Wasserfälle über Wasserfälle

This is Schweizer Deutsch.

Hey dudes or should I say Grüezi-Moin, because Schweizer Deutsch, amirite? So I just returned from a short jaunt to that lovely little trilingual country to the south. The Eurrail passes that Hannah and I had bought for our Italian adventure still had a few days left on them, so we decided to head to Interlaken, Switzerland, being pretty close to us (only about 5 hours on trains). And it was German-speaking (in the loosest sense of the term–Schweizer Deutsch is crazy), which is always a perk. 

To start, Interlaken is a bit of a tourist trap located between two lakes (hence the name, I guess). People go there to do any number of outdoorsy activities, but seeing as it's April and the end of the winter season and the slow start of the summer season, it's pretty much off season there. The weather is really hit or miss for site-seeing (ie taking cable cars to the tops of really tall mountains). In addition, it's also super expensive, because, well, Switzerland. So we were glad to be there, but also glad that we weren't there for a terribly long time, because going broke sucks. 


Anyways, we arrived in the early afternoon on Friday to gorgeous weather. The forecast said either clouds or rain and luckily we only got passing clouds. So after putting our stuff in our wonderful and adorably Swiss hostel, Balmers Herberge, we wandered around the city center. The city center consists of an array of different types of restaurants (there was so much Thai food!), tourist shops, mountaineering gear shops, and expensive brand-name stores (think Prada stores). It didn't take us long to wander through the center, as it is quite small. But during this walk, we found/did some important things. First, we exchanged money. Swiss money is the coolest currency I have ever seen. So many colors. Second, and more importantly, we found a Mexican restaurant. Now, everywhere that I have been in Europe, I have yet to see an actual proper Mexican restaurant. I'm not talking a burrito stand. Those are everywhere. This place was a restaurant, and due to our 8 months of being enchilada-deprived, we decided to go there. So after wandering through town, we went to the grocery store, a place called COOP, got food for sandwiches for the next day's hike, some cheese, chocolate, and beer. After putting that in the hostel, we went back to the Mexican restaurant. 


My God, was that the best decision ever. The wait staff was incredibly friendly. The amused us when we spoke to them in German (me) and Spanish (Hannah)–albeit they were quite confused with the simultaneous two different languages. We got margaritas and enchiladas (both of which absolutely kicked ass and we were so happy). After we finished eating, our waiter came up to us and after I asked for the check (auf Deutsch), he asked "where are you guys from?" I assume the question because he had probably heard us speaking English to each other and then the German and Spanish to him. We told him the States, and then he said he was from Florida and in the same breath not to believe anything he says. After that the manager (or at least I think he was the manager) came up to us, and I asked, in German, if we could pay separately. His response to my question was "it's really weird going up to someone and expecting them to speak to you in one language, and then them speaking to you in another." Afterwards, he chatted with Hannah in Spanish about her time in Chile and ended the entire conversation saying that we spoke good German (to me) and good Spanish (to Hannah). I'll call it a meal of accomplishments. 


After that, we went back to the hostel and spent the rest of the evening hanging out with people from hostel (a guy who was born in New Jersey, grew up in Hong Kong, went to boarding school in Scotland, and university in Washington state, and three American girls who had been studying in Oxford for something that they called the Hilary semester or something along those lines). We ate cheese and chocolate, and drank beer and it was definitely a great Swiss evening. 

The next day we woke up early. One of the guys in our room (an older gentleman who had been coming to Interlaken, to our exact hostel, in fact, every year since 1973; his name is Jim) recommended a hike for us to do that didn't involve much elevation. It was far too foggy to go much further than 700m above sea level. He told us of some waterfalls somewhere along the Brienzersee (the large lake east of Interlaken). We asked the reception about it, and they pointed us towards the commuter boat that took us to a place called Giessbachsee. So we went into town and then hiked a little further along the boat route because we had an hour or two until the boat left its first spot. We made it to Böningen, its second stop, with 40 minutes before the boat came, so we hung out at the beach until the boat picked us up. 

After the boat picked us up, it was another 30 minutes until Giessbach because the boat made zig-zags across the lake at various stops, but we didn't mind. I mean, seriously, a lake in the middle of the mountains. You can just relax and enjoy the scenery. 

