Those Americans who Know it All

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Our next stop was to meet with our former exchange student Tobias who is now married with 2 girls of his own. Tobias stayed with us for 1 year back in about 1994 when he and 2 of our boys were in high school. We’d arranged to meet Tobias in the town of Herrshing, a town just 30 minutes southwest of Munich. “Just take the S8 train to Herrshing and I will meet you there” he said. Ok, no problem.

We stopped at the main station 1st to reserve our seats for the trip from Prague then hopped on the S8 as directed from the Munich main station. We were just moving right along but then we were not sure of where Herrshing might be. We asked an Asian man in the seat across from ours and as it turned out he was from Maryland enroute to a conference in Herrshing. He said that he’d traveled this route several times and that Herrshing was the last stop.

The train car was not full so we started talking about traveling in Europe and more specifically Germany. I laughingly told him how I tell my friend Dieter that “we are from the U.S. so we know it all, and since we are from California we really know it all”. Dieter always answers “oh you Ammi’s”, the German slang for Americans.

After talking for a few minutes the train stopped about 3 stops short of Herrshing and everyone got off. We thought that it was funny that we were the only ones on the train but our new friend assured us that the train had only stopped for another train to pass. We wondered how long the train would be stopped but soon a train passed so we were assured that we would be moving soon.

A little later a woman came down the aisle and speaking in German said that the train was going back to the airport. We said “no this train is going to Herrshing”. My husband saw that she was wearing the train uniform and so we asked if she was sure that this train was going back to the airport. She said the train was going back to the airport but we must go to the platform and catch another train.

In the meantime Tobias was texting, asking where we were. Well we didn’t know where we were and why the S8 wasn’t going where it was suppose to go. Sorry Ammi’s we were turning out to be! So there I was trying to text Tobias and trying to figure out where in the world we were to go.

We and our friend were at the platform looking at what to do next when another S8 train came along but this time it said Herrshing and we got on. After sitting down and the train began to move the 3 of us started laughing about the know-it-all Americans! We laughed so hard tears were running down my cheeks.

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Photos

A View from the Beer Garden
The Beer Garden at Heiligen Berg

A Little house in Dissen
Just a cute house in the village of Dissen