Christmas from München

It sucks to not be home on Christmas, and it mildly sucks to fight your way through a grocery store full of desperate last-minute Germans to stock up on food so you can hole up in a hotel room while all of Germany closes down for the 24th, 25th, and 26th. However, the internet cafe here seems lively, so maybe there will be pockets of life.

Anyway, to all those at home this is the ever-popular service announcement from your boys overseas. Imagine Julie and I waving against a backdrop of the München Altstadt. Merry Christmas everybody. Boy, how I wish I could join you.

A bit more substantial review

Amsterdam is one of the most beautiful cities we've been to, but it's also the coldest place on Earth. Sure, each city has had its charms, but far and away the Christmas lights strung between slanting rows of brightly painted canal-side houses make Amsterdam one of the prettiest. Again, though, it's the coldest city on Earth, so my memory of it might be a bit tainted by trying to hike my H&M scarf up ever further.

Julie and I have started buying gifts sporadically, but with increasing momentum. One gift I think is particularly inspired, and falls well within the category of "stuff you can only get here," where "here" is defined retrospectively as Koln. I even had to run through the crowded streets (oh those throngs of well-dressed people!) and narrow corridors to get it, making it, (I think) extra-special.

Koln was a welcome change from the country-side, which got so quiet and lifeless at night. Corvallis is a pretty sleepy town, but there's always at least the buzz of traffic, if not a party at the neighbors'. Despite its silence, Malgarten was absolutely beautiful, and it was exactly what I wanted the German countryside to be like. Julie and I ate a fancy five course dinner family restaurant just across the street with goose and sauerbraten, striped trout soup, and Chocolate cake from Vienna. When Vienna is just a hop, skip, and a jump away, I can picture some mountain man with lederhosen and a knapsack full of my chocolate cake crossing the Alps, not some faceless refrigerated airplane that would carry the cake to the U.S. I think it's a little more romantic of a notion is all.

The lady who runs the monastery (Kloster Malgarten) sent Julie and I off with two books of her husband's art, two souvenir mugs, and friendly hugs. Which was unexpected because people in the German countryside usually border on the rude. I guess they're just trying to be honest - after all, why should they be nice to a complete stranger? But once you try to get to know them apparently, they show you all of the renovations they've made to their monastery, their art gallery, wake you up for breakfast (although that was kind of our fault for sleeping in), and give you parting gifts and hugs. Again, maybe this was just Frau Heitmann, but I'd like to leave the rural parts of Germany believing everyone would have done this.

By the way, everyone go to Kloster Malgarten, north of Bramsche. If you're in Germany, that is. There are Napoleonic prisons! Who doesn't like Napoleonic prisons?

It's kind of suprising, but Julie and I have planned our next two weeks in stunning detail! Tomorrow we go to Heidelberg and will spend the night there. Then we go to Stuttgart for two nights. After that, from the 21st to the 23rd we will be in Nuremberg, and then we will go to Munich, where we will be from the 23rd to the 26th. After Munich, we will be in Salzburg, Austria from the 26th to the 28th and after that things are a bit hazier, but we have definite reservations in Berlin from the 29th to the 1st. We're also going to see Prague and Dresden before heading to Frankfurt for the night of the 4th.

Since all of our train rides are covered on those days that we travel (within Benelux, Germany, and Austria at least) we could feasibly go straight from Netherlands to Austria in one day, but will instead use this strategically to stop off in the smaller towns inbetween our destination towns. For instance, between Munich and Salzburg on the 23rd, I'm pushing for us to stop at Garmisch-Partenkirchen to see the Zugspitze - the tallest mountain in Germany. I think that between Stuttgart and Nuremberg we might see King Ludwig's castle, just outside of Fussen, but that would take us further afield.

Anyway, we're starting to get used to this travel business and are milking it for all it's worth. Just today we're seeing Anne Frank's Hiding Place, and the Rembrandt and Van Gogh museums and we're going to have to order a Heineken with dinner, what seeing as it's brewed here and all.

