Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Getting home

I had decided to leave Trier Sunday evening, and I planned it so that I could be in my bed falling asleep by midnight. So I left Trier to go back to Koblenz, then from there, I was supposed to catch a train to Mainz, then get on a different train back to Mannheim. I misunderstood the man who was telling me this at the train station, so I did not get off the train at Mainz, and got all the way to Würzburg, before I realized that train wasn't going to Mannheim. So I got off that train at midnight, and then I had to go back to Frankfurt, then from there go to Mannheim. The train to Frankfurt didn't arrive until a few minutes after 1, and I didn't get there until 2:20 am. I then caught the train to Mannheim, which didn't arrive until 3:30.

Unfortunately, the trams don't run that early in the morning, and I didn't have enough money on me to hire a taxi, so I had to wait an hour and a half for a tram to come by so I could take it to my dorm room. During that time, I witnessed and experienced some pretty weird stuff. This creepy looking guy sat down right next to me at the tram stop, even though there were other seats to sit in, and then placed his hand on the seat and kept inching it over until he touched my thigh. I got up and moved to a different seat, then he got up and meandered over to where I was sitting and then sat right next to me again! As soon as he sat down, I stood up and immediately moved to another seat. He didn't try to sit next to me the rest of the time, but he kept looking at me, and he did the same thing to another girl later on!

Later on
, a couple of college age girls came to the tram. I didn't know if they were a couple, or if they were just friends, but something went wrong between them and they started fighting! They were cussing, slapping, pushing and screaming at each other, so much so that a police officer had to come and physically separate them. One of them walked of saying something like, "She ruined our friendship!" It was pretty intense.

The last noteworthy happening was what I think was an attempted robbery. This guy came up to me and asked me in German, "Are you tired? We could go to my apartment and have a lot of fun. I am from Iraq and I really like you." He went along those lines for about 2 to 5 minutes, all during which I looked around for the same police officer that separated those two girls, to no avail. Well, the guy finally left, and I got on the tram a short while later, took off my backpack, in which all of my things for the weekend were, and I notice
d that one of the pockets was open! Luckily, I had taken everything of an importance or value, like my camera, PDA, cellphone and eurail pass, in my purse earlier that evening, so nothing was taken. I finally got to my own bed shortly after 5 am, and slept very well afterwards.

On a lighter note, I think my husband is a fish whisperer!










He went to Lake Brownwood with some friends from the Young Marrieds group at our church in the states, and apparently caught this really big Striped Bass. I heard it tasted good too!

Monday, June 25, 2007

Cologne, Koblenz, Cochem and Trier

This weekend was amazing. I started out by going to Cologne, which is right on the Rhein, and I walked around, looked at the Dom (cathedral) in Cologne, which was absolutely breathtaking! The outside structure was very Gothic, and it was enormous. I couldn't get far enough away from it to fit it all in my camera. I did get the most memorable part of it, though. Anyway, so I met up with Vicki, Mary, Sarah G. and Kasi there, and we went to a very German restaurant called Brauhaus Früh, which also specializes in a beer called Kölsch, which basically means it comes from Köln, the German spelling of Cologne. I normally do not like beer, but I figure I couldn't go to Germany and not try the beer. Well, I have found a beer that I actually like! This stuff was good. For dinner I had what they called a Bockwurst, which tasted like it was a step up from hotdogs, with Sauerkraut and mashed potatoes which they called Püree. After dinner, I went back to my hotel, but I meandered, and by the time I got there, it was 11:00. I had intended to go to bed early, then wake up early enough to sit by the Rhein before I took a train to Koblenz. That plan fell through, since I didn't wake up until 8:30, and then I was rushing to get to the train station in time. I caught my train, and just before noon, I made it to Koblenz, where I met up with a girl I met at the Goethe Institute, named Kendra and her fiance, Michael, who is German. Kendra and I wandered around Koblenz for a while, and saw the Deutsche Ecke (German Corner) where the rivers Rhein and Mosel meet. There is a really cool monument there, which Kendra and I went into to take this picture. We took pictures of a lot of things, including more pieces of the Berlin Wall. There was another really pretty church there, actually about 3 or 4, two of which I went into. The first one was hosting a concert of Handel's Messiah, of which I only caught the latter half, but it was still pretty amazing. The second one I went into Sunday morning, when they were about to have Mass, and since I had never been to a Catholic Mass before, I decided to stay for it. It was very interesting. I wasn't able to interact with it very much, since I am not very familiar with German words associated with worship. It was still a very interesting experience. On the same day I went to Koblenz, Kendra took me to see Cochem, a very quaint, purely German city. It was really cool. The architecture was exactly what you would expect from a German town. I was amazed to see the first thing off the train was this sign. (Gleis translates to track or platform) I couldn't believe my eyes! They must be Harry Potter fans. This was this common type of architecture in this little town. There were also a lot of vineyards and wineries in that area, so I went to one and tasted some of their wine. I have mentioned before that Germans love ice cream, but until I visited this town, I had no clue to what extent. They have what is called Spaghetti Eis (ice cream). Doesn't that sound disgusting? However, they only make it look like spaghetti. They push it through a machine that makes it look like the noodles, and then the "sauce" is berry juice or glaze, and the "cheese" was white chocolate shavings. It was very tasty. The next day, Sunday, after I went to the mass, I headed for Trier, which was originally a Roman town, so it has many Roman ruins. I was touring this town alone, so I didn't have much of an idea of where to look, so I decided to try my luck, and headed down what I assumed was the main street of the town. Once again, I got lucky and only after a few minutes of walking I found Port Nigra, a Roman ruin. There was a souvenir shop, so I went in to look at postcards. I found some that basically served as my tour guide, since it had all sorts of pictures of what to see in Trier. So once I had those, I almost continually asked strangers questions like, where is the Dom, and where is the location of this? I asked in German, and they answered in German, and I understood them! That was very good for boosting my ego. I went into the Dom here, and surprisingly enough, I think it was the prettiest of all the others inside, including the famous one in Cologne. I also saw another ruin called
Kaisertherme,

