Long Long Nights

Hey all! I've been up to my old tricks as usual. Things are winding down here in Freiburg. Today was the last day of class (which I missed......I'll get into that later). It's also starting to get cooler here. I'm actually surprised it took as long as it did. It's also really windy! Something to remind me of home. I have no coat cuz I left mine up in Bremen this summer with my host family. So to compensate I've been using my suit jacket. I feel very dressed up most of the time. Actually this Australian girl, Chris, has been telling me that I always look well dressed and put together (even when I'm wearing my sweats!!!!) I don't think I agree, but oh well.......nice to know someone thinks I'm not making a complete fool of myself.

Also since I'm on the subject of clothing......I am going to bitch about how much laundry here costs. It's 11€ for a wash card, and that gets me like 6 washes! I've been through 2 cards already! Maybe I shouldn't bother separating my colors out like Nick.......it'll save money that's for sure!

Anyway back to what I've been up to.....if I can remember all of it which I usually can't.......I guess I'll just talk about the last couple of days. I'm so pathetic.....right now I'm trying to remember what I did on Tuesday night that caused me to miss Wednesdays class. I don't even remember.....bad sign. I went out drinking with friends, but I can't remember where (that might be due to the fact that I've been out drinking a lot lately!) Well anyways I missed Wednesdays class.......no worries though I can miss up to 3 and not have problems and that was my first one. But then last night we first went out for Mexican food to celebrate the fact that some of us were leaving today (Yigit was one of them). Afterwards we went to O' Dwyers, an Irish pub that a lot of us go to frequently. Well Wednesdays are Karaoke night.....I sang Like a Virgin and American Pie........not sure how well I sang but it was fun. Afterwards I hung around with the AP and some other people. We were listing to music, drinking, and dancing while Nick and the other bartenders cleaned up. Some old guys from Switzerland stayed after too and kept coming and dancing with us and were saying things like.....it's so nice you kids have so much fun. It was weird........they weren't the sketchy old guys that hit on you, but they were kinda always there. Reliving their youth vicariously through us I guess. O' Dwyers closes at 1 and we didn't leave until 3.......as if that weren't late enough......we then grabbed a taxi and headed over to the StuSie Bar where I drank some more, and danced some more. I also kinda made out with some guy who was hitting on me the week before at O' Dwyers. I dunno what happened to him though......I kinda left him to go dance and the next thign I knew was that he was gone. While dancing some other guy was like trying to feel Jules and me up on the dance floor. When he grabbed me to dance with him Jules came to my rescue. After dancing for a while and drinking these weird "shots" (Sparkling wine and tequila shaken up together) I decided I was sick of sketchy guys and that I should go home. That was at about 5:15......the first strassenbahn of the day came at 5:25.....so Jules, Ho, and some polish guy and I think turkish guy went with me to the stop. Ho was drunk off his ass. He weaved his way anywhere. By the time we got back to Händelstrasse I realized that Yigit was up and getting ready to leave for Turkey. So I we went to say hello. The expression on Yigit's face was priceless! His first comment to us was, "What the fuck!" All we wanted to do was say goodbye but then Ho went and collapsed on Yigit's bed and we needed to pull him off and get him in bed. I stayed and chatted with Yigit a little while Jules took Ho home. Then I went to bed......I kinda decided I was gonna miss the first half of class and then show up after break.......I kinda didn't make it at all. I didn't have a hangover or anything this morning, I just got nothing done. I have to go back and clean the place cuz I'm moving out.....Then I'm going out again tonight.....to the StuSie Bar. I swear I won't be out after 1. I have too much to do tomorrow. Once I get to Bremen I swear I won't be this bad!!!!! Well maybe every once in a while, but nothing frequent. I think it's something in the air here anyways and in Bremen it rains more often and clears the air........plus I'll actually be doing school work at that point.

Ok I'm rambling now.....I'll just shut up and go clean.....not something I want to do.

Lustig ist das Freiburgerleben!!!!

