10.05.09

The weather was amazing today! I took about an hour snooze in the sun today and woke up a little red..a small problem with being as Caucasian as I am :/ naja
Doris went to her mom's 95th birthday and Nathan and I went back into Kassel and walked around for another few hours. Eventually found an internet cafe and headed back home. A friend from Doris brought over some cake and when Doris returned home she too had cake from her mom's birthday party. We had to eat all the pieces, Nathan and I. I was a little full after 5 pieces AND supper. Played some Rummikub and then off to bed. School tomorrow!

09.05.09

I didn't hear my name get called yesterday saying my host mom was going to pick me up at 9, so this morning at 8:20 I was a little rushed with packing, eating, and waking up. Almost everyone is staying with a family, but my situation is a little different. My gastfamilie consists of Frau Doris Wagner, her cat Charlie, and Nathan (another Canadian from Regina). She picked us up and off we were to Baunatal, a village pretty much attached to the S.W. corner of Kassel. We got unpacked and a little settled down and then off we were into Kassel. We took the straßenbahn (tram) into the city so we would know the way to get to school. Kassel isn't the most beautiful German city (Over 80% was destroyed in the war because of a tank factory and then it was rebuilt in the wonderful 50s-70s architecture) Doris went back home and Nathan and I spent a few hours walking around the city. Good god...we counted 11 mullets today...mostly on men..but 1 or 2 on females..ugh! We watched a little tv but I went to bed early because I was stupidly tired..almost falling asleep at the supper table!
Oh yeah! The straßenbahn was not running for a few hours today because of a demonstration. The ice hockey team, The Huskeys, were demonstrating because they didn't have enough money and wanted more from the city. No clue if they got what they wanted or not.

08.05.09

My head was a little bleh this morning..but nothing that breakfast and copious amount of OJ didn't fix. Highlights of the day:
1) Swimming in is beautiful outdoor swimming pool. There was a dive tank, swimming lanes, kiddie pool, and another pool with a slide. It would have been better with a hot tub, more sun, and warmer water, but no complaints!
2) Did a tour of the city. Pretty interesting. The town was founded in the 17th century and survived many wars and what not. Our tour guide spoke pretty slowly so I was able to understand almost everything he said :) There was a massive 5 minute downpour and after that it was only sprinkling the rest of the night.
3) Repeat of last night, but with 20+ more people. This time we took over the entire non-smoking section of the pub.
Tomorrow we're heading to Kassel to meet out gastfamilie.

07.05.09

Typical German breakfast: Bread, jams, meats, cheeses, and some cereal stuff. Nothing special, but good non the less.
Made my way to the Hauptbahnhof (main train station) and then to the Flughafen (airport) to meet the rest of the group. There is about 65 of us so it wasn't too hard to find the group of tired, nervous looking, English speaking people sitting with a bunch of baggage. We had to wait a few hours for all of us to get there and around 2:30 2 buses came to pick us up and off we were to Melsungen, a small village not far from Frankfurt and Kassel. We were to spend 2 days here getting over jet lag, getting to know each other and to get English out of our system, this program ist NUR auf Deutsch! We took over the youth hostel, 4 to a room, and boosted the economy 10 fold! The first day was nothing special. I guess the highlight was buying some beer at the supermarket, drinking by the river, and then going to the pub for many more beers and to mingle with some of the locals. A great start to the program!

*I'll put up pictures when I can...I don't have internet at my gasthaus and need to get some sort of special password for Wi-Fi

Back in the Deutschland. May 5/6, 2009

So I find my-self back in the land of bier, brot, and wurst. Gott sei dank!
The lead up to my flight was a little hectic...my fault for leaving EVERYTHING, and then some, to the extreme last minute (Like canceling my phone plan while standing at the gate at Pearson International) everything is good now, or so I hope...
Anyways, flight from Calgary to Frankfurt, over Toronto, was extremely uneventful. I had a personal tv thing so I watched movies and tv the entire way. Got into Frankfurt Wednesday, May 6 around 7 am. Got my luggage and took the S-Bahn (uhh...kinda like the C-train but better cuz its Germany and its efficient) into town. Got extremely lost trying to find the youth hostel, which really sucks when you are lugging around a 40+ lb backpack and haven't really slept in 3 days. Eventually found the place and could only store my luggage there because check-in wasn't until 1, it was around 9 am at the time. Went into the downtown area and did some window shopping, seeing as everything doesn't open until 10. When the stores opened I went to Vodaphone and got my-self a German SIM card and did a lot more walking. Found this great place for lunch and had Jägerschnitzel (my absolute favorite) and beer. Went back to the hostel and checked into my room. Now I've done a fair bit of traveling and every single time I go anywhere I put my liquid stuff in ziplock bags and then those into my toiletries bag..this time I didn't and NEVER again will I make that mistake..the ONE time I didn't I end up with shampoo goo covering half my backpack...took me a good 40 minutes to semi clean it up...talked with this older gentlemen sharing the room and then passed out. Woke up at 10 to shower and fell back asleep. 15 hours of sleep is a damn good way to kick jet lag!

