And So The Rest Of The Story Begins

My trusty bicycle and I. One last ride.

I need to write a very important post...a post that needs to be written right now while the feelings I am feeling are still fresh within me. You have been officially warned. What I am about to write is worthy of the Lifetime channel and I am about to get a little "Oprah" on you. I am gonna be sappy and emotional and if you don't like it then YOU should probably live in Germany for a year and see how you feel when you are about to leave. A post like this can never really be written after the fact; the feelings one experiences are almost indescribable at the time and almost fully impossible to describe afterwards. I am, of course, talking about the fact that it is my last day here in Magdeburg and my second last day in Germany. Where has the time gone? It seems like only yesterday I was in Radolfzell thinking to myself, "Wow, only one month into this journey. I still have almost 11 more months to enjoy in Germany. That is so much time!" Well one month turned into two, two into four, four into ten, and ten into almost twelve. Now I am writing one of my last blog posts in my almost empty room in Magdeburg. All of my things are packed up, save my trusty computer.

When I first arrived in Magdeburg, it seemed I would never reach this place of feeling sadness when leaving it. At the time, that thought was unthinkable. As soon as I arrived in Magdeburg, the weather started to turn cold and all the friends I had made in Radolfzell had somehow been removed from my daily life. I thought that Magdeburg had nothing to offer me...when really it had more to offer me than I could ever imagine. Let me explain...

When I lived in Radolfzell, I lived in an absolute paradise. I lived in a picturesque little town nestled right on the largest lake in Germany. On a clear day, you could see the Alps and in 30 minutes I could set foot in Switzerland. This was the Germany I had dreamt about and wanted to experience. In those two months, I had gotten everything I had expected. When I moved to Magdeburg, I experienced a huge reality check. Magdeburg is a part of former East Germany. It was almost completely destroyed in WWII and was rebuilt under Soviet influence. Because of being rebuilt under Soviet influence, the buildings are all very plain, flat, and industrial looking. The streets are wider than you ever thought a street should be and the land itself is very flat which makes the plain buildings the only thing you can see when you are standing in the city. I found myself almost immediately opposed to living in Magdeburg but told myself, "Clayton, are you really that shallow? Just because Magdeburg isn't 'pretty' it doesn't mean it is a bad place to live." I tried to suck it up and prosper but I always found this sadness creeping into me...at times I even felt envy. I felt envy towards the other people in my program who were placed in, what I considered, attractive, lively places to live like Berlin, Munich, Cologne, or anywhere else really. The one thing Magdeburg had going for it was my awesome host family and my good friend Joe. Magdeburg doesn't have much to do and I found myself getting pretty darn bored. It turns out, however, that I am not the only person in Magdeburg who feels this way. Many of the students who study at the University in Magdeburg leave when they are finished with their studies because they do not want to live in Magdbeurg or Sachsen-Anhalt (the state that Magdeburg is in) for that matter. This is creating a serious problem for Magdeburg. The city has a decreasing population and all those smart, educated kids that get their education in Magdeburg leave and take all of their bright, new ideas with them and benefit other cities in the West. Magdeburg, and most of former East Germany are still recovering from DDR times. Time stood still during DDR time and former East Germany was not able to grow with the rest of Germany when it was separated for all of those years. They need those kids to stay with their education and new ideas. I hope, in time, this difference between East and West Germany will diminish and ALL of Germany can move towards the same future.

So there I was, feeling sorry for myself because I didn't get the Germany that I wanted. I traveled on the weekends to visit other program participants and that made things a little bit better. Traveling reminded me, however, that, even though I was not in my ideal city, I was still in Germany and had so many wonderful things to see. This was probably the beginning of the turning point for me. I started to realize that Magdeburg was not my favorite place in the world but that it was still a part of Germany. Before I left the states I thought to myself, "Get to know Germany Clayton. Experience as much of Germany as you can and embrace it." Well guess what? To embrace something wholeheartedly, you have to embrace the good and the bad. I love Germany and to truly love and embrace this country, I had to embrace all parts of it. The cities I do like and the cities I don't like; it's wonderful present and future but also its dark past. These things all make up Germany and I was beginning to realize that.

