30 Days of Germany: Day 2 (May 22nd)–Bamberg, Germany

This past weekend my friends and I took a Sunday day trip to Bamberg, Germany. There wasn’t any significant reason as to why we chose that particular city – we just wanted to go somewhere in Bavaria that we hadn’t been before. So, for my second day, I’m going to feature some pictures and travel adventures from our trip to Bamberg.

We met at Hauptbahnhof at 9 am on Sunday morning and the twelve of us split up three Bayern tickets. The traveling menagerie – me, Eric, Nuno, Ana, Dieter, Sara, Anne, Simon, Kiira, Elisa, Florian, and Kaja. Our train left Munich around 10 am so we bought some snacks and beer and we settled in for the three hour train ride to Bamberg. I love train rides – especially when I’m with my friends – so the fact that we had to sit on the train for such a long time was not a big deal to me at all. We listened to each other’s iPods (Backstreet Boys serenades!), played games (between two different iPads, Ana’s phone, and my iPod), drank beer, laughed, talked, gossiped. When we reached Nuremberg, we had to switch to an SBahn and take another hour long train ride into Bamberg. By the time we got on the SBahn, it was already 12:30 and it was HOT. We spent the next 45 minutes on the suburban train sweating and drinking even more beer to beat the heat. But, it was worth it when we got to Bamberg and stumbled off the train – half of us drunk and smiling, having just thoroughly enjoyed our long journey. We ambushed the McDonald’s bathroom and Florian let me sneak into the men’s rest room on his receipt code. Win! Then we journeyed out into the city with no real direction or travel intentions – just a desire to wander around and find stuff that was interesting.

Anne and I with our Helles on the train! It’s not a Bavarian train ride without ‘em!

Our trash can on the SBahn. Party machen!

The city of Bamberg was quaint and absolutely beautiful. It rained for the first hour or so that we were there but that didn’t stop us from enjoying it. I think the gray skies gave the city a bit of a menacing charm – and I got to dance in the rain. No big deal! It’s just water! We wandered from church to church – one of which was located on top of this massive hill with breathtaking views of the city. We took pictures on the numerous bridges that we crossed – Bamberg has the reputation of being called Germany’s Venice, for the rivers and bridges and buildings located on the riverbanks. After the rain and after we emerged from two hours worth of dinner, beer, and good company in a traditional Bamberg restaurant, the city was ridiculously beautiful and we got some great pictures.

Lighting candles in the church – thinking of my ma!

The whole traveling group (from left to right) – Florian, Elisa, Kaja, Sara, me, Anne, Simon (we made him crouch down! ha), Ana, Nuno, Eric, Dieter, and Kiira

We made our way back to the train station just in time to catch a 7:15 train back to Nuremberg. We loaded up on snacks and beer (seriously, we were drinking ALL DAY) and jumped on the train that would take us to our connection train in the next city. We were all so tired but we drank right through it and as the train traveled on – we got sillier, louder, and more ridiculous. I’m sure that anyone who was on the train with us didn’t want to be and by the time we got to Nuremberg, we had more stores and more beer to buy. So for the last three hour train ride that would take us to Munich, most of us managed two to three beers each, and we even got away with playing a deliciously entertaining drinking game that involves whispering predictions of who’s most likely to do what and a lot of irony, laughter, and extreme entertainment. We made it back to Munich at 11:30 and while everyone else decided to go home, Anne and I thought it would be fun to keep the night going and we ended up at our favorite cluster of hostel bars. It turned out to be an epic fail as Anne had her money stolen and I had to borrow 10 EUR from a hotel desk clerk near my house because I didn’t have enough change to pay my taxi driver. Epic fail, lesson learned. But, in the end, it was a travel day success. This trip was one of the best that I’ve taken since living in Germany and is almost up there at the top with our 22-hour adventure to Ludwig’s Neuschwanstein castle in August. With only 27 days left in Munich, it is the days like this that I will hold on to and hope for as my time in Munich continues to dwindle down. I will never forget these days and I consider myself extremely blessed to be able to share them with the people that have made my experience in Munich so much better. Next time, road trip to Berlin! Woo!

