After 362 days abroad I am officially back on American soil. It feels good to be home, but I do miss Germany. It is an awesome country and Goettingen was a fun university city.
I know you all have missed me like crazy so let the visiting begin! I know I am not always the most available person since I tend to travel around a lot, but I will be around in Livermore for about two weeks before I head off to India for the last two weeks of August. I am going to be working at the Little Flock orphanage near Chennai in the village of Kondamangalam (spelling?). Anyways after that I will home again, I will go up to Tahoe and then move back down to Santa Barbara towards the end of September to start my final year of college. Crazy!
After school finished in Germany on July 20th, yes you read that correctly, July 20th! I went with my mom to St. Petersburg and Estonia. Russia is awesome, but they don't make it easy to get there. Anyways we only had 3 days and in St. Petersburg you need at least a week, if not more. It was fun to be in Russia and decode the signs that are all written in Cyrillic and then Estonia was great because I got to see people again. I will try to put up some pictures from that trip soon.
Hope everyone is having a good summer and hope to talk to all of you, in case anybody actually reads this, soon.
Sorry I was so spotty in updating this throughout the year, but at least you got an idea of what sort of things I was up to. :-)
My year in Germany is officially over. And so is this blog. (unless I decide to continue just for fun, maybe I will post something about India after I get back.)
Saturday, August 04, 2007
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
One Month--31 Days...
Ok so this keyboard is really sticky and the computer is slow. But I can't really complain because at least this one works unlike my laptop. Anyways I will officially be home in one month, 31 days.
Just so that you understand how slow this computer is...I type a whole sentence and watch it slowly unfold one letter at a time. It is like some ghost is typing messages to me through the computer like in horror movies.
I would give you more of an update but I can't take this keyboard anymore. Sorry that most of my blog posts are half stories but deal with it. You can get the whole story once I return and can show you pictures.
Oh and happy 4th of July tomorrow! I will be on the train, bus and plane to Italy. I am so excited to see Pisa, Lucca and Florence and of course Uncle Sandy, Aunt Kathy and A.J.
I don't know what happened but suddenly the computer is typing much faster. Oh well I still don't really feel like saying more. :-)
Just so that you understand how slow this computer is...I type a whole sentence and watch it slowly unfold one letter at a time. It is like some ghost is typing messages to me through the computer like in horror movies.
I would give you more of an update but I can't take this keyboard anymore. Sorry that most of my blog posts are half stories but deal with it. You can get the whole story once I return and can show you pictures.
Oh and happy 4th of July tomorrow! I will be on the train, bus and plane to Italy. I am so excited to see Pisa, Lucca and Florence and of course Uncle Sandy, Aunt Kathy and A.J.
I don't know what happened but suddenly the computer is typing much faster. Oh well I still don't really feel like saying more. :-)
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Walk Like an Egyptian
So Egypt. It is an amazing country. The weather in April was fabulous, not too hot (most of the time), but warm enough to enjoy being outside.
I went to Egypt with the German mission organization called GospelTribe which was started in 2006, I believe, by Gernot and Sabine Elsner. It is specifically focused on getting youth interested and involved in missions and they go on trips all over the place, Italy, Egypt, Tunisia, South Africa, France, etc. (www.gospeltribe.de) Anyways I met up with Gernot and the rest of the team at the Frankfurt airport on March 30. In the previous week I had just returned from my month of travel, having dealt with my backpack and laptop being stolen, attempted to rewrite my Hausarbeit, term paper, in German in a few days and tried to relax and do laundry before heading out to Egypt.
Anyways, I arrived at the Frankfurt airport and met the other people on the team, Gernot, David (a guy from Ireland and friend of Gernot), two German guys-Denis and Jony (18 or 19 I think), and two German girls-Jasmin (22) and Sarah (19 or 20). They all seemed very nice and I figured I would get to know them pretty well over the next two weeks. We got on the plane and heading to Cairo, through Budapest. We left Germany around 8pm and arrived in Cairo about 3am on March 31....fun times.
After arriving in Cairo we met up with Samy, our Egyptian teammember, who was going to translate for us and generally take care of us and keep us safe. We loaded up our stuff into a minibus thingy and headed off on the bumpy road to a retired pastor's home where we were going to stay the night. On the way we drove over a giant speed bump and all three of us girls in the back flew up out of our seats. Sarah being the lightest hit the ceiling and got a giant bump on her head. Great start, huh?
