an tagen wie diesen

After spending the majority of the day cleaning, and the past few days either packing or sitting listlessly at my computer waiting for the unshakeable heat to let up, I have something to share:


Things I Will Not Miss About Living Here:

the humidity
the hall's broom that is so old it barely could hit the dust out of my rug
the hall's vacuum that instead of picking up dust and dirt simply relocates it
the white surface of everything in this room that refuses to ever look clean
all the tiny gross bugs of summer
bike riding and getting said bugs in eyes, mouth, plastered onto skin


Yeah, thats about it. I've heard tell of the heat wave that is striking the States, but I've got to say I'd take dry heat over the drippy summer I'm experiencing here. The weather is almost continuously hot and humid, with the only moments of respite being the crazy thunder storms that sweep in to cool things down for a day or two. I have been spared a little today by the arrival of one such storm (or at least, it looks like it's going to be that way), but just remembering standing in line at Getraenkemart yesterday, my back completely soaked because I was wearing a backpack. It was ridiculous. I get home from an 8 minute ride and I am as sweaty as if I had just run a couple of miles. I don't think of myself as all that sweaty of a person, but I look around here and wonder how everyone else is dealing with it and not obviously looking like they are going to pass out.

So yeah. The last few days have been about figuring out I am going to get my stuff home, packing it up, and finally cleaning my room. Tomorrow morning is my Abnahmtermin, my inspection to move out. I am afraid of getting bitched out because my room has not posessed the ability to look clean long before I ever moved in, and I realize that is something the did go in they told me it was too late, and I realized as I was cleaning today that some shelves in my cabinet have been broken for the majority of the year and I just sort of forgot about it. I have had so many little problems (lights breaking, closet rack falling down, mold on the walls, etc) with my room that the woman who works in the Hausverwaltung, the housing office, actually fills out the portion of the complaint form that requires my house and room number without even asking me. But yeah. I just sort of want to get moved out and be done with it. She told me I could move out on Saturday (after arguing with her about it), as long as I dropped off my key in her mailbox. Well, if I can move out on Saturday (a day no one would be working here), I don't see why I couldn't move out on Sunday, so I think I am going to be doing that. My rough plan at the moment is to take a taxi with my boxes to the post office to ship, and then take a taxi to Andi's on Sunday when I go there to move in. Jacky moved out yesterday, becaus inspector may not acknowledge. I also never turned in my curtains to be cleaned, and when Ie she is going traveling with her boyfriend, and they walked all of her stuff over to Andi's yesterday, but I don't think I have the willpower to do that myself. I am slightly concerned about how I am even going to be able to get everything to the airport, if I have to change trains or anything on the way to Frankfurt. I have a backpack, a traveling backpack, a largish purse (which I think is going to contain all my dirty clothes from this next week), and an enormous suitcase. The airline lowered the allowed baggage weight limit from 70 pounds (when I came) to 50, so that is fantastic. All of this just makes me appreciate minimalism so much more.

I don't know how it's going to be staying at Andi's, because his apartment is about 1/5 the size of a sliver of a fingernail, and its at the very top of the building, so it is HOT. If only news of that whole air conditioning craze had made its way across the Atlantic!

It is frustrating, because everyone is leaving this week, and I have had to get a lot done so I could move out tomorrow. Once I move into Andi's on Sunday, I think I will just need to worry about closing my bank account and settling my cell phone debts (baeh, another thing I don't want to think about). But yeah, I feel like its all rush rush rush and then sit around for a few days. It would have worked out better if I could have planned out a traveling schedule earlier, but I have been stressed about getting just all of this done in time, and I know the few people who are leaving to travel are stressing out even more, just because that's one more thing.

Looking through my Europe guidebook, I am continually disappointed, reading all of the things I didn't get the time to do. Just Germany alone, there is so much that would have been really fun. My friend Jennifer and I are planning on leaving on Monday to go to a city on the Ostsee, staying there that night and then likely coming home Tuesday night. I am not sure if this is going to work, primarily because the Ostsee is a big german tourist destination, and we as of yet do not have lodging for Monday night. But hopefully we could work it out, because the Ostsee (Baltic Sea) was one of the things I really did want to see here. I also wanted to go down the Rhine, see the Schwarzwald (Black Forest), go to Nuernberg, Dresden... but yeah, time is flying by quickly. I have wasted a lot of it this week, just feeling hot and pissy about moving and cleaning and all that unpleasantness, but there really wasn't much I could do about it. There has been stuff to do every day. Ramble ramble.

Luckily the grossness of the past week has been made up for by stuff going on every night, due to everyone leaving. I've gone out to eat and/or hang out with people the past few nights, and that has been nice. I haven't been terribly sad to say goodbye to anyone leaving, because they are all not only Americans but Californians, and I could potentially, and hopefully will, see at least some of them later on this year. But thinking about the other goodbyes I will have to make soon enough... it's a strange feeling. I hope we all keep our promises to stay in touch.

Last night Jacky and I finally came through with our party. We've been talking the whole semester about the various parties we wanted to throw, but school and other obligations got in the way. We had wanted to do an end of the semester party in Jacky's Tagesraum (living room), and then have a smaller, more intimate party on the roof of her building, but what ended up happening was a combination of the two. The planning was pretty poorly executed, mostly because she and I have both been really busy. It was also frustrating to go through my phone book to see who to invite and realize that at least half of those people are no longer in the country (especially since I had a good amount of friends from the first semester group). But it ended up being a pretty good turn-out, and the atmosphere was very nice. For as miserable is it is in the daytime here, the summer nights are just about perfect. I advertised the party as a "Dress Up Party" (ie nice clothes), which in the telephone game got translated to "Shnazzy Party" and "Sexy Party." Almost everyone dressed up, which was really nice, and I got a surge of glee when a bunch of the Germans showed up, dressed up as well. Since it was still humid (if not hot), all the boys were wearing short sleeved shirts with ties, which gave me ample room to make cracks about church-attire. Unfortunately my camera ran out of juice halfway through, and I also think that no one got a good picture of Jacky and I, but here are a few that I liked:

Setting up

Me, Eileen and Andi's hat

Okay, there were a lot more people than that, but it gives you an idea of the atmosphere.
Stevie likes dressing up just as much as I do.

itchy veins

I am officially done with my third year of college.

I don't know if it's the different perspective one is thrown into by leaving or just bad luck, but it always seems that things seem to happen right before you leave a place, that would make you want to stay. Just meeting cool people, and wishing that I had met them months ago so I could have formed something instead of just being like, well, it was nice talking to you.

I haven't figured out exactly what that is supposed to mean, if one should take life entirely less seriously (and onself in the process), or if certain things happen before big changes to just... remind you of something.

The past couple of weeks have been quite chameleonic. I've passed through completely different mindsets, and I'm finally at a place of acceptance. Awhile ago I didn't want to leave Goettingen, Germany, Europe at all. Things were amazing, and it felt so unfair that I had to know it was all going to be ripped apart. But then as others started to prepare for leaving, things for me started to follow suit, and through a couple weeks of intense studying/writing for finals and projects, it dawned on me that I wouldn't be able to stay if I wanted things to stay the same. Californians are starting to leave Goettingen as early as tomorrow, and by leaving on the 5th of August I am the third to last person to leave, as far as I know. I am afraid of the city feeling empty once a lot of my friends are gone. I am going to try to do a couple of day trips to some german cities, but so far this is hard planning, because I'd like to go with other people, and everyone is in the mess of packing and cleaning and figuring out all they need to go home. I have a week until I move out of my place here into Andi's tiny attic apartment. So far I haven't touched a thing, being as that I just finished the semester yesterday. I need to send letters to the railway company and to my cell phone provider, telling them to cancel my contract. I have to go to city hall to turn in a form saying I'll no longer be a resident of this city. I need to pack up boxes to ship by sea so that I can have them in America four months from now. I've got to see how much a rather large suitcase, a traveling backpack and a school backpack can hold. I need to figure out if there is any way I'll be able to use the two duffel bags Mom sent with Kim and Jen for me, because as far as I know I am allowed two items for the plane's cargo hold and one to carry on. I am hoping I could use one of the duffel bags as a "personal item," ie purse. I need to return this huge stack of library books I checked out for various papers and tests.

