From One Extreme to the Other

Back by popular demand or more so by the pressures of my mother to write again this time I've got Poland and Barcelona on the agenda. Starting at 5am on November 14th 45 history students got on the bus towards Poland. We slept on the two hour bus ride to Cologne, we were comatose while waiting for the plane to load, we followed that up with more sleep on the flight to Cracow where we were finally greeted in the coldest chills we had ever experienced. Sleep was no longer an option after we landed although we were still so exhausted. Immediately we were greeted by our tour guide, taken on a walking tour around Cracow and all of this while being miserably cold. After seeing a couple of statues and one square after another the phrase "just one more thing" became nails on a chalkboard for us. We were starving and cold, but the wait was well worth it. Entering through the doors into the authentic Polish restaurant we were surrounded by old stone, warm air, and plenty of delicious smells. We walked and walked and walked, the place never ended. We were never officially told, but we think that it was an old dungeon. The fact that we were underground with only small windows at the top and surrounded by swords and other medieval weapons hanging on the wall helped to give it away. Mushroom soup, lard and bread, wiener schnitzel with red beets and potatoes, and a piece of cake were on the menu for the evening. The dinner started out great, but ended less than par. Although not the healthiest thing one can eat the lard and bread was a perfect combination, the schnitzel was filling, but the piece of cake really let us down. After about the first bite the description that became the most popular was: "Oh my god this tastes like meat...gross!" Looking back now though it is okay because other better pieces of cake followed through the week. 

The days were filled with one tedious museum not having to do with our course after another, and so the dinners and nights became the most memorable. The first night led to other days of complete laughter. The common consensus amongst my friends was that we have not laughed that hard in a very long time. During a small break in the day the boys wandered over to a grocery store buying some snacks, one of them being chips with extra smak in them. Smak became the word of the week. Everything from delicatessens to chips to beer had the word on there, but what in the world could it possibly mean? Towards the end of the week the boys asked our tour guide only to receive a less than par definition. I decided to stay naive, it was funnier that way. The whole week we were fiends for Euchre, South Park, Zwiec, and anything containing Smak. We played Euchre on the buses, for hours at night, and even while eating a nice dinner. 

To be honest the days are starting to blur together with only our visit to Auschwitz standing out. We saw the ins and outs of Cracow, but I really don't feel as if I know that much more. The museums were incredibly detailed and the tour guide's voice so quiet. There were several times where we all thought we were going to keel over. Every other room of the museums contained a bench or two and it was a mad dash to the little piece of comfort. On the second day we did receive some free time in the afternoon, which allowed us to go exploring through the "old city" part of Cracow. That was my favorite part and was truly beautiful. In the center of the square is an old governmental building with a long tunnel right down the center lined with booth after booth of Polish trinkets. Amber, jewelry boxes, and polska soccer gear was the most abundant at the incredible deal of 3 Polish Zlotys to 1 dollar. Finally a break for the dollar!

The most educational and relative day was also that of eeriness and confusion. Our class, the "Rise and Fall of Hitler", went to Poland for the purpose of seeing Auschwitz and as odd as it may sound it was my favorite day. Our tour guide was incredibly knowledgeable and kept us extremely interested, which one would have to do on a six hour tour. There are three different Auschwitz camps of which we only saw the two most important ones. The first is where people may best recognize "Arbeit macht frei" hanging over the entrance of the camp. Meaning work makes you free, the original purpose of the camp was for prisoners and labor although it did not take long before several were being killed. The camp, at one time, was used for the Polish army so the barracks were made of brick and appeared much more sturdy than the following barracks at Auschwitz Birkenau. The first part of the tour was eerie in the sense that we saw displays filled with all the suitcases, clothes, and hair of those lost in Auschwitz. Along with the eerie feeling it was also confusing. It was difficult to what I had learned and was learning to where I actually was. This place has not always been a museum, but it is hard to picture it otherwise. There are few pictures of the terror which occurred behind those gates and the most difficult part to imagine is the sounds that must have been in the camp. When you read accounts from survivors they also describe the screams that they heard either from a pained prisoner or from an ordering Nazi. 

To be continued...

Reflections on the past before I go forward

While booking my last flights to Dublin and Scotland I can't help, but to look back on the last weeks and the lack of blogs about them. I last stopped in my writing about Amsterdam and luckily there has been better adventures ever since. After a week away from the Luxembourg I was relieved to come back to a regular schedule, but not ready for the homework load in front of me. It was the last weeks before midterms and our sociology class was coming to a close. Like alluded to in previous posts sociology took up most of my time and continued to do so until the end of October. It was a thorn in my side those last weeks and made my outlook on Europe a little gray. 

