October 2011 – Valpo Voyager

Month: October 2011 (page 1 of 2)

Just Around the River Bend

October 26, 2011 / Jodie Buchanan / 0 Comments

Getting ready to raft

As a part of the program here in Namibia, we are allotted one week of travel on our own. Our group here did a variety of things including visiting Victoria Falls, traveling to the Skeleton Coast, and some decided to road trip around Southern Africa. I decided that I wanted to do something that was stress free. So four friends and I headed to the border of Namibia and South Africa and rafted down a river for a week.

Jumping off a cliff

The river is called the Orange River and it is nestled between two mountain ranges; one in Nambia and the other in South Africa. We rafted for four days and saw somuch. The first day on the river we climbed a massive rock and jumped off of it into the river. Later in the week we rode down rapids with just a life jacket. My favorite part of the trip though was every night we would set up camp on the river bank and literally I would fall asleep looking at the stars. When I’d wake up in the morning I would see the sun rising above the mountains. Never in my life have I ever been surrounded by pure untainted beauty.

Sitting in the back of the raft

My vacation was just what the doctor ordered. I had so much fun with my friends, but also got to relax in the beauty of Southern Africa. I’m now back in Windhoek and the days are flying by. I have one month left here and then we head to Cape Town to finish our time here. I can’t wait to see what these last few weeks entail because I know they will be nothing less than amazing.

The Hofburg, Vienna

Living large in Vienna! (Part III)

And the Vienna saga continues with Part III! If you missed Part II or Part I, you can find them at these links!

After our failed visit to the United Nations building, we decided to head to the Hofburg, the largest palace in Vienna. It was home to the royal Habsburg family, who ruled the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Perhaps you all might recognize it better as the seat of the Holy Roman Empire until Napoleon? In any case, it was an important place – and still is! It currently is home to many museums and serves as the official residence of the Austrian President.

The Hofburg, Vienna

The Hofburg is less of a palace and more of a compound. It’s huge! The palace and surrounding buildings underwent many, many renovations and additions! It’s a maze just finding the entrance!

We all decided that we wanted to tour the inside, and chose the tour that featured the National Silver Collection, The “Sisi” Museum, as well as the Royal Apartments.

Hofburg Museums, Vienna

The National Silver Collection was, umm… interesting? I didn’t know they needed so many dishes. It was like room, after room, after room, after room of dishes. These Habsburgs had all the plates, silverware, centerpieces, cups and mugs anyone could ever want. I’d imagine during the time of the empire it went something like, “Hey honey, do you want to eat off the china from the Queen of England or the plates made for the emperor of Mexico?” “Oh! Why don’t we dine off the solid gold plates?” “Great idea! We can have the 30 foot long centerpiece polished for dinner as well!”

So that was fun for about 10 minutes, but after 45 minutes of looking at dishes, we all lost our patience with that. Luckily, we were on to something a little more exciting. Now, to explain the rest of the tour I might have to go a little “history teacher on you guys,” so bear with me.

The Hofburg has a pretty decently sized museum called the “Sisi” museum. The museum is dedicated to Elisabeth (nicknamed Sisi), who was the Empress of Austria from 1854 until 1898. She married her cousin, Emperor Franz Joseph, when she was quite young (15, I think?) and was then forced into the royal spotlight. She was always kind of a “royal-rebel,” and towards the end of her life refused to partake in events and official ceremonies. Sisi also struggled with depression and (some believe) anorexia; her dresses were always measured to have a waist size between 18 and 19 inches!

It was fascinating seeing all the memorabilia from the time of Empress Elisabeth as well as learn about the history. This part of the Hofburg took another 50 minutes to get through, but it was definitely more interesting than the dishes. 😉 Perhaps my favorite quote from her was one she said after she heard that the emperor wanted to marry her. She said something along the lines of, “I do really like Franz Joseph, I only wish he weren’t the emperor.”

Franz Joseph's entrance to the royal apartments

The last part of the tour was the royal apartments, and royal they were. Done up to the finest of Viennese standards, it was quite amazing. Those of you who have seen Schönbrunn will find it very similar (Schönbrunn was mainly used as their summer home, whereas The Hofburg was their main residence).

After this we were all pretty burnt out. Half of us decided to take a little break and head back to the hostel for an hour or two before dinner, while the others headed off to the Esperanto Museum. (Esperanto was a language that was constructed using elements of many languages and is very easy to learn. It was developed in Vienna to be the new international language, but never really caught on.)

We met up again for dinner at our favorite little Viennese restaurant and enjoyed our last “Wiener Schnitzel!” – which was fantastic, by the way!

The next day our flight didn’t leave until 4 p.m. or so, and because of that we had sort of an awkward amount of time where we had to be out of the hostel, but couldn’t go right to the airport, we bummed around in Starbucks. Quite literally.

Starbucks, Vienna

We were all pretty exhausted from the long days of tourism, and (most of us) ended up falling asleep! Rachel even somehow ended up horizontal! The Starbucks workers in Vienna must of thought we were homeless or something.

All in all, it was quite the trip. We got to see lots of exciting things, much of which we’d only learned about in class or read in books!

In my next update, you all can look forward to hearing all about my classes here in Tübingen! Bis dann! Tschüß!

Lions, Zebras, and Rhinos… oh my!!

