My trip to Switzerland to see Simona!

Valentine's weekend I went to go visit Simona in Pany, Switzerland. I took a train from Freiburg and went through Zurich and saw a lot of the Alps. I met up with Simona in Landquart and we took the last train to Kueblis, which was in a valley right below from where she lived. On the train it was nice to catch up, and I brought her a book I had bought, called Bis zum Morgengrauen which is translated to Twilight in english, it is a series by Stephanie Meyer that I have been obsessed with, so I let her borrow my German version to read. Once we arrived in Kueblis her dad met up with us with his car, I greeted him with Gruezi!!! which in Swiss German means 'hello,' I think they were a little shocked that I knew that, and he greeted me with a firm handshake and helped me get my bags in the trunk. On the drive up to their house we drove on the most narrow roads I had ever been on! I was telling her dad how I thought they were super narrow and the drive was kind of scary, and he said everyone is justused to it, although Simona had told me when we were walking up to the car that the reason for the different colored bumper was because of her mom getting into a car accident, haha. They lived really high on the mountain, my ears were popping the whole time we were driving up there, I was surprised that their small car could drive well on those roads because there was snow everywhere, but apparently they have 'winter tires.'
We finally got to her house and no one was home yet so Simona and I had something to drink and surfed the internet for a little bit showing each other new songs and youtube videos. We finally decided to go to dinner, but I was worried because I didn't exchange any Euros to Swiss Franks and we were in a town of like 15, but Simona assured me that she would pay. So we went to one of the two restaurants that they had in their town, it was a really cute Italian restaurant. Simona told me I should try this Swiss drink called Rivella, and the kids at the table next to us also had it so I thought I would try it this one time instead of getting my usual Coke Light. It was a really good drink, kind of like red bull, but a pop. I drank Rivella every chance I got after that. We ate our pasta and then walked back down to her house, I was surprised she could see while we were walking because it was pitch black except for the slight brightness of the snow covering the ground, it was also snowing as we walked back to her house. Once we got back to the house I got to meet her mom and her brother Dario, they were so nice, and I also greeted them with the swiss Grueziiii! They were pleasantly surprised that I could talk to them in German the whole time, Simona had been complaining earlier that she was really hoping her mom wouldn't try and spit out any English, like have you hunger?....translated are you hungry? It was really fun because she was asking me about school and how I liked Germany and everything, really nice to know I could talk to my best friends mom in her language. Simona and I drank some tea and then watched episodes of Sex in the City and Family Guy.





The next morning we slept in a bit. Got ready and took showers and then ate some bread and jelly and drank some hot chocolate and Orange Juice while looking out from her sun room to the Alps! What an amazing way to start the morning! We had decided that we wanted to go skiing that day, but once we woke up it was pretty gloomy and it had snowed quite a bit the night before so we decided to hop on a train and go to Chur, the oldest city in Switzerland, which was only about 40 minutes away by train.

Once we got there we went shopping around a little bit and had some McDonalds at the one she used to work at, then tried finding a movie theater so we could go see Twilight in theaters because she still hadn't seen it, we found out it was playing in about 2 hours at a farther theater so we went and saw a few cathedrals and went shopping some more until the movie started. We walked to the movie theater and happened to run into a few of her friends, one being a brother of her boyfriend, her boyfriend is a triplet by the way, weird. We finally got to the theater and got some snacks and went in to see the movie, I was pretty excited even though it was my 5th time seeing it, but we watched it in German, which I perfectly understood (I saw it in German once already too). Unfortunately we had to leave early because we had to catch a train back to Kueblis, her mom was making cheese fondue for us and the train only came once an hour and it was already 7:30, so we had to leave before we finished it. Once we got back to Kueblis we found out her dad and brother couldn't come pick us up for another half hour, so Simona claimed it was normal to hitchhike to where you needed to be on the mountain, so we stood at a corner for about 10 minutes and we were both freezing so we said that next car that passes if they don't pick us up we are going to go wait in a restaurant, luckily enough the next car that came along was a really nice woman and she gladly opened her door to let us in. She drove us to Simona's town which was like 15 minutes away, she was so nice, she had told me she was an Oper in the USA in 2000, so she spoke English really well. She dropped us off and we walked a couple minutes to Simona's house.