When we first got to Giessbach, it didn't look like really anything. The boat drops you off at the entrance to a cable car, which takes you up to a hotel and costs 6€ one way. We weren't really sure where to go until we found some trail signs. After that, we just started our way up the hill alongside the cable car, which is infinitely better than taking the lazy way up. The entire place is one gigantic waterfall that you can just climb up forever. Dreams do come true. We got up to the top of the cable car route which leads to a hotel, which I believe is closed until the summer and therefore looks super haunted. We checked out both the waterfall and the lakeside scenery, which is also just incredible. Gah, Switzerland. We walked up the waterfall path for a little while, but ended up heading over to the next town, Brienz, which the lake is named for (probably because it's at the very end of the lake, not because it's big or anything. Basically all that seems to be there is timber). Anyways, we started on our way. For a while it was normal hiking trail, but that quickly became road, and we felt like we were hitch-hiking. Along the way, we met some sort-of nice cow creatures that had super intimidating horns. We befriended in the only way that one can befriend a beautiful cow creature with gigantic horns–incredibly timidly.  

It took a while, but we eventually got to Brienz, where we ate sandwiches and I put my blistered feet in the water. Instead of taking the boat back, we decided to take the train, and once back in Interlaken, we went to COOP to get some pasta-making things for dinner, went back to the hostel, showered, and took a nap. Jim woke us up, and then we decided to go to the Irish pub next door to have a happy hour beer before starting to make dinner. Then there was dinner–Hannah's delicious brie, carrot, and onion gnocchi creation, the rest of our grocery store beer, and bad German television (some sort of talk show where people had to do any number of ridiculous challenges; oh and Cameron Diaz was there). Afterwards, we went to bed early, because of early-morning train wake-up (well early morning by my standards). 

Then today, we got up and took the train back to Tübingen without any hitches. Gotta love the Deutsche Bahn miracles. In other news, first official day of class tomorrow, but my first class isn't until Tuesday. Also I am pretty convinced that summer has come to Tübingen. It was probably 65ºF/18ºC when I got back today. Be jealous, America, be very jealous. So that's about what I've got for right now. But it is t-minus two weeks until Osterferien (Easter break) and the start of Frühlingsfest (time to break out the ol' dirndl), so wild times are a-comin'. Prepare yourself. In the meantime, bis später, gang. 

there's nothing nicer than a Galway hooker

Finally, after more than a year and a half, I have finally returned to Ireland. Now to back up, for those of you that don't know, I lived in Ireland (Dublin, more specifically) for two months during the summer of 2012, and I loved every second of it. I couldn't wait to go back, and Paddy's Day seemed like an appropriate time to do it. I even got the Tufts-in-Tübingen crew to come with me. Well, all of them minus Marlena. 

On Sunday, the day before Paddy's Day, we flew from Frankfurt into Dublin. The flight was short and painless and had free wine, and we got into Dublin around 17. Instead of taking that stupidly expensive Airlink bus, I brought us to the Dublin Bus stop. However, that's when our problems started. I had hoped there was money on my Leapcard (a card that, when loaded up, is good for transportation all around Dublin), but unfortunately there wasn't. The Dublin Bus, while a decent bus system, is possibly the largest pain in the ass if you aren't from there. They accept only coins, and the ticket machines are very rare. (And when they do exist, they rarely work.) After Julius, Theron, and I got on the bus; Elizabeth and Yasmine were sent to the ticket machine that didn't work and then left at the airport. So that wasn't ideal. But we all ended up meeting up in city centre, because the Spire is wonderful and a great meeting point. 

