Blogs from Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, Europe - page 54

Yeah, so being sick away from home really really stinks. I was supposed to go to Bonn today with my group. Instead I've spent most of it in bed with a fever, trying to sleep it off. Being sick makes me just want to go home. I'm quite upset that I couldn't go to Bonn (was really looking forward to the trip) and tonight is a big party for all the international students (which I'll also be sleeping through). Oh well, not much I can do, so I guess I should stop feeling sorry for myself. The last few days were pretty good. Our bar tour Thur. night really wasn't much of a tour. We went to one bar and ended up staying there for quite a while. Then some of the group went to a ... read more

I got back from Germany yesterday after about what seemed like a three hour plane delay. For those who don't know, I stayed with family friends of my Grandpa Grauel's. Tina, she is 27, took me to an alternative dance club which was really fun and then we hit up some pubs the next night in Frankfurt. I spent most of my time in Mainz at Tina's. On Saturday we went to Wiesbaden (spelling??) which had a neat WW monument and it was a really pretty small village with a park that had an extraodinary view. On Sunday the family and I ventured to Heidelberg. We went to a castle that was partially destroyed in 1693(Orleans Succession war) of and again in 1764 (lightning). It had an astonishing view of the town from the castle, lots ... read more

Well, today was the first day of my language class. I have mixed feelings about it. There are 17 people in my class (and I made it into the Oberstuffe... upper level =) ). There are students from the US, France, Italy, Estonia, Denmark, Greece, Romainia and Hungary. That's pretty cool. The kinda sucky thing though, is that they all knew somebody arlready in the class and today everyone stayed with their friends (so that left me pretty much to myself). Also, the French and the Belgians are always talking amongst themselves in French. When they start doing that the others start talking amongst themselves in their native languages which makes for a very boring break. Oh well, I'm hoping it'll get better. Today class wasn't difficult. I'm not having any trouble understanding anything. That's a ... read more

Last night was a lot of fun. All of us internation students participating in the orientation went to dinner. The dinner wasn't anything special, but it also consisted of wine tasting =). This region (as I may have already mentioned) is like the Napa Valley of Germany. It's wine country so each table had a few bottles of different wines from Trier. All of them were white wines and were pretty good. Jaime, Matt and I sat with a girl from Belgium (don't know how to spell her name yet) and Mosuku from Japan. Both are very nice. Sitting at the table right next us was a group from Istanbul. =) It was cool to get to talk with them. They were very nice. It was a fun evening of just getting to know people. ... read more

(typing this on Oct. 6th) I've never felt so overwhelmed and lonely in my entire life. The drive down to Trier was wonderful. The area is goregeous. We visited a town along the Mosel (don't remember the name, I'll have to get it from my room). It was absolutely gorgeous! The houses were all sooooo old. I have some really nice pics, but as of yet can't put them online. I'm working on that though and will hopefully have some pictures up soon. We walked around the town for awhile and then found a place to have lunch. I got to try Federweisse for the first time. (It's kind of like grape juice but with some alchohol in it. We then walked around some more and just enjoyed looking at all the old buildings. Some ... read more