Week before this last one I had two written finals and a presentation. This past week I had a paper I turned in on Wednesday, and an oral test with my professor yesterday (Friday) morning. It was... alright, though nerve-racking and sort of comicial in the fact that the test was comprised not solely of questions on the topics he gave us to study, but rather on topics from the whole class. I generally came to lecture, but... yeah. The good part of the 20 minute sit-in with Professor Hildermeier was at the end when he told/asked me that for sure my ancestors had come from Germany, with a last name like Brock-ree-dah. I said yeah, that I'd always been told it was German but sort of was disappointed here when no one I asked was able to provide me with any information, save that the 'Brock' was an old word for brook. But Hildermeier (who apparently has written tons of books, knows tons of UC history professors, and is pretty high up in his field) told me that he grew up a few kilometers away, and he had known some Brockriede's there. He nodded when I said, well, then it's a North German name? So that was sort of the meaning of the day, that I finally got some information from a German on that. It pleases me because it's fitting, that I'd live in the region where my name supposedly originates.

It's been strange, that since I finally accepted my leaving, I had trouble of thinking of anything else the past week or two. It's amazing how all of our 'real lives' have become so much more real, knowing that we are so close to returning to them. The past weeks have brought to mind things I hadn't allowed into my head for months. This entire year I've resisted the notion that this is just 'vacation' or a 'a break from our real lives,' as so many kids here on the program have described it. Then two weeks ago I was lying on a grassy hill by the Dorf, at night with Lee and Sarah, and we looked up into the black beyond the green leaves of the trees. That was the first time that I felt like the past year of my life was the one pepperoni slice of the cheese pizza. I don't know yet if the other slices from here on out will require some meat as well.

It's difficult saying the year was a vacation from real life, because if so then it was one of those vacations where you hike up into the Himalyans in the depths of winter, and don't come out until the passes have cleared long after. I am wondering how long I'll be back home before I can shake the cryogenic thaw.

I want to write more, but it's time to start packing.

if i am lost its only for a little while

With only two weeks of summer semester remaining, I continue to do a phenomenal job of procrastinating. Its only this afternoon, after a strange nap that makes me not want to go to Africa (not like I see the option coming up anytime soon), that I sit down and start to get some stuff done. I have a final on Tuesday morning, another final on Wednesday morning, and an oral report directly following that. For the moment I am focusing my worries on the oral report, though it is in English (for my English lit class). The topic of the report is half of what my term paper will be on, when I start writing that. I am more worried about the actual act of writing that paper [due at the end of the semester], and the oral test I have to take with my history professor [also at the end of the semester... I think]. Since I don't have a clue what is going on in that class right now I am scared, especially since its the only class from this semester that is actually going towards my major. Though apparently I'm in good company as far as the confusion due to the class's direction, since the other three Americans in that class 1. sit and read Fitzgerald in an attempt to rationalize their drinking, 2. draw intricate geometrical designs, or 3. text message their german girlfriends. Ah, school.

After the 'group photo' had been taken, I demanded a 'year kids' photo, since these are the people that have been through it all. Top row, right to left, just for kicks: Lee, Antoinette, David, Scott, Andrew, Cindy, Janelle, Kate, Karina, Jennifer, Jeremy, Andi (not actually a student, but yeah), Vivan. Bottom row: Jacky, Eileen, Me, Steven.

Since about everyone else I know is in the same boat homework-wise, there hasn't been that much going on recently. Earlier this week was our 'farewell barbeque,' where the year-kids, the new semester kids, and then a group that had arrived literally a day before convened, met the new EAP director, took our group picture and got conviently woozy due to the humidity and the free beer. Not necessarily in that order. It was one of the more surreal experiences of recent weeks to speak to the new kids and have them full of questions, what would you have done differently, what did you like the best, etc--- every question posed like my time here was already over. I still have a month left!, I wanted to shout. But it's true, its almost over. I'll save the poetry on that topic for a later entry.

My brother Steven and I at the bbq. The first picture I have of Germany, which I think Jacky took, is him and I standing with our backpacks, looking significantly younger, on the moving sidewalk in the Frankfurt airport. How time flies.

Also over is the world cup. Or at least, almost. I don't think I am going to get to watch the final game tonight, which I believe is Italy v. France, because I need to work instead. But my interest lay mainly with the german team anyway, and after I watched them beat Portugal last night to assure a third-place victory, I felt so happy watching the after-game footage. Klose, Lehmann, Podolski running around excitedly, Torsten Frings looking long-haired and a little less ready to start a fight than usual, coach Jurgen Klinsmann hugging everyone and looking genuinely pleased, all the black, red and gold in the stands of the Stuttgart stadium. It was also nice that Schweinsteiger scored (well, basically) all the three goals; I felt happy for him, since it seemed like he'd been 'off' a lot of the games. I was sitting in the living room of Henry's house, and Jacky was next to me, and I said something about feeling like I knew them all, just from watching them all play, and Jacky agreed. Spectators in the stadium were holding huge banners that read, "Ihr seid unsere Helden," you are our heros.

Watching the decisive Germany v. Italy game on Tuesday was a little more depressing, just because it dragged on forever until Italy finally scored two goals in about a minute and a half at the very very end. I was expecting mass rioting in the streets, but it actually seemed like people were still optimistic about the prospect of getting third place (which they did, last night). Last night I was sitting in a fifth-floor apartment on Arndstrasse and from his open window we could hear the cars honking below, the last german cheers of the Weltmeisterschaft.

Tim, Steven, Alex (complete with John Lennon glasses) and I at Konrad's Grillparty for the Germany-Italy game/Steven's 21st birthday.

Back to work.

"Wir fahren nach Berlin"

Yesterday Germany and Argentina tied in one of the quarter-final games of the World Cup. They went into overtime, and finally a shoot out. Germany won.

Its hard to explain what it is about being here and watching the games with people--- because to them its so much more than a game. We, the Americans, all speak in hushed voices about what it is going to be like, the day they actually lose a game.

To further on this point, you can check out this interesting article I just read. I don't agree wholeheartedly with it, but it might give you a better idea of what's going on.

I watched yesterday's game at student housing at Kellnerweg, a street up by the north university buildings. I stood on a table at the back of a large room, the windows blacked out with garbage bags, the game projected on the blank white wall. I probably lost a few pounds just being in that room for 100 and some minutes; the humidity was what one could call palpable. After the game I rode (my bike fixed again, hurrah!) into town with Eileen and her friend Marvin to watch the insanity at the Marktplatz, the main center of town by the Gaenseliesel. Truly outrageous, and I have the videos to prove it. After that I rode home, and changed, and then met back up with Eileen at the Kellnerweg party.

Next week we play Italy.

visions of johanna

When considering the time that has passed from my last blog entry until the present, I find it difficult to remember what has fallen inbetween.

On the top of a 29 story building in Leipzig, Germany

I could start with where I have been the past few Sundays. Last Sunday I was in Berlin, the Sunday before in Leipzig, before that Halle, before that Hamburg, before that Hannover. The Leipzig day-trip was undertaken with Andi and his Faust tutorium participants. I am not one of them, but I am friends with them, so I showed up too. We met early at the train station, bought our Schoenes Wochenende tickets (cheap tickets that are good for slower trains in certain areas if you go and come back on the same day), and spent about four hours doozing, reading, and listening to music. The point of the trip was to go to Auerbach's Keller, which is a cellar-bar made famous by Goethe's Faust. The group of us basically ran around town, had drinks at the Keller, and watched the antics of the South Korean and French fans there for the World Cup game.

In the Leipzig Hauptbahnhof, heading towards the train to take us home

Then this past Sunday it was Addie and I on the train from the newly-built Berlin Hauptbahnhof (main train station) back to Goettingen. The Berlin Hauptbahnhof was just opened about a month ago, and now holds the title of the largest train station in Europe.

Addie arrived on Tuesday, and just left yesterday (Wednesday) to continue her european travels. It was an amazingly fun week, and although now I am paying the price for completely disregarding all scholastic responsibility, I've got some good pictures.

She arrived Tuesday afternoon, just in time to head to the ZHG (central lecture building on campus) to meet Eileen and catch the Germany-Ecuador World Cup game. The great thing about Goettingen is that no matter where you go, you are almost bound to run into someon. I had been hanging out with Eileen earlier in the day, so we had planned to meet, and as we entered we ran into Alex buying beer, so we went and stood with him and Steven and some other folks. We demolished Ecuador (2-0, though with the number of shoulda-been-goals there shoulda-been an even greater margin) and therefore there was much revelry. I was glad Addie got to see how crazy everyone here gets over the games. After the game was over we headed with Rita into town in search of food, and ended up picking up Kate along the way. We ate at Villa Cuba and then got ice cream and walked home, but only after we'd taken numerous pictures of the insanity in the streets.