A Final Weekend at Fruhlingsfest, Late Nights, Impending Endings, Employment Prospects, and the Joy of Being an Au Pair

This past weekend I went for a second round at Fruhlingsfest and I had so much fun. Beer festivals are one of the things that I will miss the most about Munich. And there are a lot of things that I will miss but beer festivals are definitely up there at the top of the list. I like it much better than Oktoberfest because there are less people and more available tables, faster service, etc etc. We had a table right up front, center stage to the band that played all night long. We danced and sang along and had a merry time, right up until they closed and kicked us all out. And I practiced great self control. It was my pay day and I only bought two beers. Instead of five like I did the previous weekend. After the festival, a few of us braved the rain and decided to go clubbing. We ended up at Cord, a club that plays some great indie music and even though I paid 6 EUR for the cover, I only stayed about an hour or so before I left to catch the last train home. I was ridiculously tired from all of the dancing that I had been doing that day. I made it home by 2:30, soaking wet and cold, took a long, late night bath, and then went to bed close to 4 am. The night before that, I'd stayed up until about the same time, drunk off of Friday the 13th festivities and two or so bottles of wine. Last night, on Sunday, I stayed out with friends at a shisha bar until 2 a.m. I definitely need to make this week one of early nights and catch up a bit. I'm starting to feel ill from only sleeping 4 to 5 hours every night. Personal challenge accepted! Unless I have plans (aka Shamrock's karaoke) I will be in bed at 10:30 and lights out by 11 most nights this week. Haha. We'll see how well this goes!

Happy German girl at the festival!

They had these lit up while they played “Ring of Fire” by Johnny Cash

Full Monty show on the Augustiner stage!

Q62, Shisha bar!

Paul taught me this trick and Cris tagged me in this photo. Thanks Cris!

Yesterday (the 15th) was the one-month mark to the end of my au pair contract. On June 15th, I am officially done being an au pair and I will be set free for five final says in Munich, unemployed and with approximately 225 EUR in hand. My friends and I have planned an epic going away slash birthday party for a collective few of us and that happens two days before I board my plane back to California. It will be a great party and I'll probably have a few drunken cries through most of it. I don't have a lot of pocket money (thanks Rome!) for the remainder of my time here so I'm limited in what I can do for the rest of my time here but I'm hoping to go to Berlin in June to visit my friend Alison and then she'll come to Munich and visit me here. It'll be good to see her before I leave, too, since she's become my best friend from the days working as a camp counselor. I have a lot of things to organize, too, as far as packing is concerned. I want to get rid of a lot of it - so many of my clothes got ruined by the damn washer and dryer and the shitty hard water in Germany so I'm going to throw most of them away. It still feels like I'll never get it all home again. Ah! I can't believe I have to leave this place... it feels impossible. It reminds me of the quote from Eat, Pray, Love:

“The only thing more unthinkable than leaving was staying;
the only thing more impossible than staying was leaving.”

I want to go home – God, do I want that. I miss my mom and I want to meet the dog that she bought to fill the void in her heart after I left. I don’t want to live with this family anymore – or any family, for that matter. I want to spent five hours in Target. I want to take peoples of people in Wal-Mart. I want to buy crossaints and muffins and pizza at Costco. I want to go to all my favorite college bars with my friends from home. I want to lay on the beach for eight hour straight. I want to see my nephews and my sister, Christy. I want to visit my family in Montana. I want to sit down and tell my grandma all about my year abroad. I want to drive around in my car for hours and hours and turn the music up really loud and roll all the windows down. I want to get my hair cut and colored and get a manicure and pedicure and have my eyebrows waxed. I want to have a wallet full of American bills and I want to pay tax again and use my debit card everywhere I go. I want to be a California girl again.