The weekend following our mini field study tours seemed like a struggle for everyone. I remember leaving the chateau on that Friday only a couple hours before Katie, Lizzie, and myself were off to Zürich, Switzerland and the air within the place seemed stale. People were a bit more snippy than normal and you could tell that we all needed a break from studying and traveling. Our girls weekend did end up great though and just what we needed. We walked out of the train station looking around for the Marriott where we were so graciously invited by Kim Armbruster (my mom's work friend) to stay the night. As soon as we exited through the train station and weaved through the rows of bikes there it stood nearly 30 stories high with the bright red Marriott sign proudly on top. It was perfect. We had dinner and drinks, slept in a hotel not a hostel, and watched tv. Sometimes it is the simple things that make the night perfect. We followed the night with a morning of shopping and getting to know the old city. Kim had to leave us for a meeting and from there we hopped from one store to the next. Zürich was beautiful and we had another one of our famous curiosity stops. While walking up a stone cobbled, narrow European-style street we made it to the top to find a park and a one-of-a-kind view of the city. I could have sat there for hours. While exploring Zürich we found the perfect restaurant to indulge ourselves with, but first we had to find our way to our Saturday night hostel, which ended up being quite the interesting place. It was above a club in a town away from the city called Winterthur and was surrounded by little thuglets. Our room was perched on the top floor and Katie and I got to cuddle in our bed because there were only two instead of three...and yet this was the most expensive "hostel" so far. 

Heading back to Zürich for the evening we decided on Swiss fondue at this adorable restaurant. We were able to sit outside in one of the main pedestrian streets chowing down on our fondue with a glass of excellent white wine in our hands. Tip from Let's go Europe is to always eat swiss fondue with a glass of white wine or tea because otherwise you could form a decent stomachache. We sat there for what seemed like forever catching up on everything. It's funny how you think you may know nearly everything about someone and then they can surprise you. This dinner was full of that. A couple glasses of wine and a full stomach from the bread and cheese we moved on to an ever infamous Irish pub. Before this weekend all we could focus on was the relaxing weekend following it in Luxembourg City for the 40th anniversary celebration, but now looking back I believe that the weekend in Zürich was much more so. 

Back to the pub situation we sat in a corner booth and carried on our conversation from dinner. The place was packed with people our age, but somehow we only really met this guy from Canada. Katie saw him from across the room and noticed he was speaking English to some other people sitting around a table. "Guys we have to talk to him," she kept saying. I was not about to go over there out of nerves and neither were the other two so after about an hour he made his way over in a rather comical fashion. He looked as if he was about to walk out the door when he did this quick juke-like move and jumped back to our table saying, "Are you guys from America?" Now since he was English speaking too I wasn't too hesitant to tell the truth, but had he not been I would have thought twice. I always debate if I should shed light on my true heritage or not, but now that Obama has won, things are easier over here for us. Before that every conversation went right into what do with think of Bush. 

Once Canada (I don't remember his real name) opened his mouth it was quite hilarious to see Katie's disgust. He talked to us for quite some time and was completely egotistical. Lizzie and I gave him the business asking him all sorts of questions and Katie sat there hilariously still. Once we escaped back towards our "wonderful" abode in Winterthur the first thing out of Katie's mouth was,"That was such a disappointment." We laughed the whole way home about all the stupid stuff that came out of his mouth. We arrived back to our club of a hostel and even though we were five stories above the bar on the bottom we heard the thumping of the base until nearly 5 in the morning. What did we really pay for? 

The weekend following Zürich was one looked forward to for the past couple of weeks. When we first got here it was all about traveling every weekend, but as the Lux weekend got closer it was amazing to see how much we wanted to stay home. The whole week was full of festivities. On Tuesday we attended the Academic Seance where all the professors were in their graduation garments and several awards were given out. We capped the night off with a reception complete with hor' deovres (sp?), Bofferding (the local Luxembourg brewed beer), and wine. It is still strange to think that Miami paid for my alcohol. Other than Friday's dinner and dance I was most excited for the concert that week, but was seriously disappointed once the night came. I was picturing a small band playing with us eating, drinking, and being merry, but that did not end up being the case. We were to plop down in these chairs for two hours of in Lizzie's words: bad middle school band music. It was a "Medley of Europe" with songs from nearly every country in the EU and became almost comical at times. There was a group of older people sitting near us and during the Great Britain section of music they burst out laughing at one of the transitions. We didn't mind so much fooling around after they did that. Again the evening was followed by a wonderful reception where we got the chance to talk to professors and the President Hodge and then made our way to Das Boot (typical). 