The masses post-german victory; celebrators atop of the Gaenseliesel, a statue in the middle of town

Wednesday night was the Sportler Party, so we headed over and eventually met up with some folks. It was an outdoor party, which they seem to be fond of here when the weather is right, and it was IMMENSE. It was ridiculous how many people were there. I was shocked that we ended up finding anyone we knew--- we didn't stay incredibly late because we were leaving the next day, but Addie got to witness the stupidness that centers around german lines (in this case, waiting in line for beer).

The next day Addie came with me to class, and then we took the 3 o' clock to Berlin. I've been to Berlin once before, back in January with Colina and some of her friends, and I liked it a lot then, even for being soaked through with snow for four days straight. Since the weather was pretty good the whole weekend (for some reason not nearly as humid as Goettingen), Berlin this time around creapt even farther into my heart.

Addie and I on our first day in Berlin, sunset by the Hauptbahnhof

The train ride from Goettingen to Berlin is about two and a half hours, so we arrived with still a few hours of daylight left. We dropped our stuff off at the hostel, and then wandered around. At one point we were stopped at a corner on the sidewalk, and I was looking at my map, and a woman stopped and asked me if we needed help. We didn't really, so I asked her if she had any suggestions for good restaurants in the area, and she recommended a place that ended up being really yummy and friendly. After a good dinner we hit many of the major sights, and then came back and rested up for our next big day. Friday we woke up, had breakfast at the hostel, and then set out to find ourselves some Germany-shirts to wear the next day to show our support for the Germany-Sweden game. I had one of the better shopping experiences of the year, and practically wet myself with excitement over the adidas track jacket I found and promptly purchased. It was something I have been looking for all year, and I am still sort of excited, just thinking about how it is currently hanging in my closet.

That night we met up with five of Addie's friends, who had been traveling through Germany for the World Cup. We grabbed food and watched the first half of the game, and then at half-time proceeded into the "Fan Meile" (Fan Mile), which is a mile-long World-Cup extravaganza that extends from the Brandenburger Tor (Brandenburg Gate) a mile long. In all of the cities where World Cup games are being played there are screens set up around the city, but only in Berlin is there an actual mile of screens, beer and sausage vendors, and face-painted, flag-jacketed soccer fans. It was absolutely ridiculous.

Talking to some of Addie's friends after the game, note my AMAZING JACKET

Because they were all tired from traveling, we all split off relatively early, but fueled by the german tradition of beer consumption Addie and I headed home only to be detoured by numerous photo ops, and a giant record store.

The next day we met the boys at the East Side Gallery, a portion of the former wall that is covered with graffitti and art. From there we split off, and I went with Evan, one of Addie's comrades, to meet up with some of the other boys to head to the National History Museum. From there we rushed to the Fan Meile to try to get in and get decent standing places for the Germany-Sweden game at 5 o' clock. We got there around 3, and yet with the crowds I was worried we still wouldn't be let in. Luckily we did, and after a lot of standing next to masses of people in weird, humid weather we got in, got beer, and sat and waited. The experience of watching the game itself was somewhat unpleasant due to the crowds, the fact that at even 5'7.5 a lot of people are still taller than me, and that the sun was glaring into our eyes the whole time. Yet it was still amazing, and I was so glad I was able to be there. Unfortunately Addie and the two friends she had gone off with were not able to get in, so they met up with afterwards in time to watch the Mexico-Argentina game. After the Germany win, people went crazy, and we made numerous friends while dancing around with our co-revelers.

After Germany's win, Matthias and Lars (to the left of me and behind me, respectively) made friends with us and there was much jumping up and down and shouting [Addie's friend's Evan and Chris also pictured].

The last game ended around 11 and we, along with a German named Nico who just graduated from Goettingen, all headed to Tacheles. Tacheles, a place recommended to me by Lee, is basically a squat-house turned bar, and captured my fancy immediately. It was really close to our hostel, so Addie and I had actually been there a couple of times already, but our late Saturday night there was quite memorable. The building is covered in graffitti and probably about six stories high and each floor houses a different bar. On one floor there is an art gallery of sorts where I bought three postcards for myself, and one for Evan, it being his birthday. One of my favorite memories of the weekend is standing at a broken-out window with Evan, overlooking the back and down onto our friends, thinking of the day and of city, where I am and where I'll be.

Addie and I watching the Mexico-Argentina game. You can't tell, but we're wearing matching Adidas Deutscher Fussballbund (German Soccer Club) shirts.

Unfortunately it was somewhere around this point that my wallet got stolen. It was one of those things where you kind of feel your purse move a little, but I was sort of lost in the moment and figured it was just my imagination. When I actually did check my purse a minute later (which I had left unzipped) and realized my wallet my stolen, I yelped and ran down the staircase. Luckily the perpetrator just took my money and dropped the wallet a few flights below, leaving all my cards. It sucked to lose the money (somewhere between twenty and forty euro), but I was mostly grateful that I didn't have to call my mom to tell her to cancel the credit card, and then reapply for all my other cards just so I could have them for one more month before I leave. As far as getting your wallet stolen, it was kind of the best it could have been.

Somewhere along the line we lost Nico, so wherever he may be, I hope he is okay. It was around 2 that we said our goodbyes so the boys could get some sleep before their flight home that next morning. The next day Addie and I woke up and checked out of the hostel, got some Indian food from a place down the street and took the train home. That night we met Scott, Lee and Andi at Cartoon's for dinner. Monday I skipped class and we hung out, and that night we went first to Salsilito's for happy hour with some of the new kids, and then I took her to Trou, my favorite bar in Goettingen. I was able to get a good group together, and I was pleased she was able to get somewhat of a taste of what going out here is like. On Tuesday we took the train to Bremen, ran around, bought some bags, took pictures with the Bremerstadtmusikanten statue (Bremen City Musicians), and attempted to go to the Beck's Beer Factory. Unfortunately it turned out that they only give tours Thursday-Saturday, so we headed back into town for dinner, and then caught the 5:18 back to Goettingen. We got back to my room around 9, and I made dinner and Addie packed.

As we were standing around outside of Tacheles, this random guy runs up with a german flag screaming, "Deutschland! Deutschland!" We scream back at him, but when he hears one of us speaking English, he says, "America! America is going home! Whata pity, WHAT A PITY!" I was obviously delighted out of my wits, as the picture demonstrates. As this picture was being taken, his two friends were standing off to the side saying, okay, come on, lets go. We were probably the tenth group of people he had run into shouting like that. Basically the World Cup is amazing.

And thats about where I am now. I am feeling pretty stressed out about school, and about moving home, and just generally feeling somewhat moody. However, looking back through pictures of this weekend reminds me of what amazing memories I am making here these last months, even if it makes figuring out normal life that much harder. More to come.

street car visions (which you) place on the grass

On my way to Claudio's, my favorite ice cream place (only 60 euro cents for a scoop!) Goettingen downtown, sunny and bedecked with flags for the World Cup.

Written on Thursday:

I imagine you have been to a zoo. Maybe its been awhile, but its likely, and if its likely that you have ever been to a zoo, its also likely that you have at least once visited this certain exhibit of which I am thinking. The name probably varies from location to location, but basically its got a lot of red and yellow birds, maybe some sleepy bats hanging up top, and a lot of leafy greenery. In my well-zooed experience, the exhibit is like a high-roofed greenhouse, and once you step inside the impression strikes that you are no longer in temperate California but in a costa rican rainforest. Its cool to hear the bored screeches of exotic animal-life, and to breathe in that heavy mechanized mist, at least for a few minutes. By the time you reach the end of the exhibit pathway, however, (with its signs thanking you for strolling through, maybe next to a warning about the disappearance of fauna and foliage in the southern portion of our hemisphere), you're glad to be out, and to feel real, clean, fresh air, and to let your pores revert back to their normal workings. Now, imagine you had walked into the exhibit, not knowing that once you're in, you're trapped. Its at this point that you'd look around with the due amount of surprise, and read the white-posted sign to your right, "Summer in Germany."

