das Schloss

I think one of the first things that comes to mind when one thinks of Germany, other than beer, are the castles. One castle is called a "Schloss" in German. A Schloss is a very elaborate castle that someone used to live in. There is another German word "Burg" and that is more of a fortress, that no one really lived in, but from the outside, they look sort of similar.

This last weekend was a whirlwind of travelling. I went to see Johannes and Julia in Weinheim, and it was nice to catch up with them. I got back to Rad around 10pm and crashed into bed because I had to wake up at 5am to get on a train to see Neuschwanstein!

Actually 10 of us went together. We got a schönes Wochenende ticket, which lets 5 people travel on any of the slower trains in Germany all day. It only costs 39€ total. Since we couldn't use the fast trains, we had to set out early to get to Munich by noon. The trip there was gorgeous. Bavaria is a gorgeous part of Germany. It looks a lot like Kentucky, but the other Germans think of Bavaria like we think of Texas. Basically, the Bavarians are a whole different race of people.

We had to change trains in Lindau, and after spending a few minutes there we all resolved to go back there.

I should mention that this trip took place on a Sunday, which means that Germany was SHUT DOWN. I'm surprised that trains run, actually. If you want food on a Sunday, you are s.o.l. Because of this, Lindau was deserted, and that made it seem like a fairy tail.

After our layover we went further toward Neuschwanstein, and saw more of the beautiful Bavarian countryside.

Upon reaching our destination, we ran into a small snag. Our reservation to tour the castle wasn't showing up on the (purple-haired, 60 year-old) ticket agent's screen. Luckily Joe, was able to sweet talk her into giving us a reservation. It turned out that ours was actually scheduled for October.

While we waited for our reservation we checked out the scenic views in the area.

I have to say that I wasn't that impress with the outside of the castle. I mean, yeah, it's on a mountain, and yeah, it's got a gorgeous view, and yeah, it's old, but I was expecting something more...Disney.

The inside of the castle didn't disappoint. Ludwig II died before it was finished and the people were clearly not eager to continue their labors, so it is largely unfinished. We weren't allowed to photograph the inside of the castle; heaven forbid I decide to decorate my living room with a scene of the 12 apostles and a mosaic of all life on Earth and copy their style...

It was gorgeous, but alas, all good things must end. We decided to get some lunch, weißwurst and dunkel bier, and headed home.

But wait, our fantastic trip did have a snag. Our trains home were late and at a crucial connection our train came in late, but the other trains were waiting for us. Now keep in mind, we have group tickets and it's close to the last train. We get out of the train and the conductor motions (shouts) that we should go to platform three. We looked at platform 8, and it had the train we were supposed to go to. At this point, indecision splits our group and 7 of us go to platform 8 and 3 of us go to platform 3. My group was correct (platform 8), but the other three we stranded in Friedrichshafen without a ticket. It all ended up working out for the best. Two of us stayed behind at the next stop and waited for the other three and we all go home before 1am.

das Fundbüro

Up front I'm going to tell you that this post isn't going to have any pictures, so if you border on illiterate, this may be the part where you stop reading.

You might have noticed that my posts have come less frequently than they did when I was in Washington, DC or in Eppstein. Or maybe you have noticed that the posts tend to come in bursts. Originally this was because I had (and have) no internet at my host Oma's house. Well in between those last posts and now, circumstances have worsened and then gotten better.

About 3 weeks ago, we were all hanging out at the beach, "am Strand" as we like to say, and I had my backpack with me. We then decided to move our little shindig to the altstadt of Radolfzell, I also had my backpack with me there. I then decided to go home; and I no longer had my backpack with me. I went back to the bar(s) that we were in and asked about my backpack, but no one had seen it and I couldn't find it there.

Now I'm not really attached to the backpack per se, but the backpack had my course books, my dictionary, my power adapter, my sunglasses, and my laptop in it.

I asked my German friends what I should do and they all said that I should check at this place called the Fundbüro. I had never heard the word, but apparently it is a municipal lost and found. If you find something here that is worth more than a certain amount, you are required by law to turn it in to the Fundbüro.

Well, I've checked there twice and, as amazing as this office sounds, no one has turned in my laptop. Luckily, a new laptop is not (that) expensive and so I bought one and my mom shipped it here. One thing I didn't lose was my external hard drive and that had a copy of all of my music and pictures and files, so on the balance I have only really lost the laptop. My new laptop arrived yesterday, and I've named him Heiko, which is actually a German name, despite sounding Japanese.

All things considered it could have been worse. I didn't lose my passport, my bahncard, any fingers of toes, etc

die Insel

The Bodensee is large, I'm not sure exactly how big it is, but trust me it's big. Because it's so large it has more than enough room to contain some islands. Today's word by the way means 'island'.

