Week 6- The Weekend We've All Been Waiting For

Pretty much every Bonner I've encountered has talked to me about Karneval. The anticipation for the biggest party of the year was palpable all week. During lunchtime on Tuesday, Chelsea, Kadeja, Nicole, Stephenie and I went Karneval costume shopping together. It was funny to see all the different things that people might be wearing this weekend. That night, Ethan, Chelsea, and I went on an adventure to the Uniklinik to visit Alexa as she recovered from surgery. It was fun to see a new part of Bonn, and we were so glad to find Alexa in good spirits and recovering well from surgery. On Wednesday night, my host sister took me up to her room and put a pirate costume together for me. She's a professional when it comes to Karneval- she had drawers full of all sorts of clothes and accessories specifically for Karneval. The next morning, I dressed up as a pirate and headed to AIB. We ate Berliners and headed across the bridge to Beuel, where we witnessed our first parade. There was so much candy, shouting, and costumes. We had a great time with each other and the Penn State students as well. The rest of the weekend consisted of being with friends constantly, eating way too much candy, and having a really fun time in general. On Saturday, I got the authentic Karneval experience. My host brother and his girlfriend took me to Cologne for the day. We met up with their friends at Alte Markt. It was really cool to meet Germans my age, and Cologne was an absolute blast. The next morning, we got to be a part of the parade in Beuel. It was an honor to be included in this German holiday as an American student, and I really appreciated it. I spent that night having another fun evening with my friends and walking around Bonn. On Monday afternoon, we watched the parade in Bonn and caught an overwhelming amount of candy. The parade was full of exquisite costumes, marching bands, and dancers. By the end of the weekend, we were all exhausted but happy to have had such an interesting experience.

In terms of school this "week" (it was only 3 days), we stayed pretty busy working on our Enmodes project. We also received our highly anticipated physiology test grades back. The best thing that happened though, was that our pharmacology professor, Dr. Fajt, arrived from Texas A&M. It was great to meet her in person after only interacting over a webcam. She's really interesting and a lot of fun too. We're glad that she came over to our hemisphere for a little while.