Its really not the temperature, its the humidity. It doesn't help matters that my room begets the full glare of the german side of the sun, day in and day out, or that you can only have your window open at certain parts of the day in order to discriminate as to the insect intruders to your small space of residence. Furthering my annoyance with the recent weeks is my bike picking this time, the apparant beginning of summer (we are all asking one another, "What happened to spring?") , to decide... yeah, I really don't care about working anymore, no matter how many times you fix me. I have taken The Grand Purple Beauty to Dietmar ("The Bike Man") now three times since Friday (today being Thursday), just to have her wimp out on me a day or two after the repair. I think I conned my friend Scott into coming over tonight to take a look at her, so hopefully that produces something fruitful. It wouldn't be so crappy if my pores didn't well up with emotion every time I left my building. It also would be nice if I didn't live two kilometers away from anything worth going to.

Apart from complaining about the weather, today I went to class, and then to the Mensa (cafeteria) with Rita, and then to the library. I try to go to the library at least once a week (generally Monday or Thursday afternoons), and after every successful session I always promise myself another one soon, but the fruitlessness of that hope can generally be attributed to the late nights that the attempt at a enjoyable social life require.

Even though I will be glad to once more peruse a library whose organizational system actually makes sense, I will miss the beautiful SUB (university library). It is a monumental building, modern and nationally-acclaimed, its outsides constructed mainly of clear glass. It is especially talented at affording one lots of neat nooks and crannies in which to hide with a book, a dictionary and a pen. Today I started the research for my term paper that I "sort of" started about two months ago--- that I really should have started two months ago. As I was walking the aisles in the Freihandmagazin (a basement area, which to my knowledge is the place they put the books you are actually allowed to check out--- the three floors above are full of books that you just sit there and admire), I had to laugh to myself. The system, if it can even be called such, is so unfathomable to the average educated mind that after ten months I continue to fail to see how "The Greatest Irish Drinking Stories" can sit next to "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl," which is on the shelf just below the thick volume of Guenter Grass' collected poetry, shoved tightly to the end of the row by a Hungarian textbook, taught (fittingly) in French.

Due to the weather and a just general lack of motivation, I really haven't been getting much work done. But academic pursuits aside, I have been finding enough things to keep myself suitably busy. I will probably cut this entry short by heading to the gym in a bit. And speaking of athleticism, this past weekend I spent in the heat and sun in a city called Halle, in Sachsen-Anhalt, part of the former East Germany. Saturday morning I left to head to my first ultimate frisbee tournament with a fellow American named Ben. He is here for the summer hanging out with a friend of his here and learning German, and traveling to tournaments to play pick up for teams who need players.

Continued now, early Sunday morning:

After our last game on Sunday, the 'Air Pussies' (a team name which makes as little sense to you as it likely does to me. Ben and I kept wondering why they had ever picked a name like that): (L-R top row) Dishke, Ben, Renee, Tom; (second row) Frankie, Me, Frauke, Anne.

So yeah, the tournament. I slept very little Friday night, and woke up at 5 on Saturday morning to meet Ben at the train station. We got to Halle in the mid morning, and through the help of three middle-aged 'East' German men at the station, and Christian and Kristin we found our way to the playing fields. The latter were a couple, probably kids about our age, with whom I conversed as they led us the confusing way to where the tournament was held. I was really impressed by the people in Halle and how helpful everyone tried to be to us. I am not used to Germans going out of their way for, really, anything, so it was almost a shock as much as a pleasure.

I hadn't had a clue what to expect the tournament to be like, and as Ben and I had basically just met one another, it was... an interesting weekend. We ended up "picking up" (being put as two members on a team that was short) for a team from Berlin the whole weekend, and we played seven games. Each game was 45 minutes, and since we generally had to match up girls on teams (ie, girls defend girls, boys defend boys), I actually played a lot, because there was generally only one of us to switch out.

If I hadn't been so tired on Saturday, from the lack of sleep, and the intense heat, and running for literally about three hours, I probably would have been really nervous. As it was I just tried my best to keep my mind open about learning, and not take anything too personally. I felt kind of bad about being put on the team as a beginner, especially since Ben is really good, but I eventually found my place, and after a mostly frustrating Saturday, the last two games on Sunday were really good. It was mostly difficult because I was trying to learn the stradegy, while at the same time remembering rules, and taking direction from my team mates. Since the team is from Berlin, there were a couple of other foreigners: Dishke from Kyoto, Frankie from Belfast, and Tom from somewhere in Australia. Tom was also a pick up player, and since he didn't know any German, our team mates spoke often in English. It was a strange feeling, though, because though Ben has taken some German, its not really at the conversational level yet, so because he needed English, people assumed I did too. When applicable I tried to say something about me knowing German, or speaking in German to my teammates, but I felt like it was just sort of awkward. Like, if you say, "Yeah, I can speak German," its almost like saying, "Yeah, my German is really good," which is not really something I want to be saying to a German. Especially in this situation, where I felt like I was really needing to work hard to prove my worth anyhow, and the combination of physical stress and then intellectual pressure was just too much. So I stayed quiet and listened and tried to pick up things, which I think I did. I missed practice today because I spent the day recovering from last night (ahem), but at practice on Tuesday I felt like I was able to put some of the weekend's learning to use.

So we played most of Saturday, and then went out to eat at a mexican food place with some of our teammates that night. Unfortunately this is Germany, and eating out can often last an epic amount of time, and so I was basically useless until I got back to our tent at around 11:30 pm, and within 15 minutes passed out on the hard german soil. I woke up periodically throughout the night, FREEZING in my thinnish purple sleeping bag, and then woke up at 8:15 to feel the blazing sun already overhead. As previously stated, Sunday went a lot better, probably at least in part due to the sleep, and after our last game at around 3, Ben and I packed up and made our slow journey back to Goettingen.

Ultimate frisbee is an american game, so I actually heard a lot of foreign voices (ie not all german) at the tournament. There was also a lot of naked children, and an inexplicable amount of pregnant women. I think most everyone camped out at the spaces along the fields, and there was a main tent, in which a free breakfast and cheap lunch was provided. There was a building with bathrooms, and showers, and there were also port-a-potties along the main tent. The girl's bathroom, in which one toliet sat, broke down the first day, and so I had an exciting weekend of peeing next to boys. Eileen, my friend from Berkeley who has played ultimate (as it is often known, instead of "Ultimate Frisbee") for a couple of years, warned me previously that sometimes the showers at tournament are coed. I had said, oh, thats cool, my bathroom my freshman year of college was coed, I don't have a problem with it. But as I went to take my shower on Saturday evening it all became clear: one smallish room, eight shower heads, no gender differentiation. I was actually lucky that I went in right after a mass exodus, so I was actually the only one in there for my ten minutes of lukewarm recessitation. I wouldn't really have had a huge problem with it either way, but I thought it was important to note it down as one of those things that I can now say I've done.

So all in all it was a good weekend, though the feeling that coated everything was a tepid exhaustion. Unfortunately I was stupid and got really badly sunburned, which my skin is just now recovering from. At the very least I got a lot of good exercise, and Ben and I made friends with one another, and I made some friends that I will be able to say hi to if I ever go to another tournament here. I hope I get to, though when I think of the time I have left and the weekend plans I already have made, there just aren't many opportunities left. At the very least I hope to join the team when I go back to Santa Cruz, and I know we will play Berkeley, so it'd be fun to see Eileen then, and reminisce about the old days.

Another event that has started to take up time is the WM (Weltmeisterschaft), or better known to the English-speaking world, the World Cup! The international best-of-the-best of football (soccer) is this time around held throughout Germany, and so it feels like a pretty big deal to be here right now. I have only watched a few games, but a lot of people have been watching most of them... which now only in its second week would still be a lot (I think there are about 2-3 games a day, depending). The most memorable was Wednesday night's Germany-Poland game. I met some people in town to watch it, and the bar we had planned to go to was already packed, so we ended up heading to an empty cafe. The cafe was soon full, and it was so much fun to watch the game with Germans, not only because it was their team and this game pretty much assured that they'd move into the next round, but because Germans are crazy about soccer. There were special songs for goal-kicks, and throw-ins, and when Germany finally scored a goal (final score: 1-0) in the last five minutes, the place erupted, and we all chanted "Wir fahren nach Berlin! Wir fahren nach Berlin!" (We're going to Berlin, We're going to Berlin! Berlin being another city that the games are played in, and where I assume the final games are held) for what seemed like ages. After the game we went to a hookah bar, and after that Scott and I walked home, and I couldn't have wished more that I had remembered to bring my camera with me. The city was INSANE--- it was sometime early Thursday morning, and Weende Strasse, the main road through downtown, was packed with revelry, people singing, drunken groups of guys running with german flags through the side streets. A german girl (that one of my american friends was trying to hit on) was talking to us at the hookah bar, and she made what I find to be a really insightful point: Germans are taught not to be proud of their nationality, and sports are the only outlet that the world would find acceptable for any degree of german nationalism. Thus, german football fanaticism. A fun fact is that the mexican team is staying here in Goettingen, and every time I've been downtown the past two weeks I've seen some of them walking around. Its actually pretty cool, its like celebrities in your midst, eventhough they aren't like the highest ranked team or anything. I think it's nice that all of Goettingen has gotten into it, so I see almost as many mexican flags in shop windows, on police cars and hanging from apartments as I see the old black, red and gold.