Friday finally came and it felt like the day of the Christmas dance at Cathedral High School all over again. A couple girls came over to our house and got ready then we got on buses looking pretty and were shipped off to our first destination, the cruise on the Moselle. The boat was beautiful and huge. We sat down at a table then we started hearing rumors of it being a dry boat. The worst was true (sounds a bit alcoholic). Nicole, the person who organizes all these kind of events, said that in years past the students had gotten a bit out of control on the boat so decided against it for this year. We were to spend 2/1/2 hours on this boat, but the most exciting part of it all was when it turned around to come back to the dock. Some euchre games got going and some titanic-style dancing on the top deck occurred. Yet everyone was ready to get off once we docked. Next was the dinner and by this point we had our doubts about the evening, but this time it did not fail us. We arrived in a beautiful ballroom, champagne at the door, and all of our professors there to greet us. We knew that we had some time before dinner to hang out, but we never expected that time to be 2 hours long. We shoved the food down our throats so that the imminent dance floor time could begin. We went crazy. It was a mix of the new and our old. It reminded us of our first dances in sixth grade and then bounced back to the music currently played at the discoteques. 

I AMsterdam

In keeping up with the two 8 page papers, the 600 page book and countless other readings from the school I keep attending, getting online to write about two weeks ago for a city that I did not overly enjoy sounds painful most of the times. I apologize for the complaining, it's late. I shall write about a couple of accounts though. 

As I have been quoted telling other people this same story I like to say that Amsterdam slapped me in the face in a way. Everything I had been told not to do in life was right before my eyes and I really didn't know how to handle it. The first night all 41 of us from our sociology class were dropped off in the middle of the city in hopes that we would eventually make it back to our hotel 30 minutes away by train. With a copied black and white map with the binding of the book canceling out some major thoroughfares in the center the odds that we all would make it back before dawn looked pretty slim, but by some grace we did. It was dark when we arrived so we decided to walk towards the part of town where the neon lights lit it up all night long. The Red Light District was like nothing I had ever seen before. Apart from the nearly naked ladies behind glass doors only a few inches away from your walking path there were sex shops, stores, and anything else your little mind could imagine. I was nearly speechless the whole time. I kept thinking can I look, should I look, but how can I NOT look? 

It was mostly me and the guys this week, but this is not necessarily the town you want to be "one of the guys" in. Some nights were more fun than others like finding this great pub that had guiness, strongbow, and anything else your heart desired along with tv after tv of soccer and irish guys singing on the floor below. I visited this bar two out of the 4 nights we were there and on second one two girl friends and myself decided to partake in some karaoke. What an awful awful idea that was. Typically I love karaoke, but we did not pick the right song. We decided on Come on Eileen, which I thought was perfect, of course I knew that song. Nope, I was strongly mistaken. In fact I only knew three words of the song: Come. On. Eileen. It was hilarious. The lyrics started and we looked at each other like what have we just gotten ourselves into. Half way through the song I think one of the Irish guys felt bad for us so he came up and joined in with his harmonica and then strangely this girl started swing dancing with me. I went with it, but I must admit I was a bit taken aback...o well when in Amsterdam! Our friend Ted was taping the whole thing and the commentary on his behalf is far better than the film of the whole event. With his jersey accent he kept saying, "These guys are terrible." What a guy! 

Okay this headache of looking at the screen from doing my paper and figuring out class schedules for the better half of the day is really settling in. I'm going to go ahead and call it a night. 

PHOTOS

Check out some of my latest pics from my trips at: 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/30168212@N05/

Homesick for Heidelberg, Stuck on Salzburg

Thankfully the weeks go by quickly and the next city is soon at our feet. These past two weekends have been some of the best and sometimes I don't see how Europe can get any better and then it proves me wrong. Two weekends ago myself and four other girls tackled the city of Heidelberg, Germany. Heidelberg is a must see, especially for the younger crowd. It has the university there, which allows for a hopping nightlife, but it is also amazing for sight seeing and people watching at the cafes as well.