Once we got in the house it was nice and warm and the smell of melted cheese filled the air. I was so ready for some cheese fondue! Simona's mom, Heidi, had a whole spread of things to dip into the cheese, it was also weird because I asked her how she made the fondue and she said in it was mixes of different cheeses, wine, whipped cream, and corn starch, I was really baffled by the whipped cream, but it was delicious! It was fun just to sit at the table talking and laughing and eating cheese. After dinner Simona and I made some tea and watched the rest of Twilight online and then we watched the Sex in the City Movie. Simona was falling asleep during the end of it so we went to bed.











In the morning on Sunday we woke up and got ready and ate our usual breakfast and gazed at the beautiful Alps. Her sister had called her and told her they were going skiing that day, Simona and I wanted to go sledding and there happened to be sledding at the ski resort they were going to not far away. So I packed my things and we got into our snow gear and waited for her sister Corinne to come pick us up. When she arrived she brought Simona's niece, Leonie, she was adorable and was only about 5 years old and going to ski in the Alps, I felt a slight jealousy of her, because she was so young and could ski better than me! We drove to where the gondolas were to tak us up to the mountain. We got on our gondola and arrived at a snow covered ski resort, we waited for her other sister Patricia while her niece was skiing on the kids hills. Her sister finally arrived and I got to meet her too. We later went into the ski lodge and ate a snack before we went sledding. Little did I know we would be sledding all the way down to where we first got on the gondolas! I figured we were going to be sledding down a hill or something, but no Simona forgot to inform me that we were sledding together on a huge zig zag ALL the way down the mountain. We finally got on our little toboggan and began down the mountain, we were going really fast, I was sitting in front and Simona in the back, I rarely had to help steer, for some reason Simona could do it all with her feet, it was so cool. I took 2 videos while we were going down. It was definitely the coolest thing I have ever done in winter, the view was amazing, from time to time we would pass a few skiers or other people sledding, one guy was even carrying his dog on his sled all the way down. It was definitely a memory I won't ever forget. Once we got to the bottom Simona's sister picked us up and we raced to the train station so I wouldn't miss my train. We hugged goodbye and I got on the train back to Freiburg. It was an amazing winter weekend with my best friend in Switzerland. I promised her family I would be returning in May! I can't wait to go back!

I have so much homework to do before Adam and my friend Ashley get here the second week of March, look forward to some new adventures soon!! Love you and Miss you ALL!

Auf Wiedersehen

Camping in the Schwarzwald (Black Forest)

A few weeks ago about 10 people and I went camping for one night in the Black Forest. In a cabin of course, it would have been way too cold to do real camping in a tent. We left Saturday morning January 31st and headed off to Hinterzarten. It is a small town near Freiburg, only about 20 minutes away by train, and thankfully we could get there free with our semester tickets. Once we arrived in Hinterzarten the group decided we should walk to our destination which was like 30 minutes away! I really wanted to wait for the so called bus that would take us there, but then I got pressured into just following everyone else and walking to the cabin. It was really uncomfortable because we brought a ton of food with us so all of our bags were really heavy and the weather was pretty brisk too. My friend Shane was so funny, he called our friend Jason that morning asking what shoes he should wear, and Jason replied 'boots,' little did Shane think that he meant hiking boots so Shane shows up in nice going out boots, hahaha, and then walking for 30-45 minutes in the snow to our cabin. It was pretty comical. On our little hike we also saw some horses and tried petting them, and got into an argument because someone claimed horses love to eat sugar, and most of us disagreed, but turns out horses really do love sugar.