27.4.2007

We didn't have Sports today, which is fine by me =)
Markus, Nadia, and my-self went to the 'See' today and met up with a bunch of friend, the usual. This time thouhg it was a BIG group of people. Probz close to..hm..60ish? Didn't know most of them, so I just hung around mainly with the ones I do know. It eventually died off and when we went to leave...my backpack was gone...!!
Eva and Kai leave tomorrow for a motorbike trip to Czech Rep.

26.4.2007

So Anthony was able to change my flight from the 30th to the 9th of June.
The problem was: My host family had booked a package deal thing for Malta (Tiny island country south of Sicily) for our last holidays (2 weeks at the end of May start of June) They could have gotten rid of the plane ticket, but the cost of the hotel package would have been €700 and they wanted to be re-imbursed for that if I couldn't make it.
But I feel kinda bad because I know how much Mom wanted to see me at Grad =(

22.4.2007

Kinda really angepissed. I was playing around with my camera and I was seeing how much room was left on my one card (Had over 800 pics and that had only taken up 1.6 Gb) and I though I clicked the 'Make your pictures smaller so it saves room' but actually it was really 'Do you want to format your card *and loose all the pics and videos you haven't yet put on your computer*' and I said yes and ....
Damn thing didn't even say 'Are you really sure you want to REFORMAT your card and LOOSE all the pics that you haven't yet saved onto the computer' option =(
So..400 Pics from the Czech Repbulic are gone plus 300ish pics from the first 1 1/2 months

21.4.2007 Festung Hohensalzburg

Had such a crappy sleep =(
So we headed off to Salzburg, Austria for the day. Meet the others at the München Hbf and then took a train together East. There was a lady sitting in the other seat from me and she just so happened to be an English teacher, has family in Toronto, and teaches in my city!
Got to Salzburg and Jee and Lee met us. Walked around for the first hour or so and didn't really see much..The girls were more interested in going shopping and the worst part was they were shopping at stores we have back in Canada! So I got fed up with it and said I was going to leave to actually go see the city and none of them seemed to really care less so I took off.
The old part of Salzburg is amazing! You turn this corner and there is this castle perched on a hill with the Alps right behind it The first place I saw, ironicly, was the main shopping street. Along this street is also the house of where Motzart was born and had lived for a few years. It's a small meseum and I checked it out. After that I went to the Rezidence house, Uni, and the Cathederal. After all this I finally went up to the castle. Festung Hohensalzburg (Festung is the hill. High Salt Castle) is one of the largest castles in Europe. The view from up there is amazing as well. It gives a great view of the whole city, and again you have the Alps right behind you.

20.4.2007

I got excused from Sports class (Gott seid Dank-->Thank-God) so I could meet Emily at the Train station, even though she didn't come for another 1 1/2 hours =). Went to the bookstore and got 'The godfather' then went to the Hbf. We quickly saw the Rathaus (townhall) and the shopping area around there. Emily bought 2 pairs of shoes about 5 minutes apart...women!
Went to the Augsburg Zoo for a few hours then headed back home to Merching.
We went to the '5 minuten See' today. Somebody had the bright idea of putting a 6 foot dead pine tree straight up in the fire..and the person who owns the lake just so happened to be beside us when the tree went up...he got mad and wanted our phone numbers in case the place wasn't clean in the morning. You could get rich off the number of bottles that get left there by all the groups of people!

17.4.2007

After school Jonas and my-self went to this big park behind the Kongresshalle and I got to meet a few of his friends. Talked for an hour or so and played some hackey sack then the two of us went off to meet Doonie at the theatres. We went to see '300'. It was an awesome movie, lot's og gore and all that good stuff, but it was in German but there isn#t too mucht alking so it was easy to follow.

15.4.2007

Went to Lansburg today. This is the city where hitler was put in jail for some time in the 1920's, but there isn't anything here. This was also a big Nazi city after Hitler came to power and there is a giant hill in teh centre that used to be a bomb shelter but is now a parking garage.
Eva said it's her favourite city to visit, as it's modeled after a typical Italian city. Got some ice cream and spent an hour walking around.

