A Short Trip to the Beach

Since we were all exhausted from the previous day in Hamburg, we ended up sleeping pretty late and didn't have breakfast until around noon. After cleaning up a bit, Arne took me to a great beach out toward the lighthouse where the sea and harbor start to meet. We walked along for a bit and check out some of the stuff in the water, and after a bit I came across a squishy blob. I asked what it was and it turned out to be a jelly fish. I kept nearly stepping on ones in the water and that had washed up on the beach, and as I was warily looking at it, Arne picked it up and threw the whole huge blob at me! Only afterward did he explain they're not poisonous, but even then it was weird to hold and I threw mine back in the water pretty quickly.

It was really beautiful and the wind was coming from a slightly different direction than the previous day so some of the larger ships had their sails up. It was great to just walk along and hang out on the beach for a bit, especially since they're pretty sparse at home in the middle of the States.

After a short time we had to head back and grab our things. Arne arrange a ride for us on the "Mitfahrgelegenheit", which is essentially hitchhiking that you pay people for. It's actually a really cool system and way cheaper than using the trains. Basically you go to a website online where you find people who are going where you want to go, then you ride with them and pay something like 5 euro per hundred kilometers. We met our ride at the main station and I was immediately amused. It turned out to be two sort of hippie surfers with an old Mercedes MB1000 camper van. Arne and I got a sweet couch in the back, complete with a table and the soothing sounds of some kind of weird Bob Marley-Enya-beach-Indian-flute hybrid sort of music. The van was pretty slow and there was more construction so it took a while to get to Köln where they were going to drop us off, but we got there earlier than expected and were able to once again have McDonald's in the Hauptbahnhof. Our hunger satisfied, we sat on the platform for a bit, jumped on our train, then finally got in around 1. Definitely a lot of transit time, but it was an awesome weekend.

Hamburg!

Saturday afternoon Arne and I rode to Hamburg with his mom and sister, since they were heading toward that area anyway. It took a while to get there because there was construction on the autobahn, but they dropped us off around 4 in the afternoon which gave a lot of time to explore the city. We started off by taking a bus to a different train station (the one that we were at was closed and being worked on) where we jumped on a train to head toward the harbor area in Hamburg. I really couldn't get enough of the water everywhere there, it was so beautiful to be riding by train and passing over channels and old narrow streets. The transportation system was amazingly efficient and combined busses and trains that often ran in subway tunnels.

When we stepped out of the station we were right on the water by an old ship that had been docked and converted into a restaurant. I think it was a perfect day for walking around, and Hamburg is a beautiful city to explore. We went along the waterfront for a while and then crossed a bridge into one of the new areas of the city that's being developed. There, a massive old building where ships used to unload cargo is being converted into the new Hamburg opera house, which the city hopes will rival the fame of Sydney. I pulled this picture from Google of what it is supposed to look like when completed:

Right now only the lower portion is completed and the entire upper section is still being built. The building is massive already, so when they more than double the size it will certainly be impressive. Some of the pictures of the initial construction work are incredible, in particular there was one where one of the cranes was lifting an entire backhoe into the center of the building since it couldn't be gotten in there any other way. When complete, there are supposed to be three separate concert halls inside, and I believe the sign said that the entire theme is based on the water of the harbor.

The picture above is pretty awesome because it demonstrates so many of the different elements I saw in Hamburg. The red ship is an old fireboat that also has a lighthouse built into the top so that it could keep ships away from dangerous areas where an actual lighthouse couldn't be built. In the background on the left are some of the buildings that have recently been constructed, as well as the in-progress opera house which is the brick building toward the middle with blue at the top. At the right in the distance are the gigantic cranes that surround the shipping yards, where thousands of container boxes of freight are loaded onto ships to be sent all over the world.

I loved the water that was everywhere while we were walking around. Channels still run through buildings which are now apartments, offices, etc, but which were originally used so ships could pull up and unload freight directly into the buildings, where it would be sold immediately on the other side.

As walked over a bridge, Arne stopped and had me look over toward the black cathedral tower in the distance. I had assumed it was really old; however, half the reason it is black is from smoke during the second world war. Hamburg was completely destroyed by the Royal Airforce and the Americans during this time, which is why even today they are still building new and beautiful buildings. It's amazing to me though how quickly they've been able to build so much. Apparently most of the buildings that really define the city today weren't built until the last 30 years or so. We continued walking and got to the base of the cathedral tower, where the remains of what must once have been a massive building still stand. Apparently after the war the city considered rebuilding it, but instead they decided to let it remain as it was as a reminder to never have such horrible war again.