We finally arrived to our destination and it was such a cute little cabin, well actually a huge cabin, just looked small from the outside, it had 16 beds! We got into the cabin hoping for it to be warm so we could warm up a little bit from all the outdoor walking, but once we got inside there was absolutely no warmth. We had to start the fire ourselves, which proved really difficult because we were just piling on way too much wood in the fireplace. We tried using paper, cardboard, napkins...anything we could find to fuel the fire, none of it worked. The group decided to go on a 3 mile hike, but Shane, Kelly and myself didn't really feel like going outside in the cold again so we stayed behind and played cards. Once everyone was gone, a few people came to the cabin that had been staying there for a few days, and they helped us start the fire, the woman really knew what she was doing, and we were very grateful for that. The cabin finally started to warm up after about an hour. The three of us just sat and played cards until the rest of the group came back. It was really fun, we drank a ton of tea trying to warm our bodies up. Once everyone got back we made dinner, we were all scared we weren't going to have enough food for all of us because we didn't realize how many people were coming until last minute. Thank god we had a ton of ingredients to mix together, we made a big goulasch/pasta, it turned out actually very delicious. After dinner we all kind of hung out and played some card games. Then we had dessert of pudding and pears, yumm! After all that eating we brought out the wine and started playing some really fun card drinking games, it started getting really loud. We played spoons, which I haven't played since I was a kid, so much fun! A lot of people stayed up all night, but I decided on going to bed around 1 am, me and my friends just talked for a while before we fell asleep. It really sucked for us because we were the farthest room from the fireplace and so I was pretty frozen all night long.

In the morning we had pancakes and fruit salad and headed off down the trail back to Hinterzarten. It was such a fun day/night in the Black Forest, I was telling my friends I really want to get that cabin again in the summer!

Hope all is well and the weather is getting warmer back home! I miss you and love you all!

Auf Wiedersehen

Berlin Trip with AYF Program

My program organized a trip for us to Berlin from January 15-19. It was almost our whole program, which was like 30 people. It was definitely too many people for my liking. We took a train the morning to Berlin, it took about 6 hours to get there from Freiburg. When we got there it was too late to really do anything, so we just had dinner and then hung out in our rooms. Our hostel was in a Turkish district of Berlin, Berlin has the biggest population of Turkish people concentrated in one city. Berlin is a really interesting city because there is so much history there, beginning with the Berlin Wall that stood for almost 30 years separating the East from the West. There are still parts of the wall that are standing, and the East Side Gallery has a lot of remains of the Wall displayed as art work for all the graffiti on them. Berlin has definitely made a name for itself, it is the Capital city of Germany and it has become very cultured and artsy. They have kept a lot of history from when Berlin was split in two, such as the Ampelmaennchen or the pedestrian crossing signs, they are different from all of Germany and it is a reminder of which parts of the city were considered "East" or "West." The Brandenburger Tor (Brandenburg Gate) is also a large symbol for Germany and it was part of the Eastern side of Berlin when the Wall was up.

Our first day in Berlin we went to see the Holocaust Memorial and Holocaust Museum. The memorial is called Denkmal für die ermordeten Juden Europas (A Memorial to Murdered Jews in Europe.) The design was created by Peter Eisenman, he wanted create the memorial leaving an impression that the stelae are designed to produce an uneasy, confusing atmosphere, and the whole sculpture aims to represent a supposedly ordered system that has lost touch with human reason. My friends even took a picture on top of the memorial and a german guy scolded us for it, but we were told the memorial was supposed to be an every day thing to walk through, and make your own interpretations, there are no names or dates on the stones, therefore not making it a grave yard for those who died during the Holocaust. It was really easy to get lost in all of the stones because they are all different sizes and some ground is flat and some is hilly. It was finally revealed in 2005 and there have already been 3.5 Million visitors to the site. We also went into the museum/information center underneath the memorial, it was really depressing because it told horrific personal stories of what happened to some of the Jewish families. I had the feeling I would expect after seeing a Concentration Camp after I left the museum, it was really in your face and very sad. That is about all we did that day and we also saw the Brandenburg Gate because it wasn't far from the memorial, and also right next to the Brandenburg Gate is the hotel where Michael Jackson held his baby out the window.

