Praha and Berlin and nearing the end

Sadly, this week was the conclusion of my travels this semester. Three of us went to Prague to sightsee and visit my family (I have distant relatives in the Czech Republic). The weekend was awesome and extremely relaxing thanks to hospitality of all the Czechs. We got to experience a real Czech pub, the beauty of the "Old Town" in Prague, and of course, a lot of souvenir shopping! We said goodbye monday morning and caught up with our program in Berlin (only after a dramatic loss/ recovery of a purse on an international train). That afternoon we took a bike tour of Berlin and got to see what was left of the Berlin wall, the Brandenburg gate, and famous Jewish memorial in town. I found the history of Berlin absolutely fascinating, and I wouldn't exactly call myself a history buff. That evening we went to a group dinner at a Brauhaus and had a great time. The next day we visited a history of medicine museum, the East Side Gallery (professional graffiti done on the Berlin Wall), and a medical school where I got the chance to intubate a dummy! The chance to play with the training devices for the medical school was awesome. All of the students played like children for a couple hours and learned things that will hopefully help us all in the future. Wednesday we    and then we visited the Bunderstag (seat of German parliament), and then had a lovely dinner at a Moroccan restaurant (mhmmm Couscous!). Thursday was our last day in Berlin, so we visited the natural history museum as well as the Berlin Zoo! Despite the horrible weather, all the animals were out to play! :) That night we drove to Duderstadt to visit the company Ottobock the next day. Ottobock is one of the world wide leaders on cutting edge prosthetic limbs. We actually got a lecture about the devices from a worker who had a prosthetic leg from a motorcycle accident, which was definitely the highlight of the visit. We got a tour of the manufacturing facilities and then had to say goodbye. We had a four hour drive back to Bonn, which actually turned into a funky-disco sing-a-long with all the professors and our awesome advisor. We arrived back in Bonn and reality hit hard, we had a class review at 10pm on a friday night. Pretty much from here on out is going to be all studying and finals. I still have a couple things to look forward to (soccer match today, and concert in Koln next weekend) but for the most part all the fun travels are over. It was such a blessing to be able to experience all of Europe, and it has only lit my fire to travel more. I keep telling myself "When I go back to Rome/ London/ Prague/etc" or "Next time I visit Europe, Ill have to make it to Spain/ Switzerland/etc." I'm sad that this is almost over, but I miss everyone back home quite a bit as well as the sun/warmth. Three weeks from right now I'll be on a plane home and I've had a great semester, but I am ready. At least I say that now; I guess we will find out on May 4th.