Warum ist der Mensch?

Long overdue greetings to all of you, my family and friends.  The weather here has finally taken a turn for the better… I went outside to a sunny-skied Bonn with temperatures in the high sixties low seventies!  (that’s about 20 °C for those of you using the better temperature system)  I can hardly believe just how nice it is… and just how crazy people are here!  I was walking around the Stadtzentrum (city center) in jeans and a light t-shirt, and I was burning up, while the locals were taking their Sunday strolls in sweaters, wool coats, and scarves.  Then again, I get warm whenever I’m doing something other than sitting still, so maybe I’m just genetically disadvantaged to cope with warm weather, but man.  They were wearing the same clothes that I’ve seen them wearing when it’s thirties. 

So in typical Bonn fashion, I just stepped outside and it started to rain.  Mother Nature needs to calm down…

I’ve been pretty busy on this end of the deal, hence the hiatus in Blog updates.  It’s hard to sit down and spend 45 minutes hammering out something mildly interesting about my adventures in Deutschland when I’ve got a test to study for, but fortunately that’s out of the way, and now I just have the business of registering for classes. Mensch.  I can’t believe how fast this first month has gone by.  The realization has recently hit me that so far I have just been doing an orientation course, and starting in about a week I will actually be starting real school, real university.  I have beaucoup viel (that’s a lot) stuff to do prepare myself for, and I’m not quite ready for it.  I think I’ve experienced an overdose of school the past year and a half, and I’m dragging my feet starting it up again. 

On the other hand, I love learning, and I’m looking forward to getting to meet new people that aren’t just other exchange students.  I’m hoping to meet some more Germans and get more practice in with my German.  So if English is my mother language, is German my father language?  Muttersprache und Vatersprache?  Hmmm. This notion will have to sustain some contemplation.

In addition to the typical day to day life of an American chemist in Bonn (that’s me), there have been some interesting goings on.  Friday we had an Exkursion to the fair city of Aachen, which rests near the border of Belgium and the Netherlands.  There one can find the Aachen Dom (cathedral), a beautiful church erected by … uh, King Karl?  I don’t remember his name.  Karl der Grosse?  Something like that.  Man, I better check on that.  I was once again in awe of the beautiful German architecture.  The church was a good example of architectural motifs that have been used throughout the ages, considering different parts of it were built at different times.  It also had the biggest stained glass windows that I have ever seen.  Boy am I a sucker for stained glass.  I can’t imagine how much that would have cost!

Friends Jennifer and Jessica in front of weird fountain in Aachen...

In other news my friend and roommate from back home, Bryan, came to spend the weekend with me in Bonn.  I was to meet him at the Hauptbahnhof (main train station) at 9 PM on Friday, and naturally he rolled in at about 11:15.  I was starting pretty worried once it hit 10:30, and I was envisioning him stranded in Dusseldorf or something with no means of communication and no German speaking capabilities.  It turns out that there were just some complications of getting shuttled around from airport to train station, so it all worked out, but I was very relieved when I finally arrived.  The train station is not someplace that I recommend hanging out alone at night.  The station itself isn’t so bad, but underneath is the subway station, which is about the equivalent of the armpit of Bonn.  I’m pretty sure I saw a prostitute while I was waiting for Bryan…I know, exciting!  A real prostitute!  Gramma, don’t worry, she was wearing clothes.  Kind of.

Bryan and I had a pretty chill weekend here.  I gave him the walking tour of the fair city of Bonn, and the weather cooperated marvelously.  It was a perfect day to see the city and the surrounding sites.  We were even able to sit at a “biergarten” down by the Rhein and enjoy a beer.  For dinner we met up with a group of my fellows and had a good typical German dinner sitting outside in downtown Bonn.  It was a beautiful night, and for some reason there were all of these strange musical acts around us.  On one side there was a dude playing bag pipes and some people juggling flaming torches, and on the other side there was someone playing guitar.  And it constantly changed.  New musicians came and went, but the bagpipes stayed.  Unfortunately.  He was not doing a very good job, and from the sound of it he only knew a handful of songs; we were blessed with Amazing Grace about 5 times over the course of the evening.  The food was fantastic… I had the “Bayern Teller”  which featured leberkaese, fried eggs, potatoes, and salad.  Fantastic.  Leberkaese is kind of what Spam dreams of being; it sounds kind of gross, but it tastes really good.  I love the food here. 

