Berlin and Prague

So my previous blog that I was writing got deleted and I'm kind of devastated because there was almost two months of thoughts in it. So this one is probably going to be a shorter version of that original one.

BERLIN/DRESDEN
I really liked Berlin. I had been hearing stories about Berlin from my parents since I was born, so the fact that I was finally going was really exciting for me. While I think I would have a much different perspective about the city if I had gone by myself or just with some friends I still really liked it. I also go to bike for the first time since I was in middle school. It was less fun when I ran into a car but whatever.

I also really liked Dresden. It was weird because when I told my parents that I was going to Dresden, they told me that it had been completely flattened during WWII. When they told me that I imagined a torn down city that was mostly rubble and dirt. I was so wrong. It was a complete city with beautiful buildings and architecture. It had so much history that I was not expecting from this city I had never heard about. It was really a cool trip.

The concentration camp was an experience that I can't explain. I had never been to a concentration camp and I never really thought I would ever be to one. And it was a great experience.

The thing I am most disappointed about is that I don't feel like I got to know the city. The bike tour was fun and we definitely saw a lot but I spent so much time focusing on not dying, I wasn't looking at what was around me. It was a great week though! I learned a lot about Berlin and about medicine which was also really cool. The museums we went to were awesome and I wish I could go back and spend more time in them.

It was a cool city that I really hope to go back to and see more of with more time.

PRAGUE
After Berlin was Prague which was probably one of my favorite cities I visited. It was classic and old timey and quaint and adorable! I absolutely fell in love with Prague. I wish I had more than a weekend there to see everything. The food was good the sights were beautiful and the money was weird. So was the art. So much strange art. While in Berlin I felt very rushed, in Prague I just wanted to slow down and see everything. Just stroll and look at what Prague is. I could see myself living there just because it was so cute.

I fell in love that weekend with that city and I will be going back. To Prague and to Berlin.

First Week!

The first week is over, and boy has it been a whirlwind. I have the tram system down...kinda... well at least I can get from my house to AIB. We went on a couple walking tours of Bonn and in our free time went to the Beethoven house. Bonn is such a beautiful city, and I'm excited to spend the semester here! Classes are about to start and I'm a little nervous, balancing grades and travel are going to be a challenge, but Ill have plenty of down time on planes and trains to go over material so ill just have to be more efficient with my time. I guess we will see how that turns out come the first exam week.

Arrival: the Beginning of a Bonn-iful Semester

Today was a really long day. Between the plane trip, airport food, and way to many people coughing on me, I had all my energy drained. However, I arrived in once piece and found my way to the meeting point where the rest of the group was waiting for the bus to Bonn. Once in Bonn we got to see AIB, which is where all of our classes will be, and meet our host parents! My host parents are so sweet! They drove me back to their house in Bornhiem and showed me the tram I would be needing to take to get into the city. Then they sat me down to a very German dinner, sausage and potatoes! Overall today was exhausting, but a wonderful start to a great semester!

Final Days

Yay last official post that I was supposed to post while in Bonn :(

We went to the LMU Theatre performance about radium workers the night of our last final and it was interesting... It was pretty good but not my kind of play. I'm impressed by all of the theatre people though, they're really good at what they do. After that, I walked around Bonn and Hersel and saw the small groups of German guys running around with trees on their backs! I'm so glad we were here to witness that because it's probably one of the funniest things I've ever seen. I saw a girl catch her boyfriend putting up the tree with his friends and she ended up getting serenaded by him while he continued to tie the tree to her house. Germans have interesting traditions.

The next day, we went to Bingen to see the Hildegard museum with the Viz kids. We presented our plants and I completely forgot the entire speech I memorized... Oops again. Then we ate at a really delicious restaurant before we left Bingen to raft down the Rhein. Rafting was so much and also pretty tiring. I'm glad we got the chance to do it though, it was quite the experience! I think we went to a castle after but I'm not exactly sure. Those few days started to blur together... I'm going to assume it was a cool castle, what little I can remember of it. Then I'm pretty sure we went home and I went promptly to bed, because rafting is freaking exhausting.

The next day, we woke up to go bike to Remagen. I was a mess and ended up on the ground every few minutes. You'd think that if you heard "yeah we're going to be biking for two hours to get to the next town," you'd eat a few meals and make sure your contacts wouldn't dry out, but nah. I was feeling especially stupid that day. So that's how I ended up with the weird scab on the back of my leg that hasn't healed after one week... The ride was beautiful though, and it made me so sad while I was biking since I realized that we were leaving. Germany is beautiful. Following the Rhein was amazing; there were trees everywhere, the water and sky were a perfect blue, the weather was perfect. Honestly, it was just the perfect end to the trip. We went to the Peace Museum at the bridge of Remagen once we got there and I can't remember anything since I was dead from the bike ride. I do remember the ice cream that Dr. Wasser bought us though - that was awesome. Awesome ice cream. And then on the way back, I was still so dead that I took the train with half of the group. I really wish I would have been okay enough to bike back, but oh well. Side note: the train ride was fifteen minutes. FIFTEEN?! I'm going to sound extremely lazy but why bike when you can take the train.