But I want to be a German girl, too. I want to stay in Munich. I want everyone that I love in Munich to stay here too. I want to sit at a shisha bar for six hours and laugh and gossip and take pictures. I want to go to beer festivals every season and dance to music that I can’t understand but love anyway. I want to spend every sunny Saturday in the English Gardens drinking beer and catching a Frisbee and singing along to Florian’s ukulele. I want to sing karaoke at Shamrock’s every Tuesday night. I want to eat Bavarian food and have sausages and leberkase available to me on every corner. I want to buy Bayern tickets and take trains to random German towns all over Bavaria. I want to drink Augustiner every day. I want to be German forever.

I’m completely torn between the two places. In the end, I am going home, that is just the way that it is and I am okay with that. but I am going to miss Munich so much. Not only will I miss all of the wonderful friends that I’ve made here but I’m going to miss the city and the culture, the food, the memories that I had while I was living here. Hell, I might even miss the kids. Haha. It’s all coming to end so much faster than I would like. I am going to be so sad to leave here. It really does feel impossible.

But, the good news is that I have a job lined up at home that I am 98% decided upon. Between the eight families that have contacted me about working for them, only two of them have really done any follow through. I’ve been discussing offers and options, back and forth, between both of them and I think that I am decided on the one that I want. They’ve offered me the better package and the most information concerning schedules, salaries, benefits, expectations, etc, etc. Plus, the one that I want is more reasonable as far as finances are concerned and it gives me more room to rebuild my life and get back on my feet. Also, it would mean that I would be living with my mom in Morro Bay and that I wouldn’t be going back to Monterey. I’ve been thinking about living there and in the end it’s more practical for me to live with my mom for the next phase of my life and then I can work towards moving back to Monterey with better financial results. Anyway, the job is great and if I decide to take it, I’ll give more details about it but for now, we’ll just leave it in a state of indecision. I should know by the end of the week what choice I will make once they give me official offers or employment that I can either turn down or accept. I will let you know, dear readers!

Speaking of being a nanny (or something of the sort), I had a lot of fun with the girls this past Friday while I was babysitting. We went to a playground after they came home from school and we played in the sunshine and put flowers in our hair. I’ve been teaching myself how to braid so I invented this whole new hairstyle on the spot and the girls each ended up with a super cool head of hair. Au pair Hezzah for the win!

My little cuties

Frühlingsfest: Bavaria’s Spring Alternative to Oktoberfest

I don’t think I would love Bavaria as much as I do if it wasn’t home to so many wonderful beer festivals. I’ve been to a few since I’ve arrived here – Oktoberfest, obviously and Starkbierfest – both interesting and unique in their own special ways. Oktoberfest is world famous and is absolutely worth visiting at least once in your life if you are a beer enthusiast and can throw back a few liters of beer on any given day. Starkbierfest (which means strong beer in English) was unique in its merchandise – beer that is loaded with carbs and a lot of potential to get you really wasted. I was lucky enough to attend both of these beer festivals (sadly I never went to the Dachau Volksfest and will miss it this summer) and, even better, I was able to attend in my tracht wear (aka dirndl) – a traditional Bavarian dress!

This past weekend, I rocked my dirndl once again and headed out to join my friends for a day of beer and sunshine at this year’s Frühlingsfest celebration. I was expecting something along the lines of Oktoberfest size but I was met with a much smaller reality. Frühlingsfest boasts only two beer tents – Augustiner and Hippodrom – and takes up about 2/8 of the space that Oktoberfest occupied. (I only fully realized this when I was ascending the crest of the Wasserbahn (log ride) and could see the grounds of Theresienwiese laid out below us.) The festival includes a midway and carnival rides and tons and tons of delicious food and drink.

Upon arrival, my friends and I first decided to have a good old fashioned race down the massive slide. I was overconfident that I would win and definitely did not. My fellow American friend, Dieter, managed to beat both Jennie and I in a race back to ground level. This carnival slide was very sophisticated – with nine slide lanes, furry bottomed slide blankets, and an escalator that took you to the top. German’s are so efficient!

Dieter in the lead, me taking second place, and Jennie taking up the rear.