October 24, 2011 / Jodie Buchanan / 0 Comments

Lions drinking at a pond

One of the many things that I have learned while being here in Namibia is realizing how skewed my perceptions of Africa were and how people at home still have a skewed view. Growing up my two ideas of Africa came from The Lion King and those infomercials with starving African babies. However, that is not the case at all. While there are children who are hungry here, there also children that go hungry in the United States. There are lions here, but they don’t roam the continent as I once assumed they did. I can’t even begin to count the times that friends and family back home have asked me if I’ve seen a lion yet. I am staying in the capital city, Windhoek, so the only way that I can see a lion is if I go to the zoo just like at home.

Very close to an elephant!

However all of that aside I finally got a chance to see the side of Africa that so many think of. I went and camped out at Etosha a Namibian National Game park. It was one of the most surreal experiences I have ever had. As a kid, I used to love to go to the zoo, yet it always made me a little sad to see all of the animals in cages, when I felt that they should be able to roam free. Well in Etosha, the animals get to.

The moment we drove into the park, we saw a herd of wildebeests (that’s the animal that killed Mufasa for any of you Lion Kind gurus). That day I got to see Lions, Elephants, Zebra, Giraffes, Cheetah, and some rhinos. We camped on the grounds of the park and as I drifted off to sleep at night I could hear the elephants blowing their trunks in the distance. The next morning we went on an early game drive and got see a group of lions feeding on the remains of an elephant. While the whole dead elephant thing was a little gross, it was still so cool to see the lions. There is so much more to Africa than lions and the like, but I think is something that everyone should be able to see in their lifetime.

All the animals lined up

These past two weeks have been such a blur for me, I have done so much and seen so much that I feel like I can’t get my mind to sit still for a minute! But I can’t wait because tomorrow I am heading to raft down the Orange River and I know it will be so relaxing and just the break that I need. Until next time!!

Watching zebras at the watering hole at sunset

My new family

October 24, 2011 / Jodie Buchanan / 0 Comments

The chicken coup in our compound

One of the things that drew me to this program was the homestay aspect. I have already told you that I have stayed with two families, one in Johannesburg, South Africa and another in Windhoek. While I was excited for both of those experiences I was most excited for my homestay with a family in Northern Namibia in a rural setting. For a week we stayed with families in the town of Outapi, which is close to the Angolan border. I was a little nervous and didn’t really know what to expect because I knew that it would be such a different experience for me. And now looking back, it has been one of the greatest experiences in my life. My host family consisted of my Meme (mom), my sister, Secilia, and my four brothers, Ignatius, Titus, Lucas, and John. The moment that I meant my Meme she ran over to me and hugged me and picked me up… mind you this is a woman in her mid sixties!

My little brother John and me

The moment I got to their home I was made to feel like one of the family. Our house was very far in the brush and it took about 40 minutes to walk to the nearest road every morning. My family has a large herd of goats, numerous chickens, a pig and four dogs. We don’t have electricity so once the sun goes down; you have to rely on the stars and the moon for light. The bathroom consisted of the good ole outdoors, because there was no plumbing. And bathing was done with a bucket of water. Now you might be saying all of those things do not sound to fun… but I actually loved it. You never realize how much water you waste with the flush of a toilet or a ten minute shower.

A normal day with my family consists of getting up at dawn and starting chores, such as letting the goats out to pasture, feeding the chickens, waking up the small children, starting a fire for breakfast, along with many other things. At 7:00 I would then walk about 40 minutes with my brothers and they would go to school and I would meet up with the other students and we would go to our scheduled activities for the day. I would then head back to be with my family around four each day. Every night I would help start the fire and then my sister and I would cook dinner… the most memorable dinner was when I killed a chicken, plucked its feathers, cooked it and then ate it. It was one of the craziest things I have ever done. But I figured it would pretty hypocritical of me to eat meat that other people have killed but be willing to kill it myself. So the choices were kill and eat a chicken or become a vegetarian… I chose meat 🙂

Making a basket with my brother Titus

Over the weekend, my family and I just hung out at home. My meme and I wove a basket, I played soccer with my brothers, and made jewelry with neighbors. It was such an amazing time! On Sunday morning I went to church with my sister. It was very interesting, but very long… it lasted for 4 hours. Then that afternoon all the host families and students came together for a party. My meme dressed me in traditional Oshiwambo dress and made sure I looked just right before we left.

In traditional Oshiwambo dress

As the weekend came to a close I couldn’t help but think that this family had really claimed me as one of their own. Meme called me daughter, Secilia and my brothers all called me sister. I was living with a family that hardly spoke English yet I felt so loved and so welcome. On my last night we all layed out under the stars holding hands, singing, and even were crying because our family had to part. I will forever remember my Oshiwambo family because they have a piece of my heart.

Life

October 23, 2011 / Stephanie Volz / 0 Comments

Since the last time I posted, I haven’t really done much exciting traveling. I know, disappointing, but it’s only been a week or so.. But this gives me a chance to post about life in general in Reutlingen, what my average day-to-day activities are. As average as life gets here, anyway. Which isn’t that average. I mean, it’s Germany. And our professors always move classes around, so no two weeks have the same schedule. Makes things interesting.

So I guess I’ll talk about classes first. We have classes just with the other Valpo students and mostly with Valpo professors, which for this semester means there are five of us with one professor in a classroom. For all of our classes. Very different than at Valpo. We have five different classes: German language, German literature, Luther and Bach (all taught by Valpo professors), Art/Art History/Architecture (taught by a professor from another town close by), and International Economics, which also focuses on the region Reutlingen’s in and Germany and is taught by the man in charge of the international program at Reutlingen. So those five diverse classes make up our weeks, and all of them are actually pretty interesting. The only downside to these classes is that it’s just the five Valpo students in them, instead of many other programs which integrate the students into the university or at least into an international program with hundreds of other students.