They did, however, do something really cool with the tower. It is the tallest structure in Hamburg and so they built an elevator which goes to nearly to the top, almost 70 meters, and provides a view of the entire city below. When we got in the elevator there were only two button, "0m" and "70m". It flew up threw the tower, which was pretty awesome because we went from the ground floor with its soaring ceilings up through a whole series of levels, some dim with pigeons flitting around and some really bright with sweeping views. When we got to the top we were provided with a great view of the city and could see everything out toward the harbor and on in toward the town hall. There were some pretty fantastic gargoyles perched and diving from the tower and we spent quite a bit of time reading some of the information about the war and Hamburg.

I thought it was pretty amazing to see the picture from immediately after the city had been bombed and then compare it was the same view today. The development is just mind blowing. Also, a sign mentioned that the reason many of the towers still stand is because the pilots would use them for beacons and so purposefully leave them intact.

We headed on toward the Rathaus (German for city hall) and also another sort of capital building from which the state is governed. There was a market going on in the square, but we didn't wander around it for long because we were starved. I have come to realize that McDonald's is one of America's proudest creations, and even in Europe you can get cheap happy meals and order things from the Euro Menu, which is exactly the same as the dollar menu only instead of mayonnaise a lot of the sandwiches have slightly funky sauces.

After getting some food we jumped on the subway to go toward the student area of the city. Since Hamburg used to be many smaller cities, there are actually several city centers and the area we went to was one of them - a sort of liberal, alternative, young, and really fun place to walk around. There was this great old building that the government apparently tried to tear down but the people there protested and saved it. The entire thing is covered in graffiti, protests, and just random stuff.

Another great thing I saw, especially considering our preceding dining choice, was this pole that had messages of peace on it, but also on the top a fat little man throwing a McDonald's paper into the trash with an "I'm lovin' it" slogan printed below!

It was really fun to just sit, talk, and watch the people go by in this area, because there were definitely some interesting ones. We hung out for a while and wandered around a bit till it got closer to evening, then jumped on a subway and went back toward the harbor where Arne took me to one of his favorite spots where we could sit on the dock and drink a beer while the sun set. Across the water was "Der König der Löwen" - The Lion King musical theatre which has been putting on elaborate performances for years and apparently sells out every time. The evening was beautiful and it was a great combination with the city in the background the the water in the front.

We eventually got up and started wandering back into the city, where Arne was excited to show me one of Germany's most unique attractions: the Reeperbahn of Hamburg. This is the red light district and I didn't really know what to expect. When we got there, it was amazingly fun and just as packed with people as the Kieler Woche had been the night before. We walked by sex shops, porn stores, prostitutes in the windows, and what must be the most interesting police station in the world right in the middle of all of it. Saturday also happened to be a Harley Davidson fest, so bikers were streaming through the streets and people were packed in all around watching. Arne and I each got a Döner, which is a really popular sort of fast food over here that reminded me of a pita but with way more stuff crammed inside, and just watched everything. Every walk of life passed us, everything from young punks to college students to flocks of Asian tourists to elderly couples looking on and laughing. I really like the more fun and frivolous European attitude toward sex. Even when I'm shopping I notice that magazines have naked models on them and nobody minds because they're all pretty open about it.

Anyway, apparently the Reeperbahn is also where the Beatles played before they became famous, so we went by "Grosse Freiheit 36" which advertises them pretty heavily.

After a bit more time there, we had to jump on the subway to catch our ride back to Kiel. As we were getting out of the car an hour or two later, Arne's mom asked, "Well, do you two want to head back down to the harbor?". She meant did we want to go down to the party like the night before. I told her no and went to bed - I'd already had an awesome day!

Kiel - The Ship Parade

On Saturday morning we got up around 9 so that we could get down to the harbor early enough to check out the ship parade - an event during which all of the sailboats fill the water at once and head out toward the sea. I love waking up with Germans because food and coffee are usually on the top of their priority list. I thought we would just have some bread or something, but they kept bringing more and more food to the table until it was laden with cheese, meat, bread, coffee, strawberries, eggs, and every condiment known to man. Needless to say I was pretty glad we were going out afterward because I got completely stuffed full of wonderful food.