We got a chance to rest up and then the trip truly started. That first day was a chance for us to see Cairo and get acquainted with Egypt. We met in the morning for devotions and team meeting and then spent the afternoon walking around the city, meeting random Egyptians, and then we attended a church service in one the largest evangelical churches in the Egypt/Middle East area. The next morning we packed up our stuff and headed for another part of Cairo where we would be serving in two different churches. We dropped our stuff off at the first church and then prepared for our services. We had split the team in half and each prepared a service. That day each team did their service in both churchs, once in the morning and once in the evening. On our team we did a drama, Denis, Jamsin and I. It was pretty creative and I think the people actually understood what we were trying to get across and then David gave the sermon. After the services we played with the children. And since it was Palm Sunday they all had palm fronds and what not, so I started playing around with the fronds and trying to make fish like I had learned in Hawaii, boy was that stupid. Once the kids realized I was trying to origami fold the palm fronds in to shapes they all surrounded me and asked me to make them fish and rings and head bands. I really didn't know how to make any of these things, but I sort of learned on the stop and probably made about 6 fish, 30 rings and a quite intricate headband. By then it was lunch time and I had to peel the children off of me so I could go downstairs and rejoin the rest of the team for food.
That night we stayed in a really nice, but unfurnished apartment in a poorer area of Cairo. We slept in our sleeping bags on camping mats and rugs. The apartment was cool, but it was right next to a giant garbage pile/pit/really smelly area. But it wouldn't have been the same experience without that garbage smell.
Monday morning we had some team time and then in the evening we met at one of the churches for a leader's meeting, which basically meant that everyone in the church showed up and we had another service. This one also included a drama that we came up with 5 minutes before we performed it. Not quite as good as the first, but still good. We stayed in the apartment again that night (carrying the other half of our stuff the 15 minutes through dusty, garbage-covered streets from the first church to the apartment.) Then Tuesday morning we went back to the Cairo city center and met more random Egyptian people. It was a chance to go up to someone and start a conversation. It wasn't directly evangelism because if you get caught evangelizing Muslims you can get in big trouble in Egypt, but it was an opportunity to meet someone new, have a conversation ahd hope that religion, faith, God and other spiritual topics came up naturally. We, the girls on the team, noticed that many teenage girls in Egypt aren't too comfortable with their English so the conversations stayed pretty surface level. Then that evening, Jasmin, Sarah and I led a women's meeting at the first church. The boys performed a skit and then Jasmin and I each gave a short talk, my first such experience and Sarah led the prayer time. I talked about the story in Mark 14 where Jesus is anointed by the woman in Bethany. I probably only talked for about 6 or 7 minutes, but I think it went pretty well. I wasn't nervous at all and the rest of the team said I seemed pretty confident and natural on stage. Who would have thought.
After the women's meeting we loaded up our stuff into a bus and headed to Alexandria. I think we arrived around midnight or so. We stayed in an apartment on the second floor of the church we were helping at....Ok so I have managed to tell you about the first 5 days out of 15...the rest with more pictures will come later.
I went to Egypt with the German mission organization called GospelTribe which was started in 2006, I believe, by Gernot and Sabine Elsner. It is specifically focused on getting youth interested and involved in missions and they go on trips all over the place, Italy, Egypt, Tunisia, South Africa, France, etc. (www.gospeltribe.de) Anyways I met up with Gernot and the rest of the team at the Frankfurt airport on March 30. In the previous week I had just returned from my month of travel, having dealt with my backpack and laptop being stolen, attempted to rewrite my Hausarbeit, term paper, in German in a few days and tried to relax and do laundry before heading out to Egypt.
Anyways, I arrived at the Frankfurt airport and met the other people on the team, Gernot, David (a guy from Ireland and friend of Gernot), two German guys-Denis and Jony (18 or 19 I think), and two German girls-Jasmin (22) and Sarah (19 or 20). They all seemed very nice and I figured I would get to know them pretty well over the next two weeks. We got on the plane and heading to Cairo, through Budapest. We left Germany around 8pm and arrived in Cairo about 3am on March 31....fun times.
After arriving in Cairo we met up with Samy, our Egyptian teammember, who was going to translate for us and generally take care of us and keep us safe. We loaded up our stuff into a minibus thingy and headed off on the bumpy road to a retired pastor's home where we were going to stay the night. On the way we drove over a giant speed bump and all three of us girls in the back flew up out of our seats. Sarah being the lightest hit the ceiling and got a giant bump on her head. Great start, huh?