After that little debacle, we continued onto our second debacle: the hotel. We booked this little adventure in January, and by then, there was not a single hostel in Dublin with availability. So we found the cheapest hotel that we could, booked a two-person room for two nights and hoped that we could sneak all five of us into it. When I google-mapped the place before, it seemed easy enough. Right on the Liffey, just have to keep walking East. But, as it turns out, the hotel changed its name without letting anyone know. So we went a little bit further than was originally planned and only ended up finding it because we went into the Spencer to ask where the Clarion was. "This is the Clarion," they responded, as if that should be completely obvious. After sneaking five people's-worth of luggage up to our hotel room, we went to something I had been looking forward to for months: The Counter. The Counter is a wonderful burger joint on Suffolk Street, right near Trinity College and Grafton Street. From the outside the place is pretty unremarkable, and you can easily walk by without even noticing it, but they make a mean burger, and having lived in Germany for the past 7 months, I have been craving a good American-style burger. (Because German burgers, while good if you don't have anything to compare them to, just don't stand up to American burgers.) So I brought the Tufts-in-Tübingen crowd and Yasmine's friend, Tori, who is studying at UCD for the semester, to The Counter. We had burgers and cosmos (my old Counter tradition), and it was wonderful. I also met up with Megan and Bri (two of my housemates from when I lived in Dublin) there, and that was a surreal and really great reunion. 

I didn't get to talk with them much that night, though, because after the Counter, we all decided to head up to my friend Shane's place. Shane sublet from my friend's in Boston this past summer but is Irish and lives in Dublin. We had agreed to meet up while I was there, and he invited all of us over to his house to hang out on Sunday night. And strangely enough, his house was about a five minute walk from where I had lived, so getting there was pretty simple. We ended up hanging out with him and his friends until about 3AM, when we caught a cab back into town in order to wake up early for the Paddy's Day parade. 

The parade started at noon, but we woke up early. We got there around noon, just as it was supposed to be starting but the entire place was absolutely mobbed. There was no way to see the parade, unless you were four years old and sitting on someone's shoulders. But we made our way towards Trinity and found a decent place to stand by the statue of Henry Grattan. The parade got to us about 45 minutes after the start time, and we didn't stay long on account of not being able to see much and the desire to get back to The Counter. Yes, my friends enjoyed The Counter so much that they wanted to go back roughly 18 hours later. I felt accomplished. 

After our delicious, second-round of burgers, we waited at the head of Grafton Street for our Irish friend Eimear, who studies with us in Tübingen. We caught up with her and walked around Stephen's Green and Merrion Square (where I had worked whilst living in Dublin). We went our separate ways, though, after Julius managed to attract an entire group of 14 year-olds, who swarmed us like pigeons. Shortly thereafter, Yasmine, Theron, and I did the same and went back to the hotel to take a nap. Elizabeth and Julius got back a little while later, and after a little while, we met up with Shane at the Spire. He took us to a bar south of the Liffey but in the eastern part of town called O'Reilly's. It a cool little bar built under the railroad tracks that has pints for very cheap. It was pretty cool, but Shane had to leave us for a little bit, because his drunk housemate lost his keys. We were supposed to meet up at a club in Temple Bar called the Button Factory, but that didn't end up working out. Temple Bar was absolutely disgusting that night with drunk people and garbage everywhere. We tried to get into the Button Factory, but it was a mad house. So instead of staying amongst the garbage and absolutely packed bars and clubs, we decided to go back to the hotel. 

The next morning we woke up around 10 and commenced the packing process. We were hoping that getting everything out of the hostel would be as chill as getting it in, as we hadn't messed up anything with the whole cram-five-people-into-a-two-person-room thing yet. Fortunately, that all went off without a hitch. We then went, got bagels, and then made for Heuston Station to catch our train to Galway. 

We got to Galway and our hostel, Barnacles Hostel, without any problems. Barnacles is right on Quay Street, one of the main streets in Galway, and very close to the ocean. So after dropping off our stuff, we decided to go exploring and wander along the beach. It was a little cold and windy, but still absolutely marvelous, especially because we have been land-locked in Tübingen for so long. After our walk, we went to a seafood place about 20 feet from our hostel (and recommended to us by the hostel) called McDonough's, where we got really, really good seafood chowder, fish n' chips, and Guinness. Gah, the fish. How I have missed the Irish fish! After that, we went back to the hostel, took a nap, and headed out in search of Irish music, which we found at Taaffe's. I also had me a really good whiskey ginger. It was just a lovely night, but we went to bed early because we had an early morning for our Cliffs of Moher tour. 

