So since I haven’t actually written about what we’ve been doing the past four days, I think it’s about time. Also, as a side note, when I wrote “four days,” I had to stop and think for a while, because it seems soooo much longer than that.
The narrowest street in the world (and one of the Professor's cute kids hiding at the end)
Anyway. These four days have been amazing. For the most part, the group and I have just been getting acquainted with the city of Reutlingen. One day, we took a tour of the Stadtmitte, which is the only-pedestrian city center where most of the social activity, restaurants, and stores are. Despite our old and soft-spoken guide who was difficult to understand, it was fascinating to see the historical and important sights in the town. Included in the tour were the Marienkirche (St. Mary’s cathedral, the huge cathedral in the city center), the Rose Garden (which was tended by monks who lived in an adjoining building, complete with flowers, benches, and a chapel), and Reutlingen’s claim to fame in the Guinness Book of World Records, the narrowest street in the world. Unfortunately, there are too many cool photos to include in this small blog, so you’ll have to visit my Picasa account at https://picasaweb.google.com/100454144518688283131 to see the rest of them! Because this small space isn’t even close to enough room to convey the whole experience.
Molly just waiting for the bus.
Much of our time so far has been spent learning the bus and train system and walking around attempting to navigate the town. It’s not that complicated–buses come to our neighborhood every ten minutes, and leave the city center every ten minutes bound for our neighborhood. And there’s one easy route to walk to the city center. But the fact that everything’s in German makes it a bit more complicated. Times like this it’s nice to have our professor herding us around, since he’s fluent! But I’ve got it down now, I think. Time to be independent!
Not only are they the best-looking berries ever, they're also the best-tasting. Win-win.
One of the highlights of our time here has been market day, which is like an enormous farmer’s market. Meat vendors, fruit and veggie farmers, bakers, and cheese-makers all come to the market square in the city center every Saturday and Tuesday morning and sell their homemade or homegrown goodies. You can find basically anything you’d want–gigantic loaves of delicious breads, homemade honey and jam, so many fruits and veggies, and can even grab authentic German bratwurst-type sandwiches while you peruse. Again, look on my Picasa account (link above) to see all the delicious goodies, because there are way to many to portray here.
On Sunday, the Reutlingen and Tuebingen groups met up for a tour of Tuebingen given by Dr. Springer, an art history professor at the University in Tuebingen and one of the professors in the Reutlingen Valpo program. It’s a fascinating city. Unlike Reutlingen, it wasn’t destroyed in war, and so all of the buildings are extremely old, especially by American standards. The coolest part, of course, was the castle. It’d be strange if the castle wasn’t the coolest part of any tour. I mean, they’re pretty awesome. And then we got to eat at a restaurant right on the river, which has its own brewery as well as fabulous food. A great day, all in all.
CASTLE.
That’s an overview of life the past few days! Until class on Monday. But even that, too, will be incredibly interesting. After all, we’re in Europe! What isn’t interesting over here?