The parks are another of the things I really like here, and we walked through a really beautiful while trekking to the water that morning. When we got the harbor, not too many ships had gone out yet so it was really great to watch as they as started heading toward the sea. There was absolutely every kind of ship, everything from small sailboats to massive ferries heading to Scandinavia. It was really beautiful and the only unfortunate thing was that the wind was coming from a direction that didn't allow the bigger ships to use their sails. Anyway, a few of the pics I took:

Kiel and Hamburg!

This past weekend I had a really fun time going up North to see Arne's hometown of Kiel. I took the day off on Friday and left early in the morning to catch a train at the Aachen West station around 7. Unfortunately, the schedule was different from the one I had seen online, so I had to jump on a train to the Hauptbahnhof (German word for main station). There weren't any trains with the connections I need leaving for about 45 minutes, so I went in the McDonald's to grab some breakfast. The guy at the counter told me it would take 15 minutes to make the breakfast food I wanted, so instead I ended up eating two of the little hamburgers and a thing of fries at 8 in the morning. Then I jumped on a train to Köln, where I had 15 or 20 minutes and was able to step outside to see the Dom, which is supposed to be one of Europe's most famous and often-visited cathedrals. I definitely have to take a day to go check it out completely - the architecture is unbelievable and the structure is massive, towering above the plaza below.

It took a few more hours to get to the Hamburg station, during which time I was able to read and slightly get to know an old German woman who sat down beside me. She didn't really speak English and, unfortunately, my German is practically non-existent, but she got really excited when she saw I was reading "Catcher in the Rye" and kept pointing to different things that were passing by outside. I love taking the train because it goes through so much beautiful countryside, and it's still so amazing to me that you can jump on and in hours travel pretty much anywhere in the country. On the train from Köln to Hamburg there were a ton of people, some of the most amusing of which were a group of guys whom I think were having a bachelor party - they were already completely drunk and singing for the whole car at 11 in the morning. Once I got to Hamburg, I only had to wait a short time before my final train to Kiel, which was supposed to arrive at 15:36. The transportation system is amazing here - I stepped onto the platform just as the clock in the station was reach 3:35. Arne was there to meet me and we walked a little ways from the station down to the harbor, which was beautiful. It was a great weekend to go, because all of last week was the "Kieler Woche", one of the world's largest sailing events and a huge party for the entire city. People from all over come to watch the thousands of ships in the harbor, which during the week do everything from racing to just hanging out and sailing.

We accidentally took the wrong bus and had to walk a bit more than intended to get to Arne's Mom's flat, but it was a good opportunity to check out some of the city. Kiel was destroyed pretty badly during the second world was because of the harbor there, so many of the houses are newer and the street plan is much more modern than in other towns. However, we went to a really nice older part of town where his mom has a great flat. Since we were both starving we started making dinner, which was a pasta dish with a whole array of vegetables and cheeses.

We had a fun time talking and hanging out at dinner - Arne's mom and sister are really fun and wanted me to be stuffed before I left the table. After cleaning up we jumped on the internet for a bit to check out the bands playing that night at the Kiel Woche - Arne had told me there was a really big party on the harbor and throughout the whole city during the entire week, and that it got best at night. We looked up what bands were playing and when and walked down toward the harbor. What he had told me was a "party" was a complete understatement. When we got to the harbor, I was engulfed in the largest, most eclectic and fun group of people I think I have ever been in. It was amazing - along the entire harbor, which is quite a few kilometers long, were stands to buy sausages, döners, beer, cocktails, cakes, and pretty much any other item that could possibly be sold. There was music blasting when we first got there, and as we walked one concert would be drowned out by the sounds of another on up the street. It was awesome just to be in the middle of all of the crazy revelry and on one side have parties, food, and fun, while on the other evening lay over the harbor. There were a ton of people just hanging out on their boats either in the docks or nearby, just relaxing and watching everything that was going on.

Something interesting the Germans do to promote cleanliness at this type of event (which I think is virtually impossible, since people are dropping beer bottles, food, and everything else all the time) is to charge an additional amount when you first get a beer cup and then give a 1-2 euro refund if you bring it back. Arne had picked up a bunch of cups the night before and I had been amused watching him carry this whole stack through the crowd, but sure enough after a little wandering to find the right booths he had sold back all of his cups and made a pretty impressive amount of money. So that became a sort of auxiliary game for the night, collecting any stray cups we found laying around and selling them back.

