The End

A few weekends ago, I went to Scotland with a friend. We flew into Edinburgh and then took a bus to Aberdeen. We didn't expect to be given food on the bus so we got a snack to tide us over, but it turned out that we got complimentary sandwiches. And drinks. And cookies. And tea. And crackers. And a few other things until we were pleasantly full. Once we got to Aberdeen, we met with my friend's friend who showed us around the town and his university. The following day, we rode a train out to Stonehaven and hiked to a castle ruin on the beautiful cliffs along the shore. We then had a classic meal of fish and chips on the beach. We got up early the next morning to catch a bus back to the airport. Unfortunately, the bus took a half hour longer than scheduled and we got to the airport too late to check in. Since the next flight wasn't until 24 hours later, we decided to go back into the city center and explore Edinburgh. We walked up to the castle on the hill and got a few groceries. We even found a discount DVD store and bought some to bide our time in the airport. When we got back to the airport, we finished up some homework, watched the movies, and then took shifts sleeping. Finally we got on the plane the following morning and made it back to Bonn. I was exhausted and just wanted to go home and take a shower.

A few days later, we visited the Hildegard Von Bingen museum and garden, had a yummy group lunch, and rode a chilly cruise down the Rhein. We saw one castle after another to the point that it was almost ridiculous, and we toured one of them.

For Easter weekend, a group of us took a train to Paris and stayed in an apartment for a few days. The first thing we saw was the Eiffel Tower lit up at night. The next day, we visited the Louvre (which was free with our visas, along with a few of our other visits) and of course the largely unimpressive Mona Lisa. We had lunch in the gardens between the Louvre and the Arc de Triomphe. We walked to the top of the Arc and then a few of us attended Good Friday Mass at the Basilica of the Sacré Cœur. When we got back to the apartment, we ate a home-cooked meal. We spent the entire next day at the palace and gardens of Versailles. If anything, I gained an understanding of why the French Revolution began because the palace was ridiculously extravagant. That night, we ordered escargot and I wasn't planning on eating any until I saw that they were covered in pesto and olive oil. It turned out to be much less slimy than I had expected. We attended Easter Mass at the Notre Dame the next day and then the Musee d'Orsay where I saw some paintings by one of my favorite artists, Edgar Degas. We had another dinner at the apartment and then switched to a hostel for the final night to be closer to the train station. A few of us made it over to the Pasteur Museum and Institute, but it was closed on Easter Monday. Nevertheless, an employee or student let us onto the property and we explored a few of the buildings. We found a set of three lab coats and strongly considered putting them on to get into the labs, but none of us had the guts. When we were making our way out, we realized that the gate was also locked from the inside and had to nonchalantly follow another employee out. We had lunch in the Latin quarter and dinner (including chips, salsa, and raw bell peppers) on the lawn of the Eiffel Tower. Since it was April 21, we held Aggie Muster on the lawn that night.

The next couple weeks were pretty rough with exams and all, but it felt great when it was all over. The first night after finals, we had a fun night of karaoke at the AIB. The next day, we took a 25-km bike ride to and from the Ludendorff Bridge in Remagen. We had a nice lunch on the Rhein as well. The bike ride was difficult, especially against the wind, but it was definitely worth it. When we got back to Bonn, AIB hosted a farewell party for us, where we had wonderful food and got to watch a slideshow that one of us had put together. That night, we watched fireworks for the Rhein in Flammen celebration and it was certainly the best fireworks display I've ever seen. After that night, we had a few more days in Bonn that were rather uneventful before finally getting on the plane to go home.