After a good meal and bizarre entertainment, the group made its  way back to the dorms to watch Arnold Schwarzenager in Predator, which is one classy flick, I have to say.  A great time was had by all.  Bryan took the train out at around noon today and headed his merry way to Berlin.  It was a lot of fun having him around, and I think he had a good time hanging out with a bunch of people who have a hard time completing sentences in English without inserting a random deutsche word. 

Bryan posed for the stereotypical uni-bonn foto!

Today I had one of my more interesting experiences in Bonn.  My friend Jake and I took advantage of the beautiful weather to head downtown and get coffee and kuchen at a café.  It was a perfect day for it, and we enjoyed our German coffee and fine bakery.  As we were sitting and talking and soaking in the experience, a raggity guy, maybe 26 or stumbled over to our table, knelt down, and start mumbling something to us in German.  It was pretty obvious that he was trying to work us for money, but he spent about five minutes giving us this spiel that neither Jake nor I could understand.  His eyes were all red, and he couldn’t hold his head up, and he wouldn’t look at my face as he talked to me.  The only words I really pulled out of it were girlfriend, medicine, pay, money, and overall something about him needing money for his girlfriend or the like.  When he finished, I told him that we couldn’t help him, and he got upset and told us that we could help him, but that we just don’t want to.  As he was saying this, he stood up and started backing away, then turned around and opened a beer, took a swig, and walked away.  The beer makes it really hard for me to take the man's story to heart, and I chuckled a little bit.  Apparently the man heard me because he whipped around and asked me if I thought he was funny.  There was a really tense moment as I told him “nein,” but he turned around again and walked down to give his story to the next group of people who were sitting outside.  At that point Jake and I decided we’d had enough of the downtown, and we headed back to our dorm building.

It's tough dealing with situations like this, and I'm never quite sure what the right thing to do is.  I feel very sure that we did the right thing; I don't feel bad at all not giving money to a person who is not sober enough to stand up and look at my face and then walk away drinking beer.  The thing is that I feel like I have so many blessings that I take for granted that it almost seems unfair that I'm able to sit outside and drink a 2.50 Euro coffee and a 1.50 Euro cake because I feel like it, not because I need it.  Hell, I'm studying in Germany right now, I'm getting an education at a good school, I have a place to stay.  I don't have to worry about clothes I put on my back, let alone how I'm going to find my next meal.  There's just this ring of truth to what the man said: We don't give money because we can't, we don't give money because we don't want to.  Whether or not that's a bad thing is a tricky Frage (question) with no easy answer.  I wish I could say I walked away a new man with a new perspective or with great ideas, but I just have more question marks floating before my eyes.  It's reminiscent of my time in Jamaica...these experiences really show me how much of my good life I take for granted...but God knows we're never all happy all the time.  Right now I'm worried because I don't know what classes I'm taking this semester at Bonn, and I have to register for classes next semester at Ripon.  In the grand scheme of things, I think I will survive.

I just think that I need to make sure my life doesn't move so fast that I can't appreciate where I'm at and how I've gotten there.

Okay, that's it for now....this one has taken the better part of the afternoon to write; I've been letting it sit and coming back to it.  I hope that it all flows, and please forgive minor spelling/grammatical errors.  Sending you all thoughts and love!

Bryan and I were talking about this....you guys should leave comments on our Blogs, we like that : )  It's good to hear your thoughts, and it's proof that people read what takes us hours to write.  You know.  Just a thought.

A little eye candy yet...