Along with all of the partying that was going on, there were some other interesting things to see. There is a research institute right along the harbor, complete with a huge ship that they use when studying out in the open water, and next to their facility is an area where rescued sea lions can swim outside, so it was fun to watch them playing in the water for a bit.

The couple concerts we went to were pretty fun - one was a German band that is really popular here, so it was a fun atmosphere with everyone screaming the words along and me just kind of clapping and laughing the whole time. We also stopped by a Bon Jovi coverband who actually played really well, then walked by an AC/DC coverband that looked and sounded eerily similar to the real thing. After a while we ended up by a floating party platform, which had a DJ up in a sort of watchtower overlooking the sea.

I think we left around midnight when all of the booths started closing down, at which point we headed toward the student area of the town. As we walked, I became even more amazed because the party was not only in the harbor, it was literally the entire town! No matter where we went there were a ton of people and I think that a lot of people had the same idea as we did because when we got to the club area it was already picked. We wandered for a while and found a really fun little club to dance in for a while, then finally started to head back home. I think we got in around 3 or 4, but I was more interested in getting to bed at that point.

Daily Life

I've been having such a great time traveling, but there have also been really fun things to see around the city. I was walking back from class when I saw this "Happy Semen" advertisement. With that kind of a campaign how could I not check out the website? It was in German but the pictures alone are hilarious.

It takes about 30 minutes to walk home from the city center, which is about 3 km from where I live near the Uniklinik. On my bike I can get back and forth in about 10 minutes, but there are some pretty substantial hills so sometimes it isn't the most fun experience. However, I'm really glad I got a bike to have here; the busses are a lot slower than some of the other cities and don't run very frequently at night, so it's nice to just ride wherever I want. One of my favorite points is getting to the top of the hill that climbs out of the inner circle of Aachen because through the houses you can see a bunch of the surrounding area. I snapped this picture while walking and think it's pretty reflective of the streets and cars here. Pretty much all of the vehicles are small hatchback cars, which are probably all that can fit through most of the smaller streets here.

I've been loving the food and one of my favorite things is the fresh produce in the markets. I've been eating what is probably an unhealthy amount of cherries, so I figured I should pay homage to them.

The great thing is that there is a "Hit" market just about five minutes' walk from my room, so I just have to cross a little field, go up through some trees, and I'm there. Hit is great because it's a find-all sort of store where you can get everything from fresh bread, fruit, meat, cheese, and wine to housewares and various car and bike supplies. Oh, as a side note since I've mentioned bike supplies: I got a flat tire on my bike last week and couldn't find anywhere to buy a tube. Yesterday I was walking along and found what I thought was a really clever idea (especially in a place where half the population gets around on foot or bike), a tube vending machine! It cost five euro and they had a various selection of tubes, and once I made my selection out popped a box with exactly what I needed.

There have been other such intuitive things that I've really appreciate here. The Germans are very eco-friendly (I may have mentioned how they try to recycle absolutely everything) and it's been pretty cool to see so many wind turbines and alternative forms of energy. I really like that in my dorm the lights go off automatically in all the hallways, so you just push the button at one end and they stay on for a bit while you get to your room. Something that I thought was a really clever idea was automatic escalators. For a while I thought that a bunch of the escalators were broken, but when you walk onto them they automatically start moving and then turn off again when nobody is using them.

However, one of my favorite ideas by far are the windows. All of the windows I've seen are designed in such a way that they're dual-hinged. Twisting the handle straight up let's you have the window hinged at the bottom so that it's sort of cracked open, while twisting it to a horizontal position locks in a different set of hinges that let the window swing completely open from one side. I haven't encountered much air conditioning, so these are definitely a good idea and actually keep the rooms pretty cool.

I took a few shots the other evening from my bedroom window looking across the courtyard. The complex I live in is pretty unremarkable; I have my own room with a sink and I share a kitchen and bathroom with the other people on my floor. There are 8 rooms on my side and 8 on the other, so it really hasn't been too bad going back to a pseudo-dorm life. It's always kind of fun to walk into the common area and just sit down and talk with people for a little while.