As many of you know, my program consists of studying at a Germany University for 5 months and then interning at a German company after the semester portion. During the semester portion, I kind of just went to class and didn't really take much in because I was sad about where I was living. I would travel on the weekends and slowly started to realize that I was still in Germany and that I could still see and experience lots of things while I was in Germany. By the end of my semester at the university I was not quite fully there to totally embracing Magdeburg and still did not like it. My internship search in Magdeburg was turning out little results. In my defense, former East Germany has less dynamic, interesting jobs than the West (for now at least) because of all the kids running away from it. So I was unable to find an ideal internship match for me in Magdeburg. I had met someone whose father was a professor in a city called Aachen some time before my internship search. When I couldn't find anything in Magdeburg, I contacted her and asked if her father had any internship spots available. Long story short, I ended up getting an internship offer in Aachen working with a Biology workgroup at the University in Aachen. After some emails and conversations with some supervisors in my program, I was approved to move to Aachen. I would be lying if I said I wasn't excited to experience a new part of Germany. Aachen is as far West as you can get in Germany. It is literally on both the borders of Belgium and Holland. I was of course sad to be leaving Magdeburg, my host family, and Joe but happy to have gotten a good internship in an exciting new city.

Aachen was great. It was hilly with little streets to explore and the city is a University city. 50,000 people out of 250,000 were students. It was a cool vibe and I really liked it. I lived in an apartment with two other guys. They were really cool and it was neat to be able to speak German with them on a daily basis. They were my age so we had some of the same interests. We even made Bloody Marys one night. My internship in Aachen was okay...a bit boring at times. They set me up making Excel spreadsheets of information a lot of times but it was okay. Once, I got to go into the woods for 10 hours and helped look for woodpeckers with a radio that played woodpecker noises. Aachen was great but I did miss my host family and Joe back in Magdeburg and I had this overwhelming feeling that I didn't "belong" in Aachen. I kept thinking to myself, "Clayton, you were placed in Magdeburg not Aachen."

One day in Aachen, I checked my email to see an email from a professor at the University in Magdeburg. Something had panned out with an internship there that didn't pan out before I left for Aachen. I was offered an internship in Magdeburg at the University. It was an internship that was comparable to the one I already had in Aachen. What was I to do? I now lived in a German city that was exactly like the German cities I had envisioned but now had a good internship offer in Magdeburg when the only reason I left Magdeburg in the first place was because I couldn't find a good internship. I could just not tell my program about it and stay in ignorant bliss in Aachen. However, ever since I left Magdeburg, I kept feeling like I had given up on something...that I had ended something too soon. The going got tough so I got going...I quit Magdeburg when I never really gave it a chance. Not to mention that I had a host family back in Magdeburg that signed up for this program just like I did and wanted to experience another culture through me just how I wanted to experience another culture through them. I did not want to cut that experience short for them. I have never considered myself a quitter before and finally realized that Magdeburg was the right place for me to be even if it wasn't the easiest place for me to be. So, after living in Aachen for almost exactly one month, I packed up all of my belongings once more and headed back to Magdeburg to finish what I started.

In the following months, I realized that was the best thing for me to do. My internship was really good for me. I got lots of lab experience. I worked in a lab that studies cow samples (cow poo) and worked towards making methane production more efficient. Methane is a renewable source of energy and can be used to power things instead of using coal or gasoline. Not the most glamorous job I have ever had but working towards a goal like that, that could help the planet, made me feel really good. I gained lots of practical lab skills. I am now a master at using micropipettes and can label even the smallest plastic tube with my hand tied behind my back.

Outside of work, I was beginning to see Magdeburg transform. The weather was getting nicer and Magdeburg was really turning into a beautiful city. The parks in Magdeburg are really great and Magdeburg is a cyclist's paradise. The flat terrain allows you to bike easily through the city and the wide streets allowed for plenty of room for bicycle lanes. I started to ride my bike to and from work everyday and the fresh air and green landscape helped me appreciate Magdeburg. By the near end of my time in Magdbeurg, I actually played hookie at work so that I could ride my bike around the city and take pictures all day. I was also beginning to realize that Magdeburg really had given me everything I wanted to get out of this experience. I wanted to learn more about German culture and I wanted to improve my German. I accomplished both of those things by living in Magdeburg. In fact, I would almost say that my German was better than it would have been had I lived in another city. Since Magdeburg was not what you would call a "tourist hotspot" not that many people know amazing English and there are very very few native English speakers in the city.