SO yeah! And we're having a blast! It's cold, of course, but it's been gorgeous and clear everyday, with little time left for rain - only snow! Cold, glorious snow.

Missing everybody terribly, and trying hard not to think about Christmas,
Max

P.S. Julie has just informed me that our train leaves tomorrow at 6:30 am to get to Heidelberg at about noon. So, I guess I'll be sleeping on the train!

I Do In Fact Protest...

I feel in my humble yet perhaps more beer savvy experience that Altbier has a smoother richer taste, a beautiful amber color and frothy head. The after taste though rather non-existent but if I had to describe it does not contain the coppery wash as the Kölsh does but while I do enjoy the Alt I very much like the Kölsh. In Germany how can one not like any beer they taste and savor?

And the travelling stuff

I'll get to that soon. Consider this a brief: "hey, now I'm in Koln and alive and healthy and nothing's been stolen or lost yet!" update.

It's important that I provide this after disappearing to the Kloster for two days.

Tschuss!

Kolsch is better than Altbier, in my humble opinion.

Okay, the title gets the main business out of the way. Julie may contest it, but she's wrong. There's just no arguing with the smooth taste of Kolsch.

Finding One's Inner Buddha

Where does one begin. First, I wrote a bit in my travel journal and for those of you who know me you'll know what an achievement that is. It was quite poetic actually and would have very much liked to share alas my journal resides with my bags under my hostel bed hopefully safe and sound. Max and I are now in Cologne after staying in the Kloster Malgarten. Max said that it is one of those travel secrets that people come across every now and then and I agree whole heartedly. What a wonderful place. We'll give more info when we have it in front of us.

Oh, wait, I remember my bit that I considered poetic. It describes the feeling I got while staying in the monastery. A while back, during the school term, a friend of mine and I were having one of those deep (at least deep for me) conversations and he said to me that I would make a terrible buddhist because I cannot just ''be.'' Well he of course was right but staying at the Kloster made me think that if one could not simple ''be'' there then one could not ''be'' anywhere such was the welcomed quiet and tranquility of the standing monument to history and peacefulness. I found that aside from the somewhat frustrating, albiet cardiovascularly-worthy 3 hour walk to and from town, my time spent there was relaxing and allowed me to think about absolutely nothing in particular. One of the most wonderful feelings one can have, I feel.

Cologne seems uber-interesting and our plans for tomorrow will be filled with a treck up 509 steps in the Dom and a trip to the chocolate museum. Of course, anything that has to do with Chocolate is high priority on my list. I believe that as we gather our notes, thoughts, and journal entries we'll be able to fill in some gaps with more detail so please excuse the lack of sequence that may arise during our posts.

To sum up: Train travel is not that bad, hostels aren't too bad (well, most of them anyway), Cologne has a huge Dom, and Amsterdam is on the horizen.

Oh, and I prefer the Alt bier to the Kölsh but let's just keep that between us while I'm here in Cologne. Otherwise, I might start a war.

Cheers!

Planes, Trains, and Danes

Well, I suppose I won't be repetitive and I am also racing against the internet timer so I won't go into our epic train journey as of yet but I thought I'd share some things I've learned so far:

1. Oonze Gut (sp? eek, not sure) = Excuse me in danish
2. Julie es annom dom= Julie is my name in Irish
3. The people at Torden were wonderful and I wish them all the best
4. I am a barmaid and McKenzie is a ski racer ( ;-)
5. A white russian in Amsterdam is not a drink.
6. Bremen supposedly sounds very similiar to Bramming
7. You must always use both sheets at the hostel or you get scolded in German
8. I love Europe
9. The z is switched with the y on the german key board which makes for interesting typing

As Max said we are on our way to Malgarten to stay in a monestary built in 1100 so Iäm ready for some r and r and to catch up on some reading. But I think before we head off to Bramsch we'll check out a few sights in Bremen, aka, the dome.