Coming in after dark to Heidelberg we were without a map and depended only on the numbers of the buses that we had previously written down. (TIP: Write down where you hotel is and what buses to take before you get to the city. It could be late and the tourist offices will be closed. Then you are S.O.L.) The bus dropped us off on one end of the Hauptstrasse (main street of the old city) and we had to trek it to the opposite end. We get to our hostel, which is above a pub, and find out that they have overbooked our room. Fantastic. Luckily the another group had cancelled so we got a double and triple the first night, but only the triple on the second night. Originally we had planned to stay in this hostel on Friday and then another by the zoo on Saturday, but we compromised with the guy and for a really cheap rate we kept the triple with all 5 of us. 3 beds, 5 girls, an extra mattress, and two extra sets of bedding we had to lug down to the other hostel location (I guess this hostel has two different buildings?). We looked pretty cool dragging our Ikea bags nearly 5 blocks down the road. It was a huge sleep over and a blast. 

That evening we were starving and walked past this restaurant on our way to our hostel so we decided to try it out. It was amazing. I had the best chicken of my life with these really delicious potatoes and some German beer. The place was hopping as are most German restaurants. These people are great. All the time people here are making a scene about Americans and how we should be quite and blah blah blah. Our teachers keep repeating this to us and we get tense about how we should act it what situation, but in Germany they are probably going to be louder than you. For example we were at the restaurant and a few tables down was a big group of guys wearing green t-shirts with a stick figure with a ball and chain and a tent in the background. After translating it it said last week of freedom before entering camp marriage. It was a bachelor party! They were singing and dancing and drinking and doing keg stands. It was insane. Then one of them came over to our table with a slip of paper saying that he needed two girls to come over to their table and put make-up on the soon-to-be-married one. Lizzie and I's  hands shot up. They spoke only a little bit of English so that was fun. They'd starting saying things to Lizzie and she'd give me this look of "help me!". The poor guy was trashed and after our doings he looked ridiculous. 

After this happening we returned to the table, but kept hearing some American music playing loudly from somewhere. We asked the waitress and she said, "Oh yea there is a club in the back of here." You have got to be kidding me, that's amazing. We went back there and the night continued until the early morning. We met some guys cruising around Europe from England who are most remembered by their talks of Amsterdam. "You'll go there and do absolutely nothing. The whole time," said Edward (in an English accent of course). "No, no we went to the park Eddie," said Rupert. "Yea and we did absolutely nothing," said Harry. Yes, we met a Harry and Rupert just like Harry Potter from England. 

The next morning we started out the day with our most beloved Starbucks. Everything is cooler in Europe, the architecture, the culture of cafes and long dinners, the friendly people, and not even Starbucks is exempt from this. We walk in and the place has a huge chandelier in the middle and we sat in this little place up these romantic stairs with windows on every side overlooking the streets of Heidelberg. They served their coffee in a huge mug, it was delicious, and I had the biggest dollop of whip cream ever on it. From there we hiked up to the castle, and it truly was a hike. There is no way I would have attacked one of these castles back in the early centuries. It is hard enough to get just yourself up there, I can't imagine doing it with all of your equipment. The castle was neat and had some of the best views of the city. It was different from other castles I had seen because it wasn't one solid structure but open within and at one time encased a little city in it. The best part of the whole adventure was coming out of the castle and playing on these rocks outside. We climbed around, took pictures, and felt like we were four all over again. 

After this we meandered through the streets of Heidelberg, but mostly the Hauptstrasse where all of the shops and cafes are in the old city. We longed for coats that we couldn't afford and stopped for french fries when we were desperately hungry (TIP: The ketchup can taste like barbecue, which I particularly don't find so favorable so if you are skeptical then just go plain). 

Due to our long stay at the bar the previous night we crashed for a little bit after some shopping then started the night all over again. We were dressed to impress and it became one of the best nights of my life. Our group of girls was so perfect that there was no way we weren't about to have another good night. We ate at this cute little Italian place then ventured back to the street of bars and took our pick. Two doors down from the bar on the previous night was one that looked somewhat interesting. When we got inside we saw another table of girls with a big glass bucket filled with some drink and long neon straws coming out of it. We didn't know what it was, but we wanted it. The waitress recommended a long island iced tea version and when she came out with it we knew that was the perfect choice. It had a fire sparkler on the side of it and was filled to the brim. I wish I had a picture of our faces when it came out. We dove in and not long after that the song "Born in the USA" by Bruce Springsteen came on. We sang it, but were kind of embarrassed because we didn't know if we should be publicizing the fact that we were Americans. Our singing did catch the attention of some though. A big group of Navy Seals came over to talk to us after that. They had just flown from Iraq and were "detoxing" in Heidelberg for the next few days before they went back to the states. They were a fun group of guys and it was a blast to be able to talk to other Americans. It was 4 in the morning before we got home that night and we crashed as soon as we laid down. 