During my time in Magdeburg, I got to hear some very interesting stories about how things were in former East Germany and got to have a truly unique experience. There are very few Americans in Magdeburg. It is just not the place that people consider when they decide to study abroad. Because of that, I got to have a German experience that very few people will ever have. I am truly grateful for that. I always considered myself a pretty strong, resilient person before this program but Magdeburg really put that to the test. I experienced untold personal growth during this year. I am still not 100% sure of all the things Magdeburg has taught me that I will be able to use in the future but I am pretty sure even 20 years down the road I will be using what Magdeburg has taught me without even really realizing it. What's really special about Magdeburg is that it is ugly...on the outside. Now hear me out on this one. If you look really closely though and I mean really closely, you realize just how beautiful Magdeburg is. In fact, in order to appreciate Magdeburg's beauty you have to look so closely at and so deeply into it that you end up looking deep inside yourself and discovering things about yourself. I mean honestly. Really what makes you happy? It's not having mountains, old churches, or a beautiful city to look at is it? If it is, then you are a pretty darn shallow person...I must say, however, that I was that person at the beginning of my time in Magdeburg. I was so torn up about what Magdeburg did not have that I did not appreciate what it did have to offer me; a great friend, a wonderful host family, and a truly unique German experience. My first week in Magdeburg, I went on a very small, very short city tour. We came across the statue in the center of the city that basically represents the city. I was not able to fully appreciate it at the time but now can fully appreciate it and even relate to it. The statue is of two horses pulling one ball in opposite directions. The ball is actually a vacuum and the statue represents the experiment that Otto-Von-Guerricke (the university is named after him) conducted during which he discovered and proved the existence of the vacuum. Yes, the vacuum was allegedly discovered in Magdeburg. What is special about this statue is that one side looks like a traditional statue and the other side is open so that you can see the framework inside that supports the statue. This statue represents that  everything has a purpose and that even beneath a seemingly beautiful outer shell, there lies a less beautiful support system but, without this support system, the statue would most likely fall or be quickly damaged. Functionality is not always beautiful but it is needed. You need function AND beauty. In Magdeburg, the functional part is way more apparent than the beauty (wide streets, plain industrial buildings, and a flat landscape that lends itself well to agriculture and wind energy production) BUT the beauty is still there. You just have to look!

The pretty side of the statue.

Other side that shows the functionality.

So, is Magdeburg my favorite city in the world? I would probably say no...BUUUUT because of all the things that Magdeburg represents to me and has given me, it is very special to me. I learned so much about myself and about Germany in Magdeburg and I got to live with the best host family anyone could ever ask for and I got to experience the crazy city of Magdeburg with my very good friend Joe. I think it is safe to say that our 9 months together in Magdeburg has made an unbreakable bond that only people who have lived in Magdeburg can really ever understand. The city makes you go a little crazy...in a good way.

With all that said, I think you can understand why I am sad to be leaving Magdeburg. It has been the definition of a passionate experience. The lows were really low and the highs were pretty darn high. I can safely say that Magdeburg has become a home for me so leaving it will not be easy. Leaving Magdeburg and Germany is almost harder than when I left the states. When I left the states, I knew that in one year's time I would be returning. Sure some things will have changed by the time I return but, for the most part, the life I left in Wisconsin is waiting for me. Leaving Magdeburg is harder because I do not know when I will be able to return and, if I do, it will probably not be for very long. Magdeburg is a dear friend of mine that will probably never again be a part of my everyday life even though it is so meaningful to me. Sure, Magdeburg and I will share the occasional letter or phone call and even the not so occasional visit but it will never again be a part of my daily life as it was for the past 9 months. It is really something that only someone who has sudied abroad for an extended period of time can understand. I have tried to explain it the best I could but I know a website that can do it much better. Recently I saw a Thought Catalog entry going around on the internet that pretty much perfectly explains what it is like. It would be silly for me to try and replicate these thoughts in my own words when they are already explained so well. The entry was written by a woman named Chelsea Fagan who is a writer living in Paris. Here is the link to her entry:
Thought Catalog What Happens When You Live Abroad

Once you have lived away from your home for as long as I have, you can search and search the house you are leaving abroad looking for things you may have forgotten to pack. This attempt is futile...you will never ever be able to pack up all of the things you have in your home away from home. I am not talking about tangible objects or even things you can ascribe a name to...you will always leave something behind that you can't quite put your finger on...a feeling...a piece of your heart...a memory. This is not to say I will walk through the rest of my life feeling like half a person. I will will have many moments of 100% fulfillment, but, as Chelsea's article mentions, with every accomplishment, celebration, or memory I will have in the United States, I will forever wonder what I am missing back in my second home in Germany because a piece of me will always reside there...the piece of me that I looked desperately for while packing but also the piece that was never meant to return home with me. It would have been really easy to title this last post "The End" but that is so out of fashion and entirely too final for me. At the risk of sounding wayyyyy too predictable, I really do need to say that the end of this year is not an end but only the beginning of the rest of my story. When I started this program I thought to myself, "This is 'it' Clayton. This is the most important year of your life. Live it up since you probably won't have a another year like this. Make it count." I realize now that I was partially right. This year will probably remain one of the most important years of my life but this is not "it" whatever that even means. This will not be my last time in Germany and this year has really only opened countless doors for me. The only issue for me now is deciding which one of the wonderful paths before me I want to take.