I. Hate. Hummers.  Curse whoever brought this hell-spawned beast to Germany.  Curse them.  I would have spat on it if there weren't witnesses.  I still might if I ever see it again.  Driving this would be horrible in Germany, where gas is priced around 9 dollars a gallon.  Think about that when you get 9 miles to the gallon.  Curse them.

In contrast we have the Smart Ka.  Nobody taught me how to perpendicular park in driver's ed!

The sun exploding over Bonn!  Another cool view from my room....

Curse Hummers....

Auf deutsch bitte

HI GUYS!!! HAPPY EASTER!!!

Eh, sorry about that, I've been sitting alone in my room for a little bit, and that was just the release of some pent up social tension.  Forgive me.  But today (tomorrow yet for you guys back home) is Easter.  It's an odd feeling being in Germany for this holiday.  It's a big social tradition here, at least it seems like it....that families get together and do something on Easter.  Plus the church tradition is so obvious too....like I heard bells ringing for about five minutes straight at midnight.  Tomorrow should finding me holding down a church pew at the Kreuz Kirche....I've got it all scouted out, I know when the service times are, I know where the church is, I know I can get there in less than ten minutes with my new bicycle.  The game is afoot.  I'm actually really nervous, and I probably shouldn't be. I've never had a problem going to church alone in Amerika, but it's a little different here.  That is to say, people speak German, and I'm still nowhere near fluent.  

I'm ready to hang out more with German speaking people.  Unfortunately two of my best German speaking contacts have left Bonn for home....one in Hamburg and one in Ohio.... at least I get to practice my written deutsch too that way ; )  It's fine hanging out with other international students, but I find that with a few exceptions, it's really hard to keep conversation in german.  Along with that, aside from obvious things, we can't correct each other well enough to learn a lot about the language, or pick up slang or other nuances of communication.   There's so much to learn, and I just can't do it speaking English.  I'm already saddened by the fact that I will have to return to a place where most of the people I know either cannot speak or do not appreciate the German language.  It's kind of like I've been learning German for seven years to speak it for 5 months and then shelve it until I need it again.  I really hope it doesn't work that way, but that's the way it looks right now.  Who knows, maybe I can get into a German chemistry program or something, but we'll have to see where God and the winds take me.

I went to Koeln (Cologne) today to check out the used bike market that's occasionally held there.  It was a very damp experience...the weather here has just been schrecklich....I traveled with Ian, and when we got there it was snowing pretty hard....which after a while turned into a steady drizzle.  We walked and walked and walked....fortunately we had not taken the time to map out where we were going, which is a fantastic idea when you're in the fourth biggest city in germany (there's some sarcasm there for those may have missed...).  My shoes were completely drenched by the time we were back at Bonn.  The trip was a success...I came back with a sweet bike and 115 euro less than before.  Ouch.  I hate looking at that number.  That's about a hundred days worth of bread.  Why did I write that?  *sigh*  Man.  It's so hard justifying expenses when I have absolutely no income and the dollar is so weak.  SO WEAK!!!  Fortunately everything is closed till tuesday, so I have nothing to spend money on anyways.  I'm going to have to raid the ATM for the first time since I arrived....look out Germany.

So this part of my Koeln experience I've been saving for it's own paragraph.  In Koeln is the Koelner Dom, or the Cologne Cathedral.  Leading into today, I had hear a lot about, stemming back to freshman year in high school finding it on a map to hearing stories about it and seeing pictures from friends.  I found it on Wikipedia after I got back just to check some facts (yes, I consider Wikipedia a decent source ; )).  It's one of the largest churches, the largest Gothic Cathedral in Northern Europe, and has the largest choir (architectural, not singing).  It took over 600 years to complete, and was the tallest structure in the world till the Washington Monument and Eiffel Tower were erected.  So that's all great, but I'd never seen it in person until today.  Oh. My. God.  Nothing prepared me for just how huge it is....you walk out of the trainstation, look to the left, and BAM!  Enormous cathedral.  And the architecture is just incredible.  So intricate and complicated.  And stone.  Lots of stone.  Apparently it took 14 hits during WWII and didn't take significant damage.  The Dom's pretty much a BAMF.   Ian and I took some time stroll around inside, and I spent most of the time staring up with my mouth gaping open looking like an idiot, but it was just so impressive...there was so much beautiful stained glass (and this random one that was designed by a computer program...) and vaulted ceilings, and vaulted organs....the pipes were so far off the ground.  I didn't take many pictures at all because I just wanted to enjoy the experience, but I will soon be back to Koeln hopefully under sunny skies, and I will be able to show you better what I mean!