14.4.2007

My neck is KILLING me from all that headbanging last night =( I have to turn my whole body if I want to look behind my-self. The morning was spent like most mornings, suntanning and reading. In the afternoon, Janna, Lukas, and my-self went to some mini carnival in Augsburg (No idea how to spell it) It's like a very very tiny Stampede without the whole Western theme. Went on a few rides and and checked out the other places and headed home. On the way home we got bitched at by some lady on the train because out music was too loud..what ever.
Started to watch 'Casino Royal' and went on the comp for a while, but was disappointed when none of my friends were on =(

13.4.2007

Other than sitting in the sun reading and doing work, I did jack all =)
So today we went to ROFA. I was a little :S cuz from what I've heard it's a death/Heavy metal place, but i actually had an awesome time! met a few people at the Mering Bahnhof and headed to Augsburg. It was a little quiet at first, cuz the DJ's weren't there, but it soon picked up. The cheapest, and best tasing beer there, was MacMallows, €2,80 for 2. After a bit of sitting, we all headed onto the floor. The musik wans't that bad, a nice mix of everything:
Heavy/Death metal, Goth, RHCP, Green Day, Rammstein, Billy Tallent etc etc..
We had to leave at 23:30 cuz everyone is under 18, so they can't be out past 00:00, suckers :P

12.4.2007

Are slopping on suncream I spent a good 2 1/2 hours reading out in the sun. My burns have now turned into a nice brown =)
Janna and I went into the city to do some shopping at the 'City Galerie', basically a big mall. I made the mistake though of wering flip-flops and I got some blisters by the end of the day. I got another pair of long shorts (Kurtze hosen)

11.4.2007

Totally loving the weather! I spent only a little while outside reading and I'm sunburtn =(
So we went to the '5 minuten see' around 16:00 and waited and waited and waited..Raphi came around 18:15 and the 2 of us went to Mering to get some stuff for grilling. We ended up at MacDonals, thankfully. Around 20:00 the rest arrived. Phili, Maly, and Tina were really the only ones I knew at first, but I got to know most of the others as the night went on. On of the guys there, Toby, had spent a year on Van island for an exahcnge. Wish I could do a year here =( On the way home Markus somehow ran into a pole on his bike..it was some VERY funny stuff!

10.4.2007

Packed up and headed home today. Markus left a few days earlier, so there was a lot more room in the back. At the boarder I got a stamp in my passport from the Czech and at the German boarder we got suspicious looks from the guard there. Thankfully though he didn't make us empty out the whole car and search through all our stuff. I'm sure Eva knowing Czech helped lot's with that.
In Friedburg we stooped for some ice cream and got home 20 minutes later.

9.4.2007

Nothing much during the day. Watched a little TV and played a few more hands of Rummi. Starting to get the hand of it =)
Later in the day, Eva, her dad, Janna, and I went for a walk in the forest behind the house. This place is close enough to the German boarder, that I was in Germany for a few minutes. There were a couple of small villages around this area, but during the DDR times they got demolished because they were too close to the E. German boarder.

8.4.2007

The day started off with an Easter Egg Hunt in the massive garden. I'd say it took us almost 2 hours, and we still were missing a few eggs. I though for sure that I had won..but I was actually last with 24 things of chocolate. Other than that we had a very relaxed day and played a bit of rummi, and i actually won ome hands! =D

7.4.2007

We went to drop Janna off at the farm she rides at and I found a few interesting things. There were a few Ostriches and an Emu. I guess some people drooped them off a while back and no one came back for them, so they decided to keep them.
Kai and I went into Cheb for an hour or so. A general from the 30 years war was killed while sleeping in a house in the town square here. At the castle there was a kids fest going on so the place was overflowing with kids. Nothing big and overly impressive, but it's still a castle =) We were heading back to our car and saw a little surprise..a 'Denver Boot' The boot clamps tha make it so you can't drive away. We fodund the cops who put it on and we were told that it would cost 2 000 Czech crowns (€60). Kai didn't have enough on him and told the cops that Eva could come with the rest but that would take 30-40 minutes. So the cops said how much do you have? Pulls out 1 000 Czech and the cops said that was good enough, took it off and we were gone. We went to check out a small caslte on the way home, but it was closed.
Czech Easter tomorrow =)

6.7.2007

Didn't do a whole lot today. I went back to Františkovy Lázně. I wa going to get some of that special water, but it was closed..don't know why =( Walked around for an hour, got some poastcards and some Easter Eggs and we headed home. Kai came today with his motorcycle

5.4.2007

Went and looked around this small mall in Pilsen. I got my-self a soduko book for the road. So on our way home, and we are passing through this small village. there was this little kid standing beside his house and he threw a rock at the windshield as we were passing by and hit it. Wasn't that big of a rock, but it made a friggen big dent. Well..needless to say, Eva was a little pissed about it..especially since they are thinking of selling the car right away.
Later that day, after we had got back, we went to Františkovy Lázně (Frances bad). This place has water that is supposed to have very good healing qualities, so there a lot's of old German people here, as it's very close to the boarder. It reminds me a bit of an old colonial town, everything is very bright colours and very clean and set out in a certain way, unlike the random jumble of buildings most European cities look like.

