der Abend meines Geburtstages

~The evening of my birthday~

The institute has a variety of levels, A1, A2, B1, B2 etc... and after our separate courses each day, we almost always have at least some option for a 'culture' experience. Once we went to a pub which is where I talked to Max and Matthew (previous post). We went on a city tour... things like that. Friday a group of about 10 of us signed up to go on a tour of the harbor and I've uploaded a few pictures over it.

While on the tour, most of those present decided we should all go out afterward for a small birthday celebration for me :). But... unfortunately in the main train station we suffered some poor communication mishaps and essentially all got separated and it ended up just Adrian and I pressing onward. Adrian is 20 as well, from Monterrey, Mexico and studying to be a doctor. The best thing about this summer is I have absolutely zero responsibility outside class at 9 am. That said, I joined Adrian to his house dad's apartment, then to a T-mobile store, then we pretty much just tramped all over before ending up at my apartment and talking with Jogi and Hildegard (more on that in a second). So yeah, I go with him to t-mobile because he wants to get an internet card. We waited for seriously, like 45 minutes and the best part was, I had absolutely no reason to be there, but I stayed anyway. Then, when he finally gets helped, in order to purchase the card he needed a passport, which Adrian didn't have with him and wah-lah, I had mine. The guy that helped us was really nice and comical. It wasn't worth the wait, but it helped. After the internet card, Maxi had told us that "Sternchanze", a stop on the U-bahn (subway) is pretty much the young people's locale. We went and sure enough, shop after bar after shop after bar. It was an ENORMOUS Mass. St., like one Mass St. laid next to another to another to another in parallel, going on and on and on. Adrian had never had Greek food (omg!) so we stopped and had a "Greichesche" dinner.

Eventually we made our way to my apartment where Hildegard and her son, Jogi, were enjoying some dessert and wine. Together, the four of us sat and talked for a while. It was a little comical... Adrian is level A1 so his German is more limited than mine but Hildegard speaks no English. So I spoke German with Jogi and Hildegard; Jogi spoke English with Adrian and me, and Hildegard spoke a little Spanish with Adrian, of which I know none. She lived in Ecuador for a few years and knows about the same amount of Spanish as I do German. All in all it was rather enjoyable. Before Jogi left to meet his friends he told me about a flea market near where he lives that would be open the next day and talked me into meeting him to see if I could find a cheap bike.

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