Munich’s Spring Make-Over, Adventures in the English Gardens, Starkbierfest, Vacation Dreams, and Shameless Self-Promotion

Remember when I used to be really good about writing updates about my life? Those were the days. Ha. I promise you that I’ve been thinking about it – there just hasn’t been a lot of doing. I have so much to catch up so I hope that I can do it justice. This may be a fairly long update but I have a feeling that you won’t mind. :)

The best thing about my life in Munich right now is that SPRING IS HERE. And I don’t mean like, maybe spring is kind of deciding to show up… the season has done a full on, head first somersault into spring and it’s absolutely GORGEOUS. The trees started turning green sometime late last week and there’s no stopping them now. I imagine that sometime next week, Munich will be bathed completely in green and we will be in business. The weather has been absolutely breathtaking as of late – high 60’s, low 70’s for temperatures, blue skies, sunshine, cloudless afternoons. Lately I’ve been spending my days in the English Gardens, laying out in the sun with friends, picnicking, listening to music, and thoroughly enjoying the new season. I’ve gotten a few sunburns already – two or three – and as painful as they are, it’s always nice when you can say you got your first sunburn of the season in late March!

Here’s some pictures from our lay outs in the English Gardens that I graciously stole from my friends Facebooks and some that I stole from myself. Spring! Yay!

“Spring Break” in Cologne: Part II

Saturday in Cologne started around 12:30, seeing as we didn’t get up and out of bed until then. We had a late “brunch” and then headed into the city, intent on enjoying a bike ride adventure. It was a nice day – blue skies and a gentle breeze and warm weather! Everything Munich wasn’t. It took us a while to get through the city and find the bike rental station but eventually we managed. We only paid 5 EUR for a three hour rental – it was perfect. We got our bikes and headed out. Fio had done the bike ride before so she knew what she was doing. We had an hour down the right ride of the river and then we’d find a little boat that would take us to the other side. From there, we could ride down the opposite bank and get back to the city. The bike ride, each way was about 10 kilometers or 6 miles! So we rode about 12 miles on Saturday. But it was awesome and so, so, so beautiful. It was probably the best thing that came out of the weekend. I had such a good time and enjoyed the weather and scenery of Cologne from the seat of that horrible, malfunctioning bike. Sigh. Haha.

“Spring Break” in Cologne: Part I

On Friday, March 11th I traveled to Cologne for a weekend trip with my friend, Fionnuala, which was my first official inter-German travel adventure. I've been to various places within Bavaria (thank you Bayern ticket!) but this was my first trip away from Munich to another major German city. Fio's childhood and university friend, Katherine, (who'd I met for Fio's birthday in October) lives and works in Cologne so we made the trip to visit her and see the city through the eyes of a worthy "resident."

Fio and I boarded our plane in Munich around 11:30 and endured an oh-so grueling flight (50 minutes!) to northwest Germany. We landed in Cologne around 12:30 and then found our way from the airport to the city via S-Bahn. Our first stop, Cologne Hauptbahnhof and the famous Dom cathedral to meet Katherine.

Avant-Garde Performance Art in Munich, the Auer Dult Festival, a Sunday Trip to Garmisch-Partenkirchen, and a Happy Birthday Shout Out to Baby Paxton!

I can’t believe that it is Monday again… and that it’s almost November. Time is going by so incredibly fast. I don’t like it. Of course, I am seriously enjoying the beautiful autumn colors (not so much the temperatures or the rain) and the amateur photographer in me is incredibly pleased with her surroundings. This entry will be full of photos – I promise – but first, a word on my first European performance art experience.