Second side note: I thought about it, and I guess the views would be nice. That would make sense.

Finally, we had the farewell party. It was so much fun and the food was the most delicious food we had in Germany. The music was great and our group was standing up there dancing and singing! We were definitely the loudest ones there and the ones who probably got everyone to sing too :)

And that's it... One last trip to bonnsch, the happy hour doner place, and Koln later... We were flying home :( 

"Home"

I know that we're not supposed to write our reflective blog until we've had time to settle and realize how we've changed, but I want to capture some of my immediate reactions to returning to the United States.

I was at first so overwhelmed with happiness because of how friendly and helpful Americans are. Hearing so much English in the airport was irrationally exciting. I had pretty awful time getting home due to one canceled flight and one extremely delayed flight, but despite my misery trying to sleep on extremely uncomfortable airport chairs, I was reminded at my competence in traveling. I learned a lot about the best ways to travel this last semester, so this last set of difficulties during my return journey was kind of like the ultimate challenge that I passed!

Seeing my dad at the Austin airport made me so happy it almost hurt. Sleeping in my bed from high school was sooo nice. When I pet my cat for the first time in 5 months, I felt like he was a hallucination because he was so wonderfully soft and beautiful and perfect.

Now that I've been home for a few days and I feel a bit settled, I already feel like the trip to Germany wasn't real. The wonderfulness of the whole semester is just incongruous with the daily reality of my life in Texas and my brain is having trouble transitioning. I feel as though I matured greatly last semester and the people I'm interacting with now haven't realized it yet. I don't want my life to return to exactly how it was before studying abroad. I'm finding that I'm going to need to make a conscious effort though to avoid sinking back into the comfortable habits of my previous life. I enjoyed the independence I had in Europe so much and I foresee a minor struggle to maintain this sense of singularity that I cultivated in Germany.

Despite this transition, I am so grateful for my family. I have a new appreciation for how nice and clean my house is, the joy of driving a car, eating good 'ol Southern cooking by my grandma, and the warm and loving environment that pervades every space I co-inhabit with my family.

Some weird place called Abilene

My latest excursion has been one of the strangest, and more interesting trips I have taken. This ‘state’ I’m in is larger than pretty much all of the countries in Europe, which is kind of confusing. The weather here is very nice: sunny, and blue skies every day. The people are all rather plump compared to Germany and many of the other places I have visited, and while they do speak English it is an odd sounding dialect, with a smattering of  some odd words such as y’all and ain’t and fixin’. I went to a restaurant the other day, and while the ‘Tex-mex’ food was very good, the portions were kind of large and the other people there were a lot louder than the Germans I am used to. It seems that everyone drives their cars over here, because everything is so spaced out and there seems to be no tram system in place, which is rather inconvenient. I am also disappointed to see a landscape devoid of bakeries and Döner places. I don’t know how long it will be until I return to Germany, seeing as how I haven’t booked a return ticket, but I hope to return someday. 

Goodbye Blog Mit Käse

Sitting here in my apartment on the night before going back home has got me thinking. Thinking about all the fun I've had this semester, all the friends I've made and thinking about all the things I'll miss about Bonn and being abroad in general. My blogs are lagging a little bit so I am going to catch that up before continuing. 

After Aachen, we had some classes and then finals, which went alright. We also attended a play put on by the LMU theater students which was interesting, but I’m not a play fan so it was eh. The next day, bright and early in the morning we had our Rhein Cruise (which was actually a rafting trip) with the Viz kids from A&M. Before we started rafting however, we went to the Hildegard von Bingen museum and learned about the woman who had visions from God and used plants to cure diseases. Us Biosciences people also had to research a plant and what it was used for and what Hildegard used it for and gave a small presentation in the Hildegarten (haha) next to the museum. After a lunch that was so heavy it could sink a raft, we began our water journey. 