the amphitheater,

a Basilika

and a palace.

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Schwetzingen

Last weekend I went with my group of St. Eds students led by our professor to Schwetzingen and Heidelberg, two very quaint towns. We originally went to Schwetzingen to go to a waterpark they had there, but it was very cool outside that day, so we wanted to stay in the indoor pool, but they had it closed because they were painting it. So that was foiled, but we did get to see the grounds of the Schwetzingen castle, which were very extensive. The gardens started out very clean and neat, with flower beds lining the walkways. if you go straight, you encounter a big fountain, then past that are arcades of trees. Scattered along the way are many statues, some of mythological characters, others of mythological animals. Past the trees is a pond/lake with swans and ducks. You can't really see it in this picture, but behind us, the swans are nipping at our backsides, apparently looking for food. Then the swans would get mad at each other then attack and chase each other. It was absolutely hilarious!

Hidden along one of the many paths is a grotto, which is so pleasant, it is breathtaking. Further along that path was a little house that was absolutely gorgeous! However, I wasn't allowed to take pictures, so I can only describe it to you. First of all, you have to wear these special slippers that go over your shoes, and they are hard to walk in, because they are one size fits all, so my tennis shoes were flopping all over the place in the slippers. The purpose of the slippers is to not scuff the floor. Well, when you walk into the little (compared to the castle) house, there are beautiful statues facing the center of the oval room. To each side is an entrance to a wing. In each wing there are three rooms. The center room was the one we were allowed to enter on each side. The house was furnished with beautiful matching antique chairs, cabinets, and other various items of furniture. On one side of the house was a bathing area. The tub was bigger than queen size bed. You could almost swim in it. It was amazing. I had to wonder if the people who used this little house appreciated it or took it for granted. It was amazingly detailed.

In some parts of this garden, it looked like the part in "The Sound of Music" where Maria was on her way to meet the Trapp family, and sang the "Confidence" song. The two girls I was walking with and I all burst out into song! It was great! We decided that before we go to Salzburg, we will rent "The Sound of Music" and then go on the extremely touristy Sound of Music Tour, which I unfortunately missed the last time I was there. There is almost nothing that will stop me from making that tour this time!

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

More Berlin

Ok, so are you tired of hearing about Berlin? Well, the best part is coming up...


So the picture that I wanted to show you in the "Germany" blog was one of the Parliament building which is very close to the Brandenburg gate. Right outside the parliament building, the sidewalk marked where the Berlin Wall used to be.

We also went to Checkpoint Charlie, where we also saw one of the last pieces of the Berlin Wall for the first time. After that we enjoyed a German pastime: eating ice cream in a park.

