrop for many a picture. That night Jacky joined us for a nice New Year Eve's dinner at Nudelhaus, where Scott sweet-talked a Turkish bartender about finances, and then free drinks. After that we were sort of beat, and both Mom and Scott were fighting illness, so we went back to the hotel and watched some truly weird german television that reminded me why I love german and everything that entails.

Later Jacky and I rode into town just in time to catch the fireworks, and luckily eventually escaped to the Irish Pub with our lives. New Year's here is like our fourth of July. I had a chat with Lars in the kitchen last night and it was revealed to me that the reason for this extreme revelry is that fireworks are made legal here for just three days. Hence the 1945 Dresden-like appearance of the city on the last night of 2005. If I had known that there were plans to go to the Irish Pub I would have dragged Mom and Scott along, but I sort of didn't know what was happening with the night and was also worried about them getting up and to the airport safely and on time. At the Irish Pub Jacky and I met up with Steven, Duffy, Keinst, Rita, Emily and David, all Californians. When the live musician downstairs began to play Sweet Home Alabama, we all yelped, and ran downstairs to sing along, dance and just generally make fools of ourselves. "The only time in my life I've ever wanted to be from Alabama," was the sentiment shouted next to me. We stayed down there dancing and singing long enough for the people sitting at the tables near us to stop thinking it was cute and start looking somewhat annoyed. But the good thing about that is that we didn't care, and it wasn't until 4 o' clock that I found myself back home. I stayed up another hour so that I could say goodbye to Mom and Scott once more, and see them off on their way.



Towards the end of my traveling I was having a hard time enjoying myself at points because I would start fretting about all the work I was needing to be doing, and what a terrible, depressingly wintry month January was going to be. Being with my mom again was unspeakably nice, but also somewhat challenging because I was having to fight off feelings that I haven't been in the space to entertain for some months now. How upsetting it would be to say goodbye. But like I told you, only a couple of months till Spain.

And that sort of leads me into what this trip, these past weeks, have been for me. For many different reasons I really just now realized what the past five months have done to me. And that is sort of one of the Unexplainables, but to shed some light I'd have to say something about independence, self-reliance, not just growing up but growing out. I mean all this in a lot of different senses and ways, and honestly I don't even know if I understand what I mean. How much older can you get in one year?

My joys of the New Year are having been able to spend time, albeit too short, with some people I've been missing dearly. The recent discovery that in my absence they installed a heater in the shower room, and the new washing machine downstairs are also small triumphs for 2006. I am looking forward to a year with less worry, more discovery, with eyes wider and heart fuller. I hope, at the very least, the same for you.