Zu Familie Dulz, (Sonja, Konrad, Christian, Andreas, Katrin, und Oma Ruth) herzlichen Dank für eure Gastfreundshaft und für die Offnung eures Hauses zu mir. Meine Zeit in Magdeburg war etwas ganz besonderes für mich. Es ist meine deutsche Heimat. Ich bin echt ein Magdeburger Kind.

Euere Spatz,
-Clayton-

To my family back home (Michael, Brooke, Dad, Danni, Lilly, Jolene, Nana, and all the others that are too long to name), thank you for being so supportive of this journey of mine...or should I say ours. You guys have been with me the entire time and thank you for patiently awaiting for my return. It is almost here. Love you guys.

-Clayton-

Birthday in Germany!

As many of you know, I recently celebrated the big 2-4. My birthday in Germany was wonderful. It was one of those days where so many little wonderful things happened that the day just ended up being spectacular. The weather was perfect and every walk signal turned green as I approached it on my bike ride to and from work. Work was great as well. Yes, I worked because I honestly did not see a reason not to. I didn't tell my coworkers that it was my birthday until the day of because I didn't want any commotion. Once they found out it was my birthday though, they dashed off to the university cafeteria and bought me a chocolate muffin as a makeshift birthday cake. That was so nice of them and I really appreciated it. Work was very relaxed that day and I got out early and enjoyed the weather. When I returned home from work, I found a birthday card waiting for me. It was from my grandmother. I don't know how she does it but as long as I can remember, she has always mailed my birthday cards on the exact right day so that I end up getting them on my birthday...and this year was no exception. I don't know how she does it but at over 90 years old, she somehow knew when to send my birthday card so that I would receive it exactly on my birthday even though I am over 4,000 miles away from home. That night my host family and I had Greek food and ate outside because the weather was perfect. My friend Joe also came over and ate with us. My host family got me a German breakfast set as my gift. I got 4 egg cups (to place your egg in while you eat it out of the shell), 4 egg spoons (little spoons to eat your soft-boiled egg out of the shell with), 4 small breakfast boards (these are literally small plastic boards that you eat your breakfast off of), and an egg cracker (a fun device that perfectly cracks the top of the egg shell off). My friend Joe also got me a little something that included my favorite flavored beer in Germany; Birne-Ingwer Schöfferhofer. It's beer that tastes like ginger and pear. The stuff is only 2.5% alcohol so calling it beer is kind of a stretch. I also got to fit in a Skype session with my dad and got other messages from friends and family. As I said, it was just a wonderful day filled with many things that I am still thankful for.

Presents! Side note, "Gift" in German means poison...my host family did not get me any poison.

My host family and I were treated to a beautiful evening sky.

My favorite Bier!

Heidelberg Trip #2

Steffi's Hostel is bright and inviting.

In Germany, the college semester does not end when Christmas break begins. I know, isn't that crazy? These poor people have to worry about homework and exams while they are trying to enjoy Christmas and New Year. In my program, we don't have to worry about grades or anything with our classes. We just have to go to class, try and understand it, and get a feel for the student life in Germany. With that said, I was actually able to enjoy my two week Christmas break. My break was from Dec. 22 to Jan. 8. I stayed in Magdeburg the first week of the break for Christmas with the family and such but after New Year it was time to explore Germany a bit. Me and my friend decided to make a trip together. I started by first going to Kassel where he lived. We then travelled together to Heidelberg. That was the first stop on our trip. We booked a hostel room very last minute but it worked out great. The hostel was one block away from train station and it was very clean. We even got a two-bed private room so that we didn't need to sleep with 4 or 5 strangers. Breakfast was also inclusive at this hostel so we didn't need to worry about buying groceries in order to have something to eat first thing in the morning. It was called Steffi's Hostel and I highly recommend it if you ever visit Heidelberg. It is walking distance from the main street and it was not very expensive.