We got a chance to rest up and then the trip truly started. That first day was a chance for us to see Cairo and get acquainted with Egypt. We met in the morning for devotions and team meeting and then spent the afternoon walking around the city, meeting random Egyptians, and then we attended a church service in one the largest evangelical churches in the Egypt/Middle East area. The next morning we packed up our stuff and headed for another part of Cairo where we would be serving in two different churches. We dropped our stuff off at the first church and then prepared for our services. We had split the team in half and each prepared a service. That day each team did their service in both churchs, once in the morning and once in the evening. On our team we did a drama, Denis, Jamsin and I. It was pretty creative and I think the people actually understood what we were trying to get across and then David gave the sermon. After the services we played with the children. And since it was Palm Sunday they all had palm fronds and what not, so I started playing around with the fronds and trying to make fish like I had learned in Hawaii, boy was that stupid. Once the kids realized I was trying to origami fold the palm fronds in to shapes they all surrounded me and asked me to make them fish and rings and head bands. I really didn't know how to make any of these things, but I sort of learned on the stop and probably made about 6 fish, 30 rings and a quite intricate headband. By then it was lunch time and I had to peel the children off of me so I could go downstairs and rejoin the rest of the team for food.
That night we stayed in a really nice, but unfurnished apartment in a poorer area of Cairo. We slept in our sleeping bags on camping mats and rugs. The apartment was cool, but it was right next to a giant garbage pile/pit/really smelly area. But it wouldn't have been the same experience without that garbage smell.
Monday morning we had some team time and then in the evening we met at one of the churches for a leader's meeting, which basically meant that everyone in the church showed up and we had another service. This one also included a drama that we came up with 5 minutes before we performed it. Not quite as good as the first, but still good. We stayed in the apartment again that night (carrying the other half of our stuff the 15 minutes through dusty, garbage-covered streets from the first church to the apartment.) Then Tuesday morning we went back to the Cairo city center and met more random Egyptian people. It was a chance to go up to someone and start a conversation. It wasn't directly evangelism because if you get caught evangelizing Muslims you can get in big trouble in Egypt, but it was an opportunity to meet someone new, have a conversation ahd hope that religion, faith, God and other spiritual topics came up naturally. We, the girls on the team, noticed that many teenage girls in Egypt aren't too comfortable with their English so the conversations stayed pretty surface level. Then that evening, Jasmin, Sarah and I led a women's meeting at the first church. The boys performed a skit and then Jasmin and I each gave a short talk, my first such experience and Sarah led the prayer time. I talked about the story in Mark 14 where Jesus is anointed by the woman in Bethany. I probably only talked for about 6 or 7 minutes, but I think it went pretty well. I wasn't nervous at all and the rest of the team said I seemed pretty confident and natural on stage. Who would have thought.
After the women's meeting we loaded up our stuff into a bus and headed to Alexandria. I think we arrived around midnight or so. We stayed in an apartment on the second floor of the church we were helping at....Ok so I have managed to tell you about the first 5 days out of 15...the rest with more pictures will come later.
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Awesome German Weather
It is currently thunderstorming in Göttingen (like literally right over the building in which I am sitting. There was just a simultaneous flash and boom--so cool!) I love Germany! and it's crazy weather.
I went into class 2 hours ago and it was cloudy and warm, rather humid, but calm. Now just out of class and this storm has broken out. Luckily it waited until I was inside again. :-)
Oh and over the weekend I drove to Cinque Terre with some friends. I will put up pictures and stories tonight or tomorrow. I promise!!
I went into class 2 hours ago and it was cloudy and warm, rather humid, but calm. Now just out of class and this storm has broken out. Luckily it waited until I was inside again. :-)
Oh and over the weekend I drove to Cinque Terre with some friends. I will put up pictures and stories tonight or tomorrow. I promise!!
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Introduction to Egypt
The details about the Egypt trip will come soon enough. But here is a picture to get your imaginations going. :-)
Thursday, April 26, 2007
Ahhhhh....I'm back!
Hello all.
So it has been quite some time since I last wrote. There is no way I can really recount everything that has happened since then but I will try to give a short synopsis to catch you up on my crazy life. Granada was an amazing city--recommend it to all! After Granada we headed to Sevilla where we hung out with some people we met in our hostel. We took a city tour bus thingy, walked around, saw the Cathedral, the parks and gardens, and also some Flamenco. We also ate probably one of the best ice creams/gelatos I have ever had in my life. I was Flanela Helado (Spanish for Gelato) and in a cafe across from the Cathedral.
After Sevilla we made our way back to Madrid to meet up with Juan, Bob and Elska at the airport to fly to Morocco. It was so cool when our plane landed in Marrakech. I stepped on to African soil for the first time in my life. It must have been the first time for a bunch of other people too because lots of people started taking pictures as we walked from the plane to the terminal. We stayed in a small Riad/Hotel in the medina area of Marrakech. We were basically smack dab in the middle of a maze-like assortment of streets, alleyways, markets, squares and who knows what else. We walked around, got lost a few times, visited the markets and ate traditional moroccan food, pretty good by the way. We also took a three day adventure trip to the Sahara--probably the highlight of everyone's trip. It was so amazing to ride camels among the sand dunes of the western Sahara. Merzouga is gorgeous and the sand and stars are breathtaking.