Looking down from a hill onto part of Reutlingen

Instead of using classes to meet other students, we meet them most often in our dorm. These are different than dorms at Valpo. Here most rooms are singles, although I am one of the very few in a double room. Each floor in my dorm (so like 20 people) shares two toilets and two showers, one for guys and one for girls, and a kitchen/lounge area. This kitchen is where you actually meet the most people; since the cafeteria is only open for lunch, there’s always people in there cooking and watching tv or just sitting around talking. Cooking, by the way, is an adventure. Since, you know, everything’s in German. And since my German isn’t good enough to be able to read ingredients and stuff, I just make it up as I go. Problem is, I probably won’t be able to bring my newfound skills and recipes, if you call them that, to the U.S. because I won’t actually know what the ingredients are.. I just know what the bottles or packages look like! And they probably wouldn’t taste as good anyway, because Germans put much less preservatives and other junk in their food.

The best part of Reutlingen, though, is the nature, and I’ve been taking full advantage of that. There’s plenty of hills around to hike, a big outdoors sport complex with tons of fields to throw a frisbee or play some soccer on, and while out running I’ve found a big expanse of woods with trails and an absolutely beautiful nature park. And of course it’s even better now that fall is in full swing and the ground is covered with yellows, lime greens, and oranges.

One of the paths on campus yesterday

So that’s pretty much my life on a general day. And even though it does sound amazing (it is, let’s be serious), I really miss everyone back home. My best friend who’s in Athens studying abroad this semester, my boyfriend, my family, my frisbee team, and all of my other friends.. The whole experience has been a series of ups and downs, and I’ve broken down a few times because of the downs. It really is hard to be away from everyone you care about for months, and I’m only halfway through. At the same time, though, I’m already halfway through, and I feel like I’ve just started. And by the time I have everything figured out, it’ll be December and time to go home. So for these next couple of months, I’m concentrating on having the time of my life and learning more than I think possible and gaining a global perspective on things and becoming the person I want to be. And I’d say I have a pretty good start 🙂

Secession House, Vienna

Living large in Vienna! (Part II)

October 22, 2011 / Jake Stefan / 0 Comments

So you are all probably saying to yourselves right now, “Long time no post! What in the world have you been up to, Jake? We’re all waiting on the edge of our seats to read the next saga in your crazy European adventures!”

I know, I know. It’s been another one of those crazy weeks here in Tübingen with a spontaneous trip to Vienna and the first week of classes! So I’ll try my best to catch you all up during the next few days!

Because we had a little bit of free time between the end of my “Deutsch-Kompakt-Kurs” and the start of the semester, Zach, Hannah, Rachel, Emily, Helena (our Canadian friend) and I decided to do something called “Blind Booking” through the German discount airline Germanwings. We paid only 60 Euros for a two-way ticket, but we could have ended up in London, Lisbon, Rome, Barcelona, Berlin, or Vienna. Because we all simply want to see as much of Europe as we can, it wasn’t important to us that we choose exactly where we ended up!

Since Zach and I both went on the trip, we decided that he would blog about the first half, and I’d write a little about the second half! Before you read the rest of this post, you might be interested in reading Zach’s latest post first!

On Saturday we packed as much into one day as humanly possible (you think I’m joking). We woke up in the morning and had our usual hostel breakfast, and then made our way to Schönbrunn, which is conveniently right on the subway line that runs between the hostel we stayed in and downtown.

Schönbrunn (Vienna, Austria)

We spent an hour or two wandering the never-ending gardens, but decided not to take a tour of the inside. There are many palaces in Vienna, and rather than touring all of them, we decided that later on Saturday we’d go and tour the Hofburg. (The Hofburg is in the middle of the city and was the emperor’s normal residence; Schönbrunn was mainly used as a summer home.)

After Schönbrunn, we made our way to the Naschmarkt, the largest and most famous street market in Vienna. The market seemed to stretch on forever! We’d walk for a little bit, think we’d reached the end, but it would just keep going! Because we went on Saturday, it was particularly busy; at some points I was getting a little claustrophobic because there were so many people.

The Naschmarkt had so many interesting offerings. Vendors bring fresh meats, cheeses, olives, baked goods, deserts and everything else you can think of! We ended up finding a cheap Döner stand for lunch – Döner is German gyros-type meat that’s served with veggies like a sandwich. It’s often sold in Turkish snack stands, so people assume it’s Turkish, but many Germans are quick to correct you that it the Döner Sandwich actually came from Berlin.

Secession House, Vienna

After lunch we headed to the Secession House, the home of the rebellious art movement “The Vienna Secession,” founded by Gustav Klimt and other artists in 1897. The artists broke off from the primary “Wien Künstlerhaus” because they found the group too conservative and thought the group tended to copy earlier styles of art instead of pioneering innovative ways to present the ideas of the time.

The architecture of the Secession House is, in and of itself, worth seeing and the building also houses Klimt’s famous Beethoven frieze. Seeing the giant frieze in person was incredible, especially after reading about its history and the meaning behind all the panels. However, the rest of the exhibits in the Secession House left much to be desired.

The House presumably wants to keep with the “mold-breaking” nature that it’s founders intended, but some of the modern art presented there has gone a little too far. For example, the exhibits were simply random words on walls, or even air conditioning. You read that right, air conditioning. One exhibit was air conditioning a room to an uncomfortable temperature. To them that is “art.” It’s a little much, in my opinion.

