Suspense makes the heart grow fonder.

So I know you all have been waiting on pins and needles for the latest installment of my adventures abroad. They haven't been quite that adventurous (well okay, maybe a little), but it has been a bit busy. Last Tuesday was of course my birthday, which was a whole lot of fun, and one I will remember for the rest of my life.
The day started out of course rather normally, and I was quickly assimilated to the stand German birthday greeting. Alles gute zum Geburtstag which is "all, or everything good on your birthday. I think this is a typical Bayrish, because I think I remember learning it differently, however, I don't remember what it was. Most of my professors were very nice and greeted me this way, and then later, since my host dad left for work before I did, he greeted me with a hearty handshake and the same phrase. School was normal, other than that my Literature class sang Happy Birthday in German, which is just Zum Geburtstag viel Gluck sung repeatedly, I think.
When I got home, I helped my host mom make the lasagna and the apple strudel that we would be having for my birthday meal. Since there were ten people coming in addition to my family and myself, we had a lot to make!! Renate is a really good cook, and I think that her mother ran some sort of catering service or something, which is where she learned to cook. We did have a bit of problems separating the layers after boiling them. Lasagna isn't really the easiest thing to cook. We also made a veggie lasagna because one of the guys on the trip is Muslim, but actually, I forgot he can eat ground beef, just not pork. Whoops. I think there are a couple of picky eaters anyway though, so it was okay. I had some of the veggie lasagna as well and it was wonderful!! Fabian and Werner even helped make the lasagna, although Fabian more so that Werner. I believe Werner is terrified of the kitchen. He tried to separate the lasagna layers though. It was quite a bit of fun though, and a good way to spend time with the family and get to know them. My family should cook together!! Well, my dad and I made eggrolls before right before I left, and that was fun!
Then we made the apple strudel. The dough, or teig had already been made my Renate, so we just needed to cut up the apples from the apple trees outside, and then roll out the dough. We mixed the apples with chopped almonds mandeln, rum, sugar zucker, and raisins rosinen. I don't normally like raisins, but it was good! But then, I normally don't like mushrooms "Pilz, not to be confused with Pils, the type of beer", but I have started to like them here!! They're yum! Renate showed me how to roll out the dough, but the first time didn't work so well, so she showed me that I needed to roll out and the put pressure on the rolling pin. The second time worked well! We laid the dough on a kitchen towel, sprinkled the apple mixture, and then used the towel to roll up the dough and then put it on a pan. Fabian helped a bit with this as well.
After that, I went to go get ready for everyone to come, which involved showering, and getting gussied up. Luckily it doesn't take me too long. After I got ready I went back downstairs to wait on my guests, and saw the crates of beer that had been bought for the party. There were three crates of beer with about 16 bottles each.. Hell, Dunkle, and Hell-Weisse..a lot of beer! Everyone got here, although one of the girls some problems getting here, and even Orlando, one the directors came. His girlfriend Leonie, one of the other directors, wanted to come, but couldn't because she was working on her thesis, and the other one, Andi, was sick. One of the highlights of the night was when I discovered the huge beer mug that the family has with a picture of the present pope with his hands outstretched over the city of Regensburg. I need to take a picture of it. Talk about a pimp cup..
We all had a lot of fun, and it was loud and boisterous (but not too much so) and I think everyone really had a good time. My host family gave me a black scarf, some red gloves (to match my new red coat), and a head massager thing. My friends Bo and Allison gave me a french manicure kit, which I've been having fun with, and Leonie and Orlando gave me this cute little beer mug with a picture of Regensburg on it. Little, as in the size of a shot glass, so its really funny! It was my birthday, so I had a bit more to drink than normal, I think four beers, and by the end of the night I was pretty happy. Renate and I talked for quite some time as we cleaned up after everyone had left. The best part was when we were loading the dishwasher Geshirspull machinae, and there wasn't enough room. I couldn't think of what else to say, so I ended up saying something like, the dish washer doesn't have enough seating places, sitzplatz. She knew what I meant though, and we had a good laugh over it.
But it still isn't as funny as her saying, "I become a soda!" instead of "I receive a soda" at a restaurant once in the States. The verb for to receive in German is bekommen...so it makes sense.
I didn't take a lot of pictures this time, I was too busy having fun. The day after, we went to München, for our week excursion, but I'll have to write about that later.