Scott, Lee and I by the water at the Hamburg harbor at about 5am, two weekends ago.

I guess that's about it for now. Last night Scott came over to take a look at my bike, just to finish the inspection within two minutes and tell me he'd have to fix it all after I went and bought the parts. Then we called Lee, and I made dinner, and the three of us ate before we headed over to the party here at the Siedlung. What started off as a party I planned on leaving after about an hour turned into one of those leave-the-party-at-7am-ers. I paid for all the fun heavily today, but it was still worth it. Any time I get to dance for long periods of time with lots of boys, friends or strangers, is a good time to me. Tomorrow I hope to sleep in and then get some work done, and on Sunday I am planning on going to Leipzig with some people, just to walk around and see the city. On Monday Addie comes to visit, and I have to figure out how to accomodate someone for a length of time in my little box-room. And now, bed!

the wind in my earlobes

If you read the last entry and felt a little uppity, this should calm your spirits. I do lead a mostly normal life, still. This semester I've been attending:

Monday 9:15-10:45 Grammatik (Grammar)

Tuesday 9:15-10:00 Nationalismus und Vertreibung in Osteuropa in der 1. Haelfte des 20. Jahrhunderts
(Nationalism and Expulsion in Eastern Europe in the first half of the 20th Century)
Tuesday 9:15-10:45 Tutorium fuer Liternatur nach 1945
Tuesday 11:15-12:45 Literatur nach 1945 ([German] Literature after 1945)

Wednesday 9:15-10:45 Grammatik
Wednesday 11:15-12:45 Introduction to Modernism (ironic because although its my 'cop out class,' because its in English, I actually have the most work to do for this one)

Thursday 12:15-1:00 Nationalismus und Vertreibung in Osteuropa in der 1. Haelfte des 20. Jahrhunderts

And a couple of weeks ago I enrolled in classes for Fall Quarter at Santa Cruz. It felt a little early for me to be doing that, too:

MW 10:30-12:00 Ballet II
MWF 2:00-3:10 Spanish 1
MWF 3:30-4:40 Medieval Spain
F 11:45-1:45 Jazz III
TuTh 2:00-3:45 Ancient Japan

I was really excited about the classes when I signed up, so hopefully I will still be that way in a few months.

Apart from the youthful antics and school, I have been doing my best to attend a couple of gym classes a week. The gym classes are what I imagine aerobics classes to be like, but it took me a good couple of weeks to be able to handle myself so I wasn't bursting out laughing at all the ludicrous stuff we do. I don't know if that sort of thing is inherently funny, or if the fact that its all in German compounds the ridiculousness. Either way, it all is a step in the right direction. I tried once more this semester to take some dance classes, but the jazz classes are below my level and the ballet ones were all full, so I decided to wait until it was all back in English again.

So instead of going to dance classes, I sort of happenstancedly started attending the ultimate frisbee team practices. With a sport like ultimate frisbee, one would rightly imagine that the practices aren't really super official or anything, and pretty much anyone who feels like spending a few hours Tuesday and Friday evenings running around in soggy grass is welcome. So far it's been a lot of fun, and I hope to be able to go to one of the every-so-often weekend tournaments one of these times. I started going, with Jacky, mainly because our friend Eileen plays back with the team at Berkeley, and so has thus been involved with the team the whole year we've been here so far. It feels a little late to get started, but its just now that the weather is becoming decent, and even saying that is highly arguable, especially on days like today.

Most of this semester we have also been playing sports on Sundays, a big pack of us Americans with a good amount of Germans tossed in as well. It started off as Football Sunday, and after some prodding (from myself, among others), we got frisbee and soccer included as well, and now we basically just play frisbee. It's generally a lot of fun.

Last night I went out for food with Lee and Scott at a place called Cartoon. They are notorious for sort of poor service, but on Sundays things are a good deal cheaper, so we went in the spirit of not having to cook ourselves. After some pasta we rented some movies on Lee's account, which was a foreign feeling. I've rented a movie I think once before here with Andi and Matthias, but its still strange to walk around that place and look at all the titles that change in translation. Then we went back to Lee's place, where we watched L'Auberge Espagnol (The Spanish Apartment), a french movie about a kid from Paris participating in an exchange program in Barcelona. The movie, which we watched in French with German subtitles, has been out for a couple of years and I have been wanting to see it for awhile, if only because it deals with the Erasmus program, which is the european equivalent of what I am doing right now. All in all it was a little topical of a movie, though I still enjoyed it. Once the credits began to roll, Lee got up in the dark to turn it off and he said, "God, that was depressing." It's depressing because it is the highly dramaticized version of us, if we were all europeans, and living in one tight apartment together. We're not, we're all from California and we live in single rooms in student dorms, but last night we three, as would all of us, recognized every feeling portrayed--- that of indescribable excitement, of sink-your-insides disappointment, frustration and confusion, despair and finally homesickness, not really for what we left behind but what we thought we would be going back to. And its just now that I realize that today is the two month marker, that by this time on August the 5th my plane will have already left the ground, my last moments on german soil already departed. For those of us who feel the fire at the back of our heels, its not something we're looking forward to.

i'd like to think i'm a mess you'd wear with pride

I started composing this entry while I was lying in my sleeping bag on my bed at 1 o' clock this afternoon, falling asleep after one long night's adventure in Hamburg. My body being comfortable for the first time in what felt like ages, I wondered why I'd never thought of the sleeping bag thing before. Sure, it could be seen as a little ramshackle, but it really saves the amount of laundry one has to wash.

I have already decided to stay up tonight to write, and after that I hope for a good, long sleep. I have a Referat (oral report) on Tuesday morning, and since I haven't started researching yet, I plan on spending tomorrow working. Tomorrow (Monday) is Pfingsten, the translation of which I am slightly too lazy to look up right now, and we have the day off school.

It has been about a month since I wrote last. Looking through my 'April/May in Goettingen' photo folder reveals just how little work I've been doing, and how little sleep I've been getting. If I didn't feel like some of the things I have been experiencing were so important I think it would have been a lot easier to write about them, and would be feeling now like I had less of a weight to remove. That said, I know myself well enough to realize I wouldn't really ever be able to write about it all like I'd want, so its better to put some time aside and get what I can down. Its like any photo I've ever taken in any foreign land, or any video I've taken at any moving concert: you just can't do some things the justice they deserve. I guess its the trying that counts. We'll start with an excerpt from an e-mail I wrote on the 26th of May:

"I woke up this morning after about 3.5 hours of sleep, and arrived somewhat late to the 10am meet up. A cup of coffee with lots of milk later, the five Americans and two Germans set off into the woods with backpacks of rain jackets and alcohol.

We went up into a tower in the middle of caterpillar green leaves, and looked over a yellow, green and white patch-worked Goettingen. We made friends with other packs of boozing Germans and I managed to narrowly steal the show from Eileen by being the one most likely to throw up a hefty amount of Persico. Instead all I gots now is a headache.

Slippery trails and some wild pigs later, we played frisbee with some german children and walked home in the rain. We got back somewhere around 5pm, and I promptly fell asleep on the couch in Franse's dorm living room, and when I awoke it was a-bustle with the preparations of the afternoon's Grillparty. Wet and cold and already hungover, a blanket and some Kopfschmerzen. Once we had grilled to the belly's satisfaction, we headed over to a normally locked room to watch some stuff on a big screen. The personal highlight was falling in love with Johnny's love for June, and remembering that musicians [just might be] the coolest people in the world.