So it has been quite some time since I last wrote. There is no way I can really recount everything that has happened since then but I will try to give a short synopsis to catch you up on my crazy life. Granada was an amazing city--recommend it to all! After Granada we headed to Sevilla where we hung out with some people we met in our hostel. We took a city tour bus thingy, walked around, saw the Cathedral, the parks and gardens, and also some Flamenco. We also ate probably one of the best ice creams/gelatos I have ever had in my life. I was Flanela Helado (Spanish for Gelato) and in a cafe across from the Cathedral.
After Sevilla we made our way back to Madrid to meet up with Juan, Bob and Elska at the airport to fly to Morocco. It was so cool when our plane landed in Marrakech. I stepped on to African soil for the first time in my life. It must have been the first time for a bunch of other people too because lots of people started taking pictures as we walked from the plane to the terminal. We stayed in a small Riad/Hotel in the medina area of Marrakech. We were basically smack dab in the middle of a maze-like assortment of streets, alleyways, markets, squares and who knows what else. We walked around, got lost a few times, visited the markets and ate traditional moroccan food, pretty good by the way. We also took a three day adventure trip to the Sahara--probably the highlight of everyone's trip. It was so amazing to ride camels among the sand dunes of the western Sahara. Merzouga is gorgeous and the sand and stars are breathtaking.
The low point of the trip immediately followed the highlight. We came back to our hotel in Marrakech to discover that my backpack (with laptop inside--with term paper on it and hundreds of amazing pictures) had been stolen. And 4 of the books I had been using for research from the university library had been stolen to boot. Needless to say I cried quite a bit and had to call the parents for some solace. Things turned out all right I guess. I never got the backpack, laptop or books back, but I realized I would survive and get through it--although I do think I am cursed. We did get a free night at the hotel though--wahoo! Anyways...
After Marrakech we headed back to Spain, Madrid and Barcelona. Both amazing cities and wonderful weather--Madrid has awesome art museums and Barcelona has the Mediterranean and good food and fun bars. If you really want to know I can go into detail later, but I am just trying to catch you up for now. After Barcelona I headed back to Göttingen for a week of relaxing and getting ready for my mission trip to Egypt. I did laundry, attempted (unsuccessfully) to get an extension on my paper--although the day I left for Egypt, my professor e-mailed me saying I could write my paper in English (score!) Oh my parents sent me my old laptop after they heard about the other one being stolen. So I got that while I was back in between trips as well. However, I did have to pay 200 euros in customs taxes to convince the guy to give it to me though. (Hopefully we can convince the government to return the money--since I am not planning on selling my used laptop to anyone here.)
I then packed and headed off for Egypt. That was also an amazing trip and I can only say that God taught me so many things, I suffered from the food, and I came back burden-free and happy. More details on Egypt to come later. After coming back from Egypt, I proceeded to spend the next 3 days writing my paper and then I turned it in on April 16th, the first day of the summer semester. I ended up getting an A, so I suppose everything turned out ok. My classes then started on the 17th and since then I have been attending lectures, seminars, tutoriums, going to parties, meeting more Germans and the new Californians and just enjoying being back in Göttingen. Although my internet has stopped working in the last 2 days, so now I have to go on campus or borrow a friend's computer--boy that sounds familiar.
Well that is pretty much it. If you want more details on anything in particular just e-mail me or leave a comment or something. As far as pictures go, I can't do that until the internet in my room is working again, sorry. It'll happen someday I promise. I will eventually put up some pictures. :-)
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Adventures in Europe
So far I've been to Koeln for Karneval, Chamonix for skiing in the French Alps, and Madrid. I am currently in Granada and will be heading out for Seville on Saturday. Then Cordoba, Morocco, Barcelona and back to Germany. I have also gotten official word that I will be going to Egypt March 30-April 13. Definitely excited about that trip.