As for food, I've been eating a ton of bread and pasta. Sometimes I'll cook something like rice and stir-fry, and there has of course been plenty of sausage as part of my diet. I really like the restaurants I've been to, especially on the student street, "Pontstraße", where everything is really cheap and comes in big quantities. Last night we had a barbeque in this really beautiful area right behind the apartments. There is a pit at the edge of some trees, under which there is an old stone checker-board table where we hung out. It took a while to get the coals going because at first we didn't have any lighter fluid, then when some German girls walked by with their little grill we borrowed some, but it was one of the least flammable lighter fluids I'd ever seen. Luckily Ken brought some from his quick run to Hit, and we were then able to create a much more substantial flame and have a great evening grilling and hanging out in the beautiful (incredibly long, the sun hasn't been setting till way after 10) evening.

Frankfurt

Half because I am feeling a little lazy and half because it is best explained with pictures, my trip to Frankfurt is described in pictures:

The New Frankfurt School:

The old town plaza:

The Main river (Frankfurt is called Mainhattan ;) ):

And one of the lagest, most well-designed malls I have visited:

Bavaria (part I)

So it's been a while since I've updated and quite a bit has happened. This past weekend I had a great trip with Janina and Nona down to Bavaria to meet Janina's parents and see where she grew up. Going down there was pretty awesome, since it involved multiple autobahns and one of the smallest cars I've ever been in. Going 100 mph and still having BMWs and Audis flying past is certainly a unique and fun experience, and I experienced plenty of it on our drive down.

We left Friday evening and drove for about three hours to her small village, Geiselbach, near Aschaffenburg in the north of Bavaria. It was interesting to learn about all of the German driving laws. First off, it takes a huge amount of money (thousands of dollars usually) to get a license here since everyone is required to take way more classes than in the states. It's only allowed to overtake someone on the left, and if you do so on the right police will immediately take your license. The rest stops were also interesting; it costs 50 euro cents to get into the bathroom, where everything is automated and the urinals and toilets talk to you as you walk up. However, if you use the restrooms you get a voucher for the money which can then be used when you buy something at the counter.

Anyway, we got to her place around 9:00 that night and her mom had made a great, apparently typical Bavarian meal, which was a sort of chicken and bean stew. When we had finished dinner, Janina, her brother Jan, Nona and I headed off to check out some of the bars since, in the words of their mother, "If anyone can show you the bars around here, it's Jan." We ended up driving about an hour and went almost to Hamburg to a winery which makes an apple wine for which the area is famous. It was pretty hilarious - in Bavaria the smallest drink you can order is 1/2 liter, though it's just assumed you'll have a liter so they brought us a 2l "bimbel" (a fat jar) of the wine. It was really awesome and we had a fun time hanging out and talking. My favorite part about the restaurant was the sausages that were being carried by - the standard serving was a meter long!

The next morning we got up early and headed down south to Rothenburg. This small town was stereotypical German and so beautiful. The city was surrounded by a massive wall, which we were able to walk around before heading toward the old city center. There was a market going on, where vendors were selling everything from fresh pressed apple juice to bread shaped and decorated like a little pig.

One of the best things we saw was Käthe Wohlfahrt, a massive year-round Christmas store which has everything from cuckoo clocks to a 12 foot Christmas pyramid. There was even a whole village of little stuffed animals that were each doing a different chore, everything from sawing wood to washing laundry to baking bread. (Every animal was moving!)

After spending a bunch of time in that store we headed on toward the edges of the town, where there was a beautiful overlook of the valley below, and where I also saw some grape vines up close for the first time. It's so cool to me how grapes and random fruit just grow everywhere over here.

We wandered into the cathedral in the center of town where I saw the most massive organ, at least 2 stories high and towering over the pews below. There was a great carving of an angel stepping on what looked like a sort of rabid wolf, but which a sign said was a representation of the devil. It was actually the most "pagan" Christian church I've been in - there were carvings from African tribes and various reliefs of natural settings, something which was somewhat refreshing after seeing so many of the ordinary sort of churches.

We went again to the town center and into a museum and old prison, where there were scenes of a classical apothecary, a typical was scene, and an amazing drawing of Jesus the was made not from lines but tiny lines of scripture. We then went down into the old dungeons, where there were torture devices and some of the most dark, dank rooms I have ever seen. (It definitely made me glad to be neither a criminal nor alive a thousand years ago.)

After seeing all there was to see in this small town, we headed back to Geiselbach, where Janina's mom had made a spaghetti meal which somehow had a German twist and tasted amazing. A short nap and we decided we would head off to Frankfurt, but more on that soon!