May 18,2012 Bike Tour around Paderborn!

May 18, 2012

To be honest I thought I was going to sleep through the whole day today! However, I did make it up and dressed by about 11am. Eleven hours of sleep later I am ready to face a new day in Paderborn and feeling pretty good about the 40 mile bike ride that Lena has planned for us today. It takes us a little while to actually get going, but eventually we make it out of the apartment and headed to the train station to rent the bikes.

Renting bikes in Germany sounds like an easy concept. It’s really a tourist thing, so you would think that the people who work in bike shops would at least speak and inkling of English. Well go figure it’s our luck that we pick the only bike shop in Germany where NONE of the workers speak ANY English. Somehow, through a game of charades essentially, we are able to rent two semi decent bikes, one of which comes with a basket attached to it, the only thing that I demanded. These bikes are nothing like I’m used to though! For starters they weigh about as much as my horse and carting them up and down stairs and into buses is no easy task. Luckily, most of the stair cases have nice little ramps built into them specifically for bikes. Germans are so considerate. Finally on the bike I realize within about two minutes that the “shifter” doesn’t work worth a lick. I turn the knob to shift to a lower gear and about the time I get to the top of the rise, or about the time I get my bike up to speed, the gears actually decide that they should shift to the gear I asked them to five minutes before. This is extremely frustrating but I quickly catch on that if I purposefully hit a bump when I’m shifting the gears will actually shift at the right time. One problem solved.

Lena and I make it to the bus stop that will take us to the start of the tour and this is where the real fun starts. First off, sneaking on to a bus is a great idea, if you aren’t carting two enormous bikes with you. So we end up having to pay for our bikes, not the end of the world. It takes about two minutes into the bus ride, however, to discover that we have the worst bus driver in Paderborn, possibly in all of Germany. No kidding this guy needed to go back to bus driving school. He would hit the gas really hard and rev away from a stop and then at the next stop he would get about two feet away and then SLAM on his breaks to halt before the stop. This would be bad enough with my motion sickness if I was just riding the bus. Lena and I, however, were trying to stand up, hold on to our bikes, and attempting to keep them from rolling right into the older lady sitting in front of us with a walker. I think that moment is now classified as the longest ten minutes of my life. Somehow making it to the bus stop with all my contents still in my stomach is a miracle in and of itself.  We manage to make it off the stop and head towards were we believe is the start of the tour. After riding back and forth about three times we eventually realize we have no idea where the tour starts and Lena runs in to ask somebody at the mini golf place. Luckily, she knows where the trail head is and points us in the right direction!

A little later than we initially planned on leaving, Lena and I are finally on our way, determined to make the most of the trip and enjoy actually being on a bike again. The first 20 miles of the bike ride goes wonderfully. We pass fields, cows, stables, and agriculture. It was so nice to be out in the country again, after being crammed into a city for the past two weeks. I get to see my very first asparagus field, which is really interesting how they grow it, not at all like how it was grown back in our garden growing up. They have these long rows and you can see the asparagus shoot popping out of the ground and you can see where they had already cut some. I suppose they cut it by hand, I have no idea how you would do it with a machine, but they may have some way of doing it that I don’t understand.

We go through this very adorable town called Hovelholf and, after briefly losing our trail once; we head out to the wildlife conservatory and start looking for signs that will direct us to our next destination. However, at this point our luck runs out and we completely lose all signs of our previous trail and there are no signs of the trail we are supposed to be on. Germans are apparently very good at starting things off with excellent signage postings and then halfway through the trip all signs completely disappear. With no other choice but to head back to Hovelhof, we turn around and go back in the general direction of the town. Finally reaching the town again, and with a little help from my GPS, we locate our old trail and decide to go back on that, since we are both tired at this point and have ridden about 20 miles already.  These bikes are not the most comfortable to be on for six hours, but we make it back to Paderborn with no more issues.  Along the way we pass the beer festival again and of course have to stop and get some of that amazing cherry beer again. It was just as delicious the second time around as it was the first.