We then quickly made our way the United Nations building in Vienna, because someone had told us there were daily tours. But it turned out that those daily tours were only Monday-Friday. So we saw the outside! That counts for something, right?

United Nations, Vienna

I’ve got to finish up some homework and things before I meet up with my friends later in the Altstadt, so I’ve got to leave you all hanging! In the next post (Vienna: Part III), you can look forward to hearing about The Hofburg Palace, our last night in Vienna dinner, as well as our trip back home!

Unfortunately, I had forgot the memory card for my camera in Tuebingen, so I couldn’t take any pictures in Vienna, so I’m stealing Zach’s. You can check out his pictures from the trip on his Picasa account here: https://picasaweb.google.com/117445044945979223598

Belvedere from the front

Living large in Vienna!

October 19, 2011 / Zach Nelson / 0 Comments

With the end of our five-week intensive German course came a small, one-week break prior to the start of the semester this week Monday. So, we had the last-minute idea to travel somewhere and take advantage of this last opportunity until Christmas break. At first, we decided to go to Berlin, but after some disappointing searches for cheap flights, I uncovered something called “Blind Booking,” through Germanwings, a discount airline that flies out of nearby Stuttgart.

Hostel Hütteldorf

For €60 per person, we could get round-trip tickets to one of six cities: London, Lisbon, Rome, Barcelona, Berlin, or Vienna. The only catch is that you don’t find out where you are being sent until after the transaction has been processed. A surprise trip was fine with us! We figured that we had a one out of six chance of getting our original wish (for more than €100 cheaper) and that we would gladly go to any of those cities. For €5, you could pay to exclude a city, which we had originally planned to do with London, as we will all have friends studying in nearby Cambridge next semester who we had planned on visiting anyway. With the five of us plus a Canadian friend named Helina who wanted to come along, this addition put us over the limit of my credit card, so we just had to keep London in the mix and hope for the best! It was a bit of a pain having to pay for all of our tickets together, but it was better than the alternative of everyone paying their own way and being sent to six different cities in Europe.

Emily, Jake, Hannah, Helina, and Rachel at breakfast! Maybe not quite awake yet...

As we excitedly clicked through the online purchasing process, we soon learned that we would be flying to Vienna, and the search for a Youth Hostel began shortly after. I used HostelWorld, whom I follow on Twitter, to search for a place to stay and I was very pleased with the result. The website had excellent reviews and information, and the hostel turned out to be perfect. It was a little further out of the city, but within 5 minutes of a subway station, where trains into the city came every 3-8 minutes. It was only a 15 minute ride, and I was extremely impressed with the public transportation system in Vienna. I don’t think we ever waited more than 5 minutes for the subway. It seemed like every time we walked up the stairs to the platform, one was just pulling in to take us wherever we wanted to go. At the hostel, we had the option of purchasing “Vienna Cards,” which allowed us to travel on any tram, bus, or train for 72 hours for €18. It also came with discounts to museums, so it was really an incredible value. Although everything in Vienna was pretty expensive, train travel compared to Germany was very cheap.

Vienna's shopping/commercial district

Our housing accommodations for the five-day trip, “Hostel Hütteldorf,” were quite comfortable. We shared a six-person room complete with a table and chairs where we sat every night to plan our next day’s activities. The hostel came with free internet access and free breakfast, which we did out best to fill up on every morning. As an added bonus, there was almost always a big bowl of apples on the front desk, from which I always grabbed a couple for snacks or to pack in my lunch for the next day. When you’re a poor college student traveling through another country, it’s amazing how a bowl of free apples can seem like a luxury… In any case, we had really good luck with the hostel, and would gladly go back or recommend it to anyone.

We arrived in Vienna around 8:00 PM on October 12^th, and checked into our hostel after an excellent dinner at a Viennese restaurant that Jake knew of, from having been there a few short weeks before.

We accomplished so incredibly much over five days that I hope I’ll be able to describe the first half of the trip with enough detail! Jake will be doing a post soon on the second half.

The Stephansdom

On Thursday, we woke up in time to catch breakfast, which was put away promptly each day at 9:00, and took the subway into the city. We checked out the Karlsplatz train station, built in the Jugendstil style of architecture, (as recommended by Professor DeMaris) before visiting a few churches, and making our way through the shopping district, and the Altstadt (Old City.) We also purchased tickets for a musical that we saw later that night, as well as tickets for an opera that we saw on Friday night. The Musical was called, “Ich war noch niemals in New York” (“I have never been to New York,” or “I have not yet been to New York,”) and it is fairly popular here in Europe right now. It is based on the songs of Austrian composer Udo Jürgens, and although you could tell the plot was written to include the music, it was nonetheless enjoyable. The songs were great and well-performed, and the story was light and funny. The opera for which we bought tickets was Mozart’s “Die Zauberflöte” (The Magic Flute) and it was excellent!

Ich war noch niemals in New York!

While we were walking through the city, we saw a bunch of police officers near the Opera house. They asked us all to wait on the street, and although we didn’t understand why, we of course complied. A few minutes later, a motorcade of police motorcycles and Mercedes-Benzes bearing Saudi Arabian flags drove by, as we all watched curiously. Later, we learned that they had just come from a ceremony in which a Saudi-backed religious center in Vienna was officially opened. In Saudi Arabia, the only legal religion is Islam. The idea behind the religious center in Vienna is that by funding a council of Muslims, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, and Hindus to engage others in inter-religious dialogue, the Saudis can also learn how to slowly begin to integrate other religions into their country as well. I think it’s an interesting concept.

