We'll put in a syncopation...

Following the Austrian election is almost as depressing as following the American one.

(But I will be watching the VP debate tomorrow night with friends, and expect some sort of hilarity).

Recently my life has been full of work and procrastination of that work.  But weekends are fun.  This last one included a failed Welcome Back to Wonderland party by ELS and really only for ELS, because we forgot to invite anyone or tell anyone it was happening.  So...we were in the basement of ELS with very few other people, bar-tending for ourselves for a long time.  Saturday morning, graduated-friend Evan came to visit, and gave us an opportunity for a lot of trips out for food.  Also a trip to a place called Great Galaxy for ice cream, which might be the epitome of Central New York weirdness: large empty room, kind of gross old food, something called "Steakums", and an old woman with an unidentifiable accent.  I have not collapsed from food poisoning yet, so I think everything is okay.  Saturday night we had a bunch of people over to our suite, and some of us obnoxiously told abroad stories for awhile.  

Kayaking.  Yesterday I was not really in the mood to go since I was kind of exhausted, but we went to Delta Lake, which is some kind of state park.  Kayaking in the pouring rain is actually pretty fun though.  We saw herons and ospreys and played with mud.  But let's talk about last week.  We went to Nine Mile River, which is quiet and tiny and surrounded by forest.  It was the perfect day and we went for about 8 miles.  I'm pretty good at maneuvering the boat to do what I want it to now, and I really only crash because boys think they always get to go first and faster, even if I was already there.

I am working on a presentation for my Witchcraft class about the Witches' Sabbath, and it is research like this I will miss when I am no longer involved in medieval history things.  Where else do you get to learn about boiling babies at midnight in the forest?  I love that class.  And I am learning about the history of Divinations :)

Poetry class is a lot of work and a lot of crazy people.  Some people will never agree on how to write, some people will never understand what constitutes good or even passably good writing.  Creative writing workshops are always fun and involve a lot of almost-insults.  This is my super-long sestina, which my group actually liked.  But I need to take a lot of things out and make it shorter - I am aware of the overabundance of modifiers.  And a sestina is crazy hard: you use the same 6 end-words in a very specific pattern, and then use them all one more time at the end of the poem.  (Blogger has a layout that messes with the format of my poem, so the end words are not actually at the end here.  Anyway, hopefully it will still be obvious as to what the words are).

The Sea Turtle

This is a moonscape without the craters, an alien world crossed
with the familiar island scents of citrus and salt, this moist stretch of land
just hanging in the sultry air and unyielding dark. We can see back
only dimly to things familiar, to sound and speed, to filled spaces
where if we gaze long enough into the orange city, someone might wave,
we think, with connection, but this nighttime beach is miles on the swamp-brush trail.

Shuffling feet in shifting sand and knees that plunge leave a trail
of exhaustion as we hurtle forwards, balancing on a ground that shifts, footprints crossed
beneath us while we wind the beach, sand-covered eyes against wind in its waves.
Nearby, the sand drifts into the ocean, returns, sails, this ever-moving land.
Behind us there is the forest, where coarse plants crouch beneath the twisted trees, spaced
too close and breathing the musk of wet bark, pushing the branches that push back.

At the pointy end of the longest beach, we collapse, pushing our rigid backs
into sand that is at last forgiving. Look to the right, and there is the trail
imprinted fleetingly with our steps , already disappearing into water and space.
Here in front of the farthest tree we will sit, where the wind is quiet, where the cross
water finds serenity in distance. Eyes big in the darkness watch for a landing,
watch for the first black shape to manifest from black water, shoveling into waves.

A dinosaur emerges as slow as a dying geyser, kneading through wide waves.
Catching light like a dirty stained-glass window, she circles and backs
and sidesteps into this world, looking for a haven depth and warmth in which to land.
Leaving behind misshapen lumps of sand, dragging glowing bioluminescence that trails
silently into the sea, past the electrified squid and the transparent mysteries, across
from trees hiding in insect air. She slides, molds the liquid ground, makes space.

Here is the ritual balance, the squat and the sink, the rumbled claim of space,
of a territory, a nursery, a cradle to rock gently under the mothering waves.
We burrow into our own sand, palms up and waiting for life, legs crossed
and caressing the beach ceaselessly shifting new pictures beneath us, backs
whipped softly by the wind, a warning. She is ready, and while serpent-seaweed trails
treacherously nearby, her eggs like the pearls of giants nestle into the land.

Flippers fling sand, blanketing the diamond-eggs in their crowded cave, quaking the land
to wait for birth. The retreating turtle reflects navy-streaked sky, ceaseless space
spelled perfectly on a compact shell, a gash where the violet galaxy trails,
dirt and barnacles for flickering stars. Engulfed like a blackened sun in the waves,
floating deeper until our tiny eyes can no longer grasp, the Leatherback
is gone. We are left with the sand and the sky, lined with the Southern Cross.

Swallowing damp air, cross-eyed, we look behind to the forest land,
we strain up to the sleeping city, back away from infinite space,
spy the sunrise in waves of color, think of hatching and the sky, find the trail.

(see: sea turtle adventure of two summers ago in beautiful St. Croix!)

Alle sind auf der Flucht.

Today I was workshopped in Poetry class for my memory poem, "Rioting".  The workshop went well and I agree with almost everything that was said.  I knew the problems when I was writing it, just didn't put in the time or the effort to fix them then.  

Rioting

“Wear three socks! Striped and thick and everything” and dance
then tomorrow we won’t be here pick a spot and jump
and watch the window for sticky snow watch the roads
and make sure you chant quickly on your tiny bed
glancing all the while for morning.

I danced. Gradual. Be quiet. Alright, but be quiet.
In a hospital you just lie. Light that stills, waiting, thinking
of everything. Nighttime dark of these rooms, old and sick
walls that stink of fight surrendered. But then I danced -
riot of a thin, happy body on a cold, tiny bed.

I am five, and the wind carries drafty perfumes
of someone’s distant cooking. Cherries have painted
my hands, while the luminous evening hooks colors like the sweet
branches of the summer trees. I am weak from memory and dancing,
and with an easy, “It’s late, come back in,” I’m inside again and leaping,
consumed by a bed still much too big for me.

Today I gave my group copies of my thing poem, "Advanced Songs for the Beginner", which, Dear Family Members, is not actually how I feel about the situation and is really a giant exaggeration, so don't worry.  But it's here.

Advanced Songs for the Beginner

Your darkened tones with fire-threaded wood
look fragile in the blindness of my room.
That casual lean, your every measured angle,
returns silence with silence, this cold inception.

Your spindled fingers stretch, long as your body.
You fret and frown, you loose your meager hair.
They say you sound sweetly if you sound at all,
dulce, so dulce, but a part is lost in translation.

He’s worked so hard, I’ve heard and it’s such a nice gift -
In recent days I’ve held a tougher violin.
It fits neatly between chin and shoulder,
and needs no coddling on any softened lap.

You’re a part of the man, I consider this over and over,
but the creeping weeds that overgrow my dreams
sing I could never play such an Appalachian
dulcimer, without sunrises and slow talks.

So I imagine an uncle, old and tired,
a carpenter creating soft music from yesterday.
To rise with the sun and conduct the purple mountains –
to honor family, they ask for strings of connection.

Poetry is so much harder than fiction.  I miss fiction.

Yesterday I kayaked for a few hours with my class, on a lake near Colgate.  About halfway through, I finally mastered going in a straight line.  It was a problem before.  I also mastered quick turning and finally figured out how to move the boat sideways.  And I'm getting better with leaning when turning to make the turn faster.  At the end we practiced wet exits, or getting out of the boat when capsized.  It sounds difficult, it's not.  But the moment before making myself roll over was intimidating though, thinking about being upside down under water strapped onto your boat because of gear is intimidating.  Removing said gear and pushing yourself out correctly is actually not difficult, but thinking about it is.  Anyway, I did it, even if I was the least graceful of the whole group.  Having long hair that is still too short for a ponytail doesn't help when your life-vest forces you immediately to the surface, and you wind up with a face full of hair and more disoriented than you were when you were upside down and stuck in your boat.  Andrew said something about, "Well, it wasn't pretty, but it was correct."  I think flailing awkwardly trying to get back into my boat (which actually is really difficult) and sort of falling onto his was more embarrassing.  But now I know I can do it, should I ever need to.  And I love kayaking, even if I was completely worn out by the end and not sure how I was going to make it back to the dock.  I am obsessed with boats, and being on your own in the middle of a body of water feels so free.

That being said, the Chinese boys in my class have absolutely no idea of what to do in a kayak and continue to crash into me and everything else.

Last weekend Hayley, Jenn and I toured the Saranac brewery in Utica.  It was similar to touring the Haller Lowenbräu one in Germany, except this one was more focused on history, like what happened during the prohibition era.  That was interesting, the Utica townies were interesting, and the two beers at the end were fun.  I had a Black and Tan, which is chocolatey and dark and I love, and an IPA from the "High Peaks" series, high percentage of alcohol and scary and not-pleasant tasting, at least at first.  

Acoustic Coffee House also happened, and a giant dance party broke out to the Ryan Montbleau band.  First, Ryan is incredible and performs my favorite styles of music wrapped into one, and second, it was basically my friends and I and half of Utica.  Apparently, he's very popular there, even though he's from Boston.  

This weekend I am hopefully going to a Rusted Root concert.  And in November I am definitely going to Jon Stewart's performance, no matter how early I may have to line up.

Hogwarts at Hamilton is officially cast.  The rest of the E-board and I stayed up late Sunday night casting all 51 people.  We are technically over the fire-safety limit (shh, don't tell campus safety), but I am so excited for such a big cast.  I can't wait for Divinations to be completely bizarre and hopefully hilarious again.