Clearly exhausted now, we’ve been riding for almost seven hours, we go to return our bikes and there is a different guy working. We didn’t think there would be any problem, but somehow Lena’s bike number got written down that she owed 9 euros still because she had kept it an extra day. We tried explaining to the guy that we had paid in full earlier today and that there was no way Lena had kept it an extra day because we only rented it seven hours ago. Of course the guy didn’t speak any English and couldn’t understand anything that we were saying to him, so Lena walked up to a younger looking guy at the station and asked for his assistance with being a translator. Once again, due to the kindness of a stranger, we were able to explain to the rental store employee what was happening and asked him to get out the paper we had filled out earlier that day that had all our information on it. Turns out the previous person who had rented the bike had not paid his money and we were able to straighten out the whole mess. Yup, definitely learning the language next time I go to a foreign country.

After getting that entire bike mess straightened out we make a brief stop at the grocery store, where I find a HUGE jar of pickles for like 1.29, we head back to the apartment. We make spaghetti for dinner, and I actually make the sauce without burning anything! Pretty impressive for me, though Lena does help with the seasoning of the sauce, but I still like to think that I actually contributed to a meal for change. Then we sit down and watch a few episodes of Smallville before turning in for the night. J

May 23, 2012 Met my first Croatian dog!

May 23, 2012

Today was the third day in a row that I have not been able to sleep at night and when I finally do get to sleep, construction wakes me up at about 4am. For some reason people have decided that it is a good idea to start construction that early right outside our window. Not exactly the most pleasant thing to wake up to in the morning, but at least I know I’m never going to be late for a seminar. Today we are meeting at 9am to head to the Bavarian Landtag, which is the building that houses the Bavarian parliament. I’m actually pretty excited because we get to talk to one of the vice-presidents of the parliament. This trip has given me a new perspective on different countries’ politics and how they are run. Starting think I actually chose the right major this time with pre-law, I actually have a passion to learn this!

Of course the taxi service is running late and we have to rush to get to the building on time. On the way there I see the building that I ran into yesterday on my walk and I ask Dr. Copeland what that building was. She replied that that was the Bavarian Landtag. Ummm ok, I tried to break into that building yesterday, guess it is a good thing that my endeavors don’t always succeed.  Arriving finally in the back of the building, where I now see security gates and guards. Guess I should’ve walked all the way around to actually see what building I was trying to get into. We actually make it five minutes early, but end up having to wait another half hour because the person who is supposed to let us in is running a bit behind. I entertain myself by playing Teeter on my phone as successfully making it to level 17. We are escorted to a room in the back of the dining area where we are meeting our lecturer.

Franz Maget is quite an entertaining guy and I like him instantly. He is very friendly and engages us in a friendly conversation about the Bavarian Landtag, some of its functions and purposes, and then we talk about education in Germany and specifically Bavaria. Education here is much different in the US. For example, public education is completely free, no matter how high you want to take it. The most it would cost someone is 1,000 euros a year, and there are government programs that will subsidize that for you. Ok, I’m moving to Europe now, too bad my education is essentially over for an undergrad. Not that I’m ungrateful for my education, I got pretty lucky with paying for school. After about an hour of discussing the differences in education and what the Landtag’s role is in education, we head out for a tour of the Landtag and the building.

The building is absolutely gorgeous and has all original paintings from the time it was built to the current time. We make it to the actual Landtag chambers and Franz Maget was showing us around when we got kicked out because they had to bring in the drug sniffing dog. Apparently parliament was having a session that afternoon and they always have to bring in dogs to scout the room before the session starts, just to ensure the safety of the members of the parliament.