A week of painful classes later 10 of us embarked on our trip to Salzburg, Austria. We left at 12:02 from Differdange and didn't get to our hostel until 10:30 I believe. It could have been earlier, it could have been later, all I know is that it was an incredibly long time. Our hostel was really very nice and we had a mixed room for 8 of us then Ted and Steve got shafted to another room with some Spaniards because they signed up for the trip too late. The first night there wasn't too much to do because it was too dark and we all needed to get up at about 7 the next day. The only restaurant, if you can even call it that, that was open at this hour was a kebab stand a couple blocks down. (TIP: When in Salzburg don't have their brewed beer Stiegl. It is awful.) We ventured down the street that we had come in on and found an Irish bar called O'Malleys. Playing American music when we walked in, but having that European/Irish atmosphere we stayed here the whole evening. (TIP: Don't speak German to Irish bartenders. For some reason they have this huge grudge about it and if you are lucky enough to hear the reasoning behind it they'll only say one thing: 1941.) We sat at a table and danced around the bar when our favorite songs came on. The night ended relatively early there, but when we got back to the hostel we could not sleep. Joey and I especially had the giggles. All of us couldn't stop talking about The Office and when Lizzie would tell all of us to fall asleep I'd try really hard then I start laughing at something. That would be followed by Joey and we had a chain reaction of laughing to absolutely nothing. It was so much fun. 

The next morning Lizzie, Katie, and Emily S. went off to the Sound of Music tour, which they sware is the best 37 Euros that they have ever spent. The boys, Katie G. and I headed off to Berchtsgaden where Hitler's vacation house the Eagles Nest is located. We got off of the first of several buses and were greeted by the snow capped mountains in the distance. The little town was beautiful with a river of a blue-green, crystal clear tint running down the middle and surrounded by mile-high mountains. We took our first bus up the mountain, which we thought was going to take us up the whole thing, but we were strongly mistaken. They get you by making you pay another 15 euro round trip to get on this specially designed bus to take you up the other 1800 meters (over a mile high). (TIP: Avoid the right most seat on these buses. You will be the closest to the edge and no matter how brave you think you are, you'll probably be a bit afraid.) It was today that I found that I really have a fear of heights, or maybe I have a fear of being driven quickly up a mountain in a bus with little or no guard rails for protection. Actually, the guard rails wouldn't have been any help if that bus would have rocked the wrong way. We would have been goners. Finally we made it up to the top of mountain, or so I thought. My ticket in my hand from the bus ride was already soaked and now they are telling me I have to take an elevator up another hundred meters to his actual house? These people were killing me. It wasn't until we were all the way up though until I realized how well worth it it was. My fears disappeared and I was jumping from one place up to another and hiking all around. We didn't actually get to see the house because you had to pay for a special tour, which was pretty expensive, but we had one heck of a good time there. His house was on the lower part of the peak and you could climb as much as you wanted to the very tip top. We went up pretty far and I have never seen anything that stunning. 

PICTURES

The trip thus far 

Rain or Shine We'll Find a Good Time

Waking up to rain on our window Saturday morning was not my ideal form of an alarm clock. The drops hit loudly and sure enough when I mustered myself out of my surprisingly comfortable hostel top bunk I found that it was pouring outside. So much for a leisurely breakfast on the patio overlooking the Moselle River. And to think that was the reason Katie booked Auberge de Jeunesse too...how rude! The rain put us in a lull and we moved slowly that morning. In fact we moved so slowly we completely missed breakfast. Had we gotten our butts in gear we would have avoided our first run-in a most disagreeable French woman. It continued to pour, we had our backpacks on again, and we had to walk a good 25 minutes before hitting an open pastry shop for breakfast. Apparently if you order a pastry at the counter you pay a certain price and take it to go. There is a separate and more expensive price if you sit down and they serve you. Do not mix the two! How were we supposed to know, heck that was never any Rick Steve's book that I read. There was no way that we were going back out into the rain before we finished our delicious pastries. We sat down at a table and she came running over yelling French. Why must they speak faster and faster when they can see I am understanding less and less. Luckily there was a kind gentleman who could tell by our "deer in the headlights" expression that we had no idea what we had done wrong and so we think he took of the situation by handing her a couple more Euros. The whole situation is all a blur and all I know is that I ate my croissant with chocolate and took the hint to leave as quickly as possible. 

The rest of the day in Metz was pretty much miserable. We walked through a couple stores, but that was a lost cause. We were Americans, age range of a teenager-looking person, dripping water, and had bags big enough that we could stuff the whole store into them. We received a couple looks not so favorable, were miserable ourselves and so decided to head to the train station and just sit. This turned out to be the best decision we had had all morning. It turned out that there was an earlier train to Strausbourg and it would leave in 20 minutes.

