There and Back Again... A Paretsky's Tale

Wow, so it's been a long time since I've updated and let anyone know what's going on in my life. Sorry about that...last week Wednesday was my birthday, and events preceding and succeeding that day kept me fairly occupied. First and foremost, thanks to everyone who sent me birthday greetings, whether through the mail or electronic. I had a great birthday, fairly low key, but I was priviliged to spend it with the good friends, and that's all I want. Wednesday we were at James Joyce, a favorite Irish Pub of ours, where we ate pizza drank some fermented beverage, and watched a soccer game on the big screen. On the walk home, Jake and Jessica took me to an italian restaurant to get me tiramisu for birthday cake. It was a great evening.

I include the events of the following evening purely for the delight of my beloved Mother : ) Because most of us had class on Thursday morning, not many people were too interested in staying out too late on Wednesday. So we made up plans for Thursday night as well. Bönnsch, our favorite restaurant which brews an amazing beer by the same name, sells small kegs for the person on the go. A handful of my homies and I decided it would be cool to get one and take advantage of one of Germany's blessings: being able to legally drink outside. I'm sure few of you really care to know many details about this, but the grace of the story comes in the actually process of obtaining the @#$%! thing. It involved paying a 100 euro depost (!!!!!) for this tiny keg. While Jake and I were checking it out, the Bartender was giving us instructions on how to work the tap. Translated, it went something like this:

Bartender: Do you have a hammer?
Jon: Hammer? No, we don't.
Bartender: Okay, so take your hammer, and hit the tap once very hard.
*Jon and Jake exchange a confused look*

Jake and the Bane of the Hammerless

Not ones to be discouraged by the lack of a key component to the evenings success, we took our keg and marched merrily to the park where we were planning on enjoying a lovely evening. The keg had other things in mind. I had placed the tap in the recess where it belonged and tried to push it in, but to no avail. Obviously we needed a hammer. Sweet. Hey, idea! We could just hit the tap in by slamming it against the concrete berm! Great thinking, Jon! As I picked up the keg to manipulate it into position, Jake gives his oppinion:
"This looks really dangerous. I think I like it!"
No sooner had he finished speaking did the keg impact with concrete, pushing the tap only partially in, which resulted in a fine spray of beer to shoot out around the edges. I struggled valiantly to push the tap in the rest of the way, but a moments slip was all it took to douse me and Jake in a golden cascade of malted goodness. In public. I vehemently pushed the tap in the rest of the way, which was no problem with the seal broken, and went to wash off in a fountain.

Not long afterwards, it started to rain ; )

Another big event in my life lately...I went to Scotland last weekend to visit my buddy Bryan. I left early on Friday morning from the Cologne airport. It was the first time being in a plane since coming to the Fatherland, and it was strangely nostalgic. Interestingly enough, it's very easy to get through security here. There's so much pressure back home to filter out "terrorists", or my friend Jenan who has arabic ancestry, it makes flying that much more stressful. Here it was pretty chill. My flight was comfortable and short, and I arrived in Edinburgh without incident. I immediately found myself immersed in an English speaking culture, which I hadn't really thought much about, and it caught me off guard. I withdrew some money in Pounds from the money machine and made it on my merry way.

Getting to St. Andrews from Edinburgh was an interesting feet. It wasn't defined by anything spectacular, but I was dead tired and terrified I was going to fall asleep on the way there and end up in, I don't know, the arctic circle or whatever is left north of Scotland. Fortunately for me, I had an old couple next to me who was helping me keep track of the villages we were passing, and I made it St. A's just fine.

To spare a lot of gory details, I met up with Bryan not too long after I arrived, and we hung out and chatted till some of his friends showed up to cook dinner. We ate, of course, a very fine Scottish delicacy: Haggis! It was great : )

Mmm dinner : ) Haggis!

Bryan Nell's Seal of Approval

It tasted like amazingly flavorful meatloaf, and we had a great time preparing and eating it.

The next day found Bryan and I exploring the small and quaint city. There were lots of gorgeous sights to be seen, not the least of which was the North Sea, the beach being removed only about 50 meters from Bryans apartment. It was gorgeous! The weather was so so in the morning, but after spending a considerable amount of time in the botanical garden, it started to rain. We made our way to a pub to take shelter from the elements and satisfied our hunger with sandwiches and a blessed pint of real Guiness from fair Dublin itself. Upon leaving the pub, we were surprised to find that the moist weather of before had transformed into a pristine and gorgeous day! I'll take it. We walked around the city some more, and eventually ended up at the old golf course. The old golf course, like, the first golf course ever. See below....

For some reason this little bridge is apparently pretty famous.

Afterwards we walked back along the coast a little bit, taking in some of the ruins along the way, such as this castle:

We ended up at the ruins of a Cathedral that had been sacked during the Protestant Reformation (my religious heritage opening a can on Bryan's ; )) We were able to climb up a tower that afforded a fantastic view of the city. And I don't have any good pictures from it....


And that's about it for excitement. We hung out with Bryan's friends again and made sushi for dinner (pretty simple), and I left early the next morning to return home. Logistics got a little obscured by changes in the sunday bus schedule, but a taxi driver was more than willing to take my 10 pounds to transport me to the train station. I met an older Czech woman there, and I helped her figure out the train system there and carried her bags between trains and buses until we finally parted ways at the Edinburgh. It made the day go by faster to have a pseudo tavelling companion. All in all it was a good trip...I really enjoyed Scotland, but the best part by far was just being able to hang out with my best friend.

Something significant that I took away from my trip was that I really missed Germany while I was away. I missed being to talk in German, for one thing, but also the food, the drink, the way people act, the stores and such. Maybe I'm just growing comfortable here, but I noticed a lot of little differences being in St. Andrew's. For one thing, people dress very differently...I saw more exposed midriffs on my weekend than I have in the months I've been at Germany. People seem to dress and act with more propriety here. It's just an observation, but I'm down with that. It's good to be back here.

I have another week of school, and then I'm off for a while...we get a break for Pentecost ; ) Rachel, my girlfriend, is coming to visit me, and we're going to make our way over to Grenada, Spain, to check out some other aspects of european culture. I'm really curious to see how that works out, but I'm excited to see my lady!

All right, I'm out. I need to go make myself some din din. In closing, I leave you with one final picture that I took while taking a walk back when Bryan was visiting me. I love it, but it will need a little translation to be fully appreciated:

Parking only for visiters
House of the Lutheran Church
Wine Restaurant

Hmmm.... : )

Much love.