Also, we've met some reallz awesome people from all over the world which makes back home feel soo small. But I've been told that they are kidnapping people off the street to work in the accounting offices here so I've put the word out that I would not go to the Police should it happen to me. Until next time,

Skoal!

Bramming is NOT the cute Danish name for Bremen.

In the story of the four roving musicians, the animals never actually never make it to Bremen. Turns out, there are a lot of cities they didn't get to. Exotic danish locales like Kolding and Bramming have been left entirely untainted by their presence. However, Julie and I wanted to go to THE town that they wanted to go to - BREMEN - so when Julie and I realized that our tickets said "Bramming," and that we were awfully close to our supposed destination yet had not crossed the Danish-German border, we realized something was very wrong. Long story short, we got off the train at Kolding, not more than TWO MINUTES before the tourist information office closed, got tickets to the city in Germany, and waited an hour and a half in small town Denmark. It was mildly terrifying, but now Germany feels positively comfortable, with signs that I understand and a language I can kind of listen to.

I swear, I have never wanted to get out of a country more than I wanted to get out of Denmark last night.

I miss Copenhagen though. It feels like a completely different trip now, and less like the brief vacation with friends that Copenhagen was. Now, there's no one to show us around, and no crowd of people headed to the bar and the ice rink. The feeling at the apartment in Copenhagen was very sad, as some of the French students were also leaving Tuesday and people had made very strong connections over the past twelve weeks.

But now Julie and I are in Bremen, and today we take a train to Bramsch and then a taxi to Malgarten to our 11th century monastery! Trust me, travelling around Germany is a lot easier when you specify the country first!

Danish Penguins, Oompa-Loompas, and Fairy Tales

As Max so eloquently described our first day or rather our "day on the plane thing" I thought I'd take a stab at describing our second (or rather our third as they all seem to get so jumbled).

First, however, I must concur with my fellow traveller in saying that our Danish-American hosts are indeed amazing. Their hospitality has been overwhelming and they have, simply put, been awesome, which is why I'm glad we are all such friendsies. 

The other day Max mentioned plans to see the Carlsburg Brewery. We hopped on the 1A bus and punched our metro cards and made our way to the brewery. Imagine an adult Willy Wonka except it's not a chocolate factory it's a factory of deliciously brewed beer. As we walked around the grounds we could see the smoke rising and felt at any moment Slugsworth or an Oompa-Loompa to pop out at any moment. We finally found our way to the visitor's center only to run into a large group of Danes who were presumably waiting to take a tour. We made our way through the throngs of fashionably dressed people and waited in line but the lady at the counter broke into Danish to explain the procedure, often looking right at us as if we, too, were part of the group, it must have been the pashminas we were sporting. Very high fashion. 

After the crowd started to disperse we then made our to the counter and she said, "Oh, you're not Danish?" We replied, "No, we're American students" (students get a discount) What we wanted to say, "No, we're just here to taste the yummy fermented goodness that is European beer." But the we're students came out first and we purchased our tickets for 25 kroners, roughly 5 USD. That was good for a self-tour and two beers. Quite the deal. Tommy, Erika, and Katie, quickly rushed through as the process of brewing apparently was not as fascinating for them. Max, McKenzie, (the right way to spell it ;-) and I took our time only to realize that time was a tickin' and if we wanted our beer we had to get a move on. So, tour stops 13-23 were a blur but the Carlsburg Brewery Bar made up for any missed sights. Our time was then spent jovially over two beers of varying colors, heads, and flavors before we needed to head back. The rest of our evening, although not completely event-ridden aside from the culturally eclectic dinner was pleasant seeing as how we spent it with friends.