Anyway, we also visited an art museum called “Belvedere,” which took up all of Thursday afternoon. The museum wasn’t obscenely giant like the Chicago art institute, but it was big enough to tire you out after a couple hours of taking it all in. It was great to see so many works of Egon Schiele and Gustav Klimt, whom we spent a lot of time discussing in German 220. The museum was located inside of an old palace and the grounds as well as the building itself were absolutely stunning.

Belvedere

Emily, Jake, Hannah, Rachel and Me in front of Belvedere

Belvedere from the front

On Friday, we did a little shopping (I bought a new coat!) and later explored the altstadt a little more, this time going inside of the Stephansdom (a giant church in the city center) as well as visiting Mozart’s house. We decided not to take a tour of Mozart’s house in the interest of time, but we did poke around inside just for a bit. Afterwards, we took the tram down the historic “Ringstraße” (Ring Street) to the Austrian Parliament building. Where the “Ringstraße” currently stands there once stood a wall that surrounded the city of Vienna. As the city expanded, there simply wasn’t enough space inside the wall, so it was torn down, as the need for protection had also grown weaker over the years. At Parliament, we took a fifty-minute tour of the building and the various chambers, and learned a little about how the Austrian government functions. The tour was given in German as well as English, so although we understood nearly everything, it was nice to have the English in case there were technical government terms that we didn’t get the first time around in German. The Austrian Parliament was heavily damaged during World War II, but has since been restored to its original likeness. It’s a beautiful building! While we were touring one of the open reception lobby-type areas, tables were being set up for some sort of a formal state dinner that was to occur the following night.

Mozart's house!

Me in front of the Austrian Parliament

Assembly chamber - Austrian Parliament

On Saturday, Rachel, I, and our Canadian friend Helina visited the Esperanto Museum at the Austrian National Library. Esperanto is a planned language that was invented during the early 1900’s, and this museum, housed entirely in one room, is the only one of its kind. The idea behind Esperanto was that it could serve as a new international language that was very easy to learn and understand. It is a combination of many European languages (specifically Romance Languages) and it is the most successful planned language ever created. Its founder, Ludwig Zamenhof, grew up in a town in present-day Poland where the languages of Polish, German, Yiddish, Russian, and Belarusian were spoken among the many immigrants living there. His goal was to devise a language to bridge the language barriers among the various ethnic groups in his town. The museum was very interesting, and I’m almost positive it’s the only place in the world where you can choose to read or hear the exhibits in either German, English, or Esperanto.

That’s all for now! Check out my pictures at: https://picasaweb.google.com/117445044945979223598

Thanks for reading!

Bis Dann!

Mercedes-Benz Museum

Catch up part 2: Weekend excursion and field trips to Stuttgart!

October 17, 2011 / Zach Nelson / 0 Comments

Okay, now that I am back from my five-day trip to Vienna (blog to come!) I can finally continue to play blog entry catch up.

On Friday September 30th, I traveled to northern Hessen (a centrally-located state in Germany) to visit some friends for the long weekend, as Monday, October 3rd is a national holiday in Germany (Day of German Reunification.) As a high school student, I had the opportunity to travel to both Germany and northern Italy with my German class during the spring of my junior year in 2008. Since then, I have remained good friends with my host family (the Stübers).

I began my travels with the train from Tübingen to Stuttgart, and then by car with a perfect stranger from Stuttgart to Fulda, from which point I continued with the train to Eschwege. In Germany, there is a website called “Mitfahrgelegenheit” (literally, “Opportunity to ride along”) where people can post trips they are making by car, and how much space they have for others to ride along and split the cost of gas. It is somewhat similar to the “Rideshare” board back at VU, and in other ways it is essentially glorified hitchhiking. It is, however, significantly cheaper than taking the train, and although I had my qualms about it at first, it turned out to be a very nice way to travel. There were three of us riding along plus the driver, so it was a very cramped ride in the back seat of a tiny BMW, but everyone was very nice and it was an excellent opportunity to practice my German as well. In the United States, I think many people would see the concept of “Mitfahrgelegenheit” as dangerous, or untrustworthy. In Germany, where the conservation of resources and money is a high cultural priority, it is seen as a way to be less wasteful and to save time and money. Before picking up the other two passengers, I talked for awhile with the driver about Mitfahrgelegenheit in respect to the culture of Germany, and why many Americans would be weary about trusting someone they didn’t know to drive them somewhere. He told me an interesting story about an American friend of his, who was under the impression that Germany was a dangerous place because people were not allowed to carry guns and defend themselves if necessary. We both had a good laugh about that one…

Anyway, the weekend of September 30th was an especially eventful one in the Stübers little town near Eschwege, because it happened to be the weekend of their annual “Kirmes” festival. Jonas, my high school exchange partner, was one of the event organizers this year, so both he and his family were kept very busy putting on the festival.

Every night there was a different themed dance party in a giant beer tent, and during the day there were parades, bumper cars, carnival-type games, and other festivities. I arrived late on Friday – shortly before midnight – but after unpacking all of my things, I was dropped off at the tent where we proceeded to partake in the Kirmes revelry until 4:30 AM. It took almost eight hours to get from Tübingen to Eschwege, mostly due to an obscenely long traffic jam on the Autobahn, so I was already exhausted at midnight. Needless to say, but 4:30 I was quite ready for bed.