The evening before we went back to Mannheim, we hung around in our hostel room. It was a little small, had 3 sets of bunkbeds, each of which was very uncomfortable, and since there was no AC, we were even more uncomfortable because of the heat. We also had to PAY for a set of sheets AND a towel. I was not a happy camper, and they charged a very high amount of money to use the internet, and half of the few computers they had didn't work. I guess that is just the hostel experience, though.

Now for the fun part. I mentioned earlier in another post that I had forgotten my eurail pass and decided to use a Schoenes Wochenende ticket to get back to Mannheim. Well, that turned out to be a bad idea. That ticket only allows a person to use the slow trains, and if think about the fact that the fast train took 5 hours, you can imagine how long it took to get back to Mannheim. Unfortunately for me, my friends decided to take the fast train back to Mannheim (not that I blame them; I wouldn't wish my trip on anybody!) so I had to go by myself. The first train left the Berlin station at 8:00 that saturday morning, and I was supposed to arrive in Mannheimat a liitle after 6 that evening. Now the slower trains do not travel very long distances, so I had to change trains 4 times. Catching the first train was no problem, but when I got off of that one to catch the next one, there was already a train there, and my train wasn't supposed to depart for another 15 minutes or so. I didn't realize until after that train left at the time my train was supposed to, that I should have gotten on that one. at that point I was calmly hysterical. On the outside, I was fairly composed, but on the inside, I was screaming and kicking myself for not asking if it was my train, wondering what I should do next, etc. I decided to go to the Reisezentrum, where people buy their tickets, all the while trying to figure out how to explain my problem in German. I decided that I would ask the person behind the counter if they spoke English, and then go from there. I still didn't know what I would do if they didn't speak English. Unfortunately she didn't, and through my tears (I wasn't calm on the outside anymore) I showed her my schedule, and she realized I missed my train, and she printed out a new schedule for me. The next train was in two hours from then, which pushed back my arrival in Mannheim to after 8 that evening. Long story short (too late, I know) I was on a train for 12 hours that day. By the end of it, I was exhausted, miserable, and had a splitting headache. Almost immediately when I got home, which was around 9 o'clock, I went to sleep and didn't wake up again until almost 9 the next morning. So that was my trip to Berlin! since then I have gone to Schweztingen and Heidelberg, and will probably be going to Cologne this weekend. Tschues!

Monday, June 18, 2007

New Old Post

I think my big post was hidden by the Berliner Dom post. I have a post under that one that tells a lot more of my trip to Berlin. I mostly posted the Berliner Dom one because I was playing with Piccasa and uploading pictures. I hope you enjoy it. There is another post coming soon.

Thursday, June 14, 2007

This is the Berliner Dom or cathedral. It is very beautiful and ornate, and in the basement, many of the deceased royalty of Germany are buried there in above ground tombs. Some of them are very ornate, and many of them have crowns on them. Frederick the great was even buried there!
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Germany

Wow, it has been a crazy week and a half. And now I have time to tell you about it.

Once we got to Mannheim, we met a girl in our dorms, named Kookie, who was very sympathetic to our situation, who had already been in Mannheim for a while, at least long enough to know a few tricks to the trade. She took us to a place where we could get a quick, cheap, tasty and filling meal for only 2,25 euros. (They use commas instead of periods in numbers) Anyway this meal was called a doener. After our meal, which was at aroud 4 o'clock in the afternoon, I took a 5 hour long nap to help me get over jet lag, since we lost a day and a good night's sleep. Unfortunately, I woke up at 9, instead of sleeping through the night, so I went ahead and set up my computer and rearranged my room [=>], so that the desk was next to the plugs. I messed with the computer a while, and realized that the sun went down at around 10 in the evening. Around midnight, after taking a benedril to help me sleep, I went back to bed, and slept until 5 when the sunlight woke me up. I then ignored it and went back to sleep, only to wake up for good around 7 or so. I guess, I really said all that to say, the sun sets late and rises early here, so that sleeping in the night hours is more difficult here.