ELS got together on Friday and watched Clue, which is so much fun to watch with a lot of people who love it, and which I continue to find absolutely hysterical, no matter how many times I've seen it.  It's also rather genius, and I am still working out most of the explanations at the end.  After all, communism is just a red herring.

(And I am keeping my fingers crossed that choir actually gets to go abroad, and that Rob chooses China).

Ich fuehle mich wie ein Dino.

I am sitting here staring into my fan, not moving far from the aloe gel, and sunburnt all for Harry Potter.  I feel reptilian, not enough skin and weirdly stretched.  Today was the Activities Fair/every possible organization that no one really cares about gets a table out on Martin's Way to advertise to unsuspecting freshmen who will write their names down and receive unending emails.  It also happened to be the hottest day since I've been back, and I wasn't well prepared for being in the direct sun.  Jen Strater and I took the first two hours, bravely manning our table next to the College Democrats and the EMTs, trying to keep everything from blowing away with all the random, strong wind gusts.  We did manage to get a lot of people to sign up, though no male people, which continues to be a bit of a problem.  But I think more people will show up at our interest meeting on Sunday.  

When I finished frying myself, I repeated the first hour of my morning and yelled at my computer again for not connecting to the internet.  I realized how pathetically dependent I am on being able to go online, but that realization did not stop me from calling ITS three times and eventually taking my ailing computer to the Help Desk and just making them do it there.  Of course, only one thing had to be clicked, not that I had any idea what it was.  But it is healed now, yay.

All of that, Iron Man again, and my Witchcraft class built my day today.  Witchcraft might be my favorite class, because again, best professor ever, little work, and also it's about witchcraft.  We are always talking about the line between magic and religion.  BUT IS THERE ONE?  IS THERE?  And about how all these things got added the Judeo/Christian traditions and texts but now almost no one knows what they started out as.  Who knows the difference between Satan, Lucifer, Beezlebub, and Belial, hmmm?  (On another note, we are reading The Pilgrim's Progress in my Print Culture class and it features another pagan god that got rewritten as the devil, Apollyon, and this book is INSANE.  There's a board game of it.  Where is it?  Can I play it?)  

In other important news, Jon Stewart is performing at Hamilton on November 14.  He's the next in the Great Names series.  This is after the election so it is bound to be interesting anyway.  I'm so excited.

Last night I drove my friends to get sushi in another attempt to increase my awareness of where I am and how to travel like a normal person.  And we got to eat at a good Japanese restaurant too.  We returned, went to the Kooks concert for maybe 10 minutes, it was a billion degrees in there and gross, we left, went to the choir concert in the crazy Buffers suite, it was even more degrees and smelly, and we left again.  Somewhere in there was some time at the Pub.

Speaking of the Pub, three friends and I have officially formed a trivia team.  We did well last week.  Not well enough to place, but well above a lot of the other teams.  We are Here for the Beer, and I can say I proudly contributed the Stephen Colbert answer, the tuberculosis answer, and half of the failed 2004 conventions answer.  All we really want are the winners' t-shirts at the end.

Next Tuesday I start kayaking, but am a little worried now after my bizarre dream in which my instructor, Andrew Jillings, had actually been dead for many years and had been replaced by a British author who hated his life and the spotlight - a secret only a few friends and the officers of HOC knew about.  Weird.

Gute Nacht, bis spaeter.

DIE SCHOENSTE STADT!

Having returned from many European adventures, saved the animals, and not applied to Colgate, I am now back at Hamilton here in the states.  I moved in Tuesday morning, and have been fairly busy ever since.  

Tuesday night I united two of my best friends here with a best friend from abroad, and while maybe I just felt awkward at first, they all liked each other in the end.  I drove us all to dinner (!!! sometimes I can drive!) at The Only, where Old Hippie Guy missed us and gave us some delicious food.  We then exercised some of the privileges of being old people at a liquor store, and headed back to hang out for the night.  Then Wednesday saw the annual Target trip for things we forgot or want in a suite, where I mostly just bought food.  I went to the Hypnotist performance that night and he was as entertaining as I remembered from Freshman year.  I almost got trampled at the end by the guy who was convinced he'd left his kid somewhere the second he set foot out of the auditorium.  Afterwards I went to a Hogwarts at Hamilton e-board meeting (we are too excited and want to kick things off early) in the brand shiny new Kirkland loft.  There is so much space.  I actually don't even know what I would do with all that space, with just two people living there.  But it's pretty nice.  I stopped by in Kirkland to say hello to some other people first and had a nice time continuing the reunions.

Today classes began.  I started with a bright and early 9 AM The Rise of Print Culture starring my second favorite professor, Margie Thickstun.  I am mostly excited for this class because we get to use a printing press and learn to MAKE BOOKS.  I mean, that is what Creative Writing majors get excited about.  We looked at medieval books from the rare books collection, which I did in a class last year but they still amaze me.  I have a bunch of friends in that class so it should be good anyway.

I went to scary Modern German Literature after that, with Prof. Edith Toegel who has not lost any of her ability to intimidate.  It is me and five other people, all of whom I am still convinced are better at German than me, but all of whom I also (mostly) like a lot.  It turns out we have to write TWO 8-PAGE PAPERS for this class, and I am not even a German major so I am trying to justify to myself that this class is worth it.  It better be.  I don't really feel like dropping it, and I do feel like speaking German this semester, but I think my brain might explode with umlauts and the DDR and plusquamperfekt before December.  Toegel is having me come talk to her at 8:30 tomorrow morning (why do Austrians have to be functional so early?) so she can convince me I can do it and also help me figure out getting a minor.  I think I'm just going to throw out a lot of, "Wien ist die schoenste Stadt in der ganze Welt!"

Speaking of speaking German, I saw my number one favorite Professor this morning, Chris Hill, and spoke to him in German briefly of my crazy wild absolutely insane and cultural semester abroad.  (Or, I told him where I was and that it was nice we agreed neither of us could understand Schwaebisch).  I'm in his Witches and Witch-hunting class tomorrow at 10 and I'm very excited.  

And now I'm excited to watch Obama's speech with friends and possibly drink anytime anyone says the words "hope" or "change"?  We also thought anytime the Clintons looked falsely happy, but apparently they aren't there.

Okay, several hours later, the convention was very impressive.  And Al Gore alone certainly fulfilled our expectations for overuse of those words.  But look at the Obama family!  How could you not elect this family?  Mrs. Biden looks disturbingly like Mr. Biden, was the other main conclusion drawn from this.  And how did they get Stevie Wonder?  Anyway, we're planning a completely over-the-top RNC party next.

We have plans to make a team for trivia night and to join the wine club since we're finally eligible.  I have plans to go to the fellowship meeting tomorrow and try to figure out my life.  

In conclusion (wow, two words that should never be in a paper), coming back to Hamilton felt almost completely natural and my room is back to feeling like my own little world.  Being a senior is disturbing but also fun in ways I didn't think about, and even though I really, really miss people, it's not messing up my time here.

The person we're looking at is Annie Gilliland, 21 years old, surviving in Vienna, Austria for two more weeks...

Recently The Twilight Zone has made its way back into my life, and my friends and I watch episodes online and wish that Rod Serling was narrating our lives.  I'm trying to memorize his long monologue from "It's a Good Life", one of the best episodes, just so I can appear at a startling place in someone's life and start saying it, and they would know some freaky stuff was about to happen.

Speaking of happenings, I just saw The Happening, and my main question is, what horrible event occurred in M. Night Shyamalan's life between The Village and Lady in the Water that killed his ability to write a script?  Because the premise was pretty good, but the dialogue and acting were terrible.  Anyway, plants made people kill themselves.  I thought a good title would have been PLANTS!  (But aha, I was dorky enough to spot Victoria Clark of The Light in the Piazza fame, a wonderful actress).  The X-Files trailer was the most exciting part of the movie.

Then afterwards Tommy and I went to the Cafe Mozart, and I got some kind of dessert which involved strawberries and mousse inside a giant chocolate cone.  I was a fan.  They were showing the France vs. Netherlands game, and clearly everyone that worked there was for the Netherlands (actually, I think everyone in Austria is for anyone that is not Germany, France, or possibly Turkey).  The Netherlands were winning while we there, and we left before it ended to avoid insanity on the U-Bahn, but I'm assuming they won and cheering for them.  Yesterday Croatia beat Germany and nobody expected it because apparently Germany always wins.  But they are saving their best players for last, and for teams better than Croatia.

Anyway, it is kind of fun and fascinating seeing people running around the streets draped in their country's flag and face-painted appropriately.  I've witnessed lots of showdowns, mostly between Croatia and Austria, for who can be loudest.  Austria is fun because I'm pretty sure they don't expect to win anything (apparently their team is pretty bad), but they are going to scream about how great Österreich is at every possible opportunity anyway.  

Yesterday we had a tour of Parlament, which is completely beautiful inside.  We got to sit in the seat of the President and pretend to be powerful, and try to understand the party-system here, which is definitely more complicated than anything America has ever had.  Getting there was interesting, though.  I luckily ended up on the same U-Bahn as Ruth, otherwise I'm not sure I would have figured it out.  The Fanzone is blocking everything, and we had to take some weird route that involved her talking to a lot of security guards to get us in.  And then I set off the metal detector anyway.

Later Rachel and I went to the Museum Moderne Kunst - the modern art museum.  They had a huge exhibit called "Bad Painting, Good Art", about painters who deliberately use techniques considered bad in the art world, and create paintings that I generally thought were interesting.  The bottom floor was the performance art floor, bizarre as usual.  There were a lot of videos ofpeople injuring themselves, or doing various other vile things to make some kind of statement.  But it's a little hard to focus on a statement when you're distracted by the blood gushing out of the naked guy's head.