Well it's been a while since my last blog, and I have a fair bit that's happened to me since then. I guess the best place to start would be last Friday. Last Friday the program planned to take out whoever wanted to go to a Biergarten and afterwards to a Disco. Well of course I didn't go! HA!!! Me not go that's about as likely as I am to discover the next revolutionary physics theory!!!!! Well honestly I started out good. I only had my glass of wine. Some of the guys (including my flatmate, Nick from Australia) were drinking these HUGE mugs of beer. I'm talking about the ones that are usually associated with Oktoberfest. Well I was hanging with my Aussie Posse (Nick, Jules, and Michael......who usually goes by his last name....Ho). There were also some other people at the table that I didn't really know. Well hanging with the AP is great. They're sarcastic, crazy, and love to drink (sounds familiar huh?). So of course when this British guy leaves his huge mug of beer and doesn't come back for a while they decided to have some fun......and I was included in their plans. Well it doesn't take much egging on for me to chug a beer and they did one better.....they sang me a song:

Here's to Muzza. She's true blue.
She's a pisspot through and through.
She's a bastard or so they say.
She tried to go to heaven but she went the other way.
She went down, down, down, down, down, down, down.....

(by the time the downs hit you're supposed to be drinking). Oh and by the way Muzza is their nickname for me. They've even shortened it down to Muzz. For all my D-son buddies who have been looking for a nickname for me.....keep looking! You have to have the accent to call me this, and Narelle I dunno if your accent's quite right either. I guess I'll have to listen to you say it.

Well needless to say the beer went down, down, down, down, down......until the end. Sick huh? Yeah I was definitely a little queasy afterwards too. The AP thought it was hilarious that I was not exactly tip top, and despite warnings I gave Nick not to touch me he did so anyway. A tiny little tap I might add......something that most of the time is jack shit......but no......I wasn't that lucky.....and of course problems ensued.......luckily I had good aim or Ho woulda been in the line of fire. I don't remember the last time I've been so emabarassed......or the last time something I did spread so quickly through the rumor mill. The AP have not let me forget the moment and took pictures to comemorate. I sure don't plan on doing anything like that anytime soon!!!!

Well if that were the only event of consequence that weekend I'd be a lucky duck. On Sunday the plan was to go to a spa that cost only 9 Euros! Score!!!! Well while waiting around for my connecting Strassenbahn some guy came up to me and asked me out. Even now I'm not sure why I agreed. I was sketched out even then!!!!! I met up with him (with friends of course) and the evening progressed......he was all hands.....let's just leave it as it was a really really bad experience. Thank god for Yigit is all I have to say. Yigit is one of the D-son members and also the only guy in our group here in Freiburg. He is our official "cockblocker".

Speaking of Yigit, he's from Turkey and his father invited us to his house in the break between Freiburg and when classes start in Bremen. So that means I may be going to Turkey in a couple weeks!!!!! My parents are kool with it and all (which is a relief) and all I have to do is get the required Visa. Hopefully I'll have more details on that in the next entry.

Sadly this program is already coming to a close. I have only about 10 days or so of class. The time has gone by so quickly. I've met so many amazing people here and almost wish I were studying in Freiburg for the year. It's a hard decision because I find both cities very beautiful.
I dunno maybe I'll come back to Freiburg. If I'm not careful of the Bächle in Freiburg (little aquaduct type things that carry water around the city and are used to power some buildings even), I will in theory end up here. Well ok technically I'd end up married to a Freiburger, if I fell in one.....or so the myth goes.

I have yet to fall in one, however. I have been falling all over the place due to these heeled flip flops I bought. The little heel part keeps getting caught between the cobblestones, and if I'm simply walking around everyone can hear me coming cuz they go click, click, click, click. I'm definitely a sight to see on those things....wobbling all over the place.

I'm also finally learning how to cook! Something my dad's been trying to get me to do for as long as I can remember. Last night I broiled marinated chicken, sauteed Zucchini, Mushrooms, and onions, and baked some tater tots. I was very proud of myself. Nick showed me today where you can buy root beer here in Germany (A&W no less!) so hopefully we'll be having root beer floats tonight along with dinner. Aparently in Australia they're called spiders but they don't use root beer, instead they use coke. I prefer my root beer any day.....I don't care how American that makes me!