The disco parties every night where pretty similar, with the exception of the music, which changed. Friday night was a mix of everything, Saturday night was more traditional German music, and Sunday night featured a live band playing “Oldies” music from both Germany and the United States, among other countries. I was introduced to so many people I could barely keep up with what was happening as I tried to dance along to music I had never heard before. As someone who does not speak German as a native language, it is enough of a mental workout for me to understand everything that’s going on in normal conversation. The music was so loud that most of the time I could barely hear well enough to struggle through the task of comprehending what was being said to me, so I did a lot of nodding and smiling. It’s amazing what you can tell just by a person’s facial expressions, even if you can’t hear or understand them.

The thing that shocked everyone I was introduced to most was not that an American had come to attend a beerfest in a town of 700 people, but that I could not actually drink the beer; I’m gluten intolerant. Many people after meeting me and talking with me for awhile would abruptly interrupt the conversation to ask if I would like a drink. And not just any drink, but a beer. Before they would disappear into the enormous crowd, I would have to explain that although I would love something to drink, that I was allergic to wheat and couldn’t drink beer. “You can’t drink beer?!?” they would ask. “Then what can you drink?” At first, I didn’t know myself what was on the menu, so I would just say, “I’m not sure… What other things do they serve here?” After a few long minutes of thought, my friend Daisy answered, “Whiskey cola!” So, from that point onward, I was brought many whiskey colas. It was as if some mad bartender kept mixing them up just for me, and sending them out to the dance floor on a long conveyor belt, from which everyone then grabbed a drink to offer to the Stübers’ American friend. At one point I had three whiskey colas to finish…

A blurry picture of kids with lanterns in the Fackelumzug

The Kirmes festivities also included two parades, both of which I was asked to participate in. The first parade was a Torch Parade, or, “Fackelumzug.” All the adults carried torches (with giant, dangerous, blazing flames) and the kids all carried battery-operated lanterns to prevent the town from burning to the ground. Daisy and Jonas’ seven-year-old sister could barely contain her excitement for the entire day leading up to the torch parade – she was so excited to walk through the town with me and to carry her lantern. I am quite certain that I was introduced to every child in the entire town as, “Zach, mein Freund aus Amerika!” (Zach, my friend from America.)

My friend Daisy and I in the Fackelumzug

My second Kirmes parade experience was without a giant torch, but I did get to wear a chef hat and carry a banner! My friend Daisy plays on a women’s soccer team comprised of two neighboring towns, and a couple of the players from her team got together to walk in the parade. The coach dressed up like a chef, and I helped carry one of two banners with phrases that fit the cooking theme. Daisy’s little sister took on the role of throwing candy to the children watching the parade from the sidewalk. I found this to be a little funny, because the streets were so narrow that “throwing” the candy really wasn’t necessary as it is in parades back home. All she had to do was drop it on the ground next to the curb, or maybe toss it just a little bit.

Me with Daisy’s soccer team before the parade

After sleeping in a little bit on Monday, I was back to the train station to make the long trip back to Tübingen via train and Mitfahrgelegenheit. All in all, my weekend with the Stübers / at the Kirmes festival was a lot of fun, and I really enjoyed comparing their “small town festival” to those back home. There were more similarities that I would have imagined.

Mercedes-Benz Museum

Since I was caught up on my blogging, I have also been on two field trips to nearby Stuttgart, the capital of Baden-Württemberg. The first time was with my German course, and consisted of seeing the Mercedes-Benz museum, and then watching an Opera – La Traviata. The Mercedes-Benz Museum was excellent, and as a car enthusiast, I enjoyed myself very much. Even for those who aren’t all that car-crazy, I still think it would be a really fun museum to visit. For example, there is a “Room of Celebrities” exhibit that features Princess Diana’s Mercedes-Benz sports car as well as a Popemobile. The architecture of the building is great, both exterior and interior. Once inside, everyone receives an audio guide, and is taken to the top floor via elevator, where you arrive in a room with just a model of a horse in the middle to represent the age before cars were invented. Shortly after comes the exhibit about the first cars ever invented. After this point, the museum splits into two downward intertwining spiral directions – one featuring more technical exhibits, and the other featuring more historical exhibits. I made sure I saw both sides before descending to the floor below! Although I’m not a big opera fan, La Traviata was interesting to see and hear. (I was actually able to see Die Zauberflöte in Vienna a few days ago, which was really cool, so maybe my opinion on Operas has changed? More to come on that soon! At any rate, La Traviata wasn’t my favorite.)

Me in front of the Mercedes-Benz Museum

Hannah, Emily, Jake and Rachel with their audio guides – Mercedes-Benz Museum

The second field trip to Stuttgart was to visit the Canstatter Wasen – the world’s second largest “Beerfest” after Oktoberfest in Munich. The Canstatter Wasen is not as well known because unlike Oktoberfest, it’s not a tourist destination. I was completely blown away by how large it was. The only thing I could compare it to would be the Wisconsin Sate Fair – complete with rides, roller coaters, carnival games, stores, and giant beer “tents.” Valpo’s connections with nearby Reutlingen University enabled us Tübingen students to get tickets to go along, as obtaining seats in the giant portable buildings they call “tents” can be difficult. Seeing the beerfest was an interesting experience, but it is not one that I need to repeat. Everyone from Valpo was given one coupon for food, and two coupons for beer – each coupon was redeemable for 1 “Mass” of beer, a giant mug filled with nearly two liters of beer. Because I can’t drink beer, standing on a table dancing among thousands of people holding giant mugs filled with two liters of beer while singing, dancing, spilling on you, blocking every imaginable exit, and being completely obnoxious wasn’t exactly enjoyable for me. I am sure that if I were also able to drink a two-liter mug of beer that my experiences would have been much different! All of the beer drinkers loved it. I however, had to pay almost €10 for carbonated apple juice. I would also like to point out that contrary to common belief, the German’s don’t actually walk around in public wearing lederhosen. Except for at beerfests, which are lederhosen extravaganzas. (The lederhosen-wearing, giant beer-drinking stereotype of Germans is largely untrue most every part of the year, except for beerfests such as the Canstatter Wasen.)

