Amsterdam-it

Well as many of you know I’ve had an eventful past two weeks! Last week we were traveling around as a group following the path of Luther. We also got to see Dresden and Berlin. Berlin was awesome but we didn’t get to see as much as I wish we could have. We then went to Wittenberg, Eisenach, Erfurt, and Heidelberg. They were all fairly interesting cities, but we were pumped to get on our travel week. I was off to Amsterdam with the two other guys and one girl. Then began our saga of failure. And oh man was it full of failures.

            First of all we got to the hostel in Heidelberg and asked if they had the tickets that I had mailed to them in advance so I could pick them up there. Well when we got there we asked if they had the tickets, and they told us that they received them all right. But that they sent them back. So...we went to the train station and found out that returned tickets are automatically canceled. So we had to buy new tickets, for a price 36 euros more than our previous price. Bummer.  Well the next morning we got on a train to Mannheim, then found out that our connecting train was cancelled due to a fire on the track. Whatever that means. So we had to take a train to Frankfurt and then made our way to Köln (or Cologne for all you English folks). Finally we got to Köln and walked outside to see the Cathedral that is directly outside the train station. 

Its world-famous and all, but I still like the Dom St. Peter here in Regensburg better. Well…that little walk was unfortunate. We checked our tickets and found out that the train we thought was leaving at 3:42 actually left at 2:41…and our train had arrived at 2:38, so we may not have gotten the train in the first place. So we missed our second train of the day. We found a train heading to Amsterdam Centraal at 5:30 and thus waited in Köln for a few hours and ate some Burger King 1 euro hamburgers. The train ride there was just fine. We got into Amsterdam around 10 and liked the city on our first impression. We had some walking directions to our hostel and started following them. Sadly they were horrible directions and we ended up walking through the middle of the Coffeeshop district and Red Light Areas. It was a fast and harsh introduction to the world of Amsterdam. We promptly got lost and walked around Amsterdam for about an hour and a half. We asked directions from these two middle-aged men who were speaking English. One of the guys, who lived there, hadn’t ever heard of our street address. Then almost a block down the road the guy chased us down and showed us a different road name, but it was the right one. He pointed off in a direction and said that was where our hostel was. We started walking that way, but since the canals in Amsterdam are circular, we basically got way thrown off. We were debating where to go and this guy randomly walked up. His name was Thierry Baudet and he said that he would take us to our hostel because he was a writer who needed inspiration, so why not help some random tourists. It turns out that this guy is a writer for a magazine that is distributed to the top 10,000 politicians and policy makers of the Netherlands Government. He writes conservative economic columns that focus on the abolishment of the EU. It was extremely interesting to me as I need to write a paper later this semester on the views of Europeans and the EU. Very cool. He was a very nice dude and told us that he had been voted the “vainest man in Amsterdam” the day before by a local paper. Quite funny. We googled him later and he was the second option after Thierry Henry, the world famous soccer player. Yeah…apparently he’s a big deal. So we were escorted to our hostel by a local celebrity.

Getting to the hostel was only the tip of the adventure of fail. We got to the reception desk, gave them my name and our reservation number. They then proceeded to tell us that we had booked a hostel for the next two nights…but not Saturday night. This happened because we booked the hostel far in advance and the train tickets last week…not a good thing for future reference. We also found out that we couldn’t find a bed in the entire city because of the Amsterdam Marathon that was happening the next day. Apparently it’s a big deal. So we were told that we could sleep in the Centraal and be vagabonds. We resigned ourselves to sleeping in the train station, assuming it would be cool with the authorities and that it was open 24 hours. That was not the case on either point. We found a place to sit, were moved along by the floor cleaner. He pointed us to another area of the station that was thankfully warmer. We saw other sleeping there and thought that this was the acceptable area to sleep. WRONGO. The security people came through at 1:45am and told us the train station was closing, we asked for help and she said that Burger King upstairs was open until 4am and they might let us chill in there if we buy something. We went up there, but their dining room was closed. So instead we bought a coffee and sat on the platform out front. It was freezing and we were all packing on the layers. We stayed on that platform until 5am. It was ridiculous. I stood up for 95% of the time to stay warm and none of us got much sleep. I had a cool God moment at like 4am, which was cool. In the morning we went to Starbucks in the train station and sat out front for 2 more hours. The security people came around every 10 or so minutes and woke up anyone who was sleeping. It was really quite annoying and odd that they would care this much about people sleeping in the train station. We left the train station in favor of a two-story burger king that had free internet, free bathrooms, and was warm. We stayed there for a few hours and then felt that we had to leave after they kept shooting us dirty looks. We walked over to the area of where our hostel was and found a park. Naps in the sun in the park was one of the highlights of the trip for me. We checked into our hostel at 1:30pm and we slept. It was glorious. That night we walked around and chilled. It was good. 