Karneval was insane. There were so many people in ridiculous costumes drinking way too much alcohol. We got to Duesseldorf on Sunday and basically got dinner, chilled out in the hostel, walked around downtown as they were cleaning up after the day's festivities and then hit the sack early. On Monday we got to Koeln by 10 or so because we heard the parade would be starting around 11. We bought some brightly colored wigs and leis, found some prime spots along the parade route and waited beers in hand. Turns out when they say the parade is starting around 11, they really mean, we are lying and will start the parade whenever we feel like. Granted we weren't at the beginning of the parade route, but it didn't start passing by our spot until at least 1:30 or 2. Oh well, they made up for their tardiness by throwing handfuls of candy and flowers into the crowd. We collected enough chocolate to last us for the next couple Halloweens. And once the parade started it seemed it would never stop. I lasted until 4:30ish and then had to go to the bathroom so bad. A couple of beers will do that to you. :-) Anyways, after getting stuck on one side of the parade route, I finally made it to McDonald's and waited in a 30 minute line for the bathroom. At least it was free. Then we all met up along the Rhine and decided to go see a movie. It took us awhile to find the theater, but once we found it we decided to see "Nachts im Museum" (Night in the Museum or something). It was sort of the only option, but we all ended up really enjoying it. It was hilarious, I don't know if it was our lack of expectations or the fact that it was dubbed into German, but it was great. The next day we went back to Koeln and went inside the Dom (Cathedral) and also climbed the tower. Amazing views of the city and a mere 509 steps. Piece of cake...haha. About midnight on Tuesday, Amanda and I left on the night train for Geneva. We arrived about 8:30 or 9 am.
Spent the day walking around Geneva, I think we ended up seeing 24 of the 25 cites on the walking tour we got from the Tourist Office. It was an impressive accomplishment. We also had a delicious 1/2 chicken, potato wedge, salad, bread lunch at a random restaurant we passed by. It was the best deal we could find and quite tasty. We caught a bus to Chamonix, France at 4 and got there by 6. We stayed with a family that Amanda has some connection to through the husband of family friend's sister's uncle's cousin, etc. I don't really know how we ended up there, but they were incredibly nice and welcoming and they have an amazing home. We skiied on Thursday, relaxed on Friday, Saturday and Sunday (mostly because the weather was rainy/snowy pretty much the whole time). Then after all that new snow we just had to ski one more day. We decided to ski on Monday, so we got our skis rented and bought our day passes Sunday evening. Then we returned our passes Monday morning when we realized that only a few slopes were open. Then we re-bought our passes when we decided that we would check it out anyways. Turned out to be cold, snowy and basically no visibility. Oh well the snow was gorgeous, fresh powder and it was fun anyways. Tuesday we got on the bus to Geneva airport and flew into Madrid. We spent Tuesday evening walking around Madrid and ended up eating dinner at Cerveceria 100 Montaditos, where all the
food comes in a mini baguette. We didn't realize that until just before our food came, what a surprise! Haha, but it was fun and delicious. Wednesday we caught a bus to Granada and have been enjoying ourselves here since.
We have spent a fair amount of our time at the Alhambra, which is one of the 21 attractions on the list for the 7 new wonders of the world. Everyone vote for it, it's amazing! Anyways more to come...
Karneval was insane. There were so many people in ridiculous costumes drinking way too much alcohol. We got to Duesseldorf on Sunday and basically got dinner, chilled out in the hostel, walked around downtown as they were cleaning up after the day's festivities and then hit the sack early. On Monday we got to Koeln by 10 or so because we heard the parade would be starting around 11. We bought some brightly colored wigs and leis, found some prime spots along the parade route and waited beers in hand. Turns out when they say the parade is starting around 11, they really mean, we are lying and will start the parade whenever we feel like. Granted we weren't at the beginning of the parade route, but it didn't start passing by our spot until at least 1:30 or 2. Oh well, they made up for their tardiness by throwing handfuls of candy and flowers into the crowd. We collected enough chocolate to last us for the next couple Halloweens. And once the parade started it seemed it would never stop. I lasted until 4:30ish and then had to go to the bathroom so bad. A couple of beers will do that to you. :-) Anyways, after getting stuck on one side of the parade route, I finally made it to McDonald's and waited in a 30 minute line for the bathroom. At least it was free. Then we all met up along the Rhine and decided to go see a movie. It took us awhile to find the theater, but once we found it we decided to see "Nachts im Museum" (Night in the Museum or something). It was sort of the only option, but we all ended up really enjoying it. It was hilarious, I don't know if it was our lack of expectations or the fact that it was dubbed into German, but it was great. The next day we went back to Koeln and went inside the Dom (Cathedral) and also climbed the tower. Amazing views of the city and a mere 509 steps. Piece of cake...haha. About midnight on Tuesday, Amanda and I left on the night train for Geneva. We arrived about 8:30 or 9 am.