4.4.2007

Oh boy..so the trains are a little ghettoish in Czech Rep. To 'flush' this toilet there is a little lever on the ground that you step on and that white light would be the track below ^^

Walking down Václavské square I saw this poster. It's for 'Sensation White' the biggest indoor Electronic event in the world! There are 2, Sensation white and black. When you go to either you dress in complete white or black. I'll eventually go to one of these =D

We were on our way to the Jewish quarter and I noticed this on a building...the design looks like a bunch of Swastikas!

Because of Passover, all the Jewish buildings were closed for 2 days, which was a bit of a shame =(. Beside the old Jewish cemetery was this poor car...

Before leaving Prague to go back we went to the Museum of Communism. Was a really interesting museum to see. I think what made this whole trip even better was the fact that Eva grew up here and had a bunch of little side comments to go along with what this museum said.

3.4.2007

Left for Pilzeň (Prague) at 9:00. Like most things in this country, the Hbf (main train station, Hlavni Nádraží) is dirty and faling apart. Two hours later we got off in Prague and made our way to the National Museum (Národní muzeum) and Wenceslas Square (Václavské náměstí)


Národní muzeum

Václavské náměstí
Václavské náměstí is one the major squares in Prague and it was here where two university students burned them selves to death to protest the Soviet invasion on Czechoslovakia. The 'velvet revolution' of 1989, which caused the collapse of the Soviet government in Czechoslovakia, also took place here. After the square we headed deeper into the city and saw 3 of the city gates. Eventually made out way into the town square, where I big Easter market was. Attached to a church was an astronomical clock, and lucky enough it was only a few minutes to 12:00. Went for some typical Czech lunch. Small sandwiches with meats, cheese, mayo and/or mustard. Also saw a store selling an interesting type of vodka..only in Europe ;)
Our next stop was the Karlův most (Charles Bridge). This is one of the best preserved cities in Europe, especially Central/Eastern Europe, as very little damage came upon it during WW II. The Charles bridge is a bridge that connects Alt (Old) and Neu (New) Prague. Along the bridge are 36 saints and other religious icons.

The view from this city of the city is amazing! On the other side of the river is the Prague Castle (Pražský hrad) , Katedrála svatého Víta (St. Vitus Cathedral), and the palace of the president.



Entrance to the palace and Church

Katedrála svatého Víta (St. Vitus Cathedral)
After the castle we walked around the old part of the city, saw a few embassey (India,Belgium, and Poland) then made our way back the Hbf. The train we were on to go back was like the Harry Potter one =D

2.4.2007

Headed to Plzeň (Pilsen) today. By car it took us around 2 hours. This city has two major factories here, the ŠKODA car production plant and the Plizeň-Urquhal brewery. The second is what Plzeň is famous for. The city of the original pilsen beer!
Eva has a friend who live here, so we are going to spend the next two days here and use it as out base to go to Prague. When we got all our stuff unpacked we headed downtown for an hour or so. In the main square is the St. Ulrich church, which has the highest bell tower in all of Czech and the 3rd largest Synagogue in the world, 2nd largest in Europe, is located just off the main square. Went for a yummy and very cheap supper.

*I have no pictures..my camera card got deleted and I only had a handful of pictures on the computer =(

1.4.2007

it was about a 3 1/2 hour drive to the Czech boarder. The German guard doesn't do anything, but the Czech check your passport. It's crazy..there are a tonne of Vietnamese people here who used to live in Germany but got kicked out a few years ago. They have set up hundreds of 'Asian Bazaars' in the boarder towns. Eva's dads house is decent sized and the land is big. Acre or so I would say. After lunch we went for a walk to this old quarry. There is an old Soviet tank at the bottom as well as a car. A few summers back some kids were jumping into it and one never came up..They think it was so cold he went into shock and just sunk. So in total there are about 5-6 dead people in the bottom of it :S
Went to one of the Asian Bazaars. I got 'Saw III' and 'Casino Royal' for €2,00 each and a double CD for another €2,50. I saw some movies there that aren't even out in Canada or Germany. Went to look at this small Hrad (Castle) Vildštejn.