We have a nice lunch with a couple of old friends of Dr. Rivello and Dr. Copeland and then head back to the hotel for a short break before we have to leave for our next seminar this afternoon. I spend the time attempting to apply for jobs, but of course I run out of time to finish the application, which probably means I’ll have to start it over when I get back. Oh well, that’s the way the cookie crumbles sometimes.  So after about a 20 minute break it is back on the road and we head to the Geschwister-Scholl-Institute. There we meet Dr. Renner who will be talking to us about animal rights and what that means in Europe. This lecture is by far the one that I’ve been most looking forward too, since it is directly related to my Honors Thesis topic that I’ve been working on all semester. I’m not disappointed and Dr. Renner gives a very interesting lecture, I could’ve gone on asking questions for ages, but sadly we have to leave since it is getting pretty late in the evening. However, before we leave we get a chance to meet Dr. Renner’s dog and he is a gorgeous black lab mix that she adopted from Croatia. I’ve officially met my first Croatian dog and he was adorable. Anton was a little shy at first, but after a few scratches and having four girls ooh and aah over him, he was quite friendly and enthusiastic. 

After leaving Anton we head back to the hotel to grab some laundry and get it done before we go to dinner. This is the second time I have to do laundry and I don’t really want to pay another 13 euros, so I opt for just a wash and decide to let all my laundry dry back in my hotel room. So currently as I’m sitting here typing this there is bits and pieces of my clothes strung out all over the place, including out the window. However, it does make the room spell quite pleasant, like there was Febreze sprayed everywhere. Now I think I’m going to head to bed while watching an episode of Smallville, shout out to Lena for getting me addicted to that show again! J

May 17, 2012 40 hours no sleep?!

May 17, 2012

Making it to the train station this morning with no trouble I find my train and somehow manage to find my seat as well. It was my first time on the ICE train so I was a little confused on where my seat was. However, I somehow manage to find it without having to make too big of a fool of myself. This train isn’t to uncomfortable, but for whatever reason I just can’t sleep so I spend the majority of time attempting to shift from one position to another without disturbing the guy sitting beside me. At the first switchover I almost miss my train because I have no idea which one it is, but manage to make it on with barely five minutes to spare. Next time I go to a foreign country I really have to learn their language. It’s very hard not knowing what they are saying and not understanding what you are reading. The next switchover goes a lot smoother because my train actually has a number on it and I can easily identify it. So after five hours of being on a train and running on about 30 hours without sleep I make it safely to Paderborn.

To be honest at this point I am about ready to crash on the ground, but I only have a few days here with Lena so I push aside the tiredness and go exploring with her and Eric in downtown Paderborn. It’s actually a very quaint city and has the more small town feel to it that Regensburg had. We go into a few of the churches in Paderborn, which are all gorgeous. There are so many churches in each city that it amazes me. I thought the bible belt in the South was bad, but it has nothing on these German cities. We find the “three hares” at one of the churches, which is apparently a famous sculpture on a window, another story that I am going to have to look up since I cannot understand the German sign next to the sculpture.

After going through downtown we hop a bus to a castle that is by Paderborn. This is the first  castle I actually have a chance to go through and explore. It’s very pretty and is complete with a moat surrounding it, another first for me.  As we walk through the castle I am completely fascinated by all the ducks that are in the moat, including these ducklings that are so freaking adorable. I’m pretty sure I stood there for about an hour just watching them. There was this one particular duckling that was trying so hard to be independent of his parents and kept swimming away and looking for his own food. As I was watching him, he surprised a fish in the pond and it jumped up and grabbed the duckling’s beak for a second. The poor duckling was so surprised he swam back to his parents as fast as he could. I practically died laughing at that point.  

When I was through being fascinated by the ducks we went in back to the castle grounds and discovered that there was another beer fest happening. Wondering through the festival, we initially weren’t going to try anything there, but then Lena and I kept seeing people with this red beer that came from Grimbergens. We opted to try it just for the heck of it. Worst mistake ever. We have become addicted to it. It turned out to be this cherry beer that they make and it is so good!  I wanted to guzzle it down, but at the same time wanted to savor every drop. Definitely the best drink that I have had here yet. Eric ended up getting this huge stick of meat with a roll on the end. It looked like something that would’ve come from the middle ages, but apparently was extremely good. We finally leave the festival and head back to the apartment in Paderborn.