Spent the day walking around Geneva, I think we ended up seeing 24 of the 25 cites on the walking tour we got from the Tourist Office. It was an impressive accomplishment. We also had a delicious 1/2 chicken, potato wedge, salad, bread lunch at a random restaurant we passed by. It was the best deal we could find and quite tasty. We caught a bus to Chamonix, France at 4 and got there by 6. We stayed with a family that Amanda has some connection to through the husband of family friend's sister's uncle's cousin, etc. I don't really know how we ended up there, but they were incredibly nice and welcoming and they have an amazing home. We skiied on Thursday, relaxed on Friday, Saturday and Sunday (mostly because the weather was rainy/snowy pretty much the whole time). Then after all that new snow we just had to ski one more day. We decided to ski on Monday, so we got our skis rented and bought our day passes Sunday evening. Then we returned our passes Monday morning when we realized that only a few slopes were open. Then we re-bought our passes when we decided that we would check it out anyways. Turned out to be cold, snowy and basically no visibility. Oh well the snow was gorgeous, fresh powder and it was fun anyways. Tuesday we got on the bus to Geneva airport and flew into Madrid. We spent Tuesday evening walking around Madrid and ended up eating dinner at Cerveceria 100 Montaditos, where all the
food comes in a mini baguette. We didn't realize that until just before our food came, what a surprise! Haha, but it was fun and delicious. Wednesday we caught a bus to Granada and have been enjoying ourselves here since.We have spent a fair amount of our time at the Alhambra, which is one of the 21 attractions on the list for the 7 new wonders of the world. Everyone vote for it, it's amazing! Anyways more to come...
Saturday, February 17, 2007
About to head off into the unknown...
Ok so tomorrow morning at 11am, I officially begin the month of travel during my semester break. First stop is Koeln (Cologne) for Karneval and then heading by train to Geneva, Switzerland so that I can get on a bus and go to Chamonix to go skiing. I hear that is in France. I am traveling with a few other EAP Americans to Koeln and then with Amanda (EAP also) to Switzerland. Then after some wonderful skiing in the Alps, Amanda and I are headed to Madrid and other cities in Spain for exciting adventures and hopefully sunny weather. After Spain we hop on over to Morocco so that we can say we've been to Africa. We will be meeting up with some EAP students (the same ones from Karneval) to explore Marrakech and the Sahara. One more trip to Spain to see Barcelona and possibly more of Madrid and then I plan on coming back to Goettingen to finish up a term paper and do laundry. I think Amanda will be headed off to Paris and London and who knows where else.
Then hopefully on March 30th I will be off to Egypt for a two-week mission trip in Alexandria and Cairo with GospelTribe. I am still waiting to get more information and find out if I'm going or not, but I am excited about the possibility. Anyways these are my travel plans. I am going to take ridiculous amounts of pictues and maybe even find a way to upload them onto this blog at some point. I have more to talk about since my last post, but I am tired and need to get a good night's rest before traveling starts tomorrow. Until next time, and I just have to say I really like this whole 2.5 month break during late winter/spring. It is a great time for traveling! :-)
Then hopefully on March 30th I will be off to Egypt for a two-week mission trip in Alexandria and Cairo with GospelTribe. I am still waiting to get more information and find out if I'm going or not, but I am excited about the possibility. Anyways these are my travel plans. I am going to take ridiculous amounts of pictues and maybe even find a way to upload them onto this blog at some point. I have more to talk about since my last post, but I am tired and need to get a good night's rest before traveling starts tomorrow. Until next time, and I just have to say I really like this whole 2.5 month break during late winter/spring. It is a great time for traveling! :-)
Friday, January 26, 2007
Umm yeah...no worries I'm still alive, I promise
Hey Hey! Sorry about the complete lack of updates over the past month. I will try to rectify the situation somewhat by writing something right now.
So since my last update, I finished up visiting Prague: saw the Castle, walked over the bridge, ate delicious Pragueian food (Goulaschsuppe), and bought a beautiful garnet ring for my 21st birthday present. Then 2 days after I returned from Prague my parents came to visit for Christmas holiday time in Germany. YAY! I also made Christmas cookies as usual (scary thing is I still have some left, haha). We hung around Göttingen doing Christmas shopping and such while I finished up classes before Christmas. Then Melanie was supposed to arrive on Friday, but unfortunately a humungous blizzard rolled through Denver just before her flight so instead of getting here the 21st, she came on the 26th (that's pretty close, right?) Anyways, to fill up the time until Mel cam e we went to Nürnberg and saw the Courthouse where they held the Nuremberg Trials after the war. That was really neat to sit there and think about what was going on some 60 years ago. Crazy! We also saw the Nürnberg Weihnachtsmarkt because you can't go there without seeing it; it's so huge! (Kinda cool, I was there on the first day of the Nürnberg Weihnachtsmarkt and the last)
Anyways we also did various other things: visited the nearby village of Duderstadt for the best afternoon cake and hot drinks ever!, went to the Göttingen Weihnachtsmarkt, I made cinnamon rolls for Christmas morning brunch, Christmas Eve church service (with really cute little play), and christmassy stuff like that. Then we picked Mel up from the airport day after Christmas and let the real holiday hang out time begin. We had "Christmas Morning" on the 27th. Best Christmas present this year?--Probably the huge fireworks set that Dad got from the Streiffs. That was fun! After that we headed down to the Rhine/Rhein area and stayed in a 13th century (?) castle converted into a hotel, man the good times we had there, great pictures and stories, but too hard to explain now, but just to give you something to think about: Monty Python's Holy Grail (specifically the scene where John Cleese mocks King Arthur and his friends--in a ridiculous French accent) and Young Frankenstein.