We hoped that moving an hour and a half north would lessen the rain, but no such luck. Strausbourg was a lot bigger than Metz, which was slightly daunting at first, but with Katie's excellent navigational skills we got to our second hostel quite quick. It is hostels like this one that makes me jealous that I did not live in Europe as a kid. The place was teeming with preteens and teens who were out on their own for the weekend. This hostel was much cooler than the first. It was about 5 stories high, had a bar, a big breakfast room, and our room was sweet. Lizzie and Katie slept on the two bottom beds while my bunk was lofted above. We decided that it would be best that I get shafted to the top every time since I was sleep talking about sleep walking all of Friday night. All of the bunks have had guard rails so I think I am pretty safe. Katie told me on Saturday morning that at one point Friday night I leaned over the rail and said, "Thank God I'm not on the bottom bunk. I'd be walking all over this place!" Katie told me to roll over and I don't remember anything. 

Our friends were coming up from Colmar, France to meet us in Strausbourg in a couple of hours; conveniently they were staying at the same hostel. Seeing that it was still raining like it does every other day here we didn't know what really to do, but to walk around until we found something interesting. We found the best thing possible. We were walking past this place called C&A when I mentioned something about how it might be a department store and maybe we should take a "curiousity break" now. Not only was C&A a department store, but it had a huge mall connected to it. You couldn't even tell from the outside that that was what it was. It went on forever. We spent the next few hours checking out a couple stores and basically wasting time in a dry environment until we could check into our room. 

Our feet hurt pretty bad and it was after 4 so we headed back and at the check-in counter stood our seven friends. What perfect timing! They had had some pretty crazy adventures leading up to us meeting them and we had all carried our backpacks all day so we took a quick break before an incredible night began. 

"Let's head to 'Little France'!" said Emily Edenburn. "There is a 'Little France' in France?" I asked. We wandered around aimlessly looking for just the right spot when through some intertwined streets appeared The Academie de Biere. The building had the structure of  German architecture, but served Tarte Flammbe, the must have regional food. Another thing to love about Europe and Europeans is that they love us, or more they love students. With our student discounts we got the house beer and a Tarte Flammbe and then if we bought another beer we got the third free. How can you say no to that? The beer was okay, comparable to Miller Light, but the food was amazing. It took the shape of a pizza but was based in a creamier sauce with bits of ham and onions on it. The onions I could have done without, but it was still incredible. 

We arrived at the Academie of Biere around 6 and probably didn't leave until 10 something. It was in this dinner that all 10 of us experimented with the food, played the million faces game, and 3 of us found our new favorite beer. Lizzie and I needed our free beer. The goal was to be reasonably cheap and a bit of higher content. The result was Erdinger Pinkatus, a dark wheaty beer. We talked our friend Robert into getting one as well and he said it is his favorite beer thus far in Europe. I never thought I'd like dark beers, but it was delicious. 

The next destination was Java, a discoteque. It took us a while to get there, but once we did it was well worth it. All we wanted was a dance floor and a beat to move to, but they offered us a stage and a completely American music night. We sang the whole of the Grease medley and some old songs that I never thought I would hear here. At 1 am it was time to round up the troops, but I couldn't believe it was that late already. Unfortunately the night had to come to an end. Adventures of the last day in Strausbourg will continue tomorrow. For now I need to get some sleep!

PICTURES

Always Take "Curiosity Breaks"

As I sit here planning my next weekend trip, I cannot believe that I have already survived my first one; although there were times where I didn't think we would. Basically the whole of Miami migrated to Brugge, Belgium last weekend where (if I may be so cliche as to quote Robert Frost) my group and I decided to take the 'road less traveled'. They went north and we went south to Metz and Strausbourg, France. It was absolutely amazing, and if the first weekend was that good I'm hoping that they can only get better.

It was when we first got off at the Metz train station that I knew it was going to be an adventure. The P.A. system continuously made announcements in French, but first played a jingle that sounded just like the beginning of "Crank That" by Soulja Boy. Getting off the train at first we thought they were playing that song, but to our dismay it was only the preview to some French jumble. Needless to say we still did a bit of the dance. From there we grabbed a map to find that we were on the southwestern most part of the city and our hostel was on the northeastern most part. "Fabulous!" we thought. We'll get to see the city and scope out where we would like to eat. Amazingly we stayed positive despite our 30 pound backpacks we were lugging around. Our good morale could be due to what we coined on this trip as "curiosity breaks". None of these failed us in the least. First there was the stop over at the bridge. Initially we gasped at the view of the prominent cathedral that divided the waterway, but then we looked down. Before this day I had seen two swans at most together at a time. On this afternoon I saw thirty or more gathered just below us. We rushed down the stairs to one of the most picturesque views of our lives. We were all about getting the swans in the foregrounds of our pictures with the beautiful cathedral behind it, but the swans were not all about our lack of bread in our hands. We promised them to come back to return the favor, but we sadly never did. 