31.3.2007

Finally got a chance to sleep in! It's crazy...everyone gets up at 8 or 9 am!!! i was up at 11 though =). Didn't do much during the day. Watched Ice Age II for the second time, but this time it was in English =D Got my packing done and played a few games of 'settler' with Eva and Lukas. Lost everr time =(
Got my SIM card and now just need to register it and my phone will work =D
GOING TO CZECH REPUBLIC TOMORROW!!!!

30.3.2007

BLOODY TRAINS! the one going to Augsburg was a 1/2 hour late. by the time we got to school there was only 15 minutes of geography left. Again the train home was late..so we got home about an hour after we should have..
A little before 20:00, Raphi came by the house to pick me up and we went off to lidl's. his house is BIG!! especially for a German one. His room is..about 3/4 of the basement in my house in Canada, he's just missing a bathroom! The party was fun. I knew most of the people there becuase they are in our class, and a few others were new to me. Lidl got a big thing wheatbeer just for me =D Don't really remember going home, but it was a fun night =)

29.3.2007

I had gym with my 10's today...Gah! i don't know why I take gym here..it's such a waste to time. Gym is susposed to be fun, but everyone here dreads going to it. So the first 30-40 minutes was just running around the gym..After that the class split into two groups, volleyball and 'football' our team lost...it was 30+ to 18ish
the weather today was ok..was cold this morning and started to rain in the afternoon..i want summer!!
Getting my phone tomorrow and going to lidl's birthday party

28.3.2007

The Italian students were at our school today, and in Italian we watched a movie about when the Germans went there. i didn't understand most of it, but still got a lot of laughs out of it. The thing that I hate most about this school is that all the bloody sheets on the door that say what class is in this room at this time on this day are all FRIGGEN WRONG!! Some are a year or so old..so no chance of finding my musik class, so I went to physik instead. The teacher did the whole lesson in English just for me =D at times he wanted to use German because it was taking to long to do it in English, but the whole class wanted English. Julia, girl in my 11 class want's me to go to B2, hip-hop club, one of these weekends, so that should be fun =)
Oma and Opa came over for supper today, and brough like 15 pretzels =D =D =D after supper I went and watched MI:1

27.3.2007

Becuase the Italian exchange students were in München for the day, with their german partners, we got a double spare =D Lidl, Markus, and my-self walked around the city for an hour then went over to Media mart for a little. Going to get a Nokia 6020, only €75 =)
We are leaving on Sunday for the Czech Rep. =D

26.3.2007

Nothing much today..
In my 7A geography class we went to go watch a movie about London, but some of the kids were messing around with the tv and screwed up the tape so we had to go back to class =(
and in 11 English we have started to watch Chicken Run

25.3.2007

Day light savings today so it was an hour ahead =(
After breakfast Eva, kai, Janna, and I went for a walk around the area where the '72 Munich Summer olympic white water rafting course was. Even though the weather is still a little cold there were people out rafting.

23.3.2007

School took forever!!!! Gym in Germany is friggen lame! It's once a week and it's badly underfunded.. we did jump rope for the first 45 minutes with these ghetto ropes then the other 45 was spent playing basketball, 5 Vs. 5. And because the gym is so small it can only be 2 classes of guys or girls having it. Ours just happens to be Friday after school =(
I had 2 hours to kill before my train to Regensburg, so I rode a few s-bahn's and just wandered around, got 2 beer's for the trip, then set off. (I can't believe how little beer costs...the stuff I get is only €0,69 which is around $1.00 Cdn. I've seen other stuff for as little as €0,29 but I would be scared to try it)
The train ride was only 2 hours and very uneventful. I got to Regensburg (Literally Rain Castle) around 7:00 and had to wait only 10 min. Lukas came, we got some apfelmüse (Apple sauce..for later ;) ) and we went out for supper. I got a döner (Donair) and a Becks while Lukas got fried noodles and also a Becks.
After supper we went to 'The Blue Monkey'. I found this place really neat. Nothing big and a small amount of people but the inside..it was like..new age fusion, kinda hard to describe. I got something with vodka, which was very good =D, while Lukas got a Mohieto (spelling?) The place gets it's name from the blue lights it has inside.
The next place we went to was this bar/club that is underground. I actually got I.D'd!! I was like..wth...eh what ever, i don't think they know how to read photocopied passports :P There are three levels to this place, each lower than the next. It reminded me somewhat of a cave, but since no friends were there we left. About a 1/2 minute walk from this place was another bar, Zentral, where everyone was. All of Lukas' friends made it obvious they love Canadians =D This one girl was going to write an important English test, so she wanted to practice with me all night. Fair enough. Had this bier, cold, and syrup drink which was yummy but I got challenged to a chugging contest, and naturally I won ;) We stayed for only one drink and we were all off to the 'cave' bar.
It's amazing how much 15 minutes can make. The place was packed, and the vast majority of people on the bottom level knew Lukas. This is when the apfelmüse came in handy. You take a jar of this, three shots of dark tequila, and some cinnamon, mix it all and enjoy =D I my-self am not found of tequila at all..but I could have eaten this entire jar! Had a few weißbiers (wheat beer) and another vodka thing...a Solaris maybe? I think we were there for around 2 hours. Around 1:00 Lukas, Christina, and I headed over to her boyfriend's work and managed to get a free bier each. Said good-bye to those two and Lukas and i headed over to this small rave. I would say we were dancing for about 3 hours straight. It was really gross how sweaty I was...every inch of me was wet..but i had fun doing it =D There were people there that were easily in their mid 40's, it was quit an interesting this to see, I friggen love this country! We left the rave around 3:30 and walked for a 1/2 hour, so we could save some money on the cab. €12,00 later we were finally home =D
We went to bed around 5:00