We drove along the Rhine where there is pretty much a castle on every corner, so neat, and the river is cool too. Anyways we kind of just relaxed and enjoyed the awesome views and scenery. We also saw the Loreley cliffs, famous in German volk literature and stuff. Um, what else. Well, after Kaub (where our castle was) we headed over to Aachen for New Year's (the only city where we could find and open hotel.) Aachen was really neat, we got to see the Cathedral where Charlemagne is buried (has a really cool octagonal main room), we also saw some really interesting religious relics in the Domschatzkammer (Cathedral Treasury).
New Year's in Aachen was insane. We had all our fireworks with us and decided that New Year's Eve is really the time to set them off because that is when everyone does it. We were a little nervous at first about where to do it, so we followed some other people holding fireworks to a square area. Turns out we ended up in one of the most exciting areas in the city for New Year's. Not only were there tons of people just setting off the personal fireworks in everywhich direction all around you, but there was also an organized show just next to us. I pretty much felt like I was in Baghdad or some war zone, but instead of bombs it was fireworks going off everywhere. Basically the best New Year's ever.
After Aachen we went to Köln (Cologne) and saw the Cathedral. It is huge! And by huge I mean humungously huge. It is definitely worth a visit, and we went on a little tour of it so that we would understand the significance of its structure and stained glass windows and such. Also definitely worth doing. From Köln we drove over to Düsseldorf and saw the Neandertal Museum. It was a neat museum and the audioguide was very thorough, mine was in German though, so I may have missed things here and there :-) Anyways we also saw Bonn for a bit and went to the Haus der Geschichte Museum, it was a museum of Germany after WW2 with special emphasis on the differences between East and West Germany. It was a really neat exhibition and extremely people friendly and interesting. They had it set up as if you were really in that time period and experiencing the things that went on then. I would highly recommend it, the only thing is that is seems obviously targeted towards Germans because all the explanations and stuff are in German. However, still worth a visit and it's free!
All in all the Christmas/New Year's vacation time with the family was amazing and I am really glad we got to spend Christmas together in Germany (despite the many many days when no shops, grocery stores or restaurants were open because of the various holidays--Christmas Eve, 1st Christmas Day, 2nd Christmas Day, New Year's Eve/Silvester, New Year's Day and so on.) We always managed to find some food some how, even if it was snacks from a gas station :-)
After the family left, I celebrated my birthday by going out to Indian food with some friends, eating cake, and setting off the left over fireworks from New Year's. All in all a wonderful 21st birthday celebration. Since then I have just been going to classes, doing reading and homework, and working on a scholarship application.
I have one more week of classes left, one more test and one paper to write (that is due in the beginning of April), beyond that I have some ridiculous amount of time, like 10 weeks off, until next semester. I start again on April 16th, which really means like April 23rd since most classes seem to start the second week for whatever reason. So in my summer vacation amount of time, I am planning on going back to Köln for Karneval, skiing in the Swiss Alps, Spain (Madrid, Barcelona, Seville and maybe other places), Morocco, and maybe even Egypt or Poland. I am so excited for all that traveling. It should be amazing!