The Canstatter Wasen

A whole lot of crazy. And this was just the very beginning…

That’s all for this blog post! I’ll try to get my Vienna experiences up as soon as possible!

Bis Dann

Ketchup

October 14, 2011 / Stephanie Volz / 0 Comments

What did the mommy tomato say to the baby tomato when he fell behind? …Ketchup! So since I haven’t posted in a while, I thought I’d play a little “ketchup” here. Like catch up, get it? I make myself laugh sometimes. So anyway. On a more serious note. Two weeks ago we left on a week-and-a-half-long adventure to Luther- and Bach-land for our Luther and Bach course. See, this is why studying abroad is amazing. Because “class” consists of traveling and seeing the stuff you read about in real life. It’s kinda awesome.

St. Thomas Church

Anyway, our first stop was Leipzig for the weekend. While there, we took a tour of the Stadtmitte (I’m gonna keep using this word in my posts. It’s literally “city middle,” and it means the old part of the city that’s now a pedestrian zone, usually with an old church or two, cobblestone streets and sidewalks, and lots and lots of outside restaurants and shops and pidgeons). So on this tour of Leipzig’s Stadtmitte, we got to see the churches that Bach worked at, and Goethe’s favorite restaurant, which hosted a legendary barrel ride by Faust (the person, before Goethe wrote about it), among other things. While in Leipzig, we also visited the Bach museum. The highlight of this part, however, was hearing the Thomanerchor (the young boy’s choir for the St. Thomas Church, where Bach did a lot of his stuff) sing the Bach cantata that we studied in class the week before. Pretty cool stuff.

In front of the 95-theses door!

Our next stop was Wittenberg, the famous Luther city. This was my favorite part of the trip, since I’m such a big Luther geek. But he’s awesome. Anyway, we took a tour of this city too. We got to see the Luther museum in the Luther house, which had THE LUTHER BIBLE. Like, THE ORIGINAL ONE THAT HE TRANSLATED. It was amazing. And then of course we got to see the church where he nailed the 95 theses to the door. Even though the door burned down in a fire, it was still the same place, still super cool. And we even got to see the church where he did his pastor work. The church is now considered the Mother of the Reformation. So yeah, Wittenberg was amazing. Especially for a Lutheran/Luther geek like me.

Wartburg Castle

The next day we stopped in Erfurt and took a tour of the city. (Yes, again. They did get a little old..) This one wasn’t too interesting. Although we did get to see the monastery where Luther spent some time. There were also some beautiful churches. And our guide pointed out where the Pope had stood only two weeks previously, which was kinda cool. But then the next day was cooler, in Eisenach. Yeah, we never stayed long in one place.. But anyway, Eisenach had Bach’s childhood home and a bunch of instruments of the time. And a great music room where you could sit and listen to Bach’s compositions for hours. This town also has Wartburg castle, which we visited in the afternoon. This is the castle where Luther spent ten months when he was hiding from the authorities who wanted to kill him. So we got to see his room where he translated the Bible. Which was also really cool.

But then we had a few days off until we had to be back in Reutlingen. So a few of us decided to head to southern Bavaria to see the Alps. They were incredible. And it was just beautiful. So I’m gonna attach a few pics.. It really was absolutely beautiful. And the town we were in, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, hosted the Winter Olympics not too long ago, so the ski jump and ice rink are still operating. We wanted to go skating in the olympic skating rink, but ran out of time.. Because we were on the highest peak in Germany!!! In a snowstorm 🙂 Which was actually a little sad, because apparently the view is absolutely incredible. But we could only see maybe 100 feet away. If that. But still, we were in a snowstorm. And then got to play on a glacier. Not bad for a day’s work.

Neuschwanstein

Snowstorm! And at the highest point!

View from our hostel... What??

On the way home on Saturday, we went to Neuschwanstein, the famous Cinderella castle. I had been here before, but was still amazed at how cool the inside and outside was. Surrounded by mountains and with a brilliant blue lake, but the inside had a grotto. (Literally, he had a cave installed in the castle. We called it his Batcave. Although Batman probably had a better car.) It’s hard to choose which one was better.

So we got back Saturday night to Reutlingen. And the next day we had Oktoberfest! Well, technically the Cannstatter Volksfest, since it’s not the one in Munich. But the one in Stuttgart is the second-biggest one, and apparently a lot less touristy. So, more authentic. And it was. Authentic, and amazing. Guys wearing lederhosen and those German dresses on girls. Complete with huge glasses of beer. One Mass = one liter of beer. And being part of the Reutlingen University group, we got two free Mass, and dinner. Pretty sweet deal. Germans are so uptight most of the time, that this is their one excuse to go crazy. And go crazy they do. Carnival rides (even roller coasters), massive beer tents (which aren’t tents really, but more like gigantic wooden structures they construct just for this event), cool market shops, and lots and lots of German sausages.

Awesome people.

One of the beer tents before people got there

So that’s pretty much what I’ve been up to for the past two weeks. That and “normal” class. Been pretty busy. Obviously. So I’ll write more soon!