However, no good things come without little stories...  As I mentioned before, when we arrived in Koeln, it was snowing pretty hard, so naturally I was wearing a hat to ward off the cold.  When we stepped into the Dom, the temperature dropped a few degrees...it's like being in a giant stone refrigerator.  So i'm walking around staring up, when I noticed that this dude (priest? monk?  rektor?  dude....) in red robes was approaching me making a casting gesture with his arm and hand.  I was totally taken aback, and was curious if he could detect the Reformation in my religious background and was casting me out or what.  Not to help things, but everybody here speaks German, so I wasn't sure how a, "Get out my Cathedral" encounter was going to go.  The dude approacheth, still casting, and I make a tentative  cast back at him with a quizzical expression.  He smiles and says to me, "Zieh deine Kopfdecke aus."  Which was him telling me to take off my hat.  Whew, crisis averted.  How come no one ever taught me not to wear a hat in churhc?  *cough cough* mom and dad? *cough cough*  Kidding...

All right, if you take the time to read this all the way through to the end, I appreciate your commitment to my adventures here.  I have much more to right, but I need to go to bed.  I need to be ready for some Easter action!  

Miss you all....

Cool fountain with a church in the background.  Yeah Deutschland!

Abschied von Stacy...Nadinchen, du solltest da sein (noch einmal)!

Also....bet you didn't know that's german for "so."  Everything in Germany is bigger.

Wait.

Uh....

*cough*

First of all, because of popular demand, I present photographs of my room:

Where it all happens.  That's right, the desks(s) and Guido, my laptop.

Bedroom, living room, and dining room.

Just in case you had your doubts....

Second of all, tonight was a besonderes Abend (special evening) because our good friend Stacy is taking leave of us, as I mentioned previously.  Ergo a few of us got together (Stacy, Ian, Liz, Robert, Desiree, Michael, usw......) and went to a bar called...Take Two (because we're in Deutschland, naturlich!).  It was super nice inside, and really expensive....there was a drink on the menu that was 45 euro!!!  Some mix of skyy vodka and rebull that amounted to 0,5 liters.  Although I was tempted, I went with a cocktail that had a Spanish name and tasted very much like a mojito with a very tart flavor.  After a few tough goodbyes, Ian, Stacy, and I began our trek back to our Wohnungen, our living quarters.  However, we decided to make a detour to take pictures in front of a famous building in Bonn.

I had to double check my history here, but the Altes Rathaus (old city hall) is one of the most famous buildings in Bonn, and the staircase in front is apparently highly photographed.  Since its construction in 1738, such well-known people as JFK, Queen Elisabeth Deuce, and Gorbachev have walked up the ornate staircase and have given speeches to the people of Bonn.  For those who are not aware, Bonn was actually the capital of Germany for...I believe...42 years, so there's a strong governmental history there.  Anyways, keep that in mind with the following:

What manner of madness is afoot?

Preparation....

Hand stands!!!  (Stacy und Ian)

(Stacy und ich)

Rathaus salute!!!  (Stacy und ich)

Maybe someday our names will make it on to the list of people who have graced these hallowed steps with their presence.  Hopefully it's not in the police report ; )

Also (deutsches also, remember?), it was good to go out an adventure a little in Bonn, and we made good final memories for Stacy in Deutschland.

Bis naechstes mal, Stacy, you will be missed!