And last weekend was the Wachau trip.  Wachau is a valley region of Austria, along a river and full of old medieval towns with wineries, or Heurigen.  We went to Melk and Durmstein, with a boat taking us from one to the next.  In Melk we saw a huge old abbey, up high on a hill overlooking the valley.  We had a tour of it, complete with the church and the royal hallway and all.  The library possibly made some of us think we were in Beauty and the Beast.  And we arrived in the church in time to hear the monks doing their midday prayer.

We then took the boat to Durmstein, a beautiful trip complete with ice cream and drunk Austrians yelling at us in an unintelligible dialect.  In Durmstein, since it looked like a storm was approaching, we went straight to the winery.  We were treated to a plate of various sausages and cheeses (and hey, I ate blood sausage before I knew what it was, but it actually was kind of good), and a spritzer.  Some of us stayed afterwards to try the apricot schnapps the area is famous for, and I was definitely a fan.  We took a tiny little train back to Vienna.

This past week I also saw The Sound of Music at the Volksoper in German.  I loved it, and loved the translations, some of which were more amusing than anything else.  But it still worked really well, perhaps better because they were all speaking the language they were supposed to be.  The changes we all noticed are actually only different from the movie, but were always present in the stage version, apparently.  It was interesting and a little uncomfortable to be sitting next to some old Austrians who might have been old enough to remember the German annexation, especially during the concert hall scene when giant swastikas were flying onstage and Nazis were marching through the audience.  Anyway, the cast was perfect.

The roommate has gone to bed (and so must I).

So in conclusion, 

"Tonight's story on The Twilight Zone is rather unique, and calls for a different sort of introduction.  This, as you may recognize, is a map of the United States, and there's a little town called Peaksville.  On a given morning not too long ago, the rest of the world disappeared and Peaksville was left all alone.  Its inhabitants were never sure whether the world was destroyed and only Peaksville left untouched, or whether the village had somehow been taken away.  They were, on the other hand, sure of one thing: the cause.  A monster had arrived in the village..."

(and the Netherlands won 4-1) 

geh mal tanzen ja ja!

Another successful weekend of Get to Know Vienna.  Things I did, probably out of order:

Found the Kriminalmuseum, basically a large, graphic archive of Vienna's worst crimes and methods of punishments for them.  It began with the usual displays of torture instruments from the Middle Ages complete with complex German descriptions we could not understand (The Sacher Stuhl - we swear they made witches sit on the chair and then force-fed them Sachertorte).  But then it went on to the truly disgusting/morbidly fascinating collection of information and pictures about all the worst murders that have taken place here.  Why did so many crazy men own hatchets in the first place?  Also, why did so many people have completely creepy death masks made of family members?  Anyway, the museum was in a medieval buildings, which was pretty cool itself.

Saw Indiana Jones 4.  Assumed that Stephen Spielberg has not lost his talent, and therefore blamed George Lucas for all that was wrong with it.  ("Hey Stephen, your dialogue is looking a little too decent here, let me make a few edits.  Hey Stephen, we should create scenes that make it appear that Harrison Ford can't act anymore at all.  Also, Indy should fight ALIENS!")  Ugh.

Night at the Zwölf Apostelkeller, good as always.  Dealt reasonably well with a possibly-insane waiter.  

Night of Creative Writing Majors Talking About Things They Can't Talk About With Anyone Else Because No One Else will Understand was also great, and lasted for about 3 hours in a bar somewhere.

Yesterday Rob, Rachel and I went to a church from the Jugendstil, which was beautiful outside but costs to get into, so we just walked in circles around it.  It also happened to be on the edge of the Wienerwald, which we proceeded to romp through.  We found fields, tai chi, awkward old women, and ticks.  There was a cafe back at the edge of town where we dined on soup and wurst.  

I gathered with fellow American friends to be American and eat delicious sloppy joes (seriously Suzanne, how was that possible, I never even liked them before but they were so good), and watch kind of bad yet entertaining TV.  Eurovision, Europe's answer to American Idol, except not and way more legitimate since it's been on since the 1950s.  Every country enters one singing act to compete, and they only show the semifinals and the final.  I only saw the final, and concluded that Europe, on the whole, has horrible taste in music.  That Russian guy should not have won.  Greece should definitely not have come in anywhere near the top.  Bosnia and Spain were possibly actually good songs though, so of course no one liked that.  And what was not to like about Croatia, which featured old men dressed like the mafia singing old jazzy tunes, or Latvia, which had everyone dress as pirates?!  (Not to mention Finland, which was a screaming metal Finnish band).  But I was very entertained by the guy from Sweden trying to announce his country's results who was either just very drunk, couldn't speak English, or both.  And now I'm looking up that Bosnian song.  We spent an hour afterwards looking up early 90s German rap.

Rachel and I went to the crypt where Maria Theresia and crew are buried.  Basically all of the Hapsburgs are down there.  All the Franz Josephs and such.  Question: why did they use to make tombs so creepy?  What was with all the skulls?  We know they're dead!  But it was interesting to see all of that, especially Maria Theresia's enormous tomb, 20 billion times the size of everyone else's.

I saw Der Besuch der Alten Dame at Volkstheater, and understood it way better than when I had to read it in German class sophomore year.  It was so, so much more frightening onstage though.  I didn't understand that it was actually that scary.  But they did it with an amazing set, complete with a portrait that bled when chopped with an axe, and lots of lawnmowers to represent the collective mind.  And real gun shots, apparently.

Also saw a ballet at the Staatsoper.  Onegin from Tchaikovsky.  I liked it a lot more than I thought I would, and wished I could dance.  Also wished Onegin was not such a stupid man and felt sorry for all the characters.  And dealt with Italian tourists being far more obnoxious than us.

Today we were back in the Wald again, starting at the Lainzier Tiergarten, an old hunting ground for some rich guy who built a house for Sisi there, who, as predicted, hated it and continued to be stupid and spoiled.  There were rams and deer frequenting the place, but none of the promised wild boar (and we looked).  There were also many small children, including the bilingual family consisting of a very annoyed father, and Martin, who just would not get his shoes.  We ended up walking/hiking forever today, got up to the top of a foothill that overlooked all of Vienna, and went down the long way.  We covered a lot of ground.  Fortunately there was a cafe with some Spargelcremesuppe and Sachertorte to keep us all happy.  It is beautiful.  I want to live/camp in the Wienerwald.  

Wenn wir uns kennen...

Let's talk about Innsbruck/the best place I have ever been.

Friday morning Rob, Rachel S, Kevin, and I left on a train at 9:30 out of Wien Westbahnhof, headed for Innsbruck.  It was a crowded train, and mostly reserved, but after some searching we found four seats together.  It also became a boiling hot train as noon approached and there was no air.  But it was a beautiful ride through the countryside of Austria, with the hills getting bigger and bigger until they finally became mountains.  We hopped off at Salzburg to get some air for about five minutes, and just stood pointing at the mountains yelling "BERGEN!"  (Sometimes, when you know a word in Deutsch, you simply begin to loudly name everything around you, forgetting that everyone else there most likely has known that word for quite a long time).  We arrived in Innsbruck about five hours after we left.

Fortunately, walking with my backpack and bag in pants under the intense sun in Innsbruck was not too bad because the mountains visible around every corner were so beautiful.  Our hostel was fairly close to the train station, and probably the best place I have stayed yet while abroad.  It was more like a bed and breakfast, the only real difference being the hostel thing of you have to take care of yourself, which none of us minded.  The room was very nice, they gave us pasta to make for dinner, and we got an included breakfast in the cafe below every morning.  We probably annoyed the older Australian couple staying next door (there was hardly anyone else there) by singing loudly and I'm sure attractively late into the night, but oh well.

Friday evening was spent just wondering around town.  We found das goldenes Dachl, built in the early days of Tyrol.  We walked along the river as the sky was darkening.  We sat outside with ice creams, and made ourselves a nice feast for dinner back at the hostel.  Bizarrely-named cocktails at a bar later completed the evening.

The next day we got up (somewhat) early to go hiking.  We took a tram up into the mountains, into an outer village of Innsbruck that was in the fields.  It looked just like how I have always pictured Alpine culture and homes, and was gorgeous.  From there we took random paths, ending up running through fields below giant mountains, finding a lake that we couldn't really approach but could look at, and picnicking in the flowers.  We spent a lot of time traipsing around singing The Lord of the Rings theme because everything was so epic.  It was then unfortunately stuck in everybody's head the whole weekend, and if there were ever a few moments of silence, someone would inevitably begin to hum "da da dadada..."  I couldn't suppress the urge to run through the fields.  It was not possible to stand still.  I stared up at the mountains a lot, wondering about how they could possibly be snow-covered when it was so warm below, and wanting to be on a summit.  Ah well, for another trip.

We spent that evening again wandering around Innsbruck, and eventually sitting in the (admittedly lame and lacking-in-grass) Stadtpark, looking at the stars.  Everybody was tired and sore, and in my case a little sunburnt.

On Sunday we decided to hike up to the Bergisel, the giant ski jump used in the winter olympics in 1970-something.  It is pretty intimidating to look at, but very impressive to stand on top of.  The hike up took a lot of uphill, but was followed by a nice (although unnecessarily expensive) cable car up to the top.  We could see all of Innsbruck and all of the surrounding mountains.  

We found a path back down that began at a palace, inhabited apparently mostly by peacocks, which made strange noises at us and went into places labeled "private" like they owned the whole place.  Rob and I stopped there for a snack, and then we all continued back down.  The path we randomly chose was gorgeous, taking us along the river through the mountains for awhile, then back up over more hills to offer spectacular views.  I found a lot of places I wish I could have a house.  It began to rain a little, but unfortunately never got too bad, and really just made the forest smell good and the air a little cooler.  We found strange houses and dogs that appeared to bark at us, as well as a man in full business-clothes that seemed to be completely misplaced.  