We first arrived at night in Heidelberg so we really just unpacked our stuff at the hostel. We did shortly go into town to get something to eat at one of the restaurants that night but all the interesting shops were closed by that hour so we had to wait for the next day to go into them. Our first and only morning waking up at Steffi's was pretty cool. I hadn't been up that early in a while but the prospects of the day were enough incentive to drag myself out of bed early. We went upstairs to where breakfast was served. The way the sun was spilling over the mountains and through the tall buildings into the city was really cool to see from the breakfast room.

After breakfast we ventured into the town to sightsee. If you recall, this is not my first time visiting Heidelberg. I had visited once before during my Radolfzell days. Things were a lot different this time. It was much colder and a lot less lively. The last time I was in Heidelberg, the streets were filled with people (I can only assume many of them were tourists) and the weather was warm and sunny. Some of the shops we had seen the first time were now closed. I think they were shops that were set up specifically for the tourist season. Last time I was in Heidelberg, I visited the castle. This time, I did not do that. If you've seen a castle once in Germany, you've seen it a million times. Me and my friend opted to wander around the city and climb the church tower. Climbing the church tower was something that we did not get to do last time so we both really wanted to do that. The church itself is very interesting. The church has shops literally built into the church on the outside...and these aren't cute little handmade trinket shops. These are what I call "crap" shops. They are the shops that sell German flags and Oktoberfest hats as well as any other really cheaply made item that a tourist is bound to buy. I was very surprised that shops like these would be allowed to be built into the outside of the church.

Do you see the "crap" shops around the church?

Picture taken at the top of the church with the castle in the background.

The inside of the church was also very interesting. Not sure why but the original stained glass windows must have been damaged or destroyed somehow because the new windows contained modern artwork. It looked almost as if the city allowed local residents to design the windows or something. Why not? The church is a part of the city so why not let the people have a say in how it is decorated.

In this window, one can clearly see a picture of what looks like a pilot maybe.

Last time I was in Heidelberg, I saw a store that was full of gummies. Not just any gummies though. These were gummies that were shaped like beer glasses and tasted like beer. My first day in Germany at the Sparkassen Akademie (where the whole CBYX group stayed our first night in Germany) I got to try these gummies because each room had a small bag with about 3 gummies inside. I had been on the lookout for them ever since. When I first saw this store in Heidelberg I was so excited that I had the chance to buy a whole bag and maybe send it home for my family. I decided not to buy the gummies that trip because I thought I would have an opportunity to buy them later in the year. Wrong! This second trip to Heidelberg contained no beer gummy shop. I am assuming it was there during the first trip because Oktoberfest was around the corner and the shop was capitalizing on the tourism and the seasonal interest in beer. January, however, is another story. Not so much tourism and Oktoberfest is a long way away. So I was unable to acquire some beer gummies this trip but my search for beer gummies in Germany continued. Stay tuned.

My friend Adam, thank goodness, noticed this sign. Jelly doughnuts called Vampire Kisses? Just a little strange.

If you remember, I took a picture just like this for my first post on Heidelberg. I made a point of trying to replicate pictures from last time to see how time has past. It's the infamous brass monkey of Heidelberg.

You can usually tell if a place is touristy by the number of Starbucks it has. Heidelberg has two on just one street. You can also tell if it is touristy if the baristas automatically start the conversation in English...which they did at the Heidelberg Starbucks. Having worked at Starbucks for 5 years prior to my time in Germany, it is always interesting to me to go to Starbucks in other countries to see what is similar or different. Me and my friend needed to use the internet so we decided to go to Starbucks for some coffee, a bathroom break, and internet. I ordered something that I had tried many times during my work years at the coffee giant. A regular coffee and a chocolate cream cheese muffin. It tasted just like I was back at work.

Just getting some work done. 

A very beautiful Starbucks...where people let their babies crawl on the floor.

This is also a great place to mention the great length that Germans go to to ensure that people do not get to go to the bathroom for free. Usually in Germany, public bathrooms (gas stations, train stations, etc.) have gates that require payment to get through. It usually costs 50 Euro cents or something like that. The reason being that water is really not cheap in Europe. If you are a customer at a restaurant, it is free to go to the bathroom but the bathroom is usually located at the way back of the restaurant so as to ensure non-customers are not able to reach it unnoticed by the employees. If there happens to be a nice employee working you might be able to use the bathroom for free if you are not a customer or else you might need to buy something or pay a small fee. The Starbucks me and my friend visited went to great lengths to ensure only customers used the bathroom. When you bought something, your receipt had a code on it. You needed this code to go to the bathroom there. The doors each had a keypad by them where you had to enter your code in order to open the door. They meant business!