Du, du liegst mir im Herzen

Ah I'm in Germany!!!!  I cooked a spaghetti dinner in my room again tonight, which I shared with my friend Ian (see Weinprobe post, picture of dude whose head is cut off by the door).  He and I had an interesting conversation about the fact that sometimes it's easy to forget that we're in Germany.  Granted, there's obviously moments where it's impossible to miss it, but sometimes, especially when we're speaking english or we're around english-speaking people, it feels like a big multicultural city like Chicago.  It's an interesting feeling.  Today I was kind of out of it....as I've mentioned before, there's so many people that are sick here, which makes me paranoid, so I did my best to nap it off this afternoon.  Unfortunately it meant that I missed an unusually sunny Bonn, a city that has been overcast, cold, and rainy lately.  Can't complain too much...word from home in Northern Wisconsin is that there were 4 inches of snow overnight!  None of that mess here....

Last night I made my way to an Irish pub, Jame's Joyce, to celebrate St. Patricks with some friends.  Fortunately it's not a huge holiday in Deutschland, but nonetheless the bar was packed when we got there!  We had to worm our way to the bar through throngs of people to order our beverages.  No green beer in Deutschland, thank God.  I think there's laws against that here...seriously!!  There was a horde of Americans there, as well as a large group of Germans who work at the international office, so it was good to be surrounded by familiar faces.  I started out the evening kind of tired though, so I wasn't full of festive energy.  I did have some good opportunities to practice my Deutsch.  In one of the rooms there were a bunch of books on shelves around the walls, and I found one written by my Aunt Sara!  That was pretty cool...none of my friends would believe me at first that she was actually my aunt.  I'm going to have to go back and take a picture.  The last time I found one of her books was when I was at a coffee plantation in Jamaica!  It's cool to see the Paretsky name go global.  

While I was at the bar I had an interesting thought cross through my mind.  I was standing waiting for some friends and reading the menu auf Deutsch, and I was struck by how much I am going to miss the diversity here...it's like nothing I've experienced before.  There are Germans, Asians, other Western Europeans and Turks all over the place.  There are drinks that I could never order in America, food that would be ridiculously expensive, and, of course, no real German beer.  There's a party of me that's afraid of making deep connections here just because I know it will be hard to come back, but for the most part I'm amazed about the opportunity I have right now.  It's funny to think that I'm having the experience of a life time, and half the time I don't even realize it!

Okay, I'm heading out.  There's a group of people gathering at a bar to bid farewell to my friend, Stacy, who is leaving Bonn to return to the United States tomorrow.  Ah!  Unfortunately I only have about 4 dollars in small change (1 and 2 dollars are coins here, not paper) and then a fifty dollar bill....it's like walking into a bar and ordering a drink with a 75 dollars.  Eh.  Hopefully it won't be a problem!

No new pictures, but tomorrow I'm going to a museum of the Rheinland, so hopefully I can return with something to show for it!

Guten Morgen, Montag...

Hello ladies and gems, welcome to Monday, the lovely beginning of a new week...Holy Week!  It seems strange that Easter will cap this week off, but that's kind of a result of me being a little out of touch with the big picture lately.  It's hard to follow what's going on while I'm here!  I haven't really gotten any news except that Brett Favre isn't coming back next year and the New York governor was caught being involved in a prostitution ring.    Nothing like family values!

Today the weather here in Bonn is a little crusty.  It's much colder than it's been, and the dampness creeps through the layers of clothing I've wearing to give me quite the chill.  I'm still working on net getting sick...I cringe every time someone coughs or sneezes by me.  