This leads to the buoy incident—which isn't supposed to be spoken of, but I have to let my avid readers know the truth. The raft I was on had Dr. Wasser at the helm, and Kristin manning the demanding position of DJ and ‘designated selfie taker’. Our boat struggled to properly propel itself, due to a combination of inept rowers and helmsman. However, after a while we got the hang of it, and just as we were getting into a groove, a buoy appeared on the horizon. We were directly on course for the aforementioned buoy and understandably wanted to avoid crashing into it. We (the rowers) desperately (and uselessly) tried to turn the vessel, Dr. Wasser tried to steer us away and told the left rowers to row harder—even though he meant the right rowers—and Kristin sat in the middle just yelling until the inevitable impact. After all of our lives flashed before us, and a dull 'thunk', it was all over and we had all survived. The rest of the rafting was uneventful other than the inefficient snakelike movement of our vessel, which exhausted our group unlike the other groups, who wisely used the current to help them. 

The next day of ‘Kristin’s Fat Camp^TM’ involved a bike ride to a city (Remagen) that was about 20 km away. The bike ride was very fun, and once we got to the picturesque city we had a tour of the Peace Museum. We then returned to Bonn and went to the old AIB for the Farewell Party, which was very fun. All of the students from the various programs, and most of the host families attended, and this is when it started to hit me that we were actually going home. Each program gave a small speech about their experiences in Bonn, and seeing everyone laughing and having such a good time made me really happy, and really sad at the same time, because I knew this was the last time we were all going to be together. That night was also Rhein in Flammen, which is a fireworks show. After staying at the old AIB for a while, we ended up walking about an huor to the place where the Rehien in Flammen party was and just sat on the grass and enjoyed the firewokrs. It seemed like the city of Bonn was giving us a goodbye party as well which made it an amazing experience.

Now that I'm all caught up, I can continue my deep thoughts regarding leaving Germany. This semester has been the best time of my life, and I have mixed feelings about leaving. On one side, I am very excited to see my family and friends, not having to pay for water, and just being home, but on the other, Bonn had started to feel like a home to me and I am going to miss so many things about it. I'm going to miss my host family and Kristin and Dr. Wasser and the AIB and tram 61. I’m going to miss actually I’m not going to miss the expert agility and skill required to use the shelf toilet. I'm going to miss saying tchüss and entshuldigung. I’m going to miss the closeness of all the other countries to Germany, because in the US you can’t just hop on a train and get to a different country in a few hours (sometimes you can’t even get to a different state). I’m going to miss eating copious amounts of croissants from the ubiquitous bakeries, eating mayo on fries and not getting weird looks, happy hour falafel, and Haribo. Most of all I’m going to just miss walking around Bonn with my friends, just getting lunch or going to the Altstadt, because over the past 4 months Bonn became my home. 

cant think of title

The weekend after Easter break, I went to visit my cousin who lives in Stuttgart. Overall, Stuttgart was a very plain, dull city, but the Mercedes and Porsche museums are both located there were very interesting. Along with the two museums, we toured the beautiful Ludwigsburg Schloss, which was a palace that survived the war and contains many different types of architecture, including Baroque. Rococo, and Empire, however the tour we took was in German so I did not understand too much. Overall, it was nice just to visit with my cousin and relax rather than going crazy trying to see all the sights in a new city. 

Then, after a week of tests and classes, came the AIB charity weekend. The AIB hosted an international Big Event, similar to the one in College Station, and for that we broke up into small groups and went around Bonn, helping people clean or fix up their place. My group went to the NaturFreund children’s park, and pulled weeds, mowed the grass and fixed some benches. However, after we worked for a little bit, we just started to play with the things in the park like chickens, rabbits, and a zip line. The next day was the one I had been looking forward to but also dreading, because it was my birthday, but also the day of the Bonn Marathon. Earlier in the semester I had naïvely put my name down to run in the marathon, because it seemed so far away and I thought that I would have a lot of time to train. However, I am not a fan of running at all and just kept saying, “Oh I’ll start training this weekend,” and ended up at the marathon weekend and had only run once. I still participated in the race and surprisingly got through the 9k that I had to run, and actually had a lot of fun. 

It was back to business after one of my favorite weekends in Bonn, because we were heading to Aachen to present our sutureless anastomosis devices to enmodes. The presentations went very well, and afterwards we got a tour of the labs at the Helmholtz Institute, which was very cool. Then we were free to roam around the city of Aachen and toured a reliquary, the Aachener Dom and then headed home.

The Last Few Weeks

So I've been home for a day now and it's weird. I keep expecting to wake up and take the tram to the Hauptbanhof and walk through Friedensplatz... Nostalgia is real.