Do you see the keypad between the doors? Also the "D" stands for "Damen" and the "H" stands for "Herren" which is the equivalent of "Ladies" and "Gentlemen".

One day in Heidelberg (after having already visited the town before) was enough for me and Adam so that night we decided to head to Freiburg. The city is famous for being quintessential old German and for being nestled in the Black Forest. So that night, we got our things from Steffi's Hostel and headed to the train station and caught a train to Freiburg.

New Year

Okay, I stole this picture online but I WAS in that crowd somewhere. I'm the one wearing the gray jacket.

I am pretty sure that my New Year's resolution should be to blog about events earlier but we all know that would crumble in a couple of days. So here we are. New Year or Sylvester as they call it in Germany was pretty great. My host parents were already gone. They decided to go to the Ostsee for New Year. My host mom bought me an American style pizza before she left and made a point of telling me that it really was all for me. Ahhhh joy. So I had the pizza for breakfast yes I did. It was great. I decided to go to Berlin for New Year. I had been warned by my host family and past participants about Berlin on New Year's and you will read why in a bit. Anyway, me and some other participants wanted to go to the Brandenburg Gate for New Year. The Brandenburg gate concert (which is free by the way) is the largest open-air party in the world...THE WORLD! Over 1.5 million people gathered at the Brandenburg Gate to bring in 2012. It was crazy!!!!! First me and my friends were in front of the gate where there was a concert going on. There were some pretty big German music names performing there. Udo Jörgens and Cassandra Steen are two of the most notable. If you don't know who they are, you best educate yourselves. Udo Jörgens was first introduced into my life by a high school German teacher of mine with the song "Aber Bitte Mit Sahne" which means "But Please With Cream". The song is pretty comical as the entire song is about this guy basically loving some ice cream sundae. It is so weird and amazing at the same time. He is basically the Barry Manilow of Germany. It is also worth noting that my host mom has a very healthy obsession with this guy but she admits that he is way too old for her. He's like 77 now. One time for breakfast, she played all his hits including "Aber Bitte Mit Sahne". It was the most fun I have had at breakfast in Germany. Please, if you care about me even a little bit, check out the video below. I think it is funny even when you can't understand the words because, as I told you, this guy is singing about a freakin' sundae!

On to the next star. Cassandra Steen is the beautiful singer born from a German mother and an African-American father. She rose to fame in the trio Glashaus and is now flying solo. You should take interest in her because, guess what? She is a German and American citizen! I first stumbled onto the image of her when we arrived at the Brandenburg Gate and saw all these Weight Watchers ads around with her in them. It looked just like she was saying "Shoot girl, join Weight Watchers because I said so." I had to take a picture with them.

When she performed she sang her latest hit "Stadt" which means "City". In the song she talks about building a city for someone...sounds like a lot of work if you ask me. Check out the video below. It's a catchy song and you might like it.

Okay, enough about these German pop stars. Me and my friends were in front of the gate. It was super crowded. Literally packed and drunk people with open cups were trying to squeeze by all the time. Thank goodness nothing spilled on me or we might have had some problems for real. Around 11 pm me and my friends decided to go to the other side of the gate where there was no concert but where you could still see the fireworks at midnight. we moved because we did not want to be in that mob when midnight hit and the stampede to the subways began. On the way we saw a number of interesting things. First off, we saw people setting fireworks off in the Holocaust memorial. Ummmmmmmmmm not sure why people thought that was okay. I would have shown just a little more respect but those people were probably drunk...or very confused. We also saw a ton of drunk people in the streets setting fireworks off. They would either throw them or launch them out of their hands (ouch). You had to be on the lookout to make sure you weren't gonna get hit by anything. I am not saying it was a war zone or anything but it was potentially dangerous and staying aware was the key. So we arrived at the other side of the gate and were greeted by an equally large crowd. There were so many people speaking English. I have lived in Germany for a sizable amount of time so I actually found myself thinking "What are those foreigners doing here?" Haha, as if I am not a foreigner myself? We stood and talked for awhile and when midnight arrived we got to see the fireworks go off at the Brandenburg Gate. I was at the largest open air party in the WORLD. At midnight I felt like I was at the center of the universe. It was amazing and pretty surreal.