There was only one in the group that had to take more than 20 paces to their doorstep, so I rode home alone, a Thursday night silent but for the dripping of leaves, a reminder of the evening's final rain---"

I think it was one of my favorite days. Ascension Day, Christihimmelfahrt in German, is the day here that holds the tradition of a family hike to the woods. The men not heads of families would go in alcoholic packs together, and eventually through the course of history women were invited too, and thus my Thursday hike onto the green paths through trees I had yet not smelled. Andi was our leader, and his friend (also german) Franse had a backpack with her too, and then the five Amis: Steven, Jacky, Scott, Eileen and I. We met in the morning and left around 11am. As the excerpt hints I am notorious now for not having the clearest memory of that day, but it was a moment of my year soaked in a dewy greenness, sweet and fresh and easy to breathe through. I finally saw and entered the famous Bismarckturm, from the top of which one can see the whole of our fair city. The hike continued long after that, and we made friends along the way--- Germans, wild pigs, small dogs and children open yet enough to strangers for a game of frisbee. It was already evening when we arrived back at the Dorf, and some grilled food later and then a couple of movies in a projection room. A long long day and then I was once again alone, on my way home.



The Thursday before had been Andi's Grillparty, the day after I saw Belle & Sebastian play in Hamburg and spent four of the coldest morning hours with Kate outside of the Uelzen train station waiting for our connection home. I got home sometime Saturday and slept through what was the second NPD (Neo Nazi Party) march through Goettingen since I've been here. That night I left Goettingen once more, this time with Lee, Scott, Jacky, Henry and Sarah (one of the new girls) to Hannover. I got back to my room in Goettingen the next day somewhere around 11am, only then finally being able to say that I'd gone to a rave. It'd been an epic night that led us through an 18th century maze of hedges, complete with background classical music, down cobblestoned residental streets, and finally onto dark woodland paths to the site of the rave. I spent seven hours dancing, about which I got complimented in German by a girl as I was waiting to wash my hands in the bathroom. It was 8:30 am when we left to head back to the train station.

Other highlights of recent weeks include Jen and Kim visiting last weekend, and then of course, the events of last night. Andi, Scott, Lee, Jacky, Henry, Sarah and Jamie (two of the new girls who I don't really know very well) and I got on a train to Hamburg yesterday afternoon. We arrived around six, and made our way to the Reeperbahn (Red Light District) to find the venue for the concert we were attending. Apparently last night Hamburg was the site of a Schlagerparade, which on our way into the Reeperbahn made the city pockmarked with yellow and pink blouses, loudly patterned bell-bottoms and wigs. ["Schlager" is a term for a genre of german music from the 60's and 70's that is characteristically cheesy.] By the time we left the concert, what before had been brightly-lit and gay in the light of day had taken a turn for the debaucherous, and the streets through which we gingerly tred were strewn with broken glass, vomit, blood and lingering prostitutes.

The concert had been a lot of fun--- two opening acts before the guy I had come to see, the first a german woman with a cold named Emily Parker, and the second was the Clientel, more famous though not necessarily any better in my book. Jens Lekman, the man of the evening, was amazing and Jacky and I were standing right in front of him in the tiny club. I made friends with a New Yorker who is on leave from Yale to live for awhile in Berlin. She was going to come out with us after the concert, but ended up having to take a rain check- but if we can both remember one another, it'd be fun to meet up when I'm in Berlin next, which I think will be in a couple of weeks, if I go when Addie comes to visit.

But if the concert was fun, what came next should have been filmed with a lens capable of the hazy dream-sequence effect. We had lost Jamie and Sarah long before, and not long after the concert Jacky and Henry split off from us, and so I spent the morning hours wandering the dirtiest streets in the filthiest part of the city with Lee, Andi and Scott. I breathed a sigh of relief when I realized most of the strip clubs don't allow women inside (apart from the 'employees', I guess), and because the boys kept ordering rounds I hit more than a few walls of almost complete exhaustion. After much searching we settled down in a bar whose name translates fittingly to 'To The Crack' (Zur Ritze). We got friendly with our waitress, who chastised us for the thick smoke that hung in our corner, I took a lot of pictures and Lee spilled a beer on me. Around four 'o clock in the morning we emerged to find the day had begun while we were still stuck in the night, and enveloped in the blue mist of morning we four walked to the harbor. We watched the stalls of the famous Hamburg Fish Market open, and when the smell made me reel I would dance a few paces back and snap a picture for memory. We jumped the hand-rail and ran down the rocks to the water, and maybe I didn't realize it at the time, but I was so glad I was there. It was on the second train home, when I couldn't breathe through my nose and the cold of the morning threatened, that I felt like death and if it hadn't been for the complete exhaustion that has been building up these weeks I would have had to lie there awake. As it was the bike ride home from the train station was plodding, and finally as I zipped my purple sleeping cocoon closed I layed my head and I was glad for everything.

love is no big truth

Learning a foreign language is sort of like wandering around a really large department store. Sometimes you feel like you understand the lay-out pretty well, and other times you can't even get out the way you came in. There is just a lot of stuff , and oftentimes you will come upon a section you didn't even know existed, and in these cases sometimes its just better to forget you ever saw it. As I meander along, now and then I see something I'd like to try on. Sometimes this works better than others--- you can generally determine if you've misinterpreted the meaning of something by the look on someone's face.

This is inspired by waking up this morning and thinking I should use the phrase Mach's gut und intensifiers like doch, mal, bloss, and nur more. Mach's gut is a phrase I only hear now and then, but I think two and a half years ago as I was beginning to learn German it was defined in my book as something you say on parting. I think its kind of like 'take care.' The intensifiers (always in third position: Ich hatte doch nie gewusst; Wenn du nur da gegangen waerst) are a little trickier because they are just sort of those words you throw in for 'emphasis.' The 'emphasis' is kind of vague even in a mother-language, but trying to understand why and when you'd use some of these words in German is like trying to explain to a non-native English speaker what the words 'just' or 'like' mean. Just is like, well, its kind of like only but not really. I find 'emphasis' gets translated a lot easier sometimes by rapid and copious gesticulation and intonation of voice. A Mongolian girl (whose name I still have no idea how to pronouce and therefore never do) who is doing a doctorate program here in English (and therefore does not speak German) asked me the other day when I was in Jacky's kitchen what the difference is between "not bad" and "not so bad." Its really not that difficult of a question until you realize that you can't really explain the difference--- maybe you can better than I, but I spent ten minutes painting elaborate scenarios that still didn't really define anything and probably just left her more confused than she had been before she asked me. I'm always so eager to help that I think sometimes I end up doing more damage than good--- but when you hear how some other people try to 'elucidate' English things for Germans (or non- Yankees, Brits, Aussies, Kiwis, Canucks) you feel like you've gotta do something. In my creative writing class last semester our professor, who had studied for a year in England in college, would sometimes ask for a better clarification of an english word or phrase, generally as it related to a translation of something we were doing, or a question of one of the students. The class was primarily Californians, and there was always one who jumped at the opportunity to show off his in-depth knowledge of the English language. I always ended up contradicting him, though, which was just slightly painful because its such a snarky thing to do, but he was always just a little off in his definition of something and I couldn't stand it.

Thursday, right outside of Vaternahm, the bookstore where Andi works, waiting with Jacky for him to close up so we could go get indian food.

It amazes me that after nine months I am still in the place that can go so quickly from feelings of accomplishment to complete frustration and utter despair. It's in a lingual sense we're talking here. The teller at Commerzbank can make you feel like the biggest idiot in the world (the ultimate insult being a response in English, eventhough I think when that happens [which is seldom, thank you] people are just trying to help) but that night you can be sitting at a bar and waving your Beck's around and feel like the flip has been switched and they just couldn't keep the German from falling out of your mouth if they tried. Its the sweet irony that characterizes much of this year (and life, hardy har har) that relates that I could be a lot better of a student in this country if I was just at least slightly inebriated most of the time. And that people would actually find me more intelligent, to that!