Finally getting back to the apartment I am so tired that I am ready to crash right there, but I’m also starving so we decide to go grab some pizza. There is this amazing pizza place right down the street from Eric’s apartment and we have this delicious Mexican pizza. I can barely taste it at this point however because I have been up for 36 hours.  I stay up for a little longer though so I can have  a quick skype date and then crash in bed. Takes me about two minutes before I am dead to the world for the next ten hours. J

May 16, 2012

May 16, 2012

Today we woke up a little early to head to the market and buy flowers for Dr. Copeland, who tried to hide the fact that her birthday was yesterday. We found some nice flowers at the market across the street from us and made it back to the hotel a little early for our trip to the nuclear power plant. Dr. Copeland seemed to enjoy her flowers, but sadly couldn’t accompany us on our tour of the nuclear plant. After everyone had their passports and notebooks we head off to meet with the instructor that will be taking us to the nuclear plant.

The instructor talked about renewable energy and what nuclear power is doing to the environment and why Germany has decided to get away from it. He offered a different perspective of nuclear power than our first professor in Regensburg had. While our first professor was for nuclear power this professor was definitely against it, so I could tell that this would be an interesting trip to the power plant with someone who supported the closing of it. After the brief lecture we head into the car and make the hour and a half trip to the power plant Isar #2. Due to my intense motion sickness, I opt to sleep the majority of the trip to avoid getting sick.

We arrive at the nuclear power plant and our welcomed by our tour guide. She is a very nice lady who is obviously pretty smart because keeping up with her throughout the tour is quite a challenge. We go through security at the plant and our put into these white jumpsuits with yellow ducky shoe covers. No kidding it looks like we are about to take flight to space. Finally arriving to the plant we are able to see where the reactor is housed and the water that cools the used rods and how they are stored. It is a very interesting process and being able to tour the plant was quite an experience, especially when we are informed that this tour is probably the last tour that will be done, as the plant is going through its closing down process.  Keeping up with the process of nuclear power is exteremly hard as there are so many little things that affect the power output and I can’t really keep up with it all. The tour lasts about three hours and then we are served some dinner and have a discussion time with the tour guide. At one point during this discussion I thought her and our professor were about to get into a fight. They have very differing opinions on the closing of the plant and the discontinued use of nuclear power in Germany altogether.

Eventually we have to leave the power plant since it was getting pretty late. I still had some more questions, but we were already late leaving so I decided to withhold them until a later time. On the journey back I’m actually able to stay awake for the majority of the trip and get another good look at the German countryside.  Arriving back we have only a short time to get ready before we meet up with someone who used to go to my high school. Luckily he was running a little late to so we had enough time to get four girls ready for a night out.

We end up going to this pasta place for dinner and poor Mo has to translate for all of us since they have no English on the menu. I end up ordering a delicious pesto pasta with some spinach and a white beer that I hadn’t tried before. Ordering was quite an experience, but the guy who made our food was exteremly helpful and, along with the help of Mo, we were all able to get what we wanted, even with some complications. After dinner we head out for some drinks at a local cocktail bar, which is very crowded. One nice thing about this bar is all the drink names are in English, so we can actually order drinks without having to guess, for the most part, what is in it. I order what I think will be a good drink, and it ends up tasting like pure alcohol. I guess Germans make their cocktails extra strong, cause there is no way I would’ve gotten that much alcohol in a drink in the U.S.. Luckily we are there for a little while so I have plenty of time to finish the drink and not rush it, even though one of the girls keeps challenging me to a chugging contest. Which is kind of the only way I can drink my drink since it is really strong and not exactly something that you can easily sip, it doesn’t really taste that good.