Sunday evening we got standing-room (and then stealing-empty-seats-room) to The King and I in German at a local theatre.  I loved it, and was proud I could understand a good portion of it.  Again, some of the song translation were interesting.  "Getting to Know You" was more like "when we are all friends", or something.  The man who played the king was the best.  As per the theme of the weekend, we all noticed that it was very much The Sound of Music set in Bangkok.  

Speaking of the hills being alive, the next morning we found ourselves in Salzburg.  It was naturally also beautiful, but in a very different way from Innsbruck.  Salzburg looks very, very old and is full of palaces (but in a different style than those in Vienna).  We spent a lot of time figuring out where the movie was filmed and found the fountain, the steps, possibly the von Trapp house, and the mountain they escape on at the end.  The best/hottest part of the day was hiking up to a castle which we did not actually go in, but which was on a hill that offered views over all of Innsbruck and the mountains in the distance.  We came back down again on gorgeous wooded paths that lead through the backstreets by people's homes where I yet again wanted to live.  After dinner with an unhappy Italian waiter and time spent sitting by the banks of the river, we went back to the train station to go home.

And after a somewhat insane train ride on which we turned all the seats in our little compartments into beds and made everyone walking by uncomfortable, I am back in Vienna.  I miss the mountains.

He died on the road...

Feeling weird after seeing Into the Wild and now listening to sad guitarey-type songs, but today was probably the best day yet in Wien.

Yesterday was Arbeitertag, May Day to everyone else, and the Social Democrat Party through a celebration all over town, most of which my friends and I got up too late to see.  I did manage to hear the distant parade music while still being half-asleep in bed, and saw the remains of various socialist celebrations.  Everything was red.  We did indeed make it to the Fest at the Prater last night though.  We got there to a strange British country-rockish band playing, trying to say things to the audience in German, and messing up some grammar in their songs.  The Prater at night is insane.  The thrill rides that look questionable during the day look even more questionable lit up with neon lights in the night, making you wonder why human beings want to do some of these things to themselves.  I took approximately a hundred pictures of the Riesenrad at night, and they all came out lame.  It is beyond impressive when it just looks like a circle of floating lights.  We went on the smaller, more normal-sized ferris wheel, which still managed to freak me out with my fear of heights.  I don't know what it is.  Sometimes I am comfortable being up high, sometimes I am not.  But it was perfect timing, because the fireworks started while we were on it, so we saw them from up in the air.

We ended up staying at the Prater for awhile and sitting in a restaurant/Biergarten called Schweizerhaus, making ourselves feel gross with beer and fries.  But, a fun night.  We went home tiredly before the transportation stopped.

Today was a journey into the Wienerwald, or the Vienna Woods, the huge forest that begins to the east of Vienna and continues into the Alps.  I think it is the most gorgeous thing I have found since I've been abroad, and I was full of all the possible sappy pastoral sentiments all day long.  But I really do want to live in a field or a mountain or somewhere with lots of flowers.  We started out at the end of an U-Bahn line, took a bus up to the top of Kahlenberg (a foothill), and emerged at the top with a spectacular view, of which I took way too many photos.  We could see the mountains in the distance and all of Vienna laid out before us.  We picked a random path to hike back down through the woods, and were surrounded by trees for a good while until we emerged into a meadow and enjoyed watching a frantic dog run around for awhile.  A bit further down, we started to see the vineyards.  Vienna has its own vineyards and wineries on the edge of the city, and they were beautiful and reminded me of Italy.  I want to live there, maybe.  We eventually made it all the way back to the Donau (Danube) and then back into the city for an Austrian dinner of Knoblauchsuppe (my favorite Austrian food) and various types of Schnitzel.  

We saw Into the Wild tonight, so my day went from GREAT INSPIRING NATURE to INSPIRING THEN TERRIFYING NATURE.  My Lit and the Environment class talked about the story last year even though we didn't read it, so I knew most of what happened, but I apparently forgot the crucial, disturbing ending.  But I think I kind of loved the movie and am a big sucker for nature and spirituality and cliche lessons learned from being alone in the wilderness...things every nature writer of all time has written about.  I really want to read the book though, because Sean Penn seems to be an awkward director at times.

So,

FORESTS AND MOUNTAINS!  YAY!

Hunden.

Today was a very nice day, in which I finally walked through the Prater park.  It is huge and full of trees and meadows, things I have missed going from a small town in a valley to a big city.  There were dogs everywhere, but we couldn't touch any of them, which was just extremely upsetting.  However, there were a couple which bounded over to where we were lying and jumped all over us for awhile.  Tomorrow or sometime soon might bring an exploration into the Wienerwald.

Today also began the quest of Find Every Aida Cafe/Konditorei in Vienna...there are 26, according the website.  I've been to three now.

Last Monday a bunch of us got together at another Wohnheim to have a Passover feast.  Sometimes I am pretty sure I should be Jewish just for the food.  Matzahball Soup is delicious, as were all the other dishes.  It was also complete with the traditional four glasses of wine.

Last night, my friends and I went to the Zwölf Apostel-Keller again, one of my favorite cafes here.  It´s in an old Baroque cellar, and features various delicious deserts.  There are also the old men that roam around with a violin and accordion and play The Third Man theme every night.  As I was enjoying mz Glühwein and Topfenstrudel, I noticed a loose brick on the wall.  We pulled it out and found a package, full of notes from lots of countries in lots of languages.  We left one there as well, congratulating anyone on finding the hideout.  I was hoping that it would perhaps lead to a secret passageway.

Also, went to Prague recently.  Despite the fact that it rained the whole time and I have possibly not ever been wetter and colder for a whole day, it is a beautiful city and I want to go back.  We went on a very rainy tour, where we all probably looked a bit miserable and therefore got our tour guide to let us stop for a long lunch.  But the tour ended up in Prague Castle, which was pretty amazing.  The second day we found the Mucha/Dali exhibit, and I bought some Mucha prints because I loved pretty much everything he did.  We also went to a very old bar featuring old Czech men playing jazzy stuff and pretended to be writers.  Where was the absinthe?

And I now have my Innsbruck trip planned for the Pentecost holidays.  Innsbruck for two days and possibly a day trip into Salzburg on the last.  So excited ALPS!

I never knew Vienna before the war...

This was a good weekend, I believe.  It was, perhaps, a bit full of Der Dritte Man, but that is never a problem.  

Yesterday, two friends and I went on the tour, hosted by a strange little Austrian man whose entire family was so embedded within the movie and Graham Green's and Carol Reed's lives, that he may actually be a fictional character.  He walked with us to a lot of the main sites the movie was filmed at, and disillusioned us about some others (it is not actually possible to splash around in Viennese sewer waterfalls).  I enjoyed descending into an old bomb shelter to the tunes of Anton Caras' theme, to find someone strumming a zither at the bottom.  Can I please learn to play that?  Right after I learn the banjo.   Anyway, I took some cheesy skewed-angle black and white photos.

The most interesting part of the tour by far was a quirky old British woman who sounded a bit like Angela Lansbury crossed with someone who has sat inside with her cats for too long.  She was very defensive of everything about the film, saying of the entrance to the canals, "In Britain we would have made this a national monument!" and of the statues that could have been destroyed in the war, "In Britain we dismantled our statues and hid them in caves...in Wales!"  Another personal favorite was when she learned of some of the tricks of movie-making: "How deceitful, these film-makers."  I'm not sure the tour guide knew quite what to do with her.

It was interesting to watch the film again and finally recognize most of the places - beginning with the tackiest statue in the world at the very start, ending with the Zentralfriedhof.  

This weekend I also ventured to the Natural History Museum, which is also the Museum of Very Old Things.  Some of the preserved animals in there are from the 1800s.  I'm also almost positive they made some of them up.  Some of those cannot be real animals.  And I was apparently unaware of the number of bird species in the world.  And again, someone needs to remind me not to go in the insect exhibits.  But, a really cool museum.  And it even smelled like every other natural history museum!

We also had a couple of nights at bars this weekend, and a nice American dinner at TGI Friday's just for a little taste of gigantic, fried American portions, something which I have surprisingly been missing.  

I spent a couple of hours on a couple of days recently sitting in the Burg Park, which has magically sprung into a garten while I was apparently not looking.  I also wandered through the Steiernmarkt, an open-air market outside the Rathaus complete with plenty of people in Lederhosen, accordions, and lots of beer.  Actually, it was really fun, if not a bit intimidating.  

On Thursday night my grammar class met with a group of Austrian students who will be abroad in America next year (I am not sure what this has to do with learning grammar, but the Professorin is crazy, should be hosting an NPR show, and obviously doesn't care about actually teaching us).  Talking to them was interesting though.  In one of the groups, discussing cultural differences and perceptions of each other etc, we inevitably got into their views on America.  They, like most people, were able to separate the government from the people.  But I have realized that being abroad has at times made me slightly defensive of America, not of the actions of a stupid, careless government, but just of a country and its' people.  When I first left, I thought I would be embarrassed and quiet about where I was from.  But it's not necessary, and maybe self-defamatory to be so.  I'm not ashamed of being an American, and intelligent people can figure out why.

Now back to trying not to stress out about next year's classes, next year's housing, and life after college.

When your mind's made up, when your mind's made up...

I've been singing Once songs melodramatically down the streets of Vienna.