Dunguaire Castle

I figured it would be better to do the Cliffs of Moher the first day. The trip required little planning because there were tours going there all the time and there were a hell of a lot of tours. We got to the bus station at 9:45 for our 10AM tour and got seats in the back of the bus. Unlike the last time I went to the Cliffs of Moher, this whole thing would take us to a bunch of different places, like The Burren and Dunguaire Castle. Our tour guide was a little Irish man named Gary, who used the phrase "in itself" way too frequently and nonsensically. (For example, "there you see the chimney, where the family would do all of their cooking in itself.") But we had a wonderful day of touring, seeing The Burren (a really interesting part of Ireland with limestone covering most of the ground), Dunguaire Castle (which is really just a lookout tower), Corcomroe Abbey (an old church), and finally the Cliffs of Moher. Other highlights include a really tasty beef and guinness stew at a pub in Doolin and finding a Milwaukee Irishfest bumper sticker at said pub in Doolin. 


Then there were the Cliffs. The Cliffs of Moher are pretty brilliant. Gary gave us the whole schtick about don't go where the signs tell you not to, but that's the best part. So Yasmine, Elizabeth, and I made straight for the Cliffs. (The boys went to the recommended, and in my opinion, over-rated O'Brien Lookout Tower.) We did some cliff-walking, which was windy and cold and wonderful. We were lucky the weather had held-up otherwise it would have been a lot worse. 

After the Cliffs, we drove along the Atlantic coast for a while, stopping briefly at another cliff, and then made our way back to Galway with Gary blabbering on about leprechauns and "in itself" most of the way. We got back around 19 and after brief contemplation, decided to get an Irish breakfast for dinner (an Irish brinner), as it may have been our only chance to have one. And that was a good decision, because it was absolutely delicious. 

Afterwards, we decided to hit up a bar called Monroe's because they were having "world music" (ie salsa and other fancy types of dancing) night, and Elizabeth really wanted to go. The pub ended up being really cool (with just enough similarities to the Loj to make me a little home sick for it), and Elizabeth taught us to dance (or at least, tried to, I am not the most graceful human). 

View from Dún Arainn

The next morning, it was rainy and miserable. We figured that our good weather (at least for Ireland) streak had run out. But we boarded a bus bound for the ferry bound for the Aran Islands, because it was our last day in Galway, and the Aran Islands are incredible. After a rough crossing, we made it there, and much to our surprise, the sun was out. We met Mister Oliver Faherty at the docks, and he took us around the island in his van. And strangely enough, it was only us. I guess we get rewarded for our perseverance. Anyways, I guess I should give a little bit of background info. Three islands make up the Aran Islands, which lie off the coast of Galway: Inis Mór (pronounced een-ish-more, the largest, 11miles by 3miles, population 800), Inis Meadhóin (pronounced: een-ish-man, population 300), and Inis Oirthir (pronounced een-ish-eer, population 200). They are a Gaeltacht (an Irish-speaking area). Seriously, the language used in the home and stores and stuff is Irish. It's really cool. The economy is based upon tourism, fishing, and a little bit of farming, and they are known for their (really cozy and wonderful) sweaters. They didn't get electricity until 1975 and have one small supermarket on the islands (located on Inis Mór; it's a Spar.)

So I guess that gives you an idea of what kind of place I am talking about. Mr. Faherty started the tour by bringing us up to a fort called Dún Arainn, which was supposed to be closed for renovations, but he didn't say anything so neither did we. It was absolutely incredible. This fort is on the tallest point of Inis Mór. We spent probably 45 minutes, climbing on stone fences and admiring the view, which, as you can see above, is pretty breath-taking. 

Dún Aonghasa

Afterwards, we continued on towards Dún Aonghasa (pronounced dun angus), which is the most famous fort on the island and sits right on the edge of a cliff. Oliver dropped us off for about two hours. Before heading up to the Cliff, I went into some of the shops and bought Dip a Claddagh ring and myself a wonderful cozy green sweater. The five of us also had a wonderful chat with Sarah Flaherty, the woman selling the sweaters, who told us that the whole family sweater pattern thing is a load of crap. (I had heard from multiple people that each family on the islands had their own sweater pattern, that way if someone got lost at sea while fishing and turned up later, you could identify the body...morbid, I know.) The more you know. But in any case, the sweater I bought is really cool and intricate. 