After leaving the cocktail bar we head to a dance club for a couple hours. The club was really fun, but it was extremely crowded! Most of the time you could barely move, but it was actually more enjoyable than the clubs in the U.S.. I think this is because there aren’t really those creepy guys that try to come up and dance with you. It was a blast to actually go out and with the crowded club it wasn’t that hard to hide my awful dancing skills. The next thing I know it’s four in the morning and I have to rush back to the hotel and shower really quick in order to catch my train that leaves at six. I guess there’s no sleep for me tonight, but it was a fun night so I can’t complain too much.  Guess we will see how this train ride goes after being up for 24 hours and not being able to understand any German. Wish me luck! J

May 15, 2012 Landshut and German Ducks

May 15, 2012

Had to get up way too early today! And for me it wasn’t even early, I’m getting so spoiled on this trip, but at 7:10 my alarm went off and I had to crawl out of bed. Meeting downstairs at 8:15am to leave for our field trip to Landshut I was pretty much dragging my feet out the door and to the train station. It was about a 45 minute train ride, on which I couldn’t sleep at all because I was too busy attempting to keep down the contents of my stomach. However, we finally arrive in Landshut and all my weariness is forgotten. The city is absolutely gorgeous! Definitely tied for my favorite with Regensburg. The city is about 800 years old and the gentleman that meets us at the train station is the official head of the historical architecture department in Landshut, so he is very knowledgeable about city and it’s past.

Landshut was founded over 800 years ago and still maintains a lot of its medieval features. For example walking into the city we pass through one of the first gates to the city that was there during medieval times. We then head into was used to be the biggest of three original market areas. The shops lining the street are so interesting and have the cutest things in them that I can’t help but hope we have a little extra time to explore the city at the end of our day. We stop for coffee at a little shop in the market area and I enjoy a cappuccino and the company of a very adorable puppy, who belongs to the lady sitting behind me.  Since we are in a hurry we don’t get much time to sit there and I have to drink my coffee rather quickly before we head to the city hall.

At the city hall we meet Herr Bohmeyer, who will be giving us a lecture on the local government in Germany. He doesn’t know a lot of English so the gentleman who showed us to the city hall also operates as a translator for us. I find this lecture very interesting, especially having come fresh from my local and state government class that I took this past semester. I could actually understand what they were talking about and some of the logistics behind the way that their local government is set up, which happens to be very similar to what you would find in the United States. We have a short picture session afterwards with the head of public relations and then head out for a quick lunch and for another, more in depth, tour of the city.

Lunch happens at this authentic German restaurant and, oh boy, it is sooo good! I have the spargel, which is a white looking asparagus, a delicacy in Germany because they only have it this time of year. Along with that comes a delicious cheese sauce and a pork tenderloin that is pounded flat and then deep fried, also very good, but the meal is so filling I have a very difficult time finishing it, though I do manage somehow. After lunch we say goodbye to Herr Bohmeyer and the lady with him and continue on our tour.

The church that is in the center of the city is the start of the tour and we learn that it was actually the citizens of the tour that built the church and not the Duke. The church took over 100 years to build and was 650 years old! The current church was built on top of the first church that was built in the town and you could actually walk below the current church to the old one, although we were not allowed to. The steeple on the church is the tallest brick structure in the world 129 meters tall, which ironically enough made it 30 meters taller than the Duke’s castle. The peasants wanted to prove to the Duke that they were important and wealthy also. We were able to get a short glimpse of the castle, but sadly it was too far away to go to. I’m determined to actually see inside a castle before I leave, but I’m ok holding out for Neuschwanstein, which is the one I really want to visit while I am down here.

Unfortunately, our tour has to be cut short do to the impending weather, so we are briefly shown the city hall, where the paintings on the wall depict the marriage of a Duke to a Polish princess, a tradition that is shown through a festival that the city puts on every four years. The festival is a huge deal in Landshut and attracts visitors from all over the world. I guess that’s another thing to add to my bucket list. We are also shown a mini model of the city that the officials use to see what kind of buildings should be allowed in the city and where they should go. Landshut puts a lot of emphasis on combining the old with the new and keeping the historical context of the city. The guy who gave us the tour was so in love with the city and you could tell that he absolutely loved talking about his city. It’s so rare to see that kind of passion in a person for the place where they live. I felt that if I was thinking about moving to Germany I would move to Landshut just for how well that guy sold the city. It wasn’t even just him though; both people that we talked to today had a passion for their city that I haven’t seen anywhere else. Sadly we did not get time to go back and explore the shops, but maybe someday I’ll be back if I go to that festival.