22.3.2007

Again not a whole lot was done today..
Got some homework done, watched 'Batman begins' and Raphi came over for a bit.
Totally looking forward to this weekend though!

21.3.2007

The weather hear sucks at the moment. It will snow a tonne then get really sunny and everything will melt, but later that day it will start to rain snow and the process starts over again..
Nothing special at school today..just had to wait 20 min. for a bloody S-Bahn (Street Car) to come!
After school I got picked up by some family friends and we made out way to München as we were going to the BMW production plant located there. For supper we went to Pizza Hut =D, which has free refills on pop!!! Which is almost unheard of in Germany, then crossed the street to the plant. The BMW cooperate tower is a very cool looking building. Because of it's size it can be seen from a distance and it is located right next the the Olympic (Summer '72) grounds.

Because of 'Industrial Espionage' no cameras or phones or such were allowed in, so no pictures =(
The tour was all in German but my 'dad',Kai, did some translating for me. We saw the start of a car, basically a cylinder of rolled metal that gets stamped out into different parts, welding the parts together, painting + heating (makes it shiny and rust resistant etc...), assembly of the motor, putting the car and motor together, adding the wires, seats, windows, and most importantly...putting the BMW logo on. The very last part is the testing of the car to make sure it works and doing speed tests. The majority of the first 1/2 is done by robots white the other 1/2 is done more by hand. This plant produces all of the Model 3 car's in the world. And I also learned what the BMW symbol is:
The Bavarian Sky (Blue and White) as seen from behind a plane propeller (Before WW I then made plane engines, then after WW II they switched to cars)


It won't let me rotate it =(

20.3.2007

So did jack all today. Came home from school and had some carbaneti (?) spaghetti and watched 'Jurassic Park'. Did some homework and that was about all..