Just in case you forgot what this post was about...read the sign.

Brandenburg Tor in the distance.

The streets were filled, I mean filled, with litter including that perfectly functional purple boa. Now why would someone throw that away? 

Picture op on the packed U-Bahn!

Since I live only 90 minutes from Berlin, I decided to catch a red eye train back to Magdeburg. I was glad I did since I got to sleep in my own bed that morning but I was apparently not the only Berlin visitor with that idea. The trains were packed and for an hour of the trip I had to sit on some steps in the train...although I considered myself lucky to have gotten those steps. I arrived at my home in Magdeburg at about 5 in the morning. I closed all the blinds in the house, showered, and went to bed. I was gonna post the video I took of the moment the year changed but You Tube said it would take 305 minutes to upload and I really don't have time for that. I hope your New Year was great as well.

Stole this one too.

Magdeburg Zoo

Every year my host family goes to the zoo on the 26th of December. This year I got to tag along. Not much happened so this blog really will be mostly pictures but the animals were pretty active and really didn't hide that much. They really put on a show for us . I guess the animals in Germany are more active than the ones in the United States. Also, at least at the Magdeburg zoo, the zoo puts much less space between you and the animals. For instance, the penguin cage literally just had a short fence between us and the penguins. No plexi-glass or wide dugout. Just a little fence that I could have easily jumped over. Needless to say, I did not jump this fence but it was cool to be so close to the animals.

It was a pretty cloudy day when we went and the zoo itself wasn't too colorful so this guy really "popped" when we saw him.

This right here is a tapir. It is a pretty sizable animal about the size of a very large pig. What's funny is it made this little high pitched chirp the entire time we were there. Such a large animal with such a small voice.

Giant guinea pig! 

Porcupine

In da jungle, the mighty jungle...

Berlin Trip #4

It seems like only yesterday I was writing the blog entitled "Berlin Trip #1" yet here I am almost 4 months later writing "Berlin Trip #4". Berlin has been my go-to destination if I get antsy to travel but don't want to spend a lot of money or don't want to stay overnight somewhere (although I usually have the offer to overnight it in Berlin from one of my friends) . The train ride to Berlin from Magdeburg is about 1 hour and 45 minutes and 13 Euros. The 13 Euros is not exactly cheap for a 105 minute train ride but it usually ends up being cheaper than my other travel options. So Berlin wins. I decided to go on this particular trip because the other guy in CBYX that lives in Magdeburg was departing to visit family in London. He was leaving from the airport in Berlin so I figured I would ride with and then explore Berlin a little more once he left. This trip was in December so the Christmas markets were still up in Berlin and I wanted to explore them. I really did get much done in the couple of hours I wandered around alone. I visited 3 Christmas markets. One was at the Schloss Charlottenburg, one was at Alexanderplatz, and one was at the Fernsehturm. I got pictures at each one.

Schloss Charlottenburg Christmas market.

Typical stand at a Christmas market...see the sign for Glühwein? If not, it is right under the roof-mounted nativity scene that I just happened to notice as I posted this picture.

Alexanderplatz Christmas market. Can you see the Weltzeituhr (World Time Clock) that Alexanderplatz is famous for?

Fernsehturm. I went on a foggy night so the Fernsehturm looked really cool. It is lit up so it was like a bright beacon in the foggy darkness.

This is the Christmas market that was at the base of the Fernsehturm. 

I walked by this Luis Vuitton store and had to take a picture of their window display. From now on, I am going to say "We are all ignoring the pink and orange, argyle elephant in the room."

I would also like to say that this was the first time that I used Berlin public transportation all alone. I didn't get lost at all. I am becoming a city slicker. Watch out!

Dresden

Okay. So shame on me. I have not blogged in over one month and I am now paying for it. Here I am, it is 1 am where I am, and I can't sleep because the anxiety from all these backlogged blogs is keeping me awake. So I decided to start chipping away at the huge pile of blogs I have waiting for me. My trip to Dresden happened way back on the 16th of December so it really has been a while. So yeah, I decided to go to Dresden in December with some of the other participants in CBYX. We really wanted to go in December so we could catch one of the many wonderful Dresden Christmas markets. Dresden is known for having really great Christmas markets. Let me tell you...Dresden did not disappoint. Dresden had many Christmas markets but the main one was really great. It was large with a pretty old ferris wheel. Plenty of food and plenty of little knick knacks.