The last time I posted was a few days before the AIB Charity Weekend, which was so much fun! My group went to this interesting daycare where there was chickens, bunnies, ziplines, swings, and button making thangs. We had to split up into little groups because they needed us to fix a couple of things, make the pond look pretty, and clean up all of the weeds outside. Koi and I fixed a bench, which ended up taking so much longer than it should have, but ended up being so much fun. It was such a fun day of doing stupid things and acting like kids! Plus we got chocolate cake and chocolate cake makes everything five times better :) The marathon was the next day and I went to go cheer on the people who were running in it near the end. I didn't really do anything so all I can talk about was the giant party-like atmosphere at the finish line and the free food I had at the AIB (both of which rocked so yasss).

Next week was Aachen (AaAaAaAaAachen). The city is so pretty and they're apparently known for their printen, which is really just fancy gingerbread. I love gingerbread so I'm not complaining, especially cause it was pretty good. We presented to Enmodes in the morning, which was really nerve-wracking, but it's crazy that the project was finally over. It felt like we'd worked on it forever...

 Then... FINALS. I actually barely remember those few days except that I was in classroom 3 for the majority of them. Oops. I did as well as I could on all of my classes, so that was a good end to the semester. My host family thought I'd disappeared for a bit there in those last few weeks since I stayed out either studying or going out and enjoying Bonn before we left. I can't believe we actually left...

I'll save the Rheincruise (lies... it was rafting)/Bingen, the bike ride to Remagen and the rest of the past few days for another post. I'm really missing Germany and I hope home starts to feel like home again soon.

Retrospect

Something I recently realized was how powerful indulging in nostalgia is. I generally avoid sappiness and nostalgia because it makes me sad and I don't enjoy feeling sad most of the time. But I'm realizing that as we say goodbye and let ourselves indulge in this feeling of sweet sadness that stems from reminiscing on the fond memories we made, we are culling our memories and reinforcing the positive ones. 

I will remember most what I tell people when they ask "How was Germany?". So I am going to consciously make an effort to let myself indulge a bit in sticky nostalgia because I want to remember the adorable kids that I lived with, my incredibly strong and resilient host Oma, the wonderful food and drink I imbibed, and the fantastic friends I made this semester. 

My host Oma is seriously a badass who has experienced unfathomable difficulty in her life such as multiple sclerosis that has left her in a wheel chair for the last 20 years, losing her first pregnancy at 9 months gestation when she was 21 years old, and eventually raising her son by herself after divorcing the father. I think Uli is the strongest woman I've ever gotten to spend time with and I know that I immeasurably lucky to have had the opportunity to live with her. Her grandkids also happen to be the most adorable and loving children imaginable and I don't know how they grew to love me so much, but my host sister hugged mw so tight while saying Gute Nacht tonight that I know I am blessed. 

I am so thankful for getting to know the other students on this trip and I am continually realizing what awesome people chose to go to Germany this semester. I seriously love everyone in a different capacity and in my whole life, I don't know if I've ever felt this comfortable with a group of people in such a short period of time. 

I am so sad to be leaving but trying to focus on the positive, such as the amount of queso I'll be eating soon!! 

Nostalgia..

Well, I knew the day would come but I didn't realize it would come so soon. Here I am listening to some sappy nostalgic songs (Amie by Damien Rice if you want to feel the sadness like I am right now). Ok now that you're listening to a great song for these kind of feels, here I go.

As my time in Germany comes to an end, I mostly want to be sure that I don't forget the things that I learned here. Being abroad taught me some valuable lessons, both academically and personally. It's true when people say that study abroad changes you!

One of the first things that I learned coming here is that no stereotype is 100% true. I was worried about Germans being very unhealthy. What I found instead was that my host family cooked EXTREMELY healthily and were in much, much better shape than me. I think being around them helped me learn how to take care of myself better physically. I tend to get worked up and stressed about school and not take the time to exercise and maintain my well-being. My host parents really focused on maintaining a balance between work and fun; they worked very hard during the week but went running in the forest every Saturday and other such activities. I am going home much more health-conscious, and hopefully will be eating clean and exercising more (after my chick-fil-a and macaroni and cheese binge of course).

Also, the stereotype about German people being "too direct" and kind of mean isn't true either. Yes, my host family was very direct. But I loved it! It's actually kind of silly that us Americans circumvent the heart of an issue instead of speaking our minds sometimes. I think being more direct has helped me be more assured of my worldview and opinions on things instead of taking an on-the-fence stance on important issues. My host family and I often had intense discussions about politics, theater, art, culture, food, or anything else. I like the German attitude toward art and theater as a teaching and awareness tool. We were talking about how a lot of the German theater mentality is to provoke a discussion (aka controversial). I think that's very interesting, but also typical of the German culture. I don't think there's anything mean about getting to the heart of an issue and trying to resolve it--I think it's very admirable! So that's what I learned about the German stereotype.