After the sweater-buying excursion, we made our way up to the fort. May I reiterate how incredible this place is. These cliffs abut the Atlantic. You can tangle your feet over. It's probably my favourite place in all of Ireland. Up on the cliffs, we had a picnic with cheese, sausage, and baguettes that we had bought from the grocery store. Eventually, we headed back to meet up with Oliver.

We continued the journey to the northern-most point on the island, which has a beautiful, albeit very rocky beach, where we hung out and enjoyed being so close to water. 

We finished our tour by the Seven Churches, which is actually two churches and some other church-related living quarters, which had their roofs burned off them by Oliver Cromwell. (Oliver Cromwell was a proper prick, in case you had some sort of misplaced positive notions about him or something. Before he came, the Inis Mór had 2,000 people on it...then he killed them and anything else that moved or seemed Irish.) Anyways, the seven churches are pretty incredible especially when you have the place pretty much to yourself. Oh and we met a really friendly donkey. 

After the churches, we had a pint and then got on the ferry home. That night we had one last fish n' chips at McDonough's and then went back to Monroe's for live music and fun. And that was about it. The next day we got up early for 12+ hours of travel back to Tübingen. 

That's all I got for ya, dudes. I am not really sure as of right now where my adventures for the remainder of the break will take me, but I will keep you posted. With that, bis später, dudes.

Oh and P.S. a Galway hooker is a boat, you dirty-minded people. 

She smells like rotting meat.

Hey gang, so yesterday was the perfect fall day. I'm not quite sure if it could have been more beautiful. At 70F, sunny, fall-a-rific, and perfect, nature was calling, so Lisa, Louise, Lasse, Hannah, and I went for a 5 hour or so hike. We had intended upon walking to Bebenhausen, a tiny town north of Tübingen known for its castle, from Fichtenweg and then finding a trail head for a 5km hike, which probably would have made the entire trip somewhere around 10-ish km. However, upon reaching Bebenhausen, we decided to just travel along a random trail. But Bebenhausen is in the middle of Schönbuch Nature Park, so there were plenty of places for our Wanderung. We set out, and it was quite the lovely time. Plenty of beautiful leaves all over the ground, which were quite fun to jump in. Although we wished we had had a rake so that we could have made piles. All in all, our hike ended up being probably close 20km or so, but that's OK, because the sun was shining, it was warm, and the leaves were perfect.


To continue our perfect fall day, we decided upon returning to Tübingen that we were going to carve pumpkins, eat pumpkin things and candy, and watch scary movies. It was a wonderful Saturday night. We arrived back in Tübingen around 6:30, when I promptly went to Rewe, found a pumpkin, went home and showered, went to Kaufland to buy pumpkin stew ingredients, and quickly made my way over to Lisa's WG. When I got there, everyone was showering, and the candy was in a bucket (which was awesome). So I started cutting up vegetables for pumpkin stew.  Also they don't have canned pumpkin on this continent, so that made things slightly more difficult. But between Louise and myself, we cut up all of the pumpkin and mashed it into a stew kind of thing. Her housemates were particularly nice about letting me take over their kitchen, as well, which is always a good thing. All in all, for my first foray into the world of fall vegetable stew without a recipe, I'd say it turned out pretty well. 

Then came the pumpkin carving, which was lovely as well. We had four pumpkins for the six of us (Anna came over as well). So Lasse and Lisa worked together on one, while Anna and I carved the pumpkin I bought. It was also the first time Anna or Lasse had carved a pumpkin, and Louise said she had carved one only once before when she was really little. So it was great to bring a good part of America to Europe. Seeing them both dig into a pumpkin for the first time was also pretty funny. We ended up carving an owl (Hannah), a fox, as in the Ylvis fox (Anna and I), Jack Skellington (Louise), and Eric Cartman (Lisa and Lasse). And my God, did they all turn out so well! Lisa's German roommates were quite impressed, in addition to being amused by our American antics, and I would say it's definitely the highlight of my pumpkin-carving career. 