45 minutes later we made it to our hostel, which was not all that it was cracked up to be. When we first walked up I think we would have rather taken a Motel 6. I remember Katie saying, "No, no it'll be okay guys! I remember seeing on the site that it has been renovated on the inside." My thoughts were yes, but it the website also said that the hostel was located near the center of town, which was so far from the truth that it was humorous. Luckily Katie was right and the room was not all that awful. The showers, now that is another story. 

We spoke with the nice gentleman at the counter and he gave us directions to the cathedral and off we went. We saw about 3 other cathedrals on our walk there. How could we have missed it and what made this one so special? After careening through the narrow roads for a bit everything opened up and there it was. In Rome there was the coliseum and the enormous administrative building in the center of the circle, but in Metz religion stood tall over all other sports and governmental facilities. It was probably around 6 o'clock when we wandered through the gigantic doors and we managed to have the whole place to ourselves. Looking back on it, it would have been nice to have a historical tour, but being able to look at each pane of stain glass slowly or read the description of each saint's plaque was an experience I'll never forget. Lizzie managed to take some pictures of Katie and I walking around to get a size comparison between the two. I felt so small. 

We didn't want to leave the site, so we ate dinner at a restaurant on the fringe of the cathedral. We figured that we had had a long day and were deserving of a "girly" drink. Enough of that beer, we needed something sweet. The menu was in all French of course so when the waiter had come back for the second time I felt pressured to order and chose the Malibu. The other two girls followed. Never order a Malibu in France or probably in Europe for that matter. This is not Cheeseburger in Paradise where a Malibu may consist of some fun pink and orange and yellow colors. No, no, no, this was about 3 shots of Malibu in a whiskey class. Katie had a straight shot view of the bartender. With her head rested in the palm of her hand she said, "Oh geez, I hope he puts more than just Malibu Rum in there." I hadn't even thought of that. But why would that be a drink that sounds awful. Sure enough that is what it was. We starred at our drinks for about 5 minutes then flagged down the waiter and ordered 3 Cokes. It wasn't so bad after it was completely diluted. 

If we didn't look like ignoramous Americans before we were targeted in our adventures afterwards. We heard some live music down the road and around the corner so we went to check it out. It was exactly how France was supposed to be. We sat outside on a little iron garden table surrounded by small groups of friends and ordered a wine. I'm not sure what genre the musician belonged in, but he was entertaining. There were soft love songs followed by quick-paced melodies all accompanied by a pianist. We observed the groups of people and it's really in those situations that you can see the culture differences. For instance, which of the 3 men at the table in front of us was dating the 1 woman? Or why when the musician sang to a table did the guests not pay any attention to him. The exact opposite happened in our situation. The owner of the bar came up behind us thinking that we were Czech, but after telling him that we don't speak French he went up to the singer, pointed at us, and said something about how we were Americans. I thought that would be the kiss of death in France, but the singer loved it and came as close as he could to sing to our table. Thank goodness for that microphone cord not being long enough. Had it been able to reach our table I do believe that our embarrassment would have reached its breaking point. We were not like the French table. Instead we giggled and laughed and got red in the face. Shortly afterwards we called it an evening much like I am going to do now. I will continue my travels through to Strausbourg hopefully tomorrow! 

A Little Bit of Life Here

This is my new best friend Jon. He is the bartender from Dublin at Cafe el Differdange right down the street. He's amazing!

The view out my window. It's a little choppy, but these are the houses in front of me and down to the right. 

My First Ever Four Hour "Blinner"

Last Sunday when my other two roommates arrived around 3 o'clock they ate dinner right away. That somewhat threw them off, but they thought that Claire (our host mom's name) wanted to be polite and offer them food after their long flight. This weekend dinner started at 12:30. I had only woken up 30 minutes before. Since this was the first time we had been able to sleep in we really wanted to take advantage of it and thought that dinner wouldn't start until at least 5. Instead Steve (Claire's English speaking son) came to let us know that food and champagne were waiting for us downstairs. Champagne? What were we celebrating? We scrambled to get some decent clothes on and brush our teeth then walked downstairs to a full spread of salad, champagne, wine, pomme frites, and two humongous plates of beef cubes ready to be cooked in vats of oil. The joke started out as "Wow I've never had fondue for breakfast before!", but then as we kept eating we realized this would be our breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Therefore, we coined this meal "blinner". 