Rain or shine we go to the Rhein

The weather has been beautiful here the past couple of weeks except for one day last week. That one cold, rainy day was the day we went on the rhinecruise. Forgetting our bad luck with the weather, that day was a fun one! We started off heading south to Bingen for our first stop at the Hildegart von Bingen museum. We had just learned about Hildegart in class the day before so it was nice getting to explore the museum and to see things first-hand that we had discussed in class. After the museum and lunch we headed towards the Rhine to meet up with our boat for the cruise. We all did our best to fight through the cold and stay on the deck for as long as possible because the view was beautiful! The river was lined with castles and I enjoyed looking at the landscape. Plus we all tried to forget about the cold and make the best of the situation by singing random songs on the deck together which I’m sure the other tourists enjoyed…maybe. We then docked and headed to Marksburg Castle for a tour. The castle was on top of a tall hill so we had a gorgeous view of the river and surrounding area from one of the towers. This castle also had a cute little chapel and a torture room (which obviously isn’t cute but it was interesting to learn about some of the torture methods that were created in Germany). Altogether it was a great day with everyone on the Rhine!

A few of us in the dress up room in the Hildegart von Bingen museum

Prague

AIB

The following week after Berlin was a relaxing week. We didn't have many classes and just one quiz on Friday. In design we are finishing up with our Data History File and in Systems and Signals we are finishing chapters 6 and 7. In physiology we are finishing up with GI.

Personal

The weekend of April 12-14 I went to Prague. I arrived on Friday night and had a good nights rest so I could see the whole city on Saturday. On Saturday I walked around the whole city. I saw the Old Town Square, Tyn Church, Powder Gate, Prague Castle, St. Nick's Church, John Lennon wall, Charles Bridge, Petrin Tower, and many parks. The weather was perfect so even though it took 7 hours to walk around the whole city it seemed like I was only walking for a few hours. During that night our hostel took us to a bar/club which I met some Irish guys and English girls who I talked to most of the night. On Sunday I visited the Museum of Communism and walked around Old Town.

Berlin,Otto Bock, Charity Weekend

AIB

The first thing we did in Berlin was a bike tour. I did a similar bike tour in Barcelona which I really enjoyed so I was looking forward to this one in Berlin. We saw Checkpoint Charlie, the Berlin Wall, Reichstag, and the memorial to the murdered Jews in Europe. After Berlin we had our Otto Bock presentations in Duderstadt. I was really nervous about presenting our group's idea to the Otto Bock engineers because if they didn't think it was good then it would make our whole University look bad. However, the all the presentations went really well and they liked all of our ideas. The tour of the Otto Bock facilities was really cool too. Otto Bock also just opened an office in Austin so hopefully I can get an internship there next summer. After our class excursion the first international Big Event was on that following Saturday. I helped the American Protestant Church with gardening in which I pulled weeds, and clipped hedges.

Personal

During my free time in Berlin I went to the Gardens of the World. The gardens were beautiful and each one had a different theme such as the Renaissance garden, Chinese garden, Japanese garden, and the Christian garden. I also participated in the Bonn marathon relay. I have never done anything like a marathon before so I knew it was going to be difficult. I was able to run at a good pace for a good amount of my relay however towards the end I started to slow down a lot. After running my legs were sore for the next week.

I'm on a Boat!

This week, we went on a Rhein Cruise which was rather enjoyable. It was a nice bonding time when we were singing on the boat. I really loved seeing the castles along the Rhein River and the half-timbered homes. Also this week, I liked making the Hildegard "oils". My hands happened to be extra dry that day, and so making my special hand balm helped my crusting hands. Academically, this week, I liked learning about Hildegard and her upbringing.

This weekend, David and I will be heading to Zürich, Switzerland. We'll be going up to the Swiss Alps, the big waterfall in Northern Zürich, and we'll, of course, go stock up on some Swiss chocolate and Swiss knives. Overall, it'll be an enjoyable weekend. Until later, tschüß!

Learning About Myself in Switzerland

Luckily this weekend, I didn't actually have to do any learning, just had to have some good times and spend some large quantities of mula. The first night we were there, we went to the house that we stayed at to check in with Rachel, our foux host-mom. She showed us our rooms, and we dropped off our stuff then headed to the aldstadt in Zurich. We walked around and saw some things and some places and it was all very pretty. We tried to find somewhere to eat for cheap but quickly learned that it was impossible to find much of anything for under 10 swiss franks. We ended up splitting 20 McNuggets which cost us 15.90 Franks if I remember correctly. We walked around the aldstadt some more then headed back home to get some sleeps so that we could have a blast on Saturday.