The next day we decided that we wanted to go to Paris a day early and leave on Tuesday. The problem with that plan was that Paris decided to go all French on us and the Transportation workers in the country went on strike. Its still going on and Paris is currently the scene of riots. All over the changing of retirement benefits at age 62 instead of 60. So we booked tickets to come back to Germany. They cost far too much, but we were over it. We got our ICE train back to Köln and found out that the train we were on went all the way to Mannheim via Frankfurt. We decided to take naps, and, if we missed Köln, then we got closer to our destination. We were woken up by people who had reserved our seats and thus started a 12 hour trip back to Regensburg. We bought regional tickets for the four regions that we were going to be going through. Then we started out journey. We caught a train to Koblenz, then we went to Frankfurt. Our train was delayed then for 15 minutes which made us miss our connection. We waited an hour for the next train and were on our way. We made it uneventfully to Nürnberg where we again were late for our train to Regensburg. Then we waited an hour for the next train. When that train came the sign said that it was a train going to Neumarkt (random city in Bavaria) at the same time that it was going to Regensburg. We didn’t get on it, assuming that since our train was below the other one on the sign ours was waiting to come right after the other one. Sadly when this train pulled away we saw Regensburg Hbf on the back sign…meaning that the train was going to split at Neumarkt. So after some chagrined words we found another train going to Regensburg in half an hour. Finally we made the train and got back to Regensburg at 10:50pm. Thus ends the saga of the Amsterdam-it trip. It was a character building trip for sure and we gained a greater appreciation for Bavaria and Germany in general. It’s a beautiful and great place! 

Dresden-Burned but not Broken

            Dresden is one of the prettiest places that I have seen so far on my trips. This is striking for two particular reasons. First of all it was almost fully destroyed in February 1945 when the Allies firebombed the city, causing fires of more than 1000 degrees centigrade and destroying the cultural architecture that made Dresden famous. The second thing that makes it surprising that this burned out city has been reborn is the fact that it was under the rule of the communist GDR for 40 or so years. The communists are not famous for their love of beautiful architecture, the exact opposite is actually true. Thus the city, rebuilt in most of its former glory, still shines today. We were able to attend a symphony playing Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No.1 along with other selections in the Frauenkirche (the Mother Church). This was an amazing experience as it allowed us to see the church in all of its rebuilt glory (it burned with the city and was recently rebuilt with funds from the state of Germany as well as 4 other former-allied nations who raised money for it). We were also able to enjoy some amazing classical music, though I may have drowsed off for a few minutes. The next morning we went on a tour of the city of Dresden and saw the Frauenkirche in the daylight. It is an interesting building as it is constructed with a mix of old stones and new. Thus the church has the appearance of a fired building. Some of the stones and one corner of the church are soot black while others are a nice sandstone. We continued down the Procession of Dukes, a street with a giant mosaic almost 100 yards long made of porcelain that the city is famous for making. In this mosaic are the dukes of the city and some religious expressions. After seeing this we entered the Hofkirche. This cathedral was built by August the Strong in a response to the building of the original Frauenkirche. He converted to Catholicism during his reign for financial and political reasons and thus felt that he should have a church to match the Protestant one. However, the people of the city, who were mostly protestant, did not recognize it and thus its bells were not allowed to ring until the city was conquered by Napoleon. We then ventured into the museum of the Zwinger. This museum holds four separate exhibits: Mathematics and Physics, Famous Artwork, one of Medieval Armoury, and finally porcelain from China, Japan, and Dresden. The Art section was extravagant and classified by the time period and the origin of the painter. In the exhibit I saw a Rafael and several Rembrandts as well as a special exhibit on Vermeer. The art section behind me I headed to the Armour! I love medieval armour and weapon design and thus was entranced by the lavish engraving and ornamentation on these pieces. They were very selection-focused on swords, armour, and early guns. Although I am not personally interested too much in early firearms, these examples were exquisitely designed and would have been amazing to see in their heyday. In all it was an amazing exhibit and has only been surpassed in my eyes by the MET in New York City. I toured the porcelain section as well and was amazed by the detail achieved in some of the pieces. Though it was not my favorite part of the museum, I did enjoy a piece titled Affe mit Snuftabakdose. This translates into “Monkey with snuffbox” and depicted a monkey taking snuff and holding a little box in its other hand. This was a comical piece to me and I was humoured by the creation of such a fantastical situation. This fairly ended our tour of Dresden, and, though I am heading to Berlin tomorrow, I find it hard to believe that I will enjoy it more. 