And on that note, it looks like summer semester (as it is here called, since the official end of the semester is none other than July 21st, a month before my 22nd birthday [whew!]) is shaping up to be a completely different source of experience than winter semester was. I think all of us veterans keep telling the new kids (the new Californians that arrived here in April) that they are so lucky for coming when they did. To that most of them respond something in agreement, that they can't stand the cold, they've lived their whole lives in Southern California, the snow would have killed them, blah blah. But then without fail I defend the winter, and how it shaped us and hardened us and prepared us for the utter joy that comes with the blossoming of spring. More and more I realize how much stock I put in sucking it up and pushing yourself through--- I almost get a sick joy out of it. Maybe to make yourself into who you want you sort of have to see it that way. Though with that said I have to remember I continue to be a terrible procrastinater, at least with papers, and that if I go out running I need someone else there or else I'll just turn around and come home to the peach juice in my corner of the fridge. I guess everyone is a hypocrite.Friday, Lee owning his party. The tall blue building in the background is the famous Blauer Turm (blue tower), which houses smaller classes, the history department library and professor's offices.

Apart from the seemingly smooth flow of my summer classes, the joys that spring has brought are tied mostly into social activity. I've said it before and I'll likely say it again, but I am constantly surprised to see so many people out and about. Where were you people these past five months! Along with the many uni-sponsered parties that abound at the beginning of the semester (which all tend to be the same and therefore aren't generally worth my time), the staple of the semester so far are Grillpartys. As the good german name suggests, these are just barbeque's held on the lawns outside and around student housing. The few I've been invited to at the Siedlung have not been graced with my gentle presence, instead I've been a more active member of the Dorf and Boerse communities. The Dorf is where about half of the Californians live, and is closer to town and the uni buildings, even if its rooms might be a tad smaller. I am still generally happy about where I live, because the Dorf isn't so far away, and it seems now that its gotten far enough in the year where a lot of people's relationships with their housemates have turned at least somewhat sour. In the Siedlung, where I live, there are five actual buildings (though three of these buildings are like two buildings put together: for example, I live in the first building, but its actually called Haus 4; its connected to Haus 2 [don't ask me what happened to Haus 1 or 3]). There are about four or five floors in each of the three big buildings (Mahatma-Ghandi Haus and Haus 13, where Jacky lives, are built in different styles and therefore don't really count along with the rest of the place), and around fourteen people on each floor. So that means there are probably somewhere between 50-60 people living in Haus 4, the same in Haus 2. Of my fourteen housemates, I see maybe four or five on a somewhat regular basis, and would talk more than a 'hallo' to maybe three of them (Lars, Sajjad and Robert, most likely). This is all to say, then, that no one really gets in one another's way. In the Dorf, there are a ton (I really have no idea) of little houses scattered along a few car/bike paths that run parallel along the city forest. Its a cute place, with a nice cozy atmosphere. But since these little houses are just that--- little, people have to see the ten people that they live with in far closer quarters than we have to here at the Siedlung. My floor is just a long corridor, and then there is both a men's and women's bathroom, a shower room and a communal kitchen. This is the extent of the physical space we have to share, and it doesn't really feel all that much different to me than what they must experience at the Dorf, but for some reason there are a lot more problems there. Anyhow, the Dorf is really the place to be for Grillpartys, because every house has a kitchen + common room that has a door out to some sort of lawn and or patio. It is on these lawns and patios that the Germans and the foreigners they associate with gather round with supermarket packages of Wurst (sausage) and cases of beer. Its generally a "bring your own food" kind of deal, though there always seems to be beer, and I never am sure if I should lugging around my cases of it or what.

Thursday, my new best friend Scott and I heading back to Jacky's with her and Henry to watch Arrested Development (Both Scott and I ended up falling asleep). I am amazed at how warm the nights can be, though obviously it was cold enough that is was necessary to share my sweatshirt.

Yesterday around 6:30 Kate and I rode to MiniMall, where I purchased some chicken breasts and chips and she bought some soy patties. Then we headed over to the Boerse, which is a student dorm practically on campus (the closest thing you can get to living on campus) where Lee, a fellow Californian, lives. The boys were grilling, and the girls were between the kitchen making drinks and sitting at the table by the grill, consuming chips. It was mostly us Californians, a large portion being the new girls, who I like but have less to chat about with. There were still enough of us older kids there, Kate, Karina, David, Scott, Steven, Lee, eventually Jacky, etc. to maintain the German-speaking portion. Kate (this one pronounced Kah-tah, one of our orientation leaders WAY back when in August) and her boyfriend Lars showed up, David's german girlfriend Miriam (who has never really seemed to like me, for unknown reasons) and there was an Irish Eleanor there too, and the mass of non-Americans apparently continued to grow after Scott and I left to go back to the Dorf. He had to change his shoes so he could accompany us to go out dancing later, and I wanted to stop by at Henry's (one of the new boys) to check out his Grillparty. We hung out for a bit there, and then picked up Eleanor (not the Irish one, actually a friend of mine from Santa Cruz who arrived here with the new group) and headed back to Lee's, where things were just wrapping up in prepared for the group exodus to El Sol, one of Goettingen's "Mexican" restaurants, in celebration of Cinco de Mayo. We made it to El Sol, which is conviently located across from JT Keller, the club most of us were heading to later. The group had altered somewhat since we'd left Lee's: we'd actually lost Lee, picked up Andi (one of my closer German friends, who taught one of the ILP courses in the summer, and who now teaches the tutorium for the german literature class I am taking), and Nadine, Steven's german girlfriend, and Alex, a german friend of somebody's. Sebastian, Jacky's german boyfriend who I continue to approve of if only for his surprisingly good sense of humor (for a German, at the very least), joined us as well. He just finished his thesis and is leaving on Sunday to go to Australia for two months. Eleanor and I drank apple wine and shared a pina colada, and once it was late enough we all headed to JT Keller.

It ended up being on of my more favored nights here in Europe. I always have a better than decent time at JT Keller's "Indie Music Nights,"and I had fun people to dance with and the mood was just generally great. We spent most of our time in the main room jumping around with the germans, but Jacky came and grabbed me at some point (since she was spending most of her time with Sebastian, whose one obvious fault to me is his disinclination to dance) and dragged me to the other room, which was sort of jazzy and had a lot more space. I was lucky enough to get spun around (ie REAL dancing) by Alex, Tim (a British friend) but most of all by Andi, who continues to prove his superiority at leading and actually knowing what he is doing, in comparison to some of my friends who, bless them, don't really have a clue and just sort of throw you around (a lot of times with them I end up spinning myself). The second time I got Andi to dance with me I think we actually cleared the floor, which was a lot of fun. Its so classy! I am going to try to ask him if there are places he could take Jacky and I to sometime, to go dancing. It'd be so fun!

Just to throw this out there, Thursday was a lot of fun too. Jacky and I met Andi at his work and then walked to 'our' indian place for dinner. Then we still had some time to kill before the group meet-up at Nautilus (a bar), so we walked around the town a bit. At 9:30 we met Steven, who was still in his baseball uniform (of which he is very proud), and the four of us settled in a corner downstairs. By the end of the night we had taken over the whole half of that level; I am amazed at my ability to get such masses of people together! What started out as me saying, hey, we haven't been to Nautilus for awhile (and Thursdays being the night of the infamous Deep Sea Diver, a drink which, well, is well known) ended up being the Thing of the night. I also got to see and chat with Matthias for awhile, whom I haven't seen for ages because he has been so busy on his doctorate work. I am actually not sure what that is called in English--- he has been working for a couple of years on this 200-300 page paper, the final result being a doctorate, I think. Anyhow, since he has been so busy (I think its in it's final stages) he missed our Spargelessen last week with Andi and his friend Franziska. Spargel is the german word for asparagus. They grow it white here and for some reason are proud of that, so there are a number of "spring dishes" that go along. The result of Andi's cooking and his instructions on how it "should look" left us with plates of white aspargus wrapped in ham, nestled next to potatoes and slathered with hollandaise sauce. It was pretty good, though too much asparagus gives me a kind of slimey feeling. Anyhow, I think tonight we are doing some recreation of that evening, minus the asparagus dish and at Matthias' place instead of Andi's. I am not sure though, they have still got to call me. I think I am going to try to stop by Conrad's Grillparty (a German who always tries to speak English with any of us, no matter how good or bad our German is) if nothing is happening earlier in the evening, because I think Scott and Alex made me promise last night that I would.

So all in all, a comment I happened to hear from one of the new Californians at Henry's Grillparty yesterday seems to sum it up: I feel like I am finally doing the college thing. And my addition: but better!

banshee beat

Der April macht, was er will.

[April does what it wants.]