Ok, the stereotype about drinking beer is totally correct though. I'm going to miss causally ordering a beer with lunch. Or two. Fortunately all that healthy eating kept me from gaining too much weight!

About myself, this trip has taught me that it's ok to take risks because they often lead to something better than you could ever imagine. I was nervous to go on this trip because it was asking a lot of my parents (financially and worry-wise I think) and it wasn't the most economical way to accomplish the classes I needed to graduate. I went into the semester thinking I would hopefully just pull up my GPA, see a few cool buildings, then come home back to "reality". I was going to look into applying for nursing school this summer because I was worried about not being competitive enough to essentially do anything else in healthcare. However, this trip provided me with an opportunity to revisit my career plans and not sell myself short by picking nursing, which I was doing just because it was the program I felt that I was most likely to get into. I was able to interact with people--both Dr. Wasser and enmodes--who saw my potential beyond just a GPA and resume, and they have given me the extra boost that I need to start thinking outside of just nursing as a career. I'm coming back to Germany hopefully this summer to intern with enmodes, and maybe research is now in the picture for a career. I'm so glad that I took the risk to come on this trip, and took another risk to intern with enmodes. I think this will be an amazing learning experience that I never EVER could have had if I had not come to Germany.

~~

Today was a really fantastic way to end the trip.

I started the day with a pensive cup of coffee looking out the open window to the verdant garden. There are huge trees towering over budding bushes and vibrant flowers, and the clouds rushed overhead merrily. I walked my usual route from my house to the Zentrum a little slower than usual, drinking in the beautiful springtime and the Rhine. When I got to the Zentrum, I met up with Hazel and we finally toured the Beethovenhaus, which was really incredible. I love how seeing the actual places that famous composers, artists, scientists, and historical figures were--it really makes history come alive!

Then, we went to the AIB for our final "classtime". We shared memories from the trip. A random tag-a-long person on our very first trip together (Frankfurt to Bonn). Running into a buoy with our raft because we didn't know how to steer. Our kick-ass dance at the beginning of the semester. The Dr. Schnabel tour in Vienna. And my own memories were rushing through my head: accidentally riding to the trainyard on one of the first days. Runs along the Rhine. Talking nonstop about cute dogs we saw (mostly with Ryan, Hazel, or Koi). Randomly getting currywurst or Dean&Davids for lunch. Our BIMS dance party during finals. There were so many amazing moments within the program, but what truly made this semester great was being with friends. I'm equally grateful for the small moments as the big ones.

After saying our official goodbyes (even though I'll see a lot of people on the bus tomorrow), Ryan, Koi, Garrett, Mitchell and me decided to do a "Bonn in Retrospect" tour. We went to the Bonnch Restaurant and grabbed a Bonnch outside, basking in the sunshine and enjoying good conversation. Then, we went to Tuscalo for one last Beethoven pizza, which is probably the best pizza I've ever eaten. Spinach, cheese, roast beef, chicken, and truffle oil. Thin crust, hand tossed. And bananan weitzen, which is banana beer. It's amazing. Then I went shopping for a few souvenirs, walked home again, and now I'm sitting here listening to sad music and admiring the fact that I actually fit everything into my luggage...

Tomorrow, Ryan and I will spend the day in Frankfurt, then we will fly out on Wednesday. Hopefully between now and when I get home I will have some blog posts to fill in the past few weeks. I would recommend never falling behind on blogging ever because it's so much to talk about and my fingers get tired. But it's totally worth it. I'm glad I have something to look back on about my trip.

I can't believe I'm packing...

It seems like we just got here yesterday...

If you had told me in January I would be sad about leaving in May I would have thought you were crazy because I was sure it was going to be a long four months away from my family. I do miss them a lot and I am so glad to get to go home and see them but Bonn has become another home to me in the time I have been here. I spent most of last night sorting through things and beginning the packing process. I'm taking home a lot of good memories and hope that someday soon in the future I will be bringing my family here to make some more. There have been a lot of tears today, and I'm sure there will be a lot more tomorrow.

Now the anxiety of going home has started to creep in. I know this four months has changed me in some ways I've already realized and others I'm sure I'll come to recognize soon enough but how are the changes in me going to affect my family. My brother will be on the ground in North Carolina sometime around 11pm my time here in Germany tonight after a nine month deployment. I wonder if he is having some of the same emotions. I'm also anxious about what is to come in the next few months. My father will be having his prostate removed in dealing with his cancer on June 23rd and then my husband will also be needing surgery to fix some vertebrae issues in his neck after I return.

So for now it's back to packing... I'm sure things will be crazy for a bit when I get home. I just never thought it would be so bittersweet.