In other news, I found these granola bars that have honey, chocolate, and banana flavoring, and I'm in love with them.  They're so good....  also, as far as food goes, I finally purchased a pot, so I will be able to cook spaghetti, which I have been pining for since I got here.  Tonight I will cook with a couple of my friends.  It's good to have people to eat with!  I've been eating a lot for lunch at the commons (Mensa) so that I don't have to eat as much elsewhere.  It's not like the commons I'm used to back in America, where you pay a flat rate for what's an essentially an all you can eat buffet.  Here you get a main entree and then a certain number of sides depending on where you eat.  At the Mensa where I usually eat, there are three floors each with a unique offering.  Floor one is vegetarian, two is just general, and three is Asian.  I usually go with number two because you get a main dish and three sides.  Today there was chicken cordon bleu, which was actually very good. Mmm, food.  I'm getting hungry again.

Yesterday I went to a Beethoven concert performed at the Beethoven Halle down the street from my student residence.  The orchestra was really good, and what was a really enjoyable morning.  Watch the performance reminded me of my friend Tai Yi, who masterfully plays the violin and was concert master for our own orchestra at Ripon.  He's studying off campus in Washington DC this semester, and is graduating while I'm still in Germany.  

The rest of the afternoon was soaked in rain....we were supposed to do a walking tour of the city, but we ended up getting washed out and returned to the International Klub to enjoy some coffee and fine German bakery.  I must say it was quite fantastic!  I lost the evening in endeavors of communicating with my family and Rachel, and retired to bed after having spent a considerable amount of time in front of my computer.

Today, so far, has not proven to have been worth waking up to, and I find myself not homesick so much as just out of place here.  It all goes back to my favorite morning intensive language course which I enjoy so much (sarcasm?).  We did a speaking exercise today, just a simple deal about describing what we had done in past days, but what's new is that she had the class listen to what were saying, then have them tell each of us the errors we were making, after which she dissected that which we had said.  I was, uh, fortunate enough to go first, and was promptly served my confidence back to me on a platter.  It's not so much that I mind being corrected --how else would I learn?-- but it's the way she does it in a condescending manner, as if I should have known.  She treats us like we're kids, damn-it.  Maybe it's an American thing to feel the need to be respected by your professors, or maybe it's me.  One way or another, she made me pretty upset, and I've been less confident speaking because of it, which kind of set a cloud over the rest of the day.  I have since taken a nap and feel a little restored, but I'm not looking forward to going back to class.  Sweet.

All right, I just wanted to vent that out there...I think i'm going to go make spaghetti and get on with my life!  It is, after all, St. Patricks Day.

Peace!

Weinprobe!

Happy weekend everyone!  I hope that you all survived the week, and to my friends from back home, steel yourselves to return back to school.  My heart goes out to you.  I should have written this last night, but I was pretty worn out from a long day, a longer walk, and maybe some other things.  Today I am well rested...theoretically... and am going to do absolutely nothing that involves too much effort.  Other than more laundry...I swear it breeds in my closet.  I had my first tangle with the German recycling system.  There's a ridiculous number of places to put your refuse, and I haven't quite figured it out yet.  I stood around looking dumb at these various bins, and finally just threw stuff where it looked like it could go.  Eh.  I through away some egg shells instead of putting them in the compost, and I felt kind of guilty, like somewhere in Germany an angel lost it's wings or something.  This stuff is serious business here!  : )

I think my German is a little off today...I haven't really had to use it at all, and i've been corresponding in english and listening to American music.  I had a couple run ins with some Germans, but most dorm interactions go like this, "Hallo" .... awkward silence in elevator.... "Tschuss."  That's about it.  Except for today, when I got into the elevator from the basement, and there were two people inside, which kind of confused me (why do people ride down to the basement if they're not getting out there?), so I naturally said, and faltered, "Nach unt... uh, nach oben?"  which translates into, "Going dow... uh, going up?"  Smart Jon.  You never know where else the elevator might be going when you got on from the very bottom...it's a crazy world here in Deutschland!

Oh shoot... I just realized that bakeries close in about 20 minutes... that's unfortunate.  I forgot I finished my bread with my lunch.  Oops, that was stream of thought in my blog.  Thanks for flying Air Jonathan.