Boat trip!

Yesterday was quite a bit of fun. I got up early, for a Sunday, I think about 9 or 10 am. Yes, that is early for me. I can't remember what I did in the morning, so it must not have been too important. I had plans set for Sunday though, and I didn't want to rush out the door, so I mad sure to be up and ready.
The group met at the bus stop near the train station, and then we took the bus a ways out. Bo and David's host parents have some sort of access to a boat, so they offered to take us all out on it. It is a fairly small boat, but it was a lot of fun. At the beginning of the day, the weather was pretty dismal, but eventually it turned out nice. We were on the boat for a couple of hours, and went up and down the Donau. We were able to take some great pictures of Walhalla, which I was really excited about. The host parents were really nice, other than the fact that they are apparently hippies and have neither TV nor internet. Whatever. I can understand TV, but internet seems a little out there too me. They were cool nonetheless. Micheala, the host mom, made some sort of baked good that looked like biscotti when you take it out of the oven, but it wasn't hard. It was quite tasty. She also brought lots of little sample sized Ritter Sport chocolate, some lemon cookies, some drinks, and some Haribo gummies. The drinks and the gummies were a bit odd. One of the drinks was some sort of sports drink that was cherry-lemon- and something else flavored. I decided that was a bit much for me. The gummies were also strange...a lot of them looked like licorice, and a lot of them also looked like marzipan. I'm not too fond of either, but I did try a gummie that looked like a berry. It was okay.




Havin fun isn't hard. When you've got a boat.

Fog and the Forbidden Forest

Wednesday was our field trip day again. I'm late uploading this, but whatev. I always am. Consider yourself privileged.
The trip by train really didn't take very long at all, which is extraordinary. It usually takes us at least an hour. And it didn't even take that. We had maybe thirty minutes by train and then twenty minutes by bus. So not bad at all. Somehow I deleted all my music off my Ipod, but not the games, so there you have it.
The first part of the trip involved a hike, which I really enjoyed.
I thought I was in the Forbidden forest!! The hike took some time, but I enjoyed it. There were crazy looking mushrooms growing everywhere. Apparently it's kind of a big deal to go out into the forest to collect fresh mushrooms for dinner, but that would make me a bit nervous. So we were actually up in the mountains a bit here, which I of course enjoyed. It made me think of NC and of course I wanted to go back. Another girl on the trip worked at a camp too, so we shared some camp stories. I ended up talking to Leonie for quite a while about the art classes that are offered at Regensburg Uni, and that I might be able to be a guest. That would be really neat, but I think that I might have some schedule conflicts. I also asked her about her expereience in the States. She studied near Boston, and wanted to stay longer, but ran out of funds. I told her about camp, and that they often hire foreigners.
We eventually got to what we were hiking towards, which was Befreiungshalle near Kelheim. The fog really obstructed our view. I took a picture but ended up deleting it. Since we couldn't really see the building, we took a group picture with the fog. We were only a few hundred meters away, and we really couldn't see it at all. I thought it was awesome though, and an interesting story to tell. It would have been nice to be able to see the view from the top of the building...but it was still really great. The inside was really cool as well. There were an awful lot of stairs though. It seems to be a recurring theme. We did a bit more hiking, and I took a few more cool pictures of the fog.
After that we took a boat across this tiny portion of the Donau to get to the monastery. They make their own beer there! I thought we'd get a tour or something, but we didn't. We ate lunch at the monastery, and I had some tasty lamb ravioli, but it didn't taste much like lamb. I had another dark beer, which I liked a lot. I tried the boch, but the alcohol content is something insane, and I didn't want to be ridiculous for the rest of the trip.
Next, we went to the monastery church in all of it's Barocked out glory. I didn't know I liked Baroque art. It was pretty awesome, for being such a tiny church, especially since it looked so small and unassuming on the outside. Inside. Wow. The thing that was really strange to me though, was that there was only one depiction of Jesus. A woman started singing some sort of hymn in latin, which was unexpected, but cool. We also did a bit of walking around the place afterwards. Actually, we found a really beautiful spot, and we basked in the sun for a while. That was the best. Everyone got really quiet and we just enjoyed the moment. It was amazing. We got back to the bus with the little boat we came in on, but took it for about 20 minutes this time. I got some really amazing pictures of the Donau, and Befreiungshalle. Which was good, since the fog