On Wednesday, nothing special happened, since we were all very tired, and were still trying to get over jetlag. We decided to go to Berlin the next day though. Very early on Thursday morning, we set out for the Hauptbahnhof [<=] (main train station) of Mannheim, to catch a train to the capitol of Germany. once we were there, I realized that I left my eurail pass in the desk drawer in my dormroom, so I had to pay 109 euros for a train ticket. I decided to purchase a oneway ticket, since I heard about a deal called "Schoenes Wochenende" or "lovely weekend" that costs 35 euros, and will take you anywhere in Germany on Saturday and Sunday. Since we were traveling back to Mannheim on Saturday, that seemed to be a good deal. So we caught a fast train to Berlin, and 5 hours later, we arrived in Berlin. The first thing we did is check in at the youth hostel where we wanted to stay, and left our things there, so that we did not have to carry everything around with us, since our backpacks were very heavy. After that, we went to a church that was destroyed in World War II. [=>] I think it was beautiful, even in its destroyed state. After that, we took the 100 bus, which was kind of like a self-guided tour, that went by the most important sites of Berlin. The really great thing about it was that is was a part of the bus system there, so it only cost about 2 euros, so we didn't have to pay for an actual tour.

I can't remember what we did each day, but I do remember all of the important sites we saw. I already posted something on the Berliner Dom, and we also saw the Brandenburg Tor (gate) [<=], which I think is the same place that Kennedy made his famous "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech (which is actually grammatically incorrect in German, but I will spare you the reasoning behind that). Whether or not he made that speech there, the Brandenburg gate is very symbolic of Berlin, kind of like the Eiffel Tower is to Paris. Germans call those "Wahrzeichen." We also went to the Pergamon museum [=>], which is an awesome museum of Ancient Greek architectural art, Egyptian art, and Islamic art. I took so many pictures, it will be impossible to load them all into my blog, so I will set up some Internet slide show for you to see. Another place we went to was the old German historical museum [<=], which was comprised of German artwork. I didn't get to see the whole thing, since we were on a schedule, and after we left I found out that the floor I didn't visit was comprised of architectural plans. I was very disappointed to have missed it. Another place we visited was the parliament building. We had intended to go inside up to the dome at the top, because that is a really excellent view of Berlin, but we decided we were too wiped out, and went back to Mannheim earlier that anticipated. Also while we were in that area, we saw a police escort of slick black limos, and came to the conclusion that the people in those cars were important leaders, either throughout the world, or for Germany. We also remembered that the G8 summit was being held in Germany at the time and thought maybe some of those leaders had something to do in Berlin. This has been a very long post, and even though I am not done telling you about my trip to Berlin, I will complete this post, mostly since I don't think I can put any more pictures in here. Hope you are enjoying my journey.

Friday, June 8, 2007

Berlin

Berlin is so nice! I have been doing the whole museum thing, and historical and cultural things as well, and I have been learning a lot! I am really tired, because my friends and I have been constantly on the move. This afternoon, we will be going to Checkpoint Charlie, and seeing that area. It should be interesting, and very educational. I have been taking a lot of pictures, I promise, but since this is still not my regular computer, I am not able to upload them, yet. Once I get back to Mannheim, I will be able to figure out how to put pictures into my blog. Until then, use your imagination!!!

We have been staying in a hostel, and that has been very interesting. We had some really interesting roommates, who slept during the day so they would be refreshed enough to party throughout the night. It is a very different atmosphere than I am used to.

I have to admit, I am having a blast, but I miss Anthony so much. Please keep me in your thoughts and prayers during this time away from my husband. It has been harder than I anticipated.

Thursday, June 7, 2007

Busy Days

Sorry it has been so long since I put up a post, but I have yet to get internet in my room, so it has been a bit inconvenient to find a computer. Luckily there are these things in Europe called Internet cafes, where you can buy internet time. So that is what I am doing right now. I have 5 minutes left, so I will be quick. I got to Germany Tuesday morning, and with very minor setbacks, like not understanding how to work the street car ticket machine, we arrived in Mannheim, found the Goethe institute, and were shown to our dorm rooms. I am traveling with three other girls, named Mary, Vicki, and Sarah G. Anyway, we have been trying our hardest to get over jetlag, while seeing as much Germany as we can. Right now we are in Berlin, and we will be staying in a youth hostel tonight and tomorrow night. I don't have any pictures to show right now, but stay tuned, and I will show them later!

Ok, so this is the second installment of my previous blog that accidently made it onto Kitchen Karma instead of my own blog. Sorry, Myra. Well, I now have 5 minutes left on the internet without having to again, so this is going to have to be a work in progress until I have my own internet modem. Anyway, I am having trouble typing because the keyboards in Deutschland are different from American keyboards. The z and y keys are switched, and many of the punctuation keys are moved around, plus, there are more characters like ö, ü, and ä, and various other things. So if you do find typos, please be patient. Ok, once again no time left. Enjoy!