Previous to this meal I had spoken with students at school about how they had gotten to know their families decently well, but with our hectic schedule I really hadn't seen Claire at all. That all changed after a full meal, two desserts, and two coffees. During this time we found that they love America, but not so much the bread, that they don't have Starbucks because coffee at cafes is so much more superior, and that it is okay to eat the dessert with your hands. 

Now it is 4 hours later and being the Americans that we are, we are getting ready to get out of the house for a while and find something to munch on. Goodness gracious I'm going to have to go on that run soon! 

Lux has an Agenda All of Its Own

There are a couple of things to get used to when living in Europe. One, if you watched the Barack Obama speech in Berlin you may have noticed one thing in particular. The crowd clapped a fair amount for a better economy and stopping the war, but when it came to reducing our carbon footprint and saving energy they went nuts. I should have paid more attention to that because they weren't kidding around. Our lights are on automatic timers in hallways, all the doors are shut all the time to keep the heat in, and worst of all the internet goes out around 9:30 or 10 every night (tonight seems to be an exception?). I suppose we should consider ourselves lucky because most people don't even have Internet in their house, but it's hard to get used to something then have it ripped away from you potentially when you are researching for a paper. Two nights in a row now we have come home thinking we will wind down for about an hour on the web, but that hasn't been the case. Another thing that was kind of cute was I wrote in my journal last night that I would go for a run today. Ha! It rained, hard, all day long. I don't think I've seen the sun yet. Thank goodness for those shoes. They really are a lifesaver. Also had I looked at my schedule for orientation at all I would have noticed that a run would not have been possible. Sure I could have been like Mom and woke up at 4:30 am to run, but let's be serious, that wasn't going to happen. Serious props to you Mom!

Today we went to Bastogne, Belgium home of the Battle of the Bulge. I'm not quite sure how this happened, but it took us two and half hours to get there, only one to return. We saw a short video, saw the museum and walked around the monument glorifying the American soldiers that fought there. It was the first place where I wasn't desperately trying to not seem so American. The tour guide said that they loved when Americans came by. Then he said that the Germans were not so welcome in Bastogne. Thank goodness that I didn't get the chance to say Guten Tag and make a fool out of myself. I'm usually so eager to use it. Unfortunately most people here speak French or Portuguese and look at me like they've never heard the language. 

About ten of us went to dinner this evening at this "Snack Shop", but all the snack shops that I have seen serve real food. It's nowhere near a snack. Maybe this is their version of fast food? I'm not even sure what I ate, but it was delicious. I think it was lamb. You'd be proud of me with food this far. I've eaten everything given to me. So far this list includes raw or smoked sausage from my new best friend the bartender from Dublin, hot hot hot pepper sauce at a pizzeria, and now this lamb sandwich thing. 

Finishing up the evening we went to this bar, which we call "Das Boot" from the movie Beerfest. I'm not even sure what the real name of the bar is. They serve the beer in either a liter or a half liter in a glass boot. Nearly chipped my tooth, again, this evening. You have to tilt the glass to avoid this bubble that comes up, but I guess it is tradition for everyone to get popped with the bubble the first time around. Not so fun to do; hilarious to watch. 

Tomorrow we go to a winery then either the Luxembourg City carnival or my choice for the evening the Luxembourg versus Greece Fußball game.  

Tension grows as items cannot be found

There is a crisis at hand. At least there will be come the end of october when I need a jacket and possibly some gloves. As it stands right now there is a black Northface fleece and matching gloves hiding somewhere in this house. The jacket was stored in the "media room" closet, but due to some problems where a workman needed to get up in the attic through a hatch in said closet it has been moved. To where? Good question. Dad says all of the clothes that were in there were laid out on the couch. That may have been true at one point in time, but as it stands now there are no extra clothes in sight. Mom has no idea and I am right there with her. As for the gloves, the poor souls may be lost forever. When May rolls around and it is time to move out of Oxford boxes can be lost in the shuffle and I do believe the one that holds the gloves may have been one of these. Tomorrow should be an interesting day with packing, some tension, and goodbyes to the motherland. 

Side note: Hugo (my lovely VW Bug) has a substantial leak in his oil tank. That ought to be a fun little present to come back to. Merry Christmas to me!