The rest of spring break went well. The best part of Paris was still climbing Notre Dame and pretending to be in Victor Hugo's book.  Paris is beautiful but not my favorite city, perhaps just because everywhere else I went and Vienna feel much, much safer.  But I did manage to successfully navigate the ridiculously confusing Paris metro system (really, are 14 lines necessary?), to the Paris regional trains, to Charles de Gaulle Airport, then into Vienna VIE, onto another train, and onto the U-Bahn by myself starting at 6:30 AM.  

Classes suddenly became a bit more real.  It looks like I might actually have to do work sometime in the near future, rather than just continue the extended vacation this has been so far.  I went to Greenpeace once, and then slept the next day because I was sick, so I really still need to get started on that.  But my work will be fairly easy, I just have to work on better comprehension of German so I can understand everything they are saying to me very quickly.  I am just going to grocery stores, buying products, and then entering lots of information about them into a computer database.  They are keeping track of products that have genetically altered ingredients or ingredients that are in other ways not organic, or were tested on animals.  They are also tracking who uses recyclable packaging.  In other words, way to go Greenpeace.  My project is here: marktcheck.greenpeace.at

Yesterday was a good day.  We went to the Prater, a very old, famous amusement park.  A nice, 20-minute trip on the Riesenrad (the giant ferris wheel) gave us a view of most of Vienna.  You cannot actually threaten to push anyone out of it Third Man style, because the door won't open.  We then also decided it would be a good idea to go on the Dizzy Mouse, which is usually not a good idea, but I always forget.  It spun the whole time and was expert at the look-like-you're-falling-off thing.  I also tried out an absolutely insane ride called Extasy, which I imagine might be what it feels like to actually be on ecstasy.  It just turned me in every direction and kept me upside down for awhile, all the time spraying smoke and strobe lights and other colors into my face with a strange German soundtrack going on loudly.  And it was in front of a creepy 80s superhero type mural.  The Prater is full of some of the scarier thrill rides I've ever seen, most of which I'm too afraid to touch, but would stand there and wonder why people ever thought that would be fun.  

Before the Prater, we went to the Third Man museum.  It basically just made me want to watch the movie repeatedly.  The museum is comprised of a few rooms, all full of pictures and memorabilia from the movie, the makers of the movie, and Vienna immediately following WWII.  They start out by showing you a short clip from the film, on a projector from 1936 which is huge and loud and amazing.  People are more obsessed with this movie than I imagined.  There are also an appropriate number of pictures of Orson Welles looking ridiculous and Joseph Cotton looking suave.   And now I just want to play the zither.  I'm hoping to go on the tour next Friday, or some soon Friday.  

Last night we found a bar under a train station that was pretty, and sat there till somewhat late talking.  About space and science fiction and such...my friends all like the same things.  Then Rachel and I actually managed to make it home by employing some night buses, since the transportation mostly stops running at midnight.

Prague is coming up soon.  As is possibly a four day break, but I'm not sure about that yet.  I'm over halfway through abroad.

win et frommage canard et creme brulee

What is this language? I'm in Paris, and completely confused by French. It is incomprehensible to me, and less people here are willing to speak English. I'm sorry that I speak no French, all I have managed is "merci". It's a little bit uncomfortable...one man actually said, in English, "I know English, but I will not speak it to you." Thank you, sir. That and the metro is difficult because tickets never work and signs are vague. It was a stressful day.

BUT other than weird people, Paris is beautiful. I went to the big cemetery, hunted down Oscar Wilde amongst other admirable people, and looked into very old sepulchres that are basically frozen in time. The cremation part was interesting but also really freaked me out, because you could see the big smoke towers where they do it in a church. Then we went to the Pompidou, one of the coolest looking museums I have ever seen. It was built partially inside out, so all the elevators, escalators, and stairs are on the outside. And modern art is usually entertaining. I actually liked a lot of it though.

Then we went to a crazy fondue restaurant in Monmartre, which is all about loud drunk people and tiny spaces. It was amazing. They bring you wine in baby bottles, refill it for free all night, and keep giving you tons and tons of fondue for a reasonable fixed price. Then you can get pushed around by the old French man who owns the place because there's no room and he's not in the best mood since everyone is yelling and jumping on the tables.

Today we got up late and went to Chantilly, a day trip from Paris with a beautiful chateau, gardens, and a horse show. I illegally petted the horses because I loved them. Tomorrow is hopefully Notre Dame, the Louvre when it's free for students, and the Eiffle Tower at night. We'll see.

I also just did Stockholm for 5 days and loved it. Cold, but beautiful. I didn't really know anything about Sweden but now I want to go even further north, and perhaps stay in the ice hotel. The best part was the boat tour of the inner archipelago, the islands between Sweden and Finland. We only got to go a little ways out, because you need a longer trip where you would stay overnight to see the outer ones. But snow-covered islands covered with pine trees and nice Scandinavian houses, and ocassionally palaces were incredibly beautiful.

I'm running out of time!

Struenseegade?

Hello briefly from Copenhagen, Denmark.  This Danish keyboard is a little hard to figure out and also doesn't work very well, so quickly...I was just in Amsterdam for three days, and spent one full day here, and am leaving in 40 minutes for Stockholm.  The night train to Amsterdam was fun, I got my own tiny hotel room basically and spoke quick German to the nice Deutsche Bahn people.  It is very strange to wake up in another country, with an announcer speaking a language you've not really heard before.  But Dutch is very close to German, and I think I could learn it easily.  I actually had one or two people say things to me in Dutch that I understood well enough to give answers (in German) to.  After some chaos in the Amsterdam train station, I met up with Rachel and we headed to our hostel, Shelter Jordan.

I think Amsterdam could also be named Don't Get Hit by a Bike.  There are apparently more bikes than people there.  But it's beautiful and doesn't look like any other city I've seen.  Everything is on canals, and somehow it manages to be cleaner and nicer looking than Venice, I think.  We went on the free tour again, which gave us quick history and sights for three hours, starring tour guide Basilio.  The brief dip into the Red Light District was interesting, but of course you have to do it.  We also went to the Van Gogh museum, which is actually more like Some Van Gogh Plus All These Other People That Lived Around the Same Time.  We also spent a long time exploring parks, finding strange birds, going to a wax museum, getting hailed on, and sitting in bars with Dutch men singing American blues quite well.  

Night train to Copenhagen wasn't quite as great because I was in a tiny room with five other people, but they were all very nice.  Including myself there were two Americans, two Danes, and two Germans.  Again, spoke to the German girls quickly and was happy.  The venture into the part of the train that was separating and going to Moscow was just upsetting though, and reinforced my recent aversion to going to Russia.  Everything was ugly and scary looking, painted vomit color teal under horrible lighting.  We also kept getting trapped in the weird Russian doors.  At least Deutsche Bahn makes their trains look nice.  The parts going to Poland and the Czech Republic weren't doing much better, either.  Ahhhh eastern Europe.

We arrived in Copenhagen to find that our hostel, Sleep in Heaven, was kind of far from the city center, but we didn't mind walking.  We spent the day walking all over Copenhagen, which is gorgeous and I want to go back to so much.  There were swans everywhere.  Hans Christian Andersen is also everywhere.  We went in the cheesy little exhibit for him, and I remembered just how depressing all of his stories are.  I guess I forgot about how The Little Match Girl actually ends.  We also went in a Danish castle, which I loved because it didn't look like any other castle and was also not overwhelmingly spectacular.  The crown jewels were inside it.  We then managed to find a harbor out to the ocean, before becoming unbelievably cold and eating a nice Italian meal in the confusing Danish currency.  We will also have to figure out Swedish Krona soon.  Weird.

Okay, almost time to go get on the Danish train system.

I am not doing anything tonight.  Rachel and I tried to go see a play, Alice im Wunderland, but there were no more tickets left, and neither of us really had the energy left to actually do anything.  So I've been relaxing in my room for awhile, passively listening to my roommate and her friends speak some German, every once in awhile concentrating on it enough to understand something.

I have been to all of my possible classes by now.  This weekend was the Musik Seminar, ending with a Konzert on Monday evening.  It is taught by a man who looks somewhat like I imagine any number of the famous old Viennese composers to have looked when they were young and alive.  Yesterday we did Arnold Schönberg, and went to the Arnold Schönberg museum, which has lots of old musical manuscripts of his and some of his artwork.  Today was Beethoven, Motzart, Haydn, and Debussy.  We listened to some of their string quartets.  The professor handed out music and we followed along, while I realized how much I´ve missed being musically involved somehow.  One of my program directors mentioned she found a place I could take voice lessons, I will have to remind her.  On Monday we are going to see a concert, and then there will be no more of Herr Crazyhair for me.

At the Uni, I went to two different classes, and already know which one I will be keeping.  Epische Lieder (Epic Songs) was by far easier for me to follow than Liebe, Ehe, und Ehebruch in mittelaltlischer Literatur - that professor spoke incredibly fast, and there were also hundreds of people in the classroom, making it extremely difficult to concentrate.  I was able to understand about half of what the Epische Lieder Professorin said, and I think the more times I go the easier it will become.  We looked at a section of Beowulf, which I luckily remember well.  However, a translation of Old English into Modern German was one of the more confusing things I have ever read.

The way classes work here is interesting.  They are in gigantic lecture halls, people can come and go when they please, and no one is really expected to be quiet or pay attention the entire time.  This is difficult for me, because if I don´t pay complete attention then I will get completely lost and not understand anything.  I am also finding some cultural differences a little strange - such as the fact that here it is acceptable to blow one´s nose loudly in public, or when giving a lecture, zum Beispiel.  But the personal space thing is weirder for me.  It is smaller here.  I guess I didn´t really notice in Schwäbisch Hall because there were not enough people for it to matter, but here people will get really close to you.