covered most of it before.

3, 2, 1, Contact

So I mentioned earlier that making friends here seems difficult. I think I forgot to mention why. Our very first day here, the directors explained to us the difference between coconuts and peaches. Coconuts have a hard outershell, but are soft and mushy on the outside. Peaches are opposite. Of course this was a metaphor for Germans vs Americans. Germans are the coconuts. So after this introduction, things because a little more daunting.
Today, however, I made an attempt with the German world of students. IT is very common to sit at a table with people you don't know in the school cafeteria. I ate without the rest of the KIIS group, so I made myself comfortable. Shortly after, a group of guys sat down next to me. Now, let me just say that getting food at the Mensa is something like Russian roulette. A week or so ago, they had something labeled as "American Schnitzel". I honestly didn't know there was such a thing. And if there was, I certainly didn't think it would be covered in a gravy that had corn and beans. Moving on. Today, I got what I thought was some sort of pasta with vegetables and sauerkraut. Well, it wasn't pasta, so I attempted to ask the guys sitting next to me what it was. The guy sitting directly next to me gave me a side long glance and said nothing. The guy opposite me asked me if I spoke French, which was actually pretty cool, and better than him thinking I'm American, I think. He gave me a very brief description, and that was that. No other conversation. It was some kind of potato thing, any how.

Funny Little Things

I need to remember to write these things down. They are priceless.

So I prefer ice cream in bowls, instead of a cone, but I can never remember the word for cup. When we went to München for Oktoberfest, I overheard part of a discussion my hostmom was having with some friends as we were riding on the train. I was kind of half asleep, but I heard the word "becher", which I remembered means bowl. So I woke up and said, Becher, that means bowl right? My hostmom started to chuckle, and said, well it's complicated. Apparently I had missed the rest of the conversation, because they were talking about EierBecher, or egg cups. But not the kind for breakfast. Apparently that's what Germans call a jock strap. It was interesting.

Also, I almost wrote a second ago that we were driving the train, rather than riding it, because there is really only one German verb for riding/driving a car, train, bus, or bicycle.

Today I explained to my host mom and host sister what going commando, or "free balling it" means. They were really surprised anyone would do that, other than Brittney Spears, of course.. Or Lindsay Lohan. Or Paris Hilton. Yes. They mentioned all three of them.

A week or so ago, we realized that a very large spider had made a web on one of the windows. Isabella and I looked at it with some trepidation, and she asked me what the English word for web was. She nodded her head, and then a few seconds later, a look of recognition came across her face, and she said.."OH! WWW!! I get it now!" (As in the internet..) It was pretty priceless.

Also, Germans never wear white socks. I think it's considered tacky here. I can personally validate this, as I don't think I've seen a single white sock in the house, except for mine. Also, wearing socks with ballet flats, sandels, etc, is perfectly fine.