The train ride back was uneventful and I was definitely feeling a little tired since it was almost 5 in the afternoon at this point. The rains put a hold on running today, so instead I work on my computer for a bit and then decide to go do laundry with Molly. We find the laundry place ok and luckily the person working in there speaks English so we have no trouble figuring out how to work the washers and order a nice cup of coffee while we wait for our laundry to finish. While we were waiting we decide to go down and ask the hairdresser how much a cut would cost. Walking in Molly approaches the gentleman and first asks him if he speaks English. Receiving an affirmative she then asks for a price list and he responds that a wash, cut, and blow dry costs 64 euros. We respond with “Well maybe we will be back” and bolt out the door. Pretty sure I’ll wait two weeks for my $18 haircut in Bristol.

It takes almost an hour to wash our laundry and since it was two hours in the dryer we decide to head to dinner rather than wait longer at the Wash and Coffee. After collecting the other two at the hotel we head to the Asabo Steak House a few blocks from the hotel and I order a jalapeno burger that is HUGE!  The food is delicious though and we have a very fun time laughing and listening to stories from each other. The couple next to us probably could’ve chilled out on the PDA, it was slightly distracting from our meal, but at the same time I feel that we were probably distracting them with our laughing and gimmicks.

Finishing dinner, Molly and I head back to collect our laundry, which has finally finished drying.  We head back to the hotel through the rain. On our way we pass through this market and I am walking on the left side of Molly, passing this tree out of the corner of my eye I see something move. Assuming it is just a pigeon I completely ignore it and keep talking to Molly. However, right as I pass the tree the “pigeon” quacks at me and I jump about three feet in the air and let out a fairly big yell. Landing on my feet and catching my breath I realize that I mistook two German ducks for pigeons and it just shocked the crap out of me when I heard them. Molly in the meantime is practically dying from laughter and I’m forced to regain whatever dignity I have left and continue to the hotel, which is now less than a block away. Somehow I don’t think I’ll be able to live down the fact that I got scared outta my pants by two ducks every again. J

May 14, 2012 Tour of City and Newspaper

May 14, 2012

This morning started out with a tour of the city with Jewish historian from Munich. We started at the new synagogue that was built after WWII, which was only about a block from our hotel. They had designed this building so that half of it resembled the Wailing Wall from Israel and the top half resembled a tent from the desert. In the same square there was a Jewish school and the Jewish museum. The entire square could not be entered by vehicles so that there was less chance of someone attempting a hate crime. The guide then took us to several other places throughout the city that were important during Hitler’s reign, however unless you had a guide to show you all these places, you would have never known what had happened there. None of the places had any plaques or signs, anything, showing what had happened at these locations. One place, where everyone was supposed to salute as they passed a statue, there was an artist’s rendition of a path that people would take to avoid that statue and therefore avoid having to do the Hitler salute. Even at that spot there was nothing indicating what the path through the alley was there for.

We went all over the city seeing some of the memorials that had been erected and some other important sites, like where the Nazi party was founded and the memorial that was erected for those affected by WWII. That memorial was one of my favorites despite, or perhaps because of, its simplicity. The memorial was a large black square block with a cage at the top of it and inside the cage was a flame that burned continuously. This was supposed to symbolize those who had been imprisoned during WWII and yet they lived on and the flame of resistance never died.

We ended the tour at the site of what was the first synagogue built in Munich. Hitler destroyed that building during his reign and erected where it once stood was a simple stone monument with Jewish carvings, indicting what once had been there. They opted not to build the new synagogue there because the Jews didn’t want it to appear as if WWII had never happened. They felt that it wasn’t something that could be torn down and then simply re-erected in the same place.

