Lots of Action

I realize it has been quite a while since my last post.  I apologize for this and will make it up to you with this very long post!

My first time traveling by myself proved to be somewhat of an adventure.  Mom and dad dropped me off at the Dayton airport and I made it successfully through security and found my way to the gate.  The plane was due to board in about 15 minutes so I went to buy a bottle of water and find a bathroom.  I made my way back to the gate to be greeted by a sign that said my flight was delayed an hour.  The American Airlines people told me to go to the gate desk to get a new flight because I would miss my connecting flight to Chicago.  Then, while standing in line, the Chicago airport shut down completely due to a lightening storm.  All I could think was "Great... my first trip by myself and I won't even get to JFK to make it to Berlin".  I called mom and dad and luckily they hadn't gone too far so they started calling airlines while I was at the gate desk getting someone there to look up flights as well.  Dad found a direct flight to JFK from Cincinnati and we booked it at the front desk of the Dayton airport while waiting for me to get my luggage back from the plane.  Mom and dad then drove me all the way down to the Cincinnati airport for my flight from there. My flight was once again delayed, however I had plenty of time to catch my next flight. I never realized how big JFK was until I realized I needed to stop and ask for directions to my next gate.  I hopped on the tram and arrived at the British Airways gate, checked in, and went through security yet again.  I ate dinner during my 6 hour layover and read some magazines to pass the time.  My flight to London departed at 10:40pm and got delayed due to brake issues that maintenance had to fix. This flight arrived on time in London and I had an hour to catch my Berlin flight, which was also delayed.  Once I arrived in Berlin, I was met by Uta (the assistant director of the program) and she helped me get from the airport to the hostel we were staying at.  I arrived a day late for the Berlin trip, even though I was only one hour late, because the group flight was scheduled incorrectly.  All in all, my adventure to Berlin was quite eventful and I will be very happy if my return flight goes according to plan!

Berlin took my breath away from the first bus I took into the city to get to the hostel.  The buildings are a mix of old and new and there is color everywhere! The hostel was my first stop and it was interesting.  The ceiling of the bar area had cows and fake grass and the dining area had a yellow submarine painted on the walls.  The room itself had 4 bunk beds and slept the 7 girls on the trip.  It was nothing exciting and very bland but it did its job.  I was told by other people on the trip that this was a very bad hostel and they had stayed in much better ones.  Mainly, it was awful due to the bathrooms.  There were two showers, a couple sinks, and a very slippery floor when wet.  Many people slipped in the bathroom due to the water and tile mixture! The bathrooms were also located across the hall from us which meant we had lots of traffic outside our room at all hours.  There was also a group of 15 year old girls who were constantly being loud and a drunk guy outside at night peeing on our window to our room.  Luckily, the bottom three quarters of the window (which was floor to ceiling) was frosted, so we couldn't see anything.  Also, there was the hillarious drunk man outside that would yell "Hey you! You want to see my penis?".  Oh boy!

My first night in Berlin, Uta and I met up with all the others after my late arrival at an Italian restaurant.  We all ordered pizza and boy was I surprised! A single serving pizza is about the equivalent of a medium in the United States and it was huge! I got Pizza Texana which had salami, beans, pepperoni and spices.  It was delicious.

The next day, we started with a bus tour of the city.  I never realized how large the city was until this.  The city is very large and very spread out which makes travel time longer than you would expect.  Our tour guide, surprisingly, was from New York City and has dual citizenship because he was born in Germany.  His name was Torben and he wore a Mets hat on our tour which we all loved! He first took us to the Treptower Park War Memorial which was a memorial by the Russians to the war to commemorate the 5,000 Soviet soldiers that died in the Battle of Berlin. The memorial was absolutely breathtaking because you could not tell from the street how absolutely beautiful the park was, or how large! The next stop was the East Side Gallery of the Berlin Wall.  The paintings were amazing and we happened to stumble upon a large sand castle building contest in the middle of the city! Next, we drove past a park where Hitler's command post was.  It was very poetic to see such an "evil" space transform into something beautiful. Then, we moved on to Checkpoint Charlie, which was not as grand as I thought it would be, but it was still awesome to see! We then drove onto Museum Island, which houses all of the Museums in former West Berlin, and we drove through the streets looking at the buildings.  We then moved on to the Reichstag and the Brandenburg Gate.  Next on the tour was The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe.  This memorial was breathtaking and intriguing all at once.  The depth of the memorial was absolutely amazing.  It was by far my favorite memorial.  To end our afternoon, we had someone from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs talk to us.  The rest of the night was free so we found a place for dinner to watch the World Cup and I had my first beer in Germany!