Remember that date I was telling you about? Well, Mr. Date got fabulous cool points for picking such a cool and eclectic event for our date, that should be said. He had tickets for a music/dance performance at Muffathalle im Muffatwerk here in Munich. It’s an art theater, performance theater of some sort that doubles as a night club and bar. It’s actually a pretty cool little place and I was glad to be somewhere that I’d never been before. Anyway, the show started out fairly strange – the ‘dance floor’ was reminiscent of a flash mob as everyone (or almost everyone) was doing some sort of choreographed dance number. There was some guy up top with a camera helmet on who was making strange noises into a microphone and video of his face was projected onto a giant speherical screen. So weird. There was Bavarian break dancing as well and we couldn’t be too sure if they were professional dancers or just people who showed up and started dancing. I was a little confused, anyway. A woman started dancing on the bar and then broke out into German opera singing and was soon accompanied by the guy who was making all the weird noises. Eventually, a stage appeared and a real show began but it was very weird and extremely creative. Lip synching, strange dancing, and vulgar choreography (at some points). There were roller-bladers and massive white balloons were being passed through the audience. Woman dancing with giant bottles of Sangria (or something) on their head. Very crazy stuff. It ended rather abruptly, I don’t think hat anyone knew what was going on. It was pretty cool though. Something I can safely say that I enjoyed! Especially since the venue was serving FREE BEER all night. I don’t have to tell you how that made me feel. :)

On Saturday I took it easy – was pretty tired from my night out – so I went over to Brittany’s and we got Pizza Hut (again – we love it here) and then Jessica came by. The three of us eventually went out into the city and ventured to the Auer Dult folk festival in Munich – a traditional little flea market type place with standls (aka vendors), food and a miniature midway. There was so much to look at! Hundreds of vendors selling everything – ShamWow, antiques (books, postcards, dishes, mirrors trinkets, etc), clothes, toys. One row felt very much like an infomercial aisle – German people trying to sell you crazy products. It was really cool, I’m really glad that we got out to see it before it packed up on Sunday and went away. Fortunately it comes around again in April so I can go again in nicer weather.

Handmade soaps

  Mariahilfkirche

   Bad nose job, Michelle Pfeiffer!

Saturday night I stayed in because I would be getting up early for a trip to Garmisch on Sunday. I ended up lying in bed reading for most of the night and fell asleep fairly early. On Sunday I met Eric, Catherine, Jessica, and Wing at Hauptbanhof at 9 am and we got ready for our 2 hour train ride to Garmisch-Partenkirchen. It was raining in Munich and through almost every city we passed through so it was no surprise to us when it continued raining once we arrived in GP. My family friend, Käthe, met us at the station and drove us to her house where she fed us delicious, warm chili with bread and cheese. Perfect rainy day food. Then she sent us off on our way towards the Partnachklamm. Even though it was drizzling rain, we still enjoyed ourselves. The Partnachklamm is a river gorge and it is incredibly beautiful. There are few things I’ve seen that compare to it. The entire journey was beautiful – from the road in the city to the gorge itself. Of course, now I’ll just let the pictures speak for themselves. (To be honest, the rain added a bit of a shiny charm to the whole experience.)

Road leading up to the Partnachklamm

  Eric wandering through the klamm

  

If anyone ever wants to spend a weekend in GP hiking (maybe in the spring) then please, please take me with you. Or maybe I’ll just invite you. It’s gorgeous and I can’t wait to go through the Partnachklamm again and hike all of the various side trails and then, next time, the mountains! I want to see the Alps again! And this time, with my camera. 

Now I’m back in Munich – enjoying the daily grind. The week holds promising things. Seeing The Social Network with friends (FINALLY!). A few nights out. Good German fun. I’m looking forward to this weekend especially. My au pair family is going away on an autumn vacation and will be gone until Tuesday. I’m going to enjoy some good mornings sleeping in and taking advantage of the kitchen. On Saturday a few of my friends (only Laura, Eric, and Brittany so far) are coming over for an all day Harry Potter movie marathon. Movies 1-6, all in one day. We’ll figure out some kind of drinking game (Every time they use their wands? Or say a certain spell? What?!) and probably get ridiculously drunk, alone in my house, together eating junk food and pizza and trying our own homemade Oreos and butterbeer recipes. This is, of course, a preparation for the new movie which releases next month but I don’t have to tell you how excited I am for that.

Of course, our HP movie fest will be followed with Halloween shenanigans. I’m going for a zombie Bavarian this year and will make use of my dirndl for the first time since Oktoberfest ended. Parties all weekend long! We’ll try to find some good ones. Anyway, until next time!