Once the tour was over we decide to head to the English Gardens and explore that area, since the other girls hadn’t seen it yet and I had only gone on that very short run in it. We eat our lunch next to this gorgeous waterfall and it is very peaceful, despite there being a lot of people in the garden. After lunch we decide to walk through the large green area and once again we run into some police officers exercising their horses there before they take them into the city. This time we get to meet a lovely young gray and a beautiful chestnut, which could probably stand to lose a bit more weight. We also learn from the officers that there is a riding academy near the garden that might actually let us ride there. Definitely going to check that out later in the week.  Finishing up our walk in the garden we head back to the hotel and arrive just in time to make it to our next seminar, which we all thought wasn’t happening for another hour, but the time had gotten changed without us knowing about it.

So off we go in a rush to catch the next train out of Munich to the outskirts of the city. Here we meet with one of the editors of the largest paper in Germany. She talks about the direction that news print is going and what is happening with newspapers, in Germany and all over. She also talks about the building where her newspaper is. This building is the most environmentally conscious building in Germany and is a large part off geothermal energy for heating and cooling. The building also is entirely electronically controlled, including the elevators, which completely fascinated me.  The view from the top of the building was absolutely gorgeous! You could see for miles in every direction and we could actually find the plaza where our hotel was located as well, even though we were a good half hour out of the city.

We went for a tour of the printing plant after our lecture with the editor and it was amazing to see the machine where the papers came from! The roles of paper that a newspaper is printed on are 12 miles long and 100% recycled. It amazes me how much greener Germans are than Americans, everything here is recycled from bottles to paper to plastic. The printing press was huge and had several different printing areas that would each print a part of the paper. Typical paper printing happened from 6pm until 3am. Although they do print other articles and magazines there, so printing is actually going on all day. At the end of the tour we each got a paper for the following day, which I seriously considered re-selling, but sadly the opportunity passed me by. 

Coming back from our unexpected workshop we all were tired, worn-out, and STARVING! I decided to get some more wonton soup at the Thai place next door, which was delicious but they wouldn’t let me order a side of rice, which is what I really wanted, so I don’t think I’ll be going back there again on this trip. Since I didn’t have any carbs with my soup I went on a hunt for a pretzel, which is sold at every bakery in Germany, and eventually found one a couple blocks from the hotel. After that dinner it left me with ,50 euro left over from my food money for the week. Thank goodness we get more tomorrow; otherwise I would probably be coming home a few pounds thinner. J  

May 13, 2012 Dachau and Haffbrauhaus

May 13, 2012

Happy Mother’s Day to all!!! We started off our day with breakfast in the hotel lobby before venturing to the train station to make our journey to the concentration camp called Dachau. Dachau is one of the oldest concentration camps in Germany and was actually the only one that was operational all twelve years of Hitler’s reign.  The train ride was pretty enjoyable and we rode by parts of Munich I never would’ve seen otherwise. We also found a poster for a horse show this coming weekend, but sadly I will not be able to attend because I’ll be in Paderborn visiting one of my best friends.

Not too much later we finally arrived at Dachau. We had to take a bus to the actual prisoner camp and then it was just a short walk to the entrance of the camp. The main entrance of the camp had the words “Work Makes You Free” in German across the gate of the camp.  Entering you could see where all the barracks used to be and the old administrative building, where the bath houses were and were the prisoners initially walked through.  Walking through the camp to the back of the concentration camp I can’t quite describe how I was feeling. All the barracks had been burned down, due to the immense disease that was present throughout the old barracks, so all that you could see was 34 foundations on either side of a row of trees. We walked down the tree lined path until we reached a path that led out of the prisoner camp to where the two crematoriums were housed. The first crematorium wasn’t used after 1943 and you could only just see inside of it. The second crematorium you could actually walk through the rooms as the prisoners would have. You started in the sanitation room, walked through the de-robing room, and then were in the gas chamber. Supposedly the gas chamber at Dachau was not used for massive gassing of prisoners, but there are reports that it was used for single executions and for small groups. We then headed into the death chamber and then the crematorium where the dead bodies were burned and the last chamber where the dead prisoners from the camp were put to be burned.