Remnants of the ancient settlement on the Bodensee at the “Pfahlbau Museum.”

Catch up blog Part 1 of 2! Hiking to Würmlingen / Bodensee Class Trip

October 11, 2011 / Zach Nelson / 0 Comments

As of last Friday, our five-week intensive German course is finished. Now that I’m done studying everything there is to know about German grammar, I finally have some time to catch up on my blogging – but unfortunately not too much, because I’m leaving for Vienna in eight hours!

It’s been awhile since my last post, but I’ll try my best to write a little bit about some of the things I’ve done over the past few weeks! Because of how many things I want to write about (and the fact that it is 5 AM and I haven’t gone to sleep yet) this will have to be part one of two “catch up” entries, but part two will have to wait until I am back from Vienna!

September 18th – Trek to Würmlingen
As I mentioned in my last blog, the five of us Valpo Tübingen students became hopelessly lost in the woods on the way to visit the Brixners – longtime friends and professors of Valparaiso University. As of earlier this year, the Brixners retired from their jobs as professors at the VU Reutlingen program, and they were awarded with honorary doctorates from President Heckler at the graduation commencement in May. They absolutely love Valpo students, and even though they no longer work with them on a daily basis, they invited us to their house for dinner.

Emily and I in the middle of a field. (Dancing to entertain ourselves. We were so bored and lost.)

Mr. and Mrs. Brixner live in a town called Würmlingen – which although only a few minutes by car, is about a 1.5 hour hike through the forest from Tübingen. According to the Brixners, it is tradition that when students are invited to their house for dinner that they hike from Tübingen, along a path that originates near the castle. We were told by many that the path was clearly marked, and that finding our way would be absolutely no problem. In reality, it was anything but clearly marked! We had even read three sets of directions before setting out for Würmlingen.

The church we should have walked past. Zoomed in from a very far distance.

The path began as a concrete road, which turned into a concrete path, which became a gravel path, and eventually a dirt trail through the forest, splitting off into a multitude of unmarked forks every few minutes along the way. We were pretty successful with guessing which fork to take initially, until we made a small mistake. Luckily, we came across a woman hiking through the forest, who directed us back to the right path, and told us which signs to follow. We weren’t that far astray, so five minutes later, and we were back on the right track.

We continued onward for awhile before coming to a point where the trail split into three paths. A sign that read “Würmlingen” hung indecisively and unhelpfully between two of the paths, and after much discussion and some disagreement, we decided to take the path to the right. It was wrong, and added an extra hour and a half to our trip. So rather than visiting a picturesque, well-known chapel on top of a mountain shortly before arriving at the Brixners’ house, we took a much more pastoral route. Instead, we saw horse farms, streams, empty fields, towns, and an unfamiliar train station before realizing that we had arrived in the wrong place.

After walking about 45 minutes along the side of a road connecting the towns, we finally ended up in a neighborhood where sweet Mrs. Brixner was pacing the sidewalks in search of the five lost Americans for whom she had spent the day cooking. It was a little embarrassing, but they were happy to see and feed us nonetheless! After touring their house and garden and being entertained by Mr. Brixner’s stories, we were served the best German meal I’ve ever had – consisting of potato salad, meat, salad, and ice cream cake.

September 28th – Class trip to the lake of Constance
On September 28th our entire Deutsch Kompakt Kurs (German Compact Course) took a trip to the “Bodensee” (Lake of Constance) and the city of “Konstanz.” The Bodensee is one of the largest lakes in Europe, as well as one of southern Germany’s largest sources of drinking water.

Rococo Church Exterior

We began our tour with a stop at a Rococo-style Church close to Konstanz, right next to the water. The exterior, although beautiful, wasn’t particularly “churchy” looking, but the inside was absolutely stunning. Some people don’t like the Rococo style due to the complete sensory-overload decorations that adorn every centimeter of the interior, but I found it fascinating. Absolutely everywhere you could lay eyes upon was in some way decorative. Sitting through a long sermon during a church service there would be no problem – there’s so much to look at!

Complete sensory overload! Rococo church interior

From the Rococo church we hiked along the lake for about 30 minutes until we reached the “Pfahlbau Museum.” Here we learned about the Bronze and Stone Age settlements that were discovered dating back to 850 BC. Because the forest was so extremely thick, an entire village of wooden, thatched-roofed houses was built directly over the water on stilts. Some of the original buildings remain and some are recreations, but it was still very interesting to see and learn about. The tour guide was slightly difficult to understand at times, but I think I took most of the important details away from the experience.

Remnants of the ancient settlement on the Bodensee at the “Pfahlbau Museum.”

The next stop was a tour of Meersburg Castle, which happens to be the oldest currently-inhabited castle in Europe. The lakeside castle was a very important location during the reformation, but it is perhaps better known as the home of German Poetess, Annette von Droste-Hülshoff.

Part of the Castle Exterior

Looking out the castle window! Bedroom of the famous German poetess!

We ended our day with a ferry-ride to the city of Konstanz, where we were given the chance to explore the city before joining for dinner at a Turkish restaurant. Some people in the course took advantage of the free time and crossed the border into Switzerland, but I decided to stay in Konstanz and see some of the sights, landmarks, and churches in the city itself.

Yet another giant, old, beautiful, European church! Konstanz.

The Bodensee, and flags of the states and countries that border it

That’s all for now! I’m off to bed so I can wake up in a few hours, shove some clothes in a backpack, and be out the door en route to the airport.

Bis dann!

Valpo Voyager

Student Stories from Around the World