Oh, and HAPPY FREAKING BIRTHDAY to Paxton Gabriel, my good, good friend Kristy’s new baby boy! Kristy, I am so happy for you – he is beautiful! I hope I can meet him someday soon. Happy birthday, little Paxton!

The Blog is Back in Business

You might have noticed that my blog went private a few days ago. I got a lot of messages from very important people asking for me to put their email addresses on the reading list but, truth be told, I wasn’t writing anything new. A reading list was quite unnecessary. I’ve spent the last week or so (maybe not that long…) going through my blog and editing. Why? Well, it was brought to my attention last Friday by a wonderful and trusted source (thank you!) that this blog was turning into something a bit more than I’d originally intended it to be. I was using it as a vessel for venting my frustrations and wasn’t really thinking about the content that I was publishing… publicly… for the whole world to see. Including people who could use it against me – like current and future employers. I took a step back, thought about how important my experience is here and how important it is for me to be a professional, working adult – even if I’m still a world away from having a grown-up, real world job. Someday I will and I won’t want this blog to be used against me now or in any future employment situation. Therefore, I’ve been doing some editing and have taken out a lot of content that could be used against me – complaints, frustrations, harmful words and biases, and pictures – things that shouldn’t necessarily be published on such a public space.

And since I’ve been missing for the last week or so, here’s a recap of what’s happened:

On Friday night Lauren, Brittany, Eric, and Paul and I went clubbing until 4 am. I don’t care what anyone says. Sometimes that’s just what you need.

Lauren and me, before our long, long night!

Only the Germans combine life size garden gnomes and drinking traditions
that require nose adornment and shooting with your teeth.

On Saturday it was Fio’s birthday so we celebrated. (After I stayed at the house all day waiting for the movers to bring my new bed and other various furniture pieces.) The lovely Irish ginger turned 21 and we wandered around aimlessly for a while before we ended up at Sugar where we had reserved a table which came with a vodka and Red Bull package. We danced for most of the night and then Brittany and I tried to make the trains but missed them by five minutes. We tried to catch a cab but failed and ended up walking home in the cold, rainy weather at 2:30 in the morning. FAIL.

Fio’s ‘Happy Birthday’ champagne in the UBahn station. Woo!

  Me and Brittany, enjoying Fio’s club party!

On Sunday, I spent most of the actual day inside. I had lunch with my host-family – homemade schnitzel and some pasta of some sort with mushroom sauce – and then the Frau helped me with my plane ticket to England. It’s all booked up! December 29th I fly out to London for a week! Yah! In the evening I met up with Eric, Brittany, and Jessica and we went to Fio and Laura’s house for Fio’s birthday. We started watching their room mates handball game. Very weird sport. It’s like basketball and soccer all in one. We ordered pizza, I found Dr. Pepper at the gas station, and we had cake and the kickin’est garlic bread you’d ever eat. Yowch. Made it home by midnight, crashed in bed.

During the week sometime I went out with Brittany and we went to the Munich Readery. I got Stephanie Klein’s memoir, Straight Up and Dirty, which I’ve been wanting to read FOREVER. And also got The Nanny Diaries. Which I’ve already read but love, nonetheless. Also got some new headphones (AGAIN!). I’ve been through like four pairs here – they keep breaking or they go missing. Annoying. I’d love some iPod headphones for my birthday, yo. The kind with the remote control. Yum! Also got another plug adapter. I spent one evening raking leaves in the cold and the wind. THAT was fun. Fortunately, Eeine helped me there at the end and it went much faster. Had sweet potato soup for dinner one evening – so good! Went out with Helen for Pizza Hut and beer. I hadn’t seen her in a while so it was nice to spend time with her again and have someone to vent to who understands exactly where I am. Today I spent the morning with Brittany and we watched The Lion King and ate hot dogs and French fries and were generally just lazy.