So yesterday was intense....a morning of language intensive course which is making me perpetually more perturbed.  I think one of the reasons that it bothers me so much is that our professor treats more like 3rd grade Germans learning their mother tongue than university/college students who are trying to pick up a second language.  In that respect, she can be kind of condescending in her actions and behaviors.  Ehh, it frustrates me because I feel like I'm wasting my time, which I hate in the academic setting.  I have enough other stuff to do.

Fortunately it's now the weekend, and class was followed up with one of the most enjoyable excursions of my life.  

Yeah, I praise I know....what could be just that good?  There's a lot of things that worked together to make it a great night.  Part of it is that I really like Germany...I just think it's beautiful, and in a way that reminds of the parts of Wisconsin that I really like.  Maybe if northern Wisconsin had hills and castles and vineyards.  you know, something like that.  Everyone has a different sense of aesthetics, and the countryside of Germany just really appeals to mine.  

The adventure goes like this: the hundred or so students in the Ausland program gathered around 13:15 at a bus stop near the campus main building, which incidentally looks a little like this (it used to be the pimpin crib of a bishop): 

So we got in our coach buses, and started off on the hour and a half-ish drive down south towards Marksburg.  It's said that there's a castle about every two kilometers on the Rhein, and it's no exaggeration.  The way that cities splay out from the river up onto the sides of the hills is beautiful, and then here and there, there's a castle poking out from around the surrounding modern structures, or off by itself on the a hill-top.  It's ueber cool, especially considering we don't have anything like that back in the states.  Unless I've been missing out on something....

Marksburg itself was pretty neat.  It's the only Burg, the technical name for a castle built for defensive purposes, left intact on the Rhein.  The remainder of the Burgs were either destroyed in war, especially after the dawn of gunpowder warfare, or were demolished to be replaced by a Schloss, which is the kind of castle that's pretty and people lived in because they're cool.  Think Walt Disney style castle, which is actually based off of Germany style Schloss.  Bada bing.  We were divided into groups for tours, and were then shown the little features of the Burg.  

It's amazing to think that people actually lived in these things...they're so cold and so dark... the walls are unimaginable thick, I think about three meters is what the guide said, so about 10 feet.  They were already using some cool inventions back then, literally.  There was a stone refrigerator with two compartments, one on top and one on the bottom.  A block of ice could be placed in the top, and the descending coolness would refrigerate perishables in the bottom compartment.  Huge slabs of ice from the Rhein were stored under ground covered in straw and could last through out the summer!  Spiffy.  Another thing worth mentioning is the size of the doors....people back then were much, much smaller than they are now!  We went up a spiral staircase, and I had turn sideways to fit through the door (okay, part of that is for defense purposes), but then here's an example of a regular door and my friend Ian:

A little bit of a difference there, I'd say!

After the tour of the castle, we made our way back up northwards towards Mayschoss am Ahr, the vineyard that we were going to be checking out. For those of you who are not familiar, the best Rieslings in the world (only partially subjective) are made in the Rhein River valley.  We were given a brief tour of the wine cellar by a very animated and gregarious vintner, who informed us about how the vineyard was, if I understood correctly, the first coalition of multiple vineyards to produce and sell their wine in Germany.  So there was a lot of cool history, as well as some cool ornate kegs:

A regular new keg, not like this one, would cost about 5,100 Euro, which is about 7200 dollars, but at least lasts for decades and can contain thousands of liters of wine.  A reasonable trade off : )

And then there was the wine-tasting....our massive group had a large fest hall to ourselves.  It had great atmosphere, all wood and soft light, but totally open, too.  The vinter lead us all in the tasting...there were six rounds, each an entirely different wine, three whites and three reds.  One of my friends here is muslim and cannot drink alcohol, so she got grapejuice from the vineyard which was absolutely fantastic.  The best grape juice I've ever had.  We had a great time trying the wine, tasting the food, and have a general sense of harmony among a massive group of people from Japan, Taiwan, Korea, Slovakia, Singapore, Germany, and all over the USA.  Each nationality had to get together and sing a song for the entire group in their language.  That was a blast, and everyone was getting pretty into it, especially because some people had really low tolerance...  The Americans, of course, could not agree on anything, so we ended up doing two songs, Row, Row, Row Your Boat as a round, and then because of popular demand Don't Stop Believing by Journey.  It was a good time : )