24.3.2007

Was woken up around 8:30..and felt like crap! 3ish hours of sleep and my head was a little..Lukas' mother and father were up also, so they could meet me in person =). His cat reminds me of Herman, not AS big but ,), and his dog, kleina, is a big teddy bear! She's a 2 year old Burmese.
We took the train into Regensburg and went for some supper at the mall beside the station. After it, around 9:20, I said I would need my backpack for München today and I hear'...Shit...Oh shit...SHIT!' Lukas forgot the key to the locker at home :/ so he calls his mom to see if she can get here before 9:44, when I left. We meet these two girls who were going to München so I tagged along with them, and saved €10,00..which was good considering I had about €12,00 and needed a ticket home.
So I'm sitting on the train because the train person had blown the whist (saying we were leaving) when out of the corner of my eye I saw a flash of person and green. I got out of my seat and was waiting at the door when Lukas came flying down the steps and throws the bag over the train person's head..the door closed like 2 seconds after. It honestly looked like something out of a movie!
So I was sitting with three girls. Two were going to München for school stuff while the other was getting off before. The one gril (from what I could understand) had left all her bags on either the plane or a train way up in Köln and was quit sad/mad etc..and had to carry the rest of her stuff around in a plastic bag.
2 hours later we go into München and we all said our good-byes. I walked around the whole building trying to find the fountain that we were going to meet at. No fountain.. :S so I walk around for 10 min. when I hear my name called, look over and see 4 others =D I go over and there is Colton, Elias, Lee, and Robyn but no Emily..which was a little odd considering her train had gotten in at 10:30, a half hour before the rest of ours. Elias and Robyn took off while us three walked around for another 20 minutes looking for Emily. After a half hour we took off. We were going to take the U-Bahn (Subway) but got lost on the terminal and decided to walk. We found a McDonald's...this biggest one I've ever seen. The first floor is where you buy the food and the next three levels are just sitting..and it was packed. A little gross..but what ever. So we are sitting upstairs eating when Emily comes out of the blue. We were like..wth? What are the odds of this happening..Munich has over 1 million people. I guess she missed her first train so she got here at 11:20, right after I got into the station, and went to find the fountain. She then walked around a little and was about to go home when she decided to check out McDonald's because she remembered someone saying they really wanted some in Munich, and there we were.
After that we made our way down the main street and met up with the other two and did a little shopping, looked around the frauenkirche (Lady's church) then to Marienplatz, the main square in München. The rathaus (City hall) there is this masive gothic building, one of the coolest I've seen. We decided to make our way to the famous Hofbräuhaus but left after they wouldn't serve beer to those under 18, so everyone but my-self ;) So we made our way to another resturant and had some lunch. Went back to Marieplatz and climbed 306 steps to the top of a church and the view was amazing from up there :) though you couldn't see the Alps. Took the U-bahn so we could get some Pizza hut =D then made our way back to the train station
So right after running Emily to her train so she wouldn't miss it I was going back to the main part of the train station cuz i have like 30-40 min. to kill (Train was 15 min. late) and these two guys appear in front of me and one starts yelling 'PAPIER PAPIER!!!' and I'm like... WTF!?? So the first guys keeps asking for it and I get 'that look' on my face and he is like 'passport!!' so I pull out my paper one and the other guy takes it. The first guy pulls out this I.D card and says 'Hast dz das nicht verstanden!!!?', it was some police of the Federal Rep. Of Germ I.D, I'm like'...mein deutsch ist schlecht...' (My German is bad) second guy asks where I come from 'Canada..' and the first guys asks me 'hast du kiffer geraucht!??' (Did you smoke weed)
Well you f*cking stupid cop
A) If I HAD why in this bloody world would I tell you?
B) What the hell makes you think I have?
so of course I said 'nein..warum??' and the second asshole, who had my passport was like'ptf, Warum?? Warum?? Doof(dumb)' and they walked away. I was like...wtf just happened....
My train was 15 minutes late..and becuase of that I missed my connection train and didn't feel like waiting an hour..so had to walk home in the rain =(
Was a good day all around though

19.3.2007

So Markus TOTALLY forgot bout his mother birthday :P He only remember when I asked him what kind of flowers she liked. So after school we got a thing of roses and a card. She enjoyed them quit a bit =). In the afternoon I watched 'Water World' ,which I haven't seen in years, and made plans to go party it up with Lukas on Friday =D
For supper we went to a Japanese all you can eat. I must say...it was a little weird seeing Asian people speaking Germany. I've only ever heard them speaking English or some form of Asian. I definitely had my share of food. They had a few things that I've never seen before. Breaded/deep fried balls of fish (?) breaded/Deep fried balls of crab meat and a grill that have prawns, chicken, beef, pork, and oysters =D

18.3.2007

Today was Oma's 70th birthday, so to celebrate we went out for some traditional Bavarian food.
We met up with Oma and opa, Kai's (dad) sister and her husband and their two kids, and our family. For starters I had a really yummy liver ball in some kind of broth. Lunch was (Spelling may be off) Schweinhaxe with klösel and rotkraut. So it was a leg of a pig that have been grilled(??) so the outside was very crispy but the inside was lecker =D. Knösel is German dumplings, a kind of mash that's sticky and rolled in big balls, and rotkrat is red cabbage. I washed it all down with a radler (Beer with lemon juice?)
Later that day the others came over to our house and we had cake and taramasu that Eva and Janna had made from scratch.

17.3.2007 Dachau

The KZ (Concentration camp) of Dachau was the first, or one of the first, camps to be built in Germany. Oddly enough it opened only a few weeks after Hitler had come to power (1933) and was used at first, primarily, to hold political prisoners. This camp was the model camp for all other camps that were to be built in occupied Europe.


The entrance to the camp and the infamous words that can be found at all the camps 'Arbeit Macht Frei' which translates into 'work makes freedom/Work will set you free'

This is looking from the entrance out onto the roll-call area. Prisoners would at times have to stand for hours while each person was counted. If someone escaped, they would make then stand longer. If anyone fell it was forbidden to help them, and this is how many of the weak died.

This is a view of where the 30 barracks had once been. All but two are still standing. It was very surreal to touch these trees knowing that 200 000 people have once been confined here.