Now, the weekend is ahead! And I am all caught up and back to blogging. Enjoy! :)

Self-Directed Intervention, Working Hard (Or Hardly Working), What Music Sounds Like, and The Color Purple

It is official. Right at this very moment in time, on a Tuesday evening at a quarter after seven, I am finally feeling defeated by the great German beer festival known as Oktoberfest. I thought I would be resilient, that I could make it through to the end but I’m already so tired. Maybe Oktoberfest is the kind of place you need to visit on vacation… not the festival that is on your regular daily train line. Don’t get me wrong – I love German beer and I love the revelry and spirit of the festival – but I don’t love being so drunk that I turn into a lush, that I fall down and bruise every part of my body, and continuously lose really important things like my keys and cell phone. No, I am not an alcoholic but yes, I realize that I’m drinking a lot more than I ever have before. And I am going to make a conscious effort to control myself. Oktoberfest is almost over, thank God, and once all the people are gone and the festivities are over, life will slow down back to a normal pace. It’s getting colder here in Munich and once winter sets in, I have a feeling I’m going to be going out a lot less. Plus, I need to start saving money for all kinds of stuff – debt and holiday travel, a language course. Staying in every other weekend or spending time NOT going to bars and clubs will be so beneficial and I’ll probably like myself a whole lot more come Sunday evenings.

Believe it or not but I do still work while I’m here in Germany. My life has been centered around Oktoberfest a lot since it commenced but I’ve also been taking care of the girls. It’s just so uneventful that I haven’t felt compelled to write much about it. They’ve started school so our schedules been pretty consistent and easy, at least for me. I wake up everyday at about 6:30 am and help with breakfast and getting the girls out the door. Then I’m free until about 4 or 5, depending on the day, and usually I stay in. I’ve been so sore from all my recent injuries that I can’t be bothered to move around much so instead of going out for a bike ride or a walk in the English Gardens, I lay in bed on Facebook and watch Sex and the City and write stories about vampires. I know this is bad behavior which creates bad habits but I’ve always been a pretty lazy person. No excuses here. Ha. The girls are loving school though. Today Eenie multiplied by tens, it was awesome. The downside is that I hardly spend any time with them anymore seeing as the Frau does most of the work – takes them everywhere, picks them up, drops them off, etc, etc. This coming weekend I have them overnight so we’ll probably get some good girl bonding time.

This past weekend was a really nice escape from my responsibilities (not that I have very many) as two of my friends from England, Alison and Helena, were here visiting. I’d missed them way too much. I had so much fun seeing them again. It was like being on an extended day off at Camp Cayuga and we were instantly transported back to the memories of our summer  in Pennsylvania just by being in each other’s presence. The first thing Alison says to me when she gets off the airport shuttle: “I haven’t heard an American accent in so long.” Haha. We obviously care about the most important things. I am so blessed to be so close to them now and I hope that a reunion like this happens again and soon! I’ll see them both over New Years in England and I am stoked for this vacation. Let’s hope I can save money and do it right!

Me, Helena, and Alison – reunited and it feels so good!

Oh, one other thing that happened this weekend… I fell on my ass. It wouldn’t be a drunken weekend without me falling over, would it? Alison and I decided to go on a spinning swings ride at 9 pm after drinking entirely too much beer and it was pouring rain. With the combination of my drunken grace and the wet slicked everything, I fell down the stairs of the Star Flyer and hit my butt pretty hard. It hurt more for the first few minutes than it did at any other point. But I could barely sit down the following day. I was miserable. The discomfort has gone away now but I’m left with a pretty gnarly looking bruise that I’m afraid will never go away.

There was one other monumental occurrence this weekend. I traveled out of Germany for the first time since I got here! I went to Salzburg, Austria on Sunday with Alison, Helena, Helen, and Sara. We did it in kind of an unorganized, last minute kind of way but it was fun. That city is beautiful! And it made me want to watch The Sound of Music so I downloaded it and did just that!

 Mozart was born in Salzburg, you know.

Gorgeous statue in the city

   Cityscape

Right now, I am going to bed. For having slept all day, I am so ridiculously tired. All that I want to do is finish Sex and the City season 5 and then sleep deeply all night. Which is pretty easy to obtain these days. Oh, the life of a college educated au pair!