Ok, well that is all for now, sorry that I always seem to wait so long and then drop off a huge long update all at once. I will try and improve, but chances are it'll stay the same. Oh well at least you still get some updates :-)
So since my last update, I finished up visiting Prague: saw the Castle, walked over the bridge, ate delicious Pragueian food (Goulaschsuppe), and bought a beautiful garnet ring for my 21st birthday present. Then 2 days after I returned from Prague my parents came to visit for Christmas holiday time in Germany. YAY! I also made Christmas cookies as usual (scary thing is I still have some left, haha). We hung around Göttingen doing Christmas shopping and such while I finished up classes before Christmas. Then Melanie was supposed to arrive on Friday, but unfortunately a humungous blizzard rolled through Denver just before her flight so instead of getting here the 21st, she came on the 26th (that's pretty close, right?) Anyways, to fill up the time until Mel cam e we went to Nürnberg and saw the Courthouse where they held the Nuremberg Trials after the war. That was really neat to sit there and think about what was going on some 60 years ago. Crazy! We also saw the Nürnberg Weihnachtsmarkt because you can't go there without seeing it; it's so huge! (Kinda cool, I was there on the first day of the Nürnberg Weihnachtsmarkt and the last)
Anyways we also did various other things: visited the nearby village of Duderstadt for the best afternoon cake and hot drinks ever!, went to the Göttingen Weihnachtsmarkt, I made cinnamon rolls for Christmas morning brunch, Christmas Eve church service (with really cute little play), and christmassy stuff like that. Then we picked Mel up from the airport day after Christmas and let the real holiday hang out time begin. We had "Christmas Morning" on the 27th. Best Christmas present this year?--Probably the huge fireworks set that Dad got from the Streiffs. That was fun! After that we headed down to the Rhine/Rhein area and stayed in a 13th century (?) castle converted into a hotel, man the good times we had there, great pictures and stories, but too hard to explain now, but just to give you something to think about: Monty Python's Holy Grail (specifically the scene where John Cleese mocks King Arthur and his friends--in a ridiculous French accent) and Young Frankenstein.
We drove along the Rhine where there is pretty much a castle on every corner, so neat, and the river is cool too. Anyways we kind of just relaxed and enjoyed the awesome views and scenery. We also saw the Loreley cliffs, famous in German volk literature and stuff. Um, what else. Well, after Kaub (where our castle was) we headed over to Aachen for New Year's (the only city where we could find and open hotel.) Aachen was really neat, we got to see the Cathedral where Charlemagne is buried (has a really cool octagonal main room), we also saw some really interesting religious relics in the Domschatzkammer (Cathedral Treasury).
New Year's in Aachen was insane. We had all our fireworks with us and decided that New Year's Eve is really the time to set them off because that is when everyone does it. We were a little nervous at first about where to do it, so we followed some other people holding fireworks to a square area. Turns out we ended up in one of the most exciting areas in the city for New Year's. Not only were there tons of people just setting off the personal fireworks in everywhich direction all around you, but there was also an organized show just next to us. I pretty much felt like I was in Baghdad or some war zone, but instead of bombs it was fireworks going off everywhere. Basically the best New Year's ever.
After Aachen we went to Köln (Cologne) and saw the Cathedral. It is huge! And by huge I mean humungously huge. It is definitely worth a visit, and we went on a little tour of it so that we would understand the significance of its structure and stained glass windows and such. Also definitely worth doing. From Köln we drove over to Düsseldorf and saw the Neandertal Museum. It was a neat museum and the audioguide was very thorough, mine was in German though, so I may have missed things here and there :-) Anyways we also saw Bonn for a bit and went to the Haus der Geschichte Museum, it was a museum of Germany after WW2 with special emphasis on the differences between East and West Germany. It was a really neat exhibition and extremely people friendly and interesting. They had it set up as if you were really in that time period and experiencing the things that went on then. I would highly recommend it, the only thing is that is seems obviously targeted towards Germans because all the explanations and stuff are in German. However, still worth a visit and it's free!
All in all the Christmas/New Year's vacation time with the family was amazing and I am really glad we got to spend Christmas together in Germany (despite the many many days when no shops, grocery stores or restaurants were open because of the various holidays--Christmas Eve, 1st Christmas Day, 2nd Christmas Day, New Year's Eve/Silvester, New Year's Day and so on.) We always managed to find some food some how, even if it was snacks from a gas station :-)
After the family left, I celebrated my birthday by going out to Indian food with some friends, eating cake, and setting off the left over fireworks from New Year's. All in all a wonderful 21st birthday celebration. Since then I have just been going to classes, doing reading and homework, and working on a scholarship application.
I have one more week of classes left, one more test and one paper to write (that is due in the beginning of April), beyond that I have some ridiculous amount of time, like 10 weeks off, until next semester. I start again on April 16th, which really means like April 23rd since most classes seem to start the second week for whatever reason. So in my summer vacation amount of time, I am planning on going back to Köln for Karneval, skiing in the Swiss Alps, Spain (Madrid, Barcelona, Seville and maybe other places), Morocco, and maybe even Egypt or Poland. I am so excited for all that traveling. It should be amazing!
Ok, well that is all for now, sorry that I always seem to wait so long and then drop off a huge long update all at once. I will try and improve, but chances are it'll stay the same. Oh well at least you still get some updates :-)
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