Now that the rest of day 2 is filled in we can begin day 3 perhaps the most touristy of our time here. First things first, papers had to be turned in so we along with Tommy, went with McKenzie and Erica to turn in their papers due at 12. We arrived around 11 and they still needed to print them out. Way to live on the dangerous side, however, all was successful. The library at CBS (Copenhagen Business School) is gorgeous, and although, I feel Lillis is quite lovely, this place, along with its students, is beyond fashionably and chic. I, however, personally dug the self check-out kiosks for books. We rushed off to meet a friend of our friends at a coffee shop dodging Danish Penguins(tiny children in snow suits a la The Christmas Story) in the metro. Tommy had to jaunt off towards his school for a presentation so Max, Mckenzie and I began our tour of Copenhagen. We saw the Rosenberg Palace, the King's Gardens, the Marble Church, haute couture shops in ancient buildings, the Royal palace in which one royal was currently home indicated by the flying of the Danish flag above the residence, and to top it all off we headed for the Little Mermaid Statue swarming with other camera-in-hand tourists.

By that time we were all tired, cold, and hungry and headed for the grocery store beneath the Magazin which is a huge department store in the middle of the city which houses a grocery underneath, the only one, according to Mckenzie, to accept cards with signature (most card purchases here must be done with a pin). Max and I were craving a pizza and headed to the pizza sandwhich shop, amazing by the by, and opted for the #16 Roma (aka Hawaiian). However, we ordered in our best Canadian accent as I'm told the owners aren't particularly fond of Americans. However, the pizza there is too good to be concerned with national pride. However, we were not asked where we were from and thus had no troubles and took our Roma pizza joyfully home.

Plans for tonight include cooking dinner and experiencing Copenhagen's night life. However, we may have to get creative as many places are not open on Mondays. No worries, though, until next time, skoal!

Copenhagen!

So, our first day was really something like two days. I mean, there was the weird "day on the plane" thing which just kind of folded into a pocket once we stepped off the plane into Copenhagen and ceased to be. And then there was the "oh god i'm so tired because I didn't sleep on the plane" thing which followed.

Our temporary hosts in Copenhagen are very amazing, I must say. We're rooming with Julie's friends that I'd met with once before while they're here studying abroad. So they know all of the tricks of the cheapest grocery store and the secret of the pizza sandwich which they shared with us for dinner last night before, at 8 pm, I just could not go on. Not even Top Model could keep me awake, I swear.

They live right in Central Copenhagen, which is expensive for them, but absolutely perfect for us. The stairs up from the Metro (an amazingly well-developed system for how recent it is) opened up to the theater building, the city's oldest hotel, and ornate apartment buildings all in a round about the public ice rink. About three blocks from their house we walked to a lane with a canal running through it and a Christmas market along one side and joined the massive crowd of people walking down the pedestrian street (everyone walks here - there was one poor car trying to cross) to the town square with city hall by Tivoli, the amusement park that we'll at least be getting dessert at at some point. I don't know - it's all so rich and clean and shiny here - all of the storefronts looked so cool, and the town square did its best impression of Times Square or Picadilly Circus and didn't do all that bad.

But like I said, that was my "oh why didn't I sleep on the plane" day, so we didn't stay out that late. We met up with Tommy, Julie's and my friend from high school, got blankets from a friend of Mackenzie's who lived in these amazing student apartments built like stacked cubes in a circle of about seven stories, and pretty much just went back to the apartment on the fourth floor off the Metro, ate, watched Top Model, and slept.

I think today we're going to an art museum, the Toburg brewery, but it's raining so we're going to do the walking tour bit tomorrow, and I'm sure we'll find plenty else to do instead. It's an amazing city - it'd be similar to home except all the signs are in anagrams and the buildings look so much cooler with, you know, having been their for centuries - and I just can't believe I'm here.

Introduction

Greetings!

As Julie and I jet-set across Germany conquering villages, defeating foul beasts, and purchasing cute trinkets from Christmas markets we will leave trace of our adventures upon this here pixelated plane.

The adventure itself will commence upon the 7th of December and will reach its resolution on the 5th of January, when we re-enter the real world via Washington D.C. (an auspicious point of re-entry, albeit). Regular updates will be made by Julie and I at each location so the reader will be veritably awash in detail of our locations and our doings, should they choose to provide such an interest.

Cheers and maybe more updates coming before the actual point of departure!

Max