Barca, Paris, Roma!

Hello Everone!

I am sorry that I have been a horribly unfaithful writer these three weeks. I have no real excuse other than I was doing things that were more fun than writing to all of you :P The past three weeks have been good. The first class we had was very good in that it challenged some of our beliefs and was a good way to learn the basics of philosophy. It was a lot of work however, and we were all glad to be done with it. During the two weeks itself I was able to join a gym with two other members of my group and get back into the routine of being healthy. We were also able to get a lot of sightseeing done including going to the town of Weimar in former East Germany. It was a great experience and we were able to see a lot of cool political Graffiti that can be found in the Graffiti album on my Facebook. It was very interesting to me to see the vast differences between the colorful towns of Bavaria and the drab architecture of the East German Apartments. We were also able to interview a lady that grew up under the DDR’s rule. It was very interesting to hear her views. One of the things that stood out the most to us was the fact that the system Worked. They were being lied to of course, but they had what they needed.

            The past week has been…..Crazy. We flew out of Memmigan, Germany to Girona, Spain. Girona is a town up the coast from Barcelona and we thought it would be a Podunk town with nothing to offer. Boy were we wrong! It turned out to be a town with a rich history, of which we still know little, including a huge cathedral. We ended up doing Barcelona in only 6 hours and then taking the train back to Girona so we could see more of it! Barca was cool in the sense that much of what we were seeing, such as the Sagrada Familia and the Gaudi houses, are world famous. But other than that, I was not that big a fan of the town.

            We awoke at four to catch our 6 o’clock flight to Paris Monday. Our flight was delayed for an hour on the tarmac and then we were winged off to Paris. We bought metro passes at the advisement of an Indian Student who was on the shuttle bus and were thankful for them. Paris is definitely a metro city, in both senses of the word! It is a large city with the sightseeing things spread out so that a metro pass speeds things up a great amount. Additionally the metros are convenient and prevalent. As to the other meaning of the word, Paris is a well dressed city. We felt woefully underdressed in our jeans and sweatshirts. So bring nice clothes if you ever plan to travel there and be taken seriously and not just as a tourist.  While there we saw all the typical things, my favorite being the Arc De Triomphe. We saw this monument no less than 6 times as it was next to a useful metro stop and in the middle of the shopping avenue of the Champs d’Elysees. Our hostel in Paris was a lot of fun and we met a guy named Diego from Brazil who tagged along with us for the last two days in Paris. This dose of testosterone was a nice change from the two girls I was with all week. We left Paris in the evening on Wednesday and arrived in Rome at about midnight.

            Checking into our hostel, The Yellow, was a pleasant experience. It was smooth and the staff was knowleadgeable. That night I was able to catch a cab to my friend Lyndsay Angell’s apartment at around 2am. This was an adventure as I first had to have the cab called, show the driver the address on my iPod, and then fork out 16 euros for the ten minute ride. I didn’t know her apt number and her phone number didn’t work on my phone so I found some English speaking girls and asked them where to go. They showed me the building, and, after talking with the security guard (through a student who could translate into Italian, for I speak no Italian whatsoever and still don’t) I found out that I couldn’t contact Lyndsay in any way and that I could not go into the building because visiting hours were over. So I had the security guard call me a cab to go home. Luckily, right as he was on the phone, Lynds came down to look for me! It was perfect timing and we were able to walk around for about two hours and catch up. I took another cab ride that ran me 15 euros (making rome the most expensive city by far) and hit the sack. Thursday we walked around Rome and saw the Coliseum at sunset, which was by far the most beautiful thing in Rome. That night we met some chill people in the Hostel and walked around to the Trevi Fountain and the Spanish Steps to see them at night. It was a beautiful sight and an awesome time to be with people from around the world, including a German! The next day we did the whole Vatican thing and were able to see a lot of famous architecture as well as the tombs of Pope John Paul II and Saint Peter…..yep….that’s right…THE Peter. Like the one from the Bible. Cool Stuff. We went out to Ciampino to our hotel for the night…snuck me in as we only booked for two people in order to save thirty euro, ate in the hotel restaurant, saw some crazy italians do karaoke in the restaurant. (as a sidenote, these italians were in their late teens or early twenties and could sing well). We caught our flight out this morning and were blessed with on time travels back to Regensburg. Tomorrow we plan to go to Oktoberfest for its closing day and experience that landmark event (it’s the bicentennial this year!). For now I wish you all a good night and happy travels!

Peace