The Central classes are all fine.  I think I´m dropping the Theatre one, because I will just have way too much to do otherwise.  I still have Deutsche Grammatik und Stylistik (necessary for me to somehow keep learning grammar, I still don´t understand passive or subjunctive at all), the required Austria in Context class, and German Literature from Realism to the end of the 20th Century, taught by Austrian Alan Alda.  

I also saw both No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood recently.  No Country had German subtitles, and I enjoyed finally being able to pick out how subtitles differ from what people are actually saying.  Anyway, No Country was clearly better, in my opinion.  There Will Be Blood was a little too much on the crazy for me, and I´m glad all the Austrians in the theatre were also laughing nervously at inappropriate times.  Call it, friendo.

Schönbrunn palace was one of the prettier places I have ever seen.  We ventured there a few days ago, and didn´t actually go in the palace.  Wondering the grounds took long enough, and we can always go back...we do have four months.  It, and several other places in Vienna, do not actually look real.  Vienna might just be a fake place, out of someone´s bizarre dream where all the buildings look absolutely unbelievable.  Schönbrunn had an old gate of some sort, where we sat and looked out on all of Vienna for awhile, as seen in the photo.  

I also had an adventure to Zentralfriedhof by myself.  One of the first things I wanted to see in Wien was the graves of musicians, so I took some U-Bahn for awhile followed by some Strassenbahn for awhile (but hey, I understand the public transportation system a lot better now) and ended up at the giant graveyard.  I wandered around for awhile, found the circle of Austrian presidents, and various other extravagant graves, before locating the Musiker.  All the oldest and most famous ones are buried in a circle together, where I just stood and got weirdly emotional for awhile.  People had put flowers all over their graves, and unfortunately the best I could manage was picking up a flower off the ground where it blew away and putting it back on Strauss´s grave.  Somewhat pathetic, I wish I´d had my own.  I then spent awhile trying to find the old Jewish section, but the cemetery is approximately one billion kilometers in every direction, so I never made it.  Besides that, it was very cold.  But I love graveyards, for some strange reason.  I don´t get scared in them, just calm.

We set sail on the Dawn of Dreams, through the Hallways of Hope and Happiness, to the Valley of Victory and Virtue.

One day I will write the cheesiest, most alliterative short story ever.

On Thursday evening, the Central Abroad group arrived here in Wien.  It was quite a chaotic day, as expected.  Perhaps the most difficult part for me was dragging my 33 kilo suitcase across Schwaebisch Hall to the ZOB bus station.  Luckily most of it was downhill so I kind of just let it go, and if there were stairs I employed the help of our friendly Bulgarian and Saudi-Arabian men.  Miraculously, I didn't have to pay anything extra for being way over weight limit on the flight.  Marie finagled the good people at German Wings into measuring us as a whole group, and since some people were somehow under weight limit, I was fine.  We took a short flight out of Stuttgart which involved a lot of me being disturbed by the amount of turbulence, and arrived in Vienna in the late afternoon.  We were then all put in cabs, and without much information, taken to our seperate dorms.

Rachel, Jonathan, and I arrived at our dorm (Boltzmanngasse) to find it dark and locked, with no one in sight.  We stood on the street with all of our luggage for a few minutes just looking sad, until we were able to sneak in behind someone else.  We then spent the next few minutes in the lobby looking even sadder as it was dark and no one was there.  Finally Rachel just opened a door behind the desk, and the Heimleiter emerged - an awkward, short Austrian man named Karl, apparently ganz langsam and ineffectual according to my roommate.  But he gave us our keys and sent us off to our rooms, without much information about the dorm.  His office hours next week are very short and all during times that I have classes, but I need him to sign a paper so I can register with the city.  Central already told us to lie about what day we arrived, I will just have to lie more, since I can't get it in until later because of this.

I met my roommate pretty soon after arrival, and she is very nice.  She speaks German and English very well and seems to just respond in whatever language I start off speaking to her in, so we have a little weird mix going on right now.  Our room is nice and big, even though the bathroom light doesn't work and my bed light doesn't work.  The bathroom light is really the only big problem - showering in the dark last night was not the most fun.  I'm still on a quest to find a desk lamp that can double as a bed lamp when I need it to.

Friday was Central College's insane whirlwind of activity day.  Orientation in the morning was essentially filled with throwing a bunch of mostly-confusing forms at us, saying YOU MUST FILL THESE OUT AND TAKE THEM TO VARIOUS PLACES IN THE CITY NEXT WEEK, a nice, comfortable little talk about not breaking any more doors and essentially not being like the frat boy half of our program in Schwaebisch Hall, and a few things about academics.  They then took us to a few of the Universität buildings, most of which are within a 10 to 15 minute walk from my dorm, which is nice.  

We had a bit of a break during which many of us went on a frantic trip for bed sheets, which we found and which are very comfortable.  Then we had a tour of the city, which I kind of just wish they had saved till Saturday since by that point we were all very tired, wanted to buy things we needed, and it was still raining.  But, we did see lots of palaces and Hapsburgs houses...always a bonus.  Then dinner with the professors all paid for by Central...soup and goulasch and beer and chocolate cake for me.

Today was shopping day, and I found everything I needed but the desk lamp, the quest for which will continue on Monday.  Also did not find an open Apotheke, but tbc on Monday as well.  Three friends and I had a very nice dinner at a good Asian restaurant, followed by some quality time walking around to look at the Rathaus and Volksoper and to sit on the giant statue in front of the Hapsburgs´ palace.  

Anyway, I am convinced that perhaps by the end of this week I will understand the U-Bahn and street car maps a little better, but I have not actually gotten lost yet!  I have, in fact, led people home with the handy gigantic map of the city.  

On Monday I´ll have my first class, which is Central´s theatre class.  I think I am actually taking all of Central´s classes, plus one at the Uni.  I am also being interviewed by Greenpeace on Wednesday...AHHHH.

Also.  Auf wiedersehen bis das Wetter shöner ist.

(goodbye until the wetter is better and I have seen more of Vienna).

Mein Gott. Wien.

And...freak out time about Vienna.  Central College seems to be very good at not telling us most of the important information until right before we absolutely have to know it.  That will be the meeting on Wednesday afternoon, and then we leave Thursday morning.  And...dragging my way-over-the-weight-limit-suitcase to ZOB, the bus stop across town.  I still don't know a lot about what happens once we actually arrive in the city - registering with the city, whaaaaat? - and I'm sure on Wednesday they will just throw all the information at us.  So, nervous about that, and about spring break a little, because getting to the Amsterdam hostel to meet Rachel might be difficult, and Charles de Gaulle is always insane and I have no French abilities, but at least Copenhagen has calmed down some and we're just going to Legoland all day anyway.

But...I am very excited for Vienna.  I looked up the district I'm living in (again, thank you Central for not telling me much).  It's the 9th, pretty much full of University buildings and otherwise academically related things.  It looks pretty.  

On Thursday Laura came to visit and we had lots of German adventures.  And by lots of German adventures, I mean that we went to the ruins, Comburg, went to some bars and a good restaurant, and frolicked around Schwaebisch Hall.  This time, I remembered to bring my camera to Comburg, and it was just as beautiful as I remembered.  I also decided that the wall overlooking the city in the ruins is my favorite place to sit possibly ever.  Laura walked around photographing things and I sat there for maybe 30 minutes and was completely calm. 

On Friday night friends and I borrowed the Goethe Kino (actually, we got Gesine to come make it work for us) and watched The Third Man, in honor of our upcoming travels.  It was very intriguing, and now I sort of wish Vienna was all black and white and everyone there spoke in film noir dialogue.  But hopefully we are taking The Third Man tour there, and we can all pretend to chase Orson Wells everywhere.  And yay, I understood most of the German in it.  Furthermore, Holly Martins might be the best name I've heard, and now I wish I could play the zither.

So...more from me once I'm in Vienna.

Bauchschmertz :(

This day has been full of food.  I was at the Steinmeyer's house all day, basically eating the entire time.  They made me waffles, which are really good German-style, but then they kept making waffles.  They made three batches of batter.  I don't know why that many waffles were necessary, but they were very good.  I would have thought that would be enough food for the evening, but then a huge platter of sausages, cheeses, breads, pickles, peppers, and apples arrived on my lap.  I managed almost half of it, while watching a German crime drama show that was completely more insane than most of the same American genre.

Yesterday I went to Nurnberg.  The bus ride there was interesting because they guy that was taking us would not stop talking for the entire time, about things nobody wanted to hear about.  It was 8:30 in the morning and we really just wanted to sleep, but he was on the loudspeaker the whole time explaining things like, "If you see a truck with a blue stripe, it's from Poland" in German.  For one and a half hours.  I turned up my iPod all the way.  Then he was leading a tour when we got there, which my friends and I started out on but quickly realized it was just more of him talking forever and ever, and so we (not-so-discreetly) ditched it.  

We ended up with a very American breakfast of omelets (finally, there are otherwise no scrambled eggs to be found in Germany, at least not that I've seen).  Then we just walked around for awhile, not really sure what we were looking at, but it was all very pretty.  There were lots of very old, gigantic churches.  We went inside a lot of them, and saw that they all were, as usual here, reconstructions, since the originals got bombed.  But still, very beautiful.  We also found a castle.  A castle for what or who, we don't know, but it was fun.  And later on the drive out, we saw Hitler's crazy copy of the Colosseum, where he thought he could build all of the biggest and most important buildings in the world, but make them better.  Admittedly, it was pretty impressive.

And, speaking of Hitler, my class this week was for some reason about assisted suicide, Sterbehilfe.  Since I am in the intermediate-advanced level, we are working on expressing our opinions on lots of topics auf Deutsch, but this was probably one of the more depressing we could have chosen.  The class was about the medical version and whether it should be legal or not, but researching it online led me to lots of stuff about Nazi "euthanasia" programs, and then pictures of all the death camps, and then I basically just felt horrible for a night.  I'm pretty sure I could not even go on a tour of one, or stand in the gas chambers, like I saw pictures of people doing.  And it all just reinforced my strong opposition to the death penalty, because there were pictures of Nazi gas chambers, and then pictures of American death penalty gas chambers, and they looked the same.