Ohhhhh! Even writting this blog is making me miss Freiburg and I'm still here! I guess Freiburg will always hold a special place in my heart. I'm probably gonna try and visit everyone down here again during the year, and hopefully they'll come up to visit me! Well when I get to Bremen I'll put together a website with pictures from Freiburg that people can check out. That'll be on my D-son sight since I haven't bothered to figure out how to do it on this thing yet. Well I think that's all for now. Besides some people are drilling in the wall next to me and it's starting to get on my nerves! Viel Spass noch an ihr alle!!!!

Grüsse aus Freiburg

Well I've finally arrived in Germany; however, my internet access is definitely at a minimum and will be until I get to Bremen. So these posts will be exceptionally long cuz I'll try to be catching up for lack of internet access for days at a time. It's crazy isn't it, how internet dependant I've become. A couple years ago I coulda cared less now......

Well anyway the German "saga" begins with my arrival in Frankfurt. I arrived (arrove for those who know what I'm referring to) in Frankfurt and it was at 5:00 a.m. German time. Then I had to wait around for my friends Keely and Caitlin to arrive. Caitlin arrived at 7:30 a.m. but stupid me I was at the wrong terminal when she arrived so I wasn't there when she arrived. I did eventually find her though. Then Keely came in around 10:00 a.m. Once the group was together we attempted to get to the main train station (Hauptbanhof) in Frankfurt. Getting there was another story. We had so many bags and could not really carry the damn things. And, of course, as the fates would have it first we had to go down a set of escalators with these things. Then we sat around at in the "Strassenbahn" terminal trying to buy a ticket on the train that would get us to the Hauptbahnhof. I think that took us a good 20 or so minutes to push 3 buttons and insert proper amount of money. Then we travel down more escalators with the bags. When the Strassenbahn arrived we had to literally throw our bags onto it and organize them later cuz the thing woulda left without us or our things. Once we got off at our stop Keely's bags started to fall over and then proceeded to knock over Caitlin's bags.....all while we're on the escalator....again.....

After we finally buy our tickets and sit down......we supposedly had about 1 hour before our train left. I guess all of us are a bad judge of time because the next time we looked at our watches it was 5 minutes after our train had left. We had to go renew our tickets for a different train and then went and camped on the platform we were supposed to leave from just so we didn't miss the next one.......

Well we knew we had to move down on the platform (although we couldn't remember why) and we went as far as we could given the luggage. Well it wasn't far enough!!!!!! When we got on the train we were in the first class compartment. So we had to drag all of our luggage to coach only to find there were no seats left. So we ended up spending 2 hours sitting on our luggage next to the door way in the train.

By the time we arrived in Freiburg we said screw trains and called cabs (we barely fit into 2 with all of our bags). After checking in I found out that I lived in a completely different area in Freiburg than Caitlin and Keely. Very very very disappointing! But I was way too tired to care. Another taxi got us to our places where we moved in. Keely's was the worst the kitchen was an absolute mess.....I don't think the place had been properly cleaned in about 5 years. The spent hours cleaning and now it's livable but it's still not the best. The floor was caked with dirt and pots and pans hadn't been cleaned and then used again so they were so incredibly dirty!!!!!!!

My place on the other had was fine. I had a room to myself inside an apartment that I share with about 7 other people. I still haven't met all of them cuz they're never around. As for my room....it's spacious, but you'd need a pair of sunglasses in there it was so white! So my sarongs became curtains, tapistries, and bed covers. I hung up the flower pictures from my friend Stanislav, and I also taped some sashes and a couple fake roses on the wall (too bad they're white was well) It's a lot better looking now. I keep seeing things here I'd love to use to make the room look better, but I don't have the space in my luggage to take it to Bremen......that means I can't buy it. =(

On a happier note, the guy living next door to me is from Australia, and he's also doing the summer course I'm doing. Only he'll be staying in Freiburg for the semester as well. His name is Nick. I've met quite a few other Australians as well. Bad for my German, but a lot of them are pretty cute....so they're definitely not hard on the eyes.