On Saturday we woke up early and ate breakfast at the house, then headed to one of the highest points in Zurich so that we could scout out a fun place to go in the afternoon. The past statement was a lie, we just went for the view. We had a half hour train ride then another 20 minute hike or so to the top, and then after that, a 10 minute stair climb (training for the Eiffel Tower) to the top of the observation tower. From there we could see the entire world... of Zurich. After we had our fair share of the view, we headed back down, ate some expensive bratwurst and fries, then headed to our next destination, the Rhinefalls. As the name implies, this is the largest waterfall in Europe. It was a one hour tram ride of good fun, and when we were almost there, the train went right past the falls, which were indeed the largest falls in Europe. We had to walk a good twenty minutes from the train station to get back to the falls, but it was an excellent walk none-the-less. We observed the falls from many different angles and then headed across on a ferry to get to the Otherside. After disembarking, we hiked up to an ADVENTURE PARK. This was indeed as much fun as it sounds when said in all caps. It was 40 franks for 3 hours of awesome zipline-ropescourse-don't-fall-to-your-doom excitement. We enjoyed our 40 franks worth and then a few more, and then went home after our 3 hours were up/ it started pouring rain. When we got back home, which was super late, we tried to find a somewhat fancy place to eat and get some Swiss food, but were unsuccessful, because it was so late. We ended up going to a Doner place and getting some more expensive fewd. We then fell asleep back at our place to restore our energy levels for Sunday.

On Sunday, we woke up, morning routined, and then headed back into the city for our last few hours of funzies. We walked down the street with all the ultra-expensive stores, such as Rolex and Omega, and bought each other 40,000 frank watches. At the end of the street, a giant lake, lake Zurich, awaited our arrival. I bought a Swiss Swiss Army knife at a tourist shop near the shore, and then we sat and had a tasse of coffee in order to maximize relaxation prior to heading back to Bonn. We then headed back to Bonn via 4 different trains, one of which was delayed by an hour due to sneaky trespassers doing sneaky things that caused our train to be delayed by an hour. Twas an awesome weekend and I'd certainly recommend that any of my fellow comrades who are looking for a good time to go to Zurich. And pack lots of food so you won't have to buy it there.

AIB Charitay Weekend

AIB charity weekend started bright and early on Saturday morning. We all met at new AIB and got our charity weekend shirts and some food and whatnot. After taking a group picture, I found at that my big event group wasn't meeting until 1:30 to go to our project, so I could either sit around all day at AIB or I could hop on another team's project until 1:00 or so. I chose to join another group and headed off to a mentaly handicapped community to help clean up and restore their outdoor area. First, we carried out a whole bunch of old junk to make room for some prettiness. After that, we raked up all of the dead leaves in the area we had just de-junked, and then moved them to a trailer, but not in the trailer (why nots?). When that was all good and done, we began picking up bunches of rotting apples an throwing them in a bucket, which was fun and gross. When we were about halfway done with that task, I had to head off to my other project. We went to a community garden where we were to paint some concrete pipes, fix a tool shed roof, and eat some weeds. I chose to fix the roof cause that sounded right up my alley. After a few hours of working with minimal amounts of materials and tools, the shed had a new roof on it that will hopefully last a good long time.

On Sunday, I participated in my first marathon. Even though I ran the shortest leg of the relay, and took my sweet time doing it, I was still super sore the next day, and the day after that, and maybe even a little bit the day after that. I have no running experience, get shin splints, and didn't train at all, so the fact that I even finished was a really cool feeling, and I helped raise money for a good cause! Over all the weekend was a great time, even though it wore me out.