In the Verfuegungsgebauede, waiting for Tutorium for a literature class to begin (the teacher of the tutorium is our friend Andreas)

I haven't felt like writing in awhile. That is not to say that there hasn't been anything going on--- generally that means quite the opposite. Summer semester is moving into its third week, and at this moment I am only marginally positive about what classes I am taking. So to avoid the annual jinxing, I'll keep quiet about it for a bit longer. With the start of a new semester comes a disproportion amount of social opportunities, which seem to grow exponentially as sunlight becomes more plentiful. I swear that this town has grown 12 times larger since I've been back--- I guess I wasn't the only one spending half of the winter hibernating indoors.

And as I was walking home tonight, in the early morning hours of the first day of May, I was thinking that it is just in the past week that green has returned to the trees. Once back in Goettingen I was overjoyed to see spreads of hopeful buds covering branches that have long been bare. Der Platz der Goettingen Sieben, the quad of campus, was lined with pink cherry blossoms until demolition by the rainstorm at the end of the week. After yesterday's hailstorm, as the sun shone gaily as if it hadn't just been beaten out of the sky by small balls of ice, white blossoms lay trampled to the walkways of the Siedlung. Trees are blooming, leaves are appearing, grass is taller and crowded with bright dandelions. White and yellow daffodils sway happily next to red tulips, at the corners of traffic intersections and behind white fences and on university lawns. I don't think spring has ever meant as much to me as this one will.

Tomorrow (today) is a holiday. Its the first day I've gotten off of school in Germany due to a national holiday. I think its the equivalent of Pentecost. Sunday night (what I am still considering the present as) seems somewhat akin to our Halloween: the night of witches and demons. Luckily I encountered neither on my solitary journey from Andreas' house back to my own, after a quiet evening of Fawlty Towers and a picture exhibition. Andi has been asking Jacky and I to show pictures from our trip, and apart from the surprise that anyone is actually interested in seeing our pictures, problems arise when you consider the actual amount of photos we have. We didn't plan it very well, so I ended up just sitting there with my laptop and hurrying through the thousand or however many I showed. I felt I was boring everyone to death, especially since Jacky was not being very helpful, but at least Andreas seemed to actually enjoy it. All the Germans laugh at our european excursions; they wonder that we see more of Europe in one year than they have in 30. But it makes sense--- we all know our time here is limited and expense-wise it is more economical to spend the money now than fly back and forth later.

Apparently it is the tradition to bring in May dancing, a tradition I did not take part in tonight. I got my share of dancing yesterday night (if one can ever have too much of such a thing), and have had a raucous enough of a week that I just sort of wanted to come back early ("early") and sleep in tomorrow. As I take more part in social activities here I wonder more at people and all the varied ways we look at life, relationships, friendships, school, place of origin and place of currentness. Last night was the birthday party (get together) of Nadine, my friend Steven's german girlfriend. I don't know her very well, but I like her a lot and would like to get to know her better. It amazes me not only that Steven actually settled down with the same girl for more than a month, but also that she is quite his senior (27). Its funny, but I think the three of us (Jacky, Steven and I) will all have stories of aged exploits to share with one another when we get back to relative (european) anonymity of Santa Cruz. Not something I thought I would really be saying after being here.

Last night I spent in conversation mixed between German and English and got spun around a lot to Johnny Cash by a German and a Luxembourger (did you know that they have their own language? for such a small country!). Nadine had invited me the night previous while some of us were hanging out at Trou, one of our favorite bars, before the Kellnerweg Party. Afterwards we (Americans: Scott, Lee, Jacky, Me and Henry, one of the new kids) headed up by the Nord Uni to the party, which Scott so eloquently described last night as "one of those parties you see in movies with the lights shining on buildings and thousands of people standing around with beer." If the music for the most part hadn't been ridiculously bad it would have been an amazing party; as it was it was still a good time. It continues to amaze me how anyone could meet anyone (you know what I'm getting at here) at a party and not either be completely uninterested or creeped out--- it seems the only people you get into conversations with are those you'd really just at the most want to be friends with.

The night previous had been the Erasmus party at JT Keller, my favorite club in Goettingen. Erasmus is the name of the european exchange program, so when you say you are a foreign exchange student you are generally asked if you are an Erasmus student, to which you reply "almost." So the kids that come here to Goettingen to study from Poland, or France, or the Ukraine, they're the Erasmus kids. The party was giant. I like JT Keller mainly for their 'indie music night' which is the first Friday of every month, where for a few hours I can believe that european clubs are actually cool. But as the site of an Erasmus event JT Keller turns into a stifling, sweaty affair, that my friend Kate remarkably accurately compared with "a jungle." It shocked me to recognize so many people, either from classes or from other such sordid, drunken shindigs. But for the most part the "hey, hows it going!" reunions are kept to a minimum, because if I don't remember their name, I am pretty positive they don't remember mine. It comes at this point the question as to whether any of this will ever really be of much use--- whats the point anymore? (questions the 21 year old)

Earlier in the week was the party for the new Californians, and on Thursday I was quite excited to see Brokeback Mountain in English... I think I did some other stuff. Looking back, its actually been a pretty socially-full week. No wonder I am now trying to figure out a way to get by on fewer groceries.

For awhile I got into a reading kick (started with The World According to Garp, John Irving, currently giving East of Eden a shot), and then I tried to force myself to go running (worked for less than a week), and so now I am going to try to get myself to be a good student. I don't think I'm really ever a terrible student... its just I get caught up in other things. But, as we all are starting to anxiously whisper to one another, our time here in Europe is running out. It is now already May, and I leave Germany at the beginning of August. The issue now is to spend my remaining months as wisely as possible... one of those things you can really only solve for yourself. I'll start with some sleep---

While the cherry blossoms were still intact- on der Platz der Goettingen Sieben

siete horas

The first of the many photo albums of the trip to come.

And then the second.

hvala, grazie, merci, gracias, danke

Ironically, the class I did poorest in last semester was the one for which I was able to write my final paper in English. Still, I did pretty well.

Five weeks away, two and a half days back home to Goettingen and then the new semester was upon me. I think I am actually done for the week at this point, but only because a lot of classes don't start up until the second week of summer semester. Its not well advertised which classes start the first official week and which the second, so I went ahead and skipped the very first class of the semester on Tuesday morning. Jacky's friend Jared was visiting from California and we had intended to give him a good time on his last night in Germany, and in that process I made the difficult decision to sleep in instead of attend class the next morning. I found out today that it ended up not mattering because the class doesn't start until next week. This university system promotes confusion and unneccesary worry. (In its defense, my home university system has been sending me emails telling me I am no longer listed as a full time student. I don't know who dropped the ball on this one, but really, come on guys.)

So! I was gone for a really long time. I imagine at some point I will detail a little more than I have the inspiration to at the moment, but needless to say it can really surprise you how five weeks can feel more like three years. I came back older, enriched with a myriad of experiences, and far poorer. To those of you not in the know, it went somewhat like this:

March 9th, 2006
Hamburg, Germany to Zagreb, Croatia
Zagreb to Sarajevo, Bosnia & Herzegovina
Sarajevo to Mostar, Bosnia & Herzegovina
Mostar to Dubrovnik, Croatia
Dubrovnik to Split, Croatia
Split to Rijeka, Croatia
Rijeka to Ljubljana, Slovenia
Ljubljana to Venice, Italy
Venice to Siena, Italy
Siena to Riomaggiore (Cinque Terre), Italy
Here it gets a little tricky, so I'll simplify by only naming places where we actually slept in lodgings and not in trains or at the train station
Riomaggiore to Marseille, France
Marseille to Madrid, Spain
Madrid to Toledo, Spain
Madrid to Malaga, Spain
Malaga/Costa Mijas to Tangier, Morocco
Malaga/Costa Mijas to Granada, Spain
Malaga to Salzburg, Austria
Salzburg to Munich, Germany
April 14th, 2006: the long last day from Munich to Goettingen

I had a map with me that I was drawing lines on during the whole trip, but unfortunately I don't own a scanner. Its going to be a lucky day when I can even get it together to make some online photo albums. Yet I find it important to at least throw out a taste, since I am not writing much. Allow me a moment of narcissim in my slight retelling:

Snow in Sarajevo

Water and Wind in Mostar

the Adriatic in Dubrovnik

the Mediterranean in Cinque Terre
Heat in Toledo

Remembering How I've Missed the Ocean in Costa Mijas

Life on my Back in Malaga

I just realized that I am not smiling in any of those pictures. Don't think its not because I wasn't having fun. Pictures of landscapes and buildings and other people are on their way, but until then- its back to my book.