After the pumpkin extravaganza and eating LOTS of frozen pizza (yes, in addition to the stew, we ate no fewer than 5 frozen pizzas), we decided to watch a scary movie. Lisa, our scary movie connoisseur decided to have us watch The Conjuring, which is a shitty movie set in the 1970s about a house in Rhode Island haunted by multiple demonic spirits, which a nice family of 7 decided to buy. It was pretty bad, but also ridiculously terrifying. I maybe watched 1/3 of it, and the rest of the time my face was behind my sweatshirt or the duvet cover. The walk home was also mildly terrifying. 

So yup, that's about what I got for you. There are sure to be more Halloween-related shenanigans, as the Tufts Kinder are throwing a Halloween party at Marlena's on Thursday for a combination of Deutsch Kompakt Kinder, START Kurs Kinder, and random German folks that we know. It promises to be a regular old riot. So bis später, Kinder.

Ich kam in wie eine Abrissbirne.

Hey, gang. As I mentioned before, this week has been the last week of Sommer before the Semesteranfang, which is, in deed, tomorrow. Therefore (as I also previously mentioned) a group of friends (Harvey, Graham, Johanna, Kyle, Hannah) and I went on a 3 day hiking adventure to a tiny mountain hamlet called Spielmannsau. Although I am not sure if the word hamlet accurately describes how tiny this place is.

To begin: our journey started just before 9AM on Thursday when we met at the Hauptbahnhof. Our first train left at 9:15. Since we wanted to save money, we bought a Schönes Wochenende ticket, which means that a group of 5 can travel on any Bahn (except IC Bahns) for the day. This, however, meant that we had to travel on four different trains. Naturally, our first train to Wenzingen am Neckar got in late. Which meant that we had to wait in the rain for 25 minutes for a train to Plochingen, and then from Plochingen we caught a train to Ulm. We said hello to the Ulmer Münster for a second time and sat in a very nice cafe to get out of the cold and rain. Luckily from Ulm, we got a direct train to Oberstdorf, which meant sitting in a super cozy train for 2 hours, sleeping, and reading On the Road. All of those things were quite wonderful. 

We got to Oberstdorf just as the rain began turning to slush and then snow. Before I talk about the weather, however, I shall talk about Oberstdorf. Oberstdorf is a lovely town in the middle of Bavaria. The train station strongly resembles an REI, and all of the buildings in the town are cute-sy and matching and lovely. It also happens to be a tourist trap, but it seems, largely only for old Germans. It's also 813m above sea level, which is roughly 2667ft high. 

Es schneit!!

However, we were not staying in Oberstdorf. Upon arriving at the train station, we waited 20 minutes for a bus to take us out to Spielmannsau. Spielmannsau is 983m (3225ft) high and is lucky if it can be big enough to be considered a hamlet. It consists of a hostel, a restaurant/biergarten, what appear to be a house, and a barn. There was a chicken just roaming around and it's in the middle of the mountains. And it's perfect. Since Spielmannsau is more than 100m higher than Oberstdorf, this meant that the sleet/slush in Oberstdorf quickly turned into full on snow in Spielmannsau. And it was beautiful. We kept reminding each other that it was, in fact, October 10th. 


Anyways, we arrived at Spielmannsau around 4. Since it was so tiny, it was incredibly easy to find our hostel, the Mountain Hostel. We went in, and a guy, who was the quintessential stereotypical hiker, and who I presume to be his girlfriend quickly escorted us to a room with 9 beds on the top floor. It was super chill. They didn't demand that we pay immediately or anything. The hostel itself was also the nicest hostel I have ever stayed in. It was super lodge-y feeling. Not a substitute for the Loj, but seeing as I was Loj-sick this weekend with Peak Weekend going on, it was a lovely place to be. We dropped our bags, and immediately went outside and played in the snow. That was super fun, and luckily not terribly cold (at least for me). 

After playing in the snow, we started making dinner. Otherwise known as installment three of pasta night. We still had pasta and pesto from our dinner a week ago that we brought. Boiling the water went more smoothly this time. After dinner, we hung out until around 11, when we decided it was just about time to go to bed. Because Loj time exists even whilst not at the Loj. 