I felt a little weird walking through the same building that the prisoners previously had walked through. There were mass graves for the ashes around the crematorium and you could walk right up to the wall where the prisoners were shot by pistol, execution style.  After leaving the crematorium area we walked to the three memorials that had been erected by a Pentecostal church, a catholic church, and the Jewish church. I didn’t go into the Pentecostal one because it was a legitimate church, but I did explore the catholic and the Jewish memorials and both were very well put together. The catholic memorial had a large crown of thorns adorning it, symbolizing the misery that happened at the camp. The Jewish memorial had a ramp that led into darkness with one ray of light coming through a hole in the top of the building where you could see the nine-candle statue symbolizing Judaism at the top of the opening.

I decided to walk back up the camp and see the two barracks that had been reconstructed by the camp when it was turned into a memorial. They showed how the barracks had changed over the years from when the camp had first begun to when it was overcrowded with people. The first barracks each prisoner had their own bunk with a little shelf above it for belongings, in the second room there were still individual beds, stacked three high, but no shelf and no ladder to reach the higher beds, in the last room all the beds were stacked three high and you couldn’t distinguish where one bed ended an another began.  There were 54 prisoners for each sleeping area and there was one wash area that was shared between two different sleeping areas. Each barrack also had a dining area, complete with lockers and a stool for each prisoner. Everything had to be kept in perfect order and nothing was allowed to be put out of place or a prisoner risked being shot. Within the barracks it was common to have suicides, though sometimes so called suicides were really improper treatment from the guards.

I then walked through the museum and read some personal testimonies from prisoners who had survived. The museum took over an hour to get through, but I could have easily spent longer in there reading all of the information. By far not enough time, only spent about two hours total, in Dachau. But emotionally I may not have been able to handle much more.

After taking a short bus ride, and some slight confusion as to which train we should be on, we are on our way back to Munich. I get off with Dr. Copeland and Dr. Rivello a few stops early in order to purchase my ticket to Paderborn this weekend. Despite the fact that it was a bit more than I wanted to spend I finally got it purchased and am officially ready to go to Paderborn on Thursday! Very excited to see Lena and Eric and watch them play football this weekend.

On our way we stopped and I got to try my first espresso in Germany. Can I just say that it is so much better here! Thanks Dr. Rivello for getting me that! We then head back to the hotel for the afternoon. While the rest of my group decides to sleep I opt to go for a run and find out where this infamous English Garden is.

Only getting slightly confused on where I was going once I eventually find the Garden about a mile away from the hotel. I fell in love the instant my foot hit the dirt path. First off the dirt paths to run on were a welcome relief from the hard pavement I had been running on and I could practically feel my shin splints disappearing.  The park was GORGEOUS! There were running paths everywhere and for the first time I actually ran into other runners out and about. I decided to run around the large green area towards the front of the park, since I didn’t want to get too lost on my first day. I found this amazing waterfall that was very close to a Japanese garden. Definitely decided to go back another day when my main focus would be taking pictures and not exercise. I’m actually really excited to go back running on those paths and may even go tomorrow before we have to leave for our seminar.

Arriving back at the hotel my fellow classmates were still sleeping so I kill some time on youtube, interestingly enough watching videos on the Europe horse slaughter, and prepare to go back out for dinner. We decide to go to the Haffbrauhaus, which is a famous brewery in Munich that has been around since 1516. Dinner was great, but the beer there was even better! I had my first authentic German liter beer and still have the glass to prove it. J After finishing our sausages and our beer, Molly and I engaged in a chugging contest at the end, which I won, title is still mine! Well minus that one person who beat me. One day I’ll reclaim full honors. We leave the Haffbrauhaus and take the long way back to the hotel through part of the Marienplatza again. I experience my first Burger King in Germany on the way back since it is the only place with ice cream that is still open on a Sunday afternoon. All in all I’m slightly embarrassed that of all the places I could’ve ended up in I went to Burger King, not like I can’t find those in the U.S.. After desert we head back to the hotel since it is a little late at night and we are all ready for some shut eye.