We arrived on a Thursday. On Friday we had our first meeting for the group. While looking for the building we ran into the last member of the Dickinson group...Yigit. So now the group was a whole and we had to march in to take placement exams. The exam was ok until they gave us a Kafka passage called Der Nachbar. That was definitely not the easiest reading I've encountered, but at least I understood most of what I read as opposed to other people I talked to.

After that there was this wine and prertzel thing where we met other people involved with our program. I talked only to native english speakers. I honestly tried not to but they kept comming up and talking to us in English and I didn't have the heart to start speaking in German to them.....not all of them spoke it all that fluently. That's when I met a lot of the Australian guys as well as people from Canada, America, and England. I did meet people from France and Turkey and other places like that as well.

That Saturday we walked around Freiburg for a while getting to know the city a little bit better, and purchased necessary things like alarm clocks, and the others bought cell phones.....My dad had already gotten me one. It was nice because we were finally able to get in touch with one another. None of us had phones in our room and getting in touch with each other was a pain. So this made our lives a lot easier. We did spend forever on the streets trying to figure out how to work the phones that were all in German.

Later that day there was a dance party for our group to welcome us. It was held at a bar in the StuSi. The StuSi (Studentensiedlung) is where Caitlin and Keely lived. Yigit and I lived on Händelstrasse. The party was great. After having a couple drinks we went out and danced for hours. I've never had so much fun dancing. I was a maniac though (I think that was due to one too many Mai Thai's). I was Salsaing and Swing dancing along with some bumping and grinding. There was also some kinda techno dancing involved and cheesy 80's dance music that I love so much! Everyone else was having a blast too. Nick apparently got into some fight with this local guy who was trying to pick a fight anyway. So I guess he wasn't having to great of a time.....oh well.

As for Sunday....we absolutely did nothing so that's a bore.

Today was the first day of classes and all the others were placed into the same class. It kinda sux being the only one not with them but I'm in a more advanced level. I think I may have to move up again anyway. We'll see. I'm gonna sit in one more day on the class and then make a decision. I like the prof so I dunno maybe I'll just stay in an easier class. Well tonights Keely's birthday as well. So we're going out to celebrate. She's the baby in our group. =) Well I gotta go and get ready if we're gonna celebrate Keely's b-day. So I'm outta here! Have fun and I'll fill you in on things I forgot now and my new adventures next time.

Day of Disasters

Well today has been full of disasters!!!!! Within the last couple of days I've learned that my CD drive on my computer is dead. So my dad order out for a new one. It arrived today only it was the wrong one. So now I dunno what I'm gonna do and I leave in about a day. GREAT...... This means that the pictures on the memory card of my new digital camera are stuck on there.

After giving up on the computer thing I figured I should start packing and all seeing as I only had 2 days left. Well first that meant doing this weeks laundry.....well NO.....I can't do that either cuz the washing machine decides that today of all days it's going to die!!!!!! Lovely......so now I have to go to my Grandmother's house to do my laundry. Wasting valuble packing time (which I still haven't started).

My grandma insists I stay for dinner and also insists on sewing my pajama bottoms back up (the ones my dog ripped). This means that I don't get home until 8:30 p.m. Now I start to work on this CD thing for a friend who is also a German professor. The only problem is I can't burn this CD. Instead trying to create this CD has messed up two computers' Windows Media Player and Real Player programs.

So right now I'm sitting here and trying to sneakily use my dad's new laptop to make this CD (which needs to be mailed out tomorrow), and my dad will kill me if he catches me using his new computer. Ugh!!!!! I hate this. I hope he goes to bed soon.

On the plus side I was able to call Caitlin and we got each other psyched about our coming time in Freiburg and then Bremen. But all in all it's been a shitty day and I just wanna go to bed.....I'll need my sleep anyways cuz I have to pack and pack and pack and pack tomorrow.......great huh? It is my fault.....oh well....I don't think I'd mind if so many things hadn't gone wrong today.