Another Gorgeous Day

The weather was absolutely perfect today. Too bad it wasn't on Friday, when we went to Augsburg. None of us really enjoyed that trip. Friday was a holiday, which was why we went then instead of Wednesday. That way we wouldn't have two free days last week. None of us were that pleased about that considering all the other students had the day off. Eh.
This weekend Renate was gone... I THINK to a Yoga retreat, but you know, I never can tell. That is I never can tell if I really understand. There's a good chance that's what she was doing though. So Werner cooked. One night neither Fabian nor Isabella ate, so it was just he and I, and he told me he hates to cook, it makes him nervous (or something), and everyone complains about his cooking and doesn't eat it. Considering we were the only ones eating that night..well..yeah. I thought it was fine! It was grilled fish, rice, and steamed broccoli. I mean, it wasn't gourmet or anything, but I'm not complaining!! I don't have to cook!
The family seems to like to go out for lunch on Sunday, we have every Sunday so far. Fabian didn't come with us though, because I guess he put off his homework until today. Isabella, Werner, and I went to a restaurant out in the country. It was a really gorgeous drive, and I believe we went on the AutoBahn. It took us maybe 15 minutes to get there. I had this ridiculously huge piece of pork leg. It's called Schweinshaxe. Actually, I just looked that up in my German dictionary, and it says that that means pork knuckle. I guess maybe I just don't know what a pork knuckle looks like. Either way, it was quite tasty, and it came with Reiderknödle (Potato dumplings) and was smothered in gravy. It was funny though, because Werner and I ordered the same thing, except his came with soup and desert and my pork knuckle thing was about twice as big as his. I should have traded, but then again, I don't think he finished his either. Isabella and I decided we should get some ice cream. However, the kind I wanted came with egg liqueur on top...which is not so appetizing. I successfully ordered my ice cream sans egg liqueur in German..and I got a standing ovation from Werner. Well, I think that has been the first time anyone has told me that my German is "getting always better" which is the direct translation. So to me, that was as good as an applause.
After we ate, the three of us went to this woodland preserve thing and took a short hike. I'm telling you what, Germans are into outdoor recreation. I know that I would have not been particularly excited about going hiking on a Sunday afternoon when I was 16, but Isabella was really perky. Maybe she's just really good natured and I was a horrid teenager. Well, I already know the answer to the later... :) There was an interesting little kiddie play ground, with a bunch of musical instruments made out of wood. Isabella and I got really into them. I think we could have formed a band..
We came home from that around 3 or 4 pm, and at first I thought about laying down for a bit. I still had a headache from the night before. I really think German beer must be quite a bit stronger. I only had three beers, and it was over the course of several hours. Speaking of which, Allison, Bo, Kevin, and I met up with some Erasmus students. Erasmus is the typical study abroad program for Europe. Bo had met one of them on campus a few days ago when she was asking for directions. The girl of course knew at once he wasn't from here, and asked him where he was from and they struck up a conversation. There were about 20 or so of them. As far as I can tell, they've only been here a few days. I talked to a Hungarian girl that as really cool, and either she's only going to be here for a few days, or she's only been here for a few days. I hope she's staying for the full semester, because she was pretty cool. I also talked to a Czechoslovakian girl, and I'm pretty glad I struck up a conversation with her because it turns out, she didn't really know anyone in the group she was with either. At first I was intimidated by all those people, but a little beer will do you wonders!! So, you know, it has it's pros and cons.. We ended up going to a disco afterwards, which was surprisingly fun. I stayed out later than I should have though.
Luckily, I didn't stay up too late so that I couldn't enjoy Sunday. I went for another bike ride along the Donau, and you should be jealous. Fall is absolutely gorgeous here. I think it's fast becoming my favorite season. Next time I go, I'll have to remember to bring my camera with me. I can't explain how happy this evening made me though. It was beyond gorgeous. I sat by the river for a bit as well, contemplating the people that passed me, and thinking about how lucky I am to be here. I honestly wonder if maybe I enjoy these type of moments more than anything else..

What??

There is a bathroom in the alcove where you take off your shoes and jackets in our house. A few days ago, as I was heading out for the day, I attempted to take a pit stop. I'm pretty sure Fabian tried to dispose of his cereal in the toilette. It was really strange..