So...on better topics, last weekend I saw the Mercedes Benz museum in Stuttgart, which was really really cool, and talked to some random German guy in German for awhile waiting for the train, which made me happy.  I also bought Harry Potter in German (Harry Potter und der Gefangene von Askaban) and I loooooove it.  I'm learning a lot of new fantastical vocabulary, and I actually understand a lot, but that might be mostly because I've read it enough in English.  But I spent last Sunday, when it was beautiful and sunny but still very very cold outside, sitting in the park reading it, surrounded by ducks.  

Spring break is almost finalized, just working out Paris.  The hostel we are trying to get is very close to the Moulin Rouge, and I definitely want to go to a show.  And also, Laura is coming to visit on Thursday, and I am excited.

Gute Nacht.

They leave the West behind...

I am now returned from the exhausting Berlin trip.  (Thanks, German grammar, that is how it first came out).  Hanover was disastrous, but I am now a member of Hostelling International, which it looks like I'll need for the crazy Scandinavia trip we're trying to plan for spring break.

Yesterday I spent several hours at the Steinmeyer's house - my tandem partners.  Jona, the 5 year old boy, was mad at me for awhile because his mom made him came home since I was there, instead of play with his friend after kindergarten.  But then we got home and he put all of his toys all over me again and everything was fine.  We talked in English almost the whole time, but the mom, Keri, said she was very impressed with my German when I did use it.  She made me dinner again, and bought me a donut and cookies.  They love to give me stuff, and I'm not good enough at being direct and German-like to refuse it.  But I enjoyed it all.  Dad Klaus, who is my favorite German person I have ever met, came to take me home, in half the time it would have taken an American driver.  

It feels very strange having all the new Americans here.  Last month, there were a lot more students, and they were from more countries.  This month was the American invasion, and there are just less people over all.  My class is half American, except for the Turkish guys who also stayed another month, and are some of the nicest people I know.  Stephania made a surprise return, here to represent Italy for a little while longer.  We even talked about the American election, auf Deutsch naturlich, in my class.

Speaking of which, a reporter from Schwaebisch Hall came to talk to American students at Goethe about the election.  Unfortunately the first guy he found was Ben, who told him that he is very conservative, essentially in love with Mitt Romney, and thinks all the democratic candidates are crazy radicals.  He was not the best representation of America, and the rest of us were standing around embarrassed, especially when he talked about how great the Iraq War is and couldn't speak one word of German.  Luckily, the guy then talked to Suzanne from my class, who likes Obama and is way more liberal, and basically smarter about the whole thing.

Anyway, too bad for Ben Romney got kicked out of everything.

I also basically have my classes lined up for Vienna.  Three classes from Central (in partnership with the Uni, still obviously taught in German): German Literature from Realism to the end of the 20th Century, Theater in Theory and Praxis, the Music workshop which is only one weekend, and the History of Austria seminar that we all have to take.  Then one at the University, which I'll be counting towards my minor:  Love, Honor, and Adultery in Medieval Literature.  A little scared of doing things in Middle High German in a class taught all in Modern High German, but I am up for the challenge.  Vielleicht.  And then, according to Ruth, I am most likely getting an internship at Greenpeace.  Ganz toll.

Back to Stuttgart for a day this weekend, because why not.  Today Suzanne, Rachel, Rob and I climbed a mountain...it felt like...and found a meadow and giant expanses of farmland, where we proceeded to (yet again) pretend we were in The Sound of Music.  We have also already planned trips to Salzburg just for that purpose.

Gute Nacht, must face terrifying teacher in the morning.

Also, best picture of all time, when our tour guide made me and one other girl represent East and West Berlin.

Hey there, Old Sport.

Today was the attempted excursion to the Baltic coast of Germany. With a bit more planning, it probablý would have gone a lot better. We did actually get there, but it was something of an adventure.

Getting up somewhat late as usual and taking a long breakfast break, we finally got to the Hauptbahnhof to discover that the ticket we thought we could get did not actually exist. We ended up with two state group tickets, and headed off on a 2 hour 40 minute train ride to Rostock, on the northern coast of Germany. Once in Rostock, where it was already somewhat dark and very cold, we looked at a map and assumed we could easily walk to the beach. This was not true, a fact we realized after a cafe-break. We took a long S-Bahn trip, got off one stop too early at what appeared to be some sort of industrial stocking yard, sat around in the dark and extreme cold for twenty minutes, and then finally made it to the stop that is at the boardwalk. By this time it was definitely night and definitely dark.

The boardwalk was nice, and I would like to come back to the area in summer, when the conditions are not so harsh, and when all the boats are in use and the restaurants and other things open. We walked down the boardwalk, believing the ocean not to be far away. Yet again, this was not true. We got past all the shops and restaurants, and saw a green lighthouse in the distance. It didn't look too far, so we began our trek through the tundra of the Baltic to the pale green light (there were three Creative Writing majors in the group, of course there were Great Gatsby references).

I thought I might have been on another planet. We could hardly see anything but the floating green light we were heading towards, the wind was so hard it pushed us as we tried to walk, and the air was frigid. I have probably been colder at Hamilton, but being right by the ocean, it felt extreme. It was probably the strangest ten minute walk of my life, past shadowy sand dunes on one side and the sea on the other, against the wind throwing sand into our faces, all the while losing feeling in my extremeties.

We got to the lighthouse and stayed there for about a minute, it was so cold. Everyone was complaining, but I thought it was pretty amazing, staring out at the nothing of the ocean at night, the Ostsee. It was so cold and so windy, and the water was so dark since there was cloud cover, and the only lights came from murky and slightly disturbing looking distant lighthouses, besides the one right above us. My brain immediately went, you could do your best writing at a time like this. I felt like a Viking.

After a long ride, we got back to Berlin. Tomorrow is my friend Rachel's birthday, so we will have a good time. Yesterday I not only saw Knut, the cutest animal I have ever seen, but also Iron and Wine in concert in a church...in Berlin. Yeah. It's been a good week.

To Hanover on Saturday, then home to Schwaebs on Sunday.

Bis spater.

berlin...

I have spent the day touring Berlin, and don't want to forget some of the things I've seen. (Also, typing on a German keyboard seems to only be getting more difficult for me).

Our hostel offers walking tours of the city everyday, so today I was guided around Berlin by Bartleby Pole, someone who should possibly exist in only Harry Potter books. He was funny and informative, and serious when appropriate. And also extremely British, complete with loaded French jokes and all. He took us time travelling basically, and we started with a lot of Prussian buildings. The Catholic and Protestant cathedrals that were built across from each other in a gesture of friendship are my favorite.

We saw the old city library, the Platz that was the cite of major Nazi book burnings. We saw, in fact, a lot of buildings that used to be Third Reich and are now used, obviously, for much different functions. Working in them must be very strange.

Within the Nazi-era part of the tour, we ended up standing on top of the exact spot of Hitler's bunker, the ground of which is still intact a few meters underground. We saw the area where Goebels dragged his body out after he killed himself, where the Soviets found and identified him a few days later. Needless to say, it was one of the more disturbing places I've been, even though it's now just a spot of grass, surrounded by apartments. I cannot imagine living in those apartments, because you'd wake up each day to look out at Hitler's old bunker, and just beyond that, the line where the inner Berlin wall used to stand, right next to what was known as the 'Death Zone'. Back to that in a moment.

We went to the controversial Memorial to Murdered Jews of Europe, which, even though apparently no one here can agree on whether or not it is an appropriate way to remember, I found incredibly moving and overwhelming. It is just a huge area of gray slabs of rock rising out of the ground, of various different sizes. The ground isn't level, and in the middle it turns into basically a maze. Youcan easily get lost, lose the people you came in with, trip on the uneven ground, and look around to see absolutely no one, since you're in a claustrophic row of rocks. The feeling is so disconcerting and overwhelming, that I found it an entirely appropriate memorial.

I saw the remains of the outer Berlin wall, another incredibly weird experience. It's completely decrepit now, but a line of stone marks where the rest of it would have gone, and our guide had us sit in the 'Death Zone', the area between the inner and outer walls full of landmines, traps that set off machine guns, watch towers manned with armed guards with orders to kill, sand to catch footprints, and various other ways to make sure no one ever got out of East Berlin. The number of people that apparently died trying to cross the wall is much higher than I thought. All we did was stand in the replica of Checkpoint Charlie and pretend to be smugglers.

All of that being said, Berlin is a beautiful city. The Brandenberger Tor alone is worth coming here for. Tomorrow or Wednesday we want to go into the Reichtstag buildings. A river runs straight through it, it's got all the old churches you need in any big European city, and covers what might be considered the most important events of recent history. Tonight we went in a church that was almost entirely destroyed by one of the air raids, but was still gorgeous. And the differences between the eastern and western parts of the city are still amazing. I definitely want to come back here.

The Dude?

Hello from Dresden. I'm on quickly, with Rob's extra 8 minutes, trying to learn to type better on a German keyboard. We arrived this evening after long train rides, and got into our hostel, the Moon Palace easily. (I'm also having a problem because I tend to write in German grammar structure now, or spell English words weirdly that I would not have before).

The extent of the rebuilding of the city is evident. Some of it is very modern, some that apparently avoided the night bombing is very old. But tomorrow we're going exploring, before we head off to Berlin for most of the week.

Back to the bar to finish off my White Russian, or Big Lebowski as it is apparently called here.