I am gonna go off on a tangent now to tell you a little about the German Christmas markets. They all basically have the same knick knacks. They all have a wood work stand filled with wooden ornaments and other things made out of wood (although it was kicked up a notch in Dresden because Sachsen, where Dresden is,  is where all those beautiful wood ornaments are made). They all have a blown glass ornament stand and they all have a candle holder stand. Now, just because they have mostly the same things does not degrade them in any way it just means that you don't need to feel like you are missing out on any great Christmas gifts if you don't live in a certain area. Just buy them where it is most convenient. The food and drink can vary from region to region though. I was very lucky that my Christmas market in Magdeburg had fried mushrooms. Not everyone is that lucky. Almost every single Christmas market in Germany also has a Weihnachstpyramide. You can see two of them in the above picture. They are basically a wooden pyramid with people dancing around them and there is a fan on top. Now they don't really spin without a motor with those huge ones you see but the smaller models (that you can find at every Christmas market) really spin without electricity. The smaller Weihnachstpyramiden have places to put tea-lights. The warm air produced by the tea lights rises and pushes the wooden fans around causing the Weihnachtspyramide to actually move. Gotta love those German engineers! Every Christmas market also has Glühwein! It is very sweet wine served warm. It is a German tradition and the stuff can be found everywhere in Germany during the holidays. I would also like to say that the Dresden Christmas market did have one pretty awesome nativity scene. It had real sheep in it. It was like a petting zoo!

Real sheep!

Dresden also had this really cool medieval Christmas market. It was in the courtyard of a building and everything was medieval themed. It even had a hot tub that you could sit in for a certain price. It was so strange to be walking through this market, in the cold, in a winter jacket only to have someone run past you in a swimsuit to get to the bathroom. Haha I really felt sorry for that poor soul...I hope he was able to make it back to the hot tub in quickly.

Dresden is also in former east Germany and was also destroyed in WWII much like Magdeburg. Dresen, however, did a really good job of restoring the destroyed structures and trying to give people a sense of what the city used to look like. The two main rebuilt structures I saw were the Frauenkirche and the Kreuzkirche. On both of them you can see very dark bricks with some very light ones. The light bricks are the new ones and the dark bricks are the old salvaged bricks from the original that the city used to build the new ones. They rebuilt them as close to the original as possible. The Frauenkirche is fairly new. I believe it was completed in 2005. One of the participants that lived in Dresden even told us that the Frauenkirche is so newly built that Google Earth still shows it as a construction site. Crazy!

Kreuzkirche, Dresden

Frauenkirche, Dresden with a little Christmas market around it. See the different colored bricks?

The inside of the Frauenkirche. It was very white and gold and very pretty.

The participant that we were visiting in Dresden was nice enough to look into a candle light organ concert that the Frauenkirche was having that weekend. We attended and it was very nice. I am not gonna lie, if you are human with blood coursing through your veins, you will get bored at least a little bit during an organ concert. It is only natural. There you are, sitting for almost and hour just listening to the organ music. I am just saying that to be honest but it was nonetheless very nice. Candles everywhere and organ music playing.

Beautiful right?

CBYX gang's all here.

Below I have included two special pictures from the weekend I spent in Dresden. One is of a santa statue we saw. Here I thought I was going to Germany where Santa was going to be very traditional and tame but instead I find a statue of him that makes him look like he is performing in the World Wrestling Federation. I mean sheesh! The other is a photo of me holding a cookie I designed to look like the state of Wisconsin. The Dresden CBYXers had already made friends with people who were not in the program...they were just in Germany on their own accord. We were invited to their house for a bit and one of them brought out this big ol' ball of dough and invited us to make cookies of whatever shape we wanted. I was at a loss so I just decided to make a cookie shaped like Wisconsin. It got a little warped in the oven but you can still totally see the peninsula.

Can you smell what the elves are cookin'?! Ahhh Santa is about to drop that present on his opponent!

Don't deny it, you see the peninsula. That is Wisconsin baby! It tasted very yummy!

A special thanks to Andrea for letting all 3 of us sleep on the floor of her dorm room...I had back problems for about a week after but, hey, a floor is free and a hostel is not. My body can heal itself my wallet cannot. I also found the perfect Christmas gifts in Dresden for my family back home so, for that, I was really thankful.

Oh! By the way! There was this really cool bar in Dresden that had all kinds of board games. Beer and board games made for a very awesome night with some of the coolest people I have ever met. I think back on that night very fondly with many a laugh.