Gute Nacht

Poor Unfortunate Soul

Well today I was finally able to reach the Janoschek's and ask if I could stay with them for the year. And the verdict is..............I can't stay with them.........I'm a "poor unfortunate soul. So sad. So true". Yes that's the disney kick talking. I watched the Little Mermaid today as well, and that movie (as can be imagined) struck a cord with me.

I have to admit I was disappointed. But of course I couldn't let my parents see too much of that......I'm supposed to be excited and prepared to go. So the butterflys in my stomach have to remain a secret. At least I think they're butterflys, but who knows maybe I went and swallowed some fairies in my sleep and now they're trying to get out. (Maybe I took some LSD instead!)

Speaking of LSD I recently saw this movie called Harvard Man.....(Alex managed to con me inton watching it with him). Anyway in this movie the main character takes like 4 times the recommended dosage of LSD. Great.....whoopie.....who cares.....right? Well it just so happens that they filmed the movie from his perspective while he was tripping on this stuff. My head hurt so bad from watching it, you'd have thought I'd taken the LSD myself!!!!! My recommendation......it's an awful movie!!!!!!!!! The movie Airplane is up for an Oscar compared to this one (and for those of you who know how much I hate the movie Airplane....that's saying something).

I also talked to A.J. today. He seems to love college already and he's only been there a week. (Personally I still can't believe he's in college already.......I feel so OLD) =p I've also managed to talk to a plethora of friends in the last couple of days......I'm amazed people still remember me......I hardly remember myself in the summer. Well I guess I don't have much else to tell except for some more bad jokes and I'm not in a torturous mood.......soooo Good Night

Home Boring Home

As usual being at home is about the most boring thing I can do. The "highlight" of my day is probably running to the grocery store for some Country Crock (artificial butter.........) and green peppers (YUCK!!!!!!!!!). What a dull life I lead......

It'll be 8 days until I leave for Germany (assuming, of course, I get a seat on the plane). Until then I'm wasting away and unfortunately not in Margaritaville. I really am not up for packing yet. It means sifting through my belongings and choosing 2 suit cases full of stuff that's most important to me. Oh and LUCKY ME!!!! I'm packing winter clothes....and we all know that takes up little to no space. If I were smart (which I know I won't be) I wouldn't even completely fill the two suitcases. Then I wouldn't have to worry about how I'm going to get all the things I acquire in Bremen back to Chicago. Whatever......my parents'll probably come visit me while I'm there. They can take a suitcase back with them.

I have to grudgingly admit that while I was wasting away on my couch I actually enjoyed some of it. For some reason I decided to go looking through the VHS tapes at home. I usually don't bother.....I mean c'mon if you have 2000+ (yes I mean 2000 not 200) DVDs what's the point in watching VHS anymore? Well my mother hasn't quite converted all of the VHS to DVD yet so the tapes that we don't have on DVD are still upstairs and accessible (unlike the others which are in the basement in plastic bins and alphabetically cataloged). Well I found hidden at the back of one of the cabinets a bunch of cartoons. Well honestly that's not saying much cuz we have cartoons up the wazoo. We have the cartoon series for Ducktales, Little Mermaid, Talespin, Chip and Dale, Darkwing Duck, Mickey Mouse and Friends, Mighty Mouse, Super Ted, Goof Troop and a whole lot more. But my find was the Disney Mini Classics.....half hour or so tapes on some thing or another. Some of them include Ben and Me (which is one of the ones I watched), Bongo, Wind in the Willows, Mickey and the Beanstalk, Peter and the Wolf, and even one about some operatic whale. My favorite, though, was Donald in Mathemagic Land.......I know, I know, pathetic huh! But hey I am a physics major. Of course the instant I found it I had to watch it! ROAD BLOCK!!!!!!!!!! My dad's now watching the news on the only T.V. we have equipped to still watch VHS's. So now I have to spend a long hour waiting......