Freude beim Wein

Joy with Wine

I think I'm going to stop here....I have more I could say, but it seems fitting for me to end with the wine.  Our vintner spoke about something that really struck a chord with me.  He talked about the harmony that you can find in the room when people are singing, and the harmony that you can find in a shared glass of wine.  There were people together there from all over the world, a world that finds itself continuously enveloped in disharmony.  Last night, if only for a little bit, we found unity.  

Peace!

Nadine, falls du dieses Blog liest, you should have been there!

Laundry blues in Bonn....

Endlich.  Finally.  I have finished my laundry.  *sigh*  If you guys have been following up to this point, you may have caught that I, thanks to my own doing, got about 4.5 hours of sleep right now.  Please, save the violins of sympathy, for I know I deserve none.  However, it has made it difficult for me to (a) be patient with things that I usually let slide and (b) speak german.  The latter has caused me more problems, and put a lot of "ifs" "maybes" and "likes" into my Deutsch this afternoon.  And no, the "likes" do not mean I was speaking Valley Deutsch.  Gag me with a Loeffel...

Tonight has been another realization night of my American heritage (not to be confused with the magazine).  Lets see if I can describe this in ways that make sense... the washing machines here are tiny.  They're so little, and as my mother might say, cute. Just to make it clear, I would not say that myself.  Mom would say it.  But in America we have these relatively huge washing machines...and then when I started thinking about it, pretty much everything in America is huge.  Seriously....one of our grocery stores would be about 6 German grocery stores, and that's to say nothing about Wal-Mart or Target or anything of that nature.  And our cars are huge, too.  SUVs aside, my mercury sable would easily be as bigger than 60% of cars on the road here.  The Mercedes Smart Ka looks like a bench surrounded by sheet metal set on a red Radio Flier.  

So today was kind of uneventful...I had class all morning, then I had lunch at the Mensa, or cafeteria, and then I made my way to the International club for Kaffeestunde, or coffee hour, which I definitely needed.  I got to chat with some of my friends, and had to say goodbye to one of the Germans from another city who had been visiting for a week.  I intensely dislike goodbyes, and I think it was a good thing I was tired today....it's too soon since I said goodbye to everyone at home!  

After the Kaffeestunde I had my Arbeitsgemeinschaft, which is a sort of workshop.  The one that I'm in is "Meet the Germans:  Kulturelle Sensibilitaet" (cultural sensiblity, yay cognates!).  It's with Herr Impekoven, who's the director of the internation program, and Katharina Schmitt, who does most of the coordination for our events.  Anyways, they're really cool, and they really help me, and I think the other students as well, evaluate our own cultures as well as the German culture.  It's an interesting class because There's four Americans, four Taiwanese, and a Japanese student, so there's definitely some cultural differences right there!  

Tomorrow we're going to Marksburg for our wine tasting.  I'm so excited!  It's going to be so much fun : )

Me, Liz and Sheryl in front of a cool German building.

Well, of course it's German.  I'm in Germany.

There's been a lot of discussion about elevator etiquette lately, which I find relatively amusing.  Cuz let's face it, most of us have awkward elevator experiences.  Most people get on an elevator, say nothing, and ride in silence until arriving at they're destination.  It's weird for me at least to be in such close proximity to someone and not say anything.  Apparently it is a very German thing to say hello when entering an occupied elevator, and say goodbye when leaving, but to not speak at all during the ride.  I don't think we go for that much talking even in America.  Think about that the next time you're riding the Aufzug, ladies and germs.  Think about the Awkward Elevator Silence.  

And finally I send herzliche gruesse to my favorite Hamburgerin who is going back home.  May it laeuft for you always : )