We woke up around 8 for our hike. But we probably didn't get going until 9 or so what with rallying the troops, making sandwiches and packing backpacks. Unfortunately, what with the foot+ of snow, the original hike that we had planned wasn't particularly feasible. Everyone had tennis shoes, instead of hiking boots (except me, seeing as Simon keeps on saying we're going to hike the Matterhorn when he comes to visit, wanted to be prepared). So instead of hiking to the Austrian border, we did a little ~4km loop and ended up back at the hostel around noon or so. The hike was lovely. It was the most wonderful winterwonderland. Unfortunately it was quite foggy, so we couldn't see the mountains in all of their glory. 

Mmmm, I love me some nature.

Upon getting back to the hostel, we napped, and around 2, Hannah and I went into town to pick up food for our fourth installment of pasta night. We had pasta and sauce, but we also were hoping to get some meat and vegetables. We found an Edeka very near to the Busbahnhof and bought a bunch of feast for both dinner and breakfast the next morning. We got back around 4 or so, and after people futzed around with their technology (the place had wifi, which was rather sad, as the lack of wifi one wonderful thing about the Loj), we started making our glorious feast of pasta with tomato sauce, bratwurst, zucchini, onions, and peppers. We also made or attempted to make apple cider. Which for what we had (two packets of mix and a bunch of apples and some sugar) turned out quite well. After dinner, we hung out in our room again and there were various different types of shenanigans (the creation of der Dangerschrank, zum Beispiel) and then went to bed relatively early again. 

In the morning, we feasted again, but this time on 16 eggs. Harvey set off the fire alarm trying to make toast, and we left the hostel around 11, in order to catch the 12:30 train back to Ulm. We wandered around Oberstdorf, seeing as we had some time to kill. But that was a slight challenge seeing as all the old people in Bayern seemed to have descended upon Oberstdorf for the street fair. (Seriously someone in Germany must have yelled "Straßenmarkt in Oberstdorf!" and all the old people came in packs.) T'was utter insanity. 

The very packed Drunk Train

We made our train easily, and even managed to get prime seats (two of the coveted four-person tables). So we were quite comfortable for the first two hours of our journey. Then there was Ulm. Our train to Plochingen had straight up been cancelled. Luckily, we thought, there was train to Stuttgart. This train, however, was both 20 minutes late, and full of drunk people (most of which were wearing lederhosen and dirndls) going to Cannstatt for the last day of the Wasen. Seeing as the train was late and packed, we stood with all of our stuff for an hour and a half. But luckily we were standing by some drunk Spaniards, who kept us entertained. About an hour in, they started singing. There was the Macarena (something which I don't think I have ever heard someone sing the lyrics to), I Knew You Were Trouble (better than the goat version in my opinion, the screaming was perfect), and Stand By Me, amongst other songs. It was quite comical. 

After transferring in Plochingen, we got on a slightly (but only slightly) less packed train to Tübingen, wherein a dirndl-ed girl vomited, and we spoke with a man, who wore glorious Bono glasses. It was particularly funny when a guy standing next to us, stated in surprise "you're speaking German?" Yup, bro, wir können Deutsch sprechen. 

We got back around 6, and I went home, did laundry, managed to cut my finger pretty badly on the vent/cheese grater on the very short ceiling of my laundry room/dungeon. That wasn't pleasant, and the laundry room kind of looked like a crime scene. So yeah, that wasn't great. 

But yeah, other than that the only other big bit of news is that: Ich habe mein Flugticket nach SCHWEDEN gebucht. Woooo!! Super stoked. Even if it is in the dead of winter (December). We are gonna have a blast and a half. 

And now, classes officially start tomorrow. But only one of my classes starts this week. All the rest start next week. When I am more sure of what I am taking, I'll lay it all out, but for now, it looks like I am gonna do a poli sci class, an econ class, a history class, Swedish, creative writing in German, and an art class. Should be an interesting semester. And I guess this means that the study part of studying abroad is officially starting. And that's about it for now. Bis später, Kinder.