Well now, in comes my dog who wants to play. Okay something to do!!! Yay!!! Right? Wrong! I get outside with my puppy and am just walking off the patio and onto the grass to play when he jumps up on me and rips my pants. They just happened to be my favorite pajama bottoms. So now I'm out of a pair of pants and I have to listen to the latest drive by shooting or hear about Kerry and his Purple Hearts.......I'm sorry but I DON'T CARE......it's not news to me anymore.....when you come up with something new then I'll listen. International politics is somewhat interesting, but the local news is the same exact shit......only the people change. And then there's those stupid news anchors especially the women who ooooh and aaaaah over some "cute" kids thing that some politician helped out with just to make himself look good. I might actually believe the anchorwomen if they didn't do it every single time!!!!!!!

Ok back to the math cartoon......that was a fun watch but sometimes they didn't give me enough time to hash out what they were trying to say. (Granted I was trying to apply the ideas to more complex ones that I had just learned last semester.) I think my favorite part is the billiards thing, although the trees with square roots is pretty kool as well.

I popped The Last Samurai into the DVD player later in the day (as a matter of fact I still haven't finished watching it.....grocery store trip then dinner......), and while watching it, it occured to me that I too am going to be in a foreign place soon. Although, Ive the luxury of actually understanding German.....I dunno if I could pull of what that guy did if I didn't speak the language.....honestly I'm a scardy cat if I don't know what's going on........

We lead up to the conclusion of my uneventful day......my puppy attempting to chew my limbs up while I type this blog.

I apologize now if I've wasted your time.......I probably wasted mine.....but I have tons of it for the next week anyway so whatever.

Preparation

I'm creating this blog because I'll be abroad in Germany for the school year. I'll first be in Freiburg for the month of September. Then I travel on and will be studying at the University of Bremen for the rest of the school year.

So to begin my blog......

So yeah I'm definitely not packed yet. Haven't even started as a matter of fact. I've got about 1 week before I leave. Sure I can't wait to get to Germany but there are certain things I'm gonna miss at home--my cat and my new puppy.

My puppy drives me nuts he doesn't bark when he needs to go out. He just acts like he wants to play. So I never know if he needs to pee or he wants to play. And he LOVES to wake me up at 7 in the morning....to play.....but despite all that he's the cutest puppy ever.

Going to Germany I have more problems than just "pet sickness", I also wanna stay with my host family from this summer....but so far I haven't been able to reach them. I'm gonna try calling them in a little bit. This has to be the hardest thing I've done in a while....cuz I'm basically trying to invite myself over to someone's house for a YEAR! Oh well I hope it works out. I'd rather be with them.....then my German's guaranteed to get better. Oh well I guess I'll cast my pride aside....

On the other hand I definitely can't wait to leave home. It's so incredibly boring here. It's my fault really.....that's what happens when you leave home at the age of 15 to go to boarding school. No friends to come home to when you're in college, and since I went to Germany for the month of June (and a little of July) I couldn't get a job when I got back. I don't blame them. Who wants to hire someone for a month and a half? But now I'm stuck at home doing nothing. I don't know how many more books I can read or movies I can watch. I like doing those things but as we all know I'm a people person.....and those activities don't exactly involve people.

My brothers are even gone. A.J. left on Wednesday for his freshman year at the University of North Dakota. Andy and Alex are in high school and are in their senior and sophmore years respectively.....and they've gone back. So I don't even have people telling me how much I suck. Even after 3:30 no ones here......well maybe Andy but he just sits online or reads or something......he's not as extroverted as the rest of us in my family.......Alex is at football practice.....and probably trying to get with some girl......he's the only one I really worry about when it comes to my brothers.....Cuz he can be impulsive and then make stupid choices.......So yeah very bored here....and no money to go out and do anything due to lack of job.......Grrrrrrr

Well I guess this is enough background info for one day.....I leave you all with a quote to get my travels started.

"My philological studies have statisfied me that a
gifted person ought to learn English (barring spelling and pronouncing) in
thirty hours, French in thirty days, and German in thirty years. It seems
manifest, then, that the latter tongue ought to be trimmed down andrepaired. If
it is to remain as it is, it ought to be gently and reverently set aside among
thedead languages, for only the dead have time to learn it."

Exerpt from A Tramp Abroad by Mark Twain.