Keiner weint um Hexen

Yesterday, a friend and I headed to Stuttgart to see Wicked auf Deutsch.  It was a good adventure.  We got there fine, the only mishap being getting off the bus at the wrong station, which should not have happened, and therefore missing the first train we could have taken.

But, we arrived in Stuttgart, got some currywurst quickly, and after a good deal of confusion, found a taxi.  The taxi ride was my favorite part of the whole trip, actually, because I had a conversation with the driver the whole time in German, and I understood almost everything he said, and apparently got my points across well enough for him to understand them.  He said we were the first Americans he'd met who were trying to learn German, and that we were doing very well.  We talked a lot about differences between America and Germany, and how he (and I) likes American people, but not American politics.  He asked me all about my opinions on the Iraq War and President Bush and I think I articulated myself well enough.  He was apparently Iranian but had lived in Germany for a long time, with a sister in Texas, so he knew a lot about everything.  It was a really good conversation, and he loved us, and I just felt myself grinning the whole time.  

We got to the theatre very early, but it was a huge complex that had way more than just a theatre, so we settled down for a little while with Apfelstrudel and Gluhwein.  I bought a shirt that says "Wicked - Stuttgart" (I wanted one with some German lyrics, but they didn't exist).  

We were way in the back for the show, but it didn't matter, because it was fabulous.  I understood enough of it, but I'm not sure if that's because I've seen it twice in English or actually knew what they were saying.  A lot of the song translations were strange and funny, but worked well enough.  "Popular" becoming "Heiss geliebt" was an especially interesting one.  But, the two main women had incredible voices and were great for their roles.  The set was exactly the same, except somehow the giant dragon looked creepier.  Seeing it in another language reinforced my somewhat-obsessive love for musical theatre, because it's universal no matter what, and still got a standing ovation over here in Deutschland.  

Getting back was fine, we just had to sprint through the train station and hope that our train went directly to Schwaebisch Hall, because we were a little unsure about that.  Then we ended up at Schwaebisch Hall-Hessental at midnight, in the rain, with no taxis and no other people.  My cell phone decided to work for once, and I called for a Taxis in broken-exhausted-German that probably sounded terrible, when one magically appeared before us.  Took us back to the institute, headed to the Wohnheim, that was the end of that adventure.

So, I've been to Stuttgart twice in the past week, and I love it.  It's a beautiful city, I'm a big fan of the Schlossgarten, and sometimes at night creepy swans approach you.  

I just went for a long walk along the river, attempting to find some ruins that I'd heard about and failing, but getting a lot of exercise and a lot of out-of-breath up a huge hill.  And tonight will perhaps contain a puppet show of Doktor Faust...

This weekend I meet my tandem partner, actually an entire tandem family, which I am excited/nervous about.  But all their emails are fun, they apparently love Americans and can't wait to speak English with me, while I try to practice my Deutsch.

The upcoming break has now turned into a massive tour of Germany, with a long stay in Berlin and some trips into Poland.  I am excited.

Auf wiedersehen.

Verknupfungen, mein neue Lieblingswort

The second week has almost passed.  And I'm sitting in a kitchen full of people, all asking things like, "How does the subjunctive possibly work?  Why does my dictionary not have half these words?"

This week I spent a lot of time sitting in cafes or bars, relaxing the European way.  I already find it easy to stay for several hours, without worrying about being rushed out by employees who are handling too much at once.  (Although, wow, I wish I'd been there for the coffee with the ex-Nazi...that happened to a friend).  Today I sat for awhile writing postcards, much calmer than I would have been in most places at home, enjoying my heisse Shokolade und Bretzel.

Last night I went out for drinks with a class I am not actually in, but was invited to go with.  Perhaps I was feeling a bit arrogant, being in a higher level than that class and speaking German with their teacher pretty well, but I think this is allowed, as I feel ein bisschen slow in my own class.

I also watched the movie here last night, Der Tunnel.  It ended up being incredibly moving, and I was happy to find that I understood most of what happened (clearly, this is because we watched it with German subtitles, but I think I still could have gotten a large portion of it without).  I also spend a long time thinking the lead man was possibly a German Bruce Willis.

One of my more interesting interactions lately was with Enrique, the old man from Spain in my class.  Until today, neither of us ever understood a word the other said, partially due to my horrible grammatical constructions, but also because of both of our accents.  However, today, we managed to have a conversation.  We were talking about an article the class read, regarding studies on whether music can actually make people more intelligent.  Enrique and I came to the eventual conclusion that yes, studying music definitely makes people smarter, but listening to it creates confusion (especially if one is trying to complete one's German homework).  During all of this, I got a good deal of his life story.  I told him about how I used to play violin, and he proceeded to explain that he always wanted to do so, but has bad bones and was told it would be physically bad for him to hold a violin for too long.  He envied the violin players that used to be in the streets of Spain, but now feels he is too old to do anything about his wish to play, whether arthritis is an obstacle or not.  He was so animated during all of this, and as a Creative Writing major, I was secretly fascinated...

I bought Die Zeit today, and felt a little strange about the headline being American news (well, that and the fact that it says "Schwarz oder Frau?" and has a picture of Obama and Clinton...which is just a somewhat uncomfortable translation).  It was good to be updated though, and I understood enough of what I've read so far to actually get something out of it.

I think today I made my breakthrough against simply going "nein" or "ja" when I don't understand a question or statement, which inevitably only makes me look more clueless.  But I managed to have several interactions (Baeckerei, buying the newspaper, die Post, and out for Doners for dinner) that did not involve me looking incredibly confused, but finally succeeding in politely getting people to repeat things.  And I had been nervous about the post office, but it went well.  

Saturday I'm off to Stuttgart, which a couple of us are trying to return to next week to see Wicked, hopefully auf Deutsch.  And we're starting, slowly, to plan for the 10 day break between January and February.  Some of us are hoping to get to the UK, which might be difficult, but I've got friends there.  STA is apparently not functioning at the moment, but Lufthansa has some flights available that aren't too crazy.  We shall see.

Need to finish the Hausaufgaben so I can successfully rise before the sun again, and head down the dark, curving hills to a fruehstuck of meats and better bread than I ever get at home.

Die Schlosser

What has been accomplished this weekend?  Yesterday I went the Alps, something I've wanted to do for a long time.  We didn't really actually spend much time within the Alps themselves, so I really want to go back and spend time hiking or just being in them.  But, I went to Neuschwanstein, mad King Ludwig II's crazy fairy tale castle.  It is beyond impressive, but also a little off-putting, because he built it high up on a mountain and the whole thing reflects all of his mental disorders, which eventually caused him to be taken out of the ruling position.  But every room was painted to look like a Wagner opera (speaking of crazy), so it really was beautiful to see.  The tour was in German, and I tried to concentrate on understanding a few sentences.  All the other American tourists there were pretty annoying, but I liked speaking German around them and feeling better about myself.  I do not understand the American desire to be as loud as possible, and to make assumptions about things you do not actually know.  ("This castle is way back from the Middle Ages!")  No.  It was built in the 1800s. 

We also spent time in Fuessen before this, a nice little Alpine town, where we all learned a little bit more about ordering food in German.  I think we must appear immediately American or at least out of place, because people speak English to us before we even say anything.   

We came back, with a nice bus ride away from the Alps, and then several of us cooked a late dinner, after a somewhat chaotic grocery-shopping trip.  Spaghetti with wurst in it, which were really just hot dogs, but we couldn't tell.  (Tonight we had frozen pizzas and had an interesting time trying to figure out the baking directions in German).  The Nutella is also present at every meal.

Today was Dreikoenigstag - Epiphany - very important here.  I went to a mass this morning at a church right next to my Wohnheim, with another Goethe student.  We were able to understand a little bit, like the Lord's Prayer, the post communion prayer, the gospel (because I know the story), and the hymns since we were reading them.  But other than that, it was difficult.  Very interesting and pleasant though, except for the fact that it looks like Europeans don't heat any rooms that they don't live in.

I went to the one bakery in town that is open on Sundays (everything else shuts down), and managed to have an entire interaction in German to order what I wanted.  It was short, but I was proud.  Then several of us walked all the way down the river and eventually out of Schwaebisch Hall.  We were told that if you walked long enough, you'd get to a castle.  And we found it, in Comberg.  It was hard to miss, sitting on top of a very high hill, extremely walled, with a giant church in the middle and overlooking the whole town.  We went inside the grounds (the museum and church were closed though, so we want to go back; also I forgot my camera), and it was more amazing even than Neuschwanstein.  This one actually looked real, and apparently did not come from a crazy person.  We walked all around in it, and could see for so far in all directions since we were up so high.  It had been raining on the way over, but the sun broke through and pretty much created some of the most picturesque scenes I have ever witnessed.  I thought I had to be in a very-nicely-shot movie at some point.

Interesting occurrences on the way back - first we saw a car with "Elvis lebt!" spray painted on it (Elvis lives).  Then we nearly got hit by the Volksmarch - the annual run that happens all over Germany on Dreikoenigstag.  It was 10 kilos, and we were right in the path.  We smelled gunpowder, knew we were in trouble, yelled a lot of "schnell, schnell!", and got out of the way in time to be hit by pouring rain and sleet.  But it was fun to watch what must have been most of the population of Schwaebisch Hall go running by.  Today, I was charged by the Germans.

I have realized that I am not really afraid to go out and do things - at first I was, thinking about how obvious it would be that I am not from here and how terrible I would be at German.  But I am less nervous about interacting with German people than I was before, and have finally begun to understand that the best way to learn is just go be in the town, like I actually really do live here.  Some people are so eager to completely hide the fact that they are American to the point that they limit themselves on what they do.  Don't be afraid to be yourself, but do try to learn about the local culture and become a part of it.  I do think both are possible.