On Saturday we went to the Reichstag ( the site of the German Parliament) it is a really cool building, and also where Angela Merkel's office is (the German Chancellor.) We had a tour inside the Reichstag, but for me it was pretty boring because I am not extremely interested in government and politics, I have had plenty of classes on the German government, but it was cool to actually see where it all happens. The glass dome on top of the building is seen in almost every book about Germany, so it was really cool to take pictures of that, since it was on my first German language book. After that my friends and I went and had coffee and also bought some souvenirs. My thing now is buying a cool picture from the places I go to so I can frame it and use it as art work back home in my apartment, so far I have gotten a picture from Paris, Chamonix, and Berlin, they are all really cool. We also went and took more pictures at the Brandenburg Gate and saw the large sculpture from afar that Hitler had moved so that when he had his parades in Berlin he would pass it every time. There were a lot of things that I never got to see in Berlin, like going to the museums on Museum Island, seeing the site of Hitlers bunker underground, Potsdamer Platz and the East Side Gallery. That night we went to see a play that we had read in one of my classes, it was called Wir Negativen (We are negative) it was so funny and a really good experience to hear German and be able to understand it! I love when I can go see something like a movie or play and be able to follow along when it is all in German, it is such a rewarding feeling and reconfirms that I am here for a good reason.

On Sunday it was terrible, I didn't want to do any of the things we did, first we traveled to a Stasi Museum, the Stasi were the SS Police and a whole Museum dedicated to them. My first thought was that it was going to be very interesting because it is a part of WWII history that we aren't thoroghly taught about. Once we got there, there was a woman that talked for hours, and the 'museum' was hardly a museum, more like a bunch of rooms with random posters on the wall. The woman even locked the doors from the inside to make sure we couldn't leave, haha, well I'm sure that wasn't her intention but it definitely seemed like it. One of our teachers even abandoned the tour and sat and waited for it to be over. A couple guys found a window in the bathroom and jumped out it, one of them actually broke his foot, oh what we do when something is so boring it's like pulling teeth.

After that wretched museum we went to the Jewish Museum, which was surprisingly a lot better, the architecture of it blew me away, it was so different. The museum was more aimed toward where the Jewish people originated from, really not much about the Holocaust, but more just preserving their history. I was pretty upset when the day was over because it had all been wasted on museums, and museums are definitely not my favorite especially when I have to be lead around with a big group. We all met at a Steakhouse/Pizzeria (I know, weird mix...steak or pizza) and our program treated everyone with their own pizza and salad.

The next day we woke up fairly early and dropped out bags off in a van and we had the whole day to ourselves to explore wherever we wanted to in Berlin. I went with Joanna and Kelly. First we went to Checkpoint Charlie. Checkpoint Charlie was designated for the one passage between West Berlin and East Berlin when the wall was up, it was for foreigners and allied troops. There is a sign and on it is one Soviet soldier and on the other side is an American soldier. Checkpoint Charlie became a symbol of the Cold War, representing the separation of east and west, and — for some East Germans — a gateway to freedom. I got a picture with the fake guards and also got my passport stamped with a Checkpoint Charlie stamp.

After that we walked to the Berliner Dom, which is a huge Cathedral next to Museum Island. It was built between 1895 and 1905. It is one of the coolest looking cathedrals I have seen yet. Kelly, Joanna and I all climbed to the top of the church too, the view was awesome, we could even see all the way to the Brandenburg Gate and Reichstag, and it was also an amazing day outside, so that was nice for picture taking.

Next we traveled to Ka De We (Kaufhaus des Westens) basically a big mall of West Berlin, we went in but everything was so out of anyone's price range, basically like a Nordstrom, but everything was pretty to look at. We also got to see this church that was destroyed greatly during WWII but they kept what was left still standing and it had a memorial tower next to it, it is called the Kaiser Wilhem Church. It was a really cool site, especially since they kept it like that. After shopping we had no more time left and had to return to the train station to meet our group. I had such a great time in Berlin, I would really love to go back! So much history and a huge turn around from what it used to be.

Until next time. This weekend I am going to Switzerland to see Simona and her family, we will probably go skiing too!

Auf Wiedersehen!