Day two in Berlin was even more eventful, we woke up really early and went to Potsdam to see the Castle Sanssouci.  The castle was absolutely glorious! The gardens were the most beautiful part with lots of green space and a large fountain.  The whole castle was of French origin and even had grape vines for the vineyard. We then moved on to the Memorial Site of the Berlin Wall, which was a part of the Berlin Wall that was still intact along with a watch tower and Death Strip.  It was very unsettling to know that where I stood not many people got to stand.  Later that night, we went to the Symphony and saw a great performance of the orchestra and even some opera singers!

The next day, which was also our last, we had a free day.  The group of us decided we would see the Gedachtnis Church which was bombed and never restored.  We then shopped for a couple hours in H&M and other local stores.  Next stop was the zoo which was a blast! You could get very close to the animals because there was no large wall separating you from them.  There was instead a moat to keep the animals from escaping.  This meant great views and great pictures and an even better time walking around!  We then returned to the hostel where the entire group met in order to catch our train to Luneburg.

When we arrived in Luneburg, it was dark outside so I felt very confused as to where we were going. My buddy met me at the train station and took me to my apartment.  My buddy, Teresa, and another buddy picked up Katie and I and showed up in a very small car to take us to where we were staying.  Only Katie's suitcase fit in the trunk and we managed to squeeze in my small one on the trunk separator.  Then we fit my large suitcase on a seat in the back and Katie and I then jammed into the backseat.  German cars are very small! Haha! When we got to my apartment, my landlady was waiting for me and she gave me my keys.  She speaks on a very small amount of English so the whole process was very interesting.

My apartment is very small, however it is a typical German student apartment.  I have one room, which contains a kitchen table with chairs, a desk, small kitchenette (it has a tiny fridge, two burners, a sink and some pots and pans and tableware), a cupboard (which houses my bathroom sink, some shelves for toiletries and a place to hang towels), and a bed and bedside table.

My first day in Luneburg, I was met by Reuben, a fellow student from session 1, at my apartment and he showed me how to get to the University for orientation.  The orientation was long and uneventful.  The walking tour of Luneburg, directed by Reuben, was much for fun and very exciting to see the city.  We then met up for a German BBQ dinner with the director and visiting professor, Dr. John McNay from the University of Cincinnati (kind of funny that he is from my university).  Afterwards, we hit up some bars downtown and I had a beer I can say I actually really liked.  It is kristallweizen and it is amazing!

Day two, I bought a pre paid phone for local calling.  Then, the group of us went to the freibad (the community pool) and it was awesome! For 1,40 euros, I got all day admission and there was a large field for setting up towels and picnics and two pools.  One pool was a children's pool with a huge slide and very cold water.  The other pool was a lap pool and was warm and soothing.  The lap pool had lots of people doing the frog stroke and I never saw another kind of swimming. It was weird to not see people doing breast stroke during laps.  The warm weather was much more comfortable while at the pool.  We then left to watch the World Cup game.  We sat at a local French bar and watched the game.  We surrounded a large projection screen and enjoyed the free shots for every time Germany scored.  We then made our way through the throngs of people celebrating Germany's win in the streets and went to fine 5 euro pizza.  It was the best food I've had since getting here and that is hard to say since the pastries are amazing and so is the gellato.

Today is a very uneventful day.  I am under the weather with no voice so I decided to stay in today.  I caught up on adding photos to my photo blog (Christy's Travels Shutterfly Photo Blog) and am writing this very long blog post. I will update the title's of photos tomorrow or the next day so you know what photo is what!

Well if you made it this far I applaud you. Thanks for reading the entire thing, I know this was a very long post! I will also try to update the blog more often because it took quite a while to catch up on a whole week of blogging!

Till next time!