'Dachau- the significance of the name will never be erased from German history. It stands for all concentration camps which the Nazi's established in their territory'

17.3.2007 Schleißheim schloß

Schleißheim schloß is located just a little out side of München. It was used as a royal residence back in the 18th century by some of the Kings of Bayern. There is two parts to it, the Alte schloß and the new part. Because of the airport located right beside the Alte schloß it was completely destroyed by allied bombing attacks during the Second World War, the other received some damage.

This is the Alte schloß, which has been rebuilt. There is nothing spectacular about it, but still it's more than what we have in Canada.

This is the other part of the schloß, it's behind the top picture. This the part that the king or regent or what ever would live in. From end to end it is about 183m (I do believe) and it was set up in a way that you could see end to end when the doors were open.

This is the ground floor. Everything is made out of marble and the ceiling has been painted by hand :/. This is where the balls would be held and I don't think it was used much for anything else.

This is the 'Big Gallery' on the second level. Most of the pictures here were either religious or had to do with Greek mythology. Some on the 1st floor had to do with the Christan armies battling the Turks. The sleeping quarters were also on the second level as was a mini chapel. The main one is located on the main floor.

16.3.2007

I forgot to mention I saw a transvestite at the train station yesterday..It was around 5 (Had classes in the afternoon) and the train was about to pull in. I was looking at the ground when these high heels caugh my attention. I started to look up and I was liking the very short mini skirt. When it came to the face I looked in horror, and thankfully the train had just arrived, and ran onto the train and burst out laughing. Now I just need to see the skin heads...
This school is so friggen big and it doesn't make any sence!!! Classes are in random places...
so I spent our first 15 min. break trying to find my Spanish class, and after 20 min. I gave up and decided to go into downtown. I love just randomly walking, as you never know what you are going to find. I saw a few amazing churches and statues and did lot's of window shopping. I find this one place that I'm thinking was once the residence of the Bishop or a person high up in the church. It is this big beautful building with an attached church and this amazing little park. It's nice to find these places inside the city, as they are offten rare. But here I felt totally drawn out of the city and it was nice and refreshing. Later tonight I'm going to be going to ROFA, which should be interesing =D
and München tomorrow...Last I heard it's not going to happen =(

15,3,2007

Just another regular day. Nothing special went on today. Instead of 6 classes we had 8 (Not super sure why....but what ever) Today was my first art class. I was given a big piece of paper/cardboard stuff and was sent off. The teacher didn't tell me what to do (Unless it was in German and I had completely zoned out) so I start my project not knowing really what to do..just looking on other people's papers and AFTER I have started some one comes up and tells me I'm doing it wrong...What ever..I have never been good with art any ways. Lunch we went out for some döners, which I have missed ever so much!
We got home from school around 17.00 and I haven't done much today. I'll work on some Canadian home work and maybe watch a movie.
I'm really looking forward to the weekend though =D
Tomorrow I'm going to ROFA, which is a metal disko, and Laurel, another Canadian, is going to be there so it should be good. And on Saturday a bunch of us are going to go spend the afternoon in München.
Snow on Sunday...

14.3.2007

Today was the same old same old.
Left for the train station (In Merin it's a single track with a shelter and a ticket machine...great Banhhof ;) ) got to Augsburg and walked to school.

So far all my French classes have actually been Italien, and the only word I have understood is gelato. So I went to my 'french' class and the teacher told me it would be a waste of time becuase they were writing a test, so instead I went into the city (downtown) for just under 2 hours. I love walking through all the narrow streets and just looking at all the good stuff they have over here. So I came back for my last two class, Latin and Spanish. Because my Latin is all but 2 words I got to play around on the computer while everyone else did some work =D. Spanish....oh god. I was a little late for class becuase I had no idea where it was (basement in some dark corner) and Anna was with me, showing me were it was, and the teacher kicked me out of class even before I got a chance to sit down. She was freaking out becuae we were late and some other reason, I didn't understand. She then starting to ask me stuff in Spanish, while going faster than she was in German. So to make it short I had no clue what so ever what she was saying, so she cloesed the door in our face and that was that. i ended up going to a lower level Spanish class =D
Going home was a nightmare..For what ever reason the train wasn't running to Mering/Merching to day so we had to take the bus. Mering is only...15-20ish Km from Augsburg but this bus, jamed in like sardines, went through 6 different villages before finally getting to Merching, 1 1/2 hours later :/
I went for a walk later that day with Eva and the dog and watched Borat later that night =D

Leaving for Germany....

Friday March 9th, 2007

Emily & Jordan at the airport leaving for Germany!