One of the islands is Insel Reichenau, which is a UNESCO WorldHeritage Site. Reichenau is also the place where most of the food around here is grown. The first week we were here, there was also a wine festival there.

But as pretty as Reichenau is, it's not the reason I'm writing today.The last time I was in Germany, my uncle strongly recommended that I visit a place called Insel Mainau, which is located off the coast of Konstanz. Sadly I didn't get the time and I missed it.

Insel Mainau is a botanical island and is somehow loosely related to a Swedish count who I believe lived on the island.

Now you know how I get about plants; it's bad. I just know that one day I'll end up like Seymore from Little Shop of Horrors with some crazy venus flytrap ordering me around. So when my Language School offered a trip there, I was on it like white on rice.

The island is absolutely breath taking. And the fact that it's in Germany makes it all that much better. The island has a winding footpath that takes you all around the grounds. The displays are split between very natural looking scenes of wild flowers and native plants or wildly shaped flower displays. There is also a small petting zoo, but the dwarf pony looked ridiculous and I didn't wanna chance getting anthrax or bird flu by interacting with the animals, so I speed walked past that. I'm gonna stop talking and just leave the rest to be described in pictures.

Here is a map of the Bodensee in flowers. The tall ones represent that agricultural island, Reichenau.

The Swedish Count's Castle

I have no idea who the dude is, but he is standing in front of a really cool waterfall that leads into the Bodensee.

Here is an alley of Redwood Trees!

This is one of those flower sculptures I was talking about earlier.

das Bodensee-Wasserversorgungswerk

Some of you may be asking, “Alex, I’ve heard that European water is nearly undrinkable, how do you cope with your coming lead poisoning or how do you afford bottled water at every meal?” My response to these people is usually that I lived in Iowa, if the agricultural run-off hasn’t fire bombed my endocrine system yet, I think I can handle anything.

In all seriousness though, many people in Europe are completely afraid of drinking tap water, and if you order it at a restaurant waiters will often tell you it’s impotable. Bottled water is even more popular here than in the US, and worse, Germans drink soda water instead of regular water. You will have to look high and low to find water that isn’t bubbly. Maybe to dispel the poison water myth or maybe to show off a local bit of pride, our Language School organized a trip to the Bodensee-Wasserversorgungswerk in Sipplingen. The word looks imposing, but it’s not difficult. When you break down a German compound word, start from the right, which is usually the stem word. In this case the stem is das Werk, which is a factory. All the words and word parts to the left are going to describe this factory. Sorgen is to worry about or care for something, Versorgung is a related noun that means supply or care. Finally Wasser is a cognate and means water. Bodensee is the location. So this place is a factory that supplies the water from the Bodensee. And it was cool as hell!

Most people are not allowed to tour the factory, and our school is only allowed to do it once a year, so they time their tour to the season when the CBYX students arrive. The plant takes water from the Bodensee at a rate of about 4000 liters per second. I figured they’d have the Lake emptied in no time, but it turns out that the Lake evaporates more than twice that amount per second. The water is very clean to begin with and doesn’t have much or any farm runoff and such that would make it toxic. It’s taken from deep in the Lake but it has a greenish color to it.

Once the water is taken out of the Lake it’s filtered to remove algae and other debris. The water is then mixed with ozone to kill any bacteria or viruses (and destroy almost any other things) that are in the water. Finally the water is filtered through a sort of sand trap to catch all of the remaining debris that was destroyed by the ozone.

The factory is at the top of a mountain. This is important because the factory supplies water to people living as far away as Stuttgart all without pumping it. Since Stuttgart, and most of Baden-Württemburg, is at a lower altitude the water flows naturally to it. The Factory supplies 4 million people with water, and I tried this water myself, so the next time some jerk waiter tries to tell me that I have to buy bottled water, I’m gonna drop some knowledge on him.

Finally, after our tour we left the plant, but the busses that took us up the mountain were nowhere to be seen. We soon realized that we’d be hiking down the mountain to get to our train. I wasn’t even mad because after the first turn, I saw this and really stopped caring about the hike.

der Ausflug

der Ausflug is one of German’s many words for vacation related travelling. By definition, an Ausflug takes place in one day or less and is generally to a place you can reach fairly easily. For instance, if I lived in New York, LA would not qualify as an Ausflug. Newark would be an acceptable Ausflug.

Before I get much further, I have to first say that Radolfzell, which by the way, is pronounced RAHD-olf-TSELL, is very charming. My language school is right by the city garden, which my host Oma explained used to be the city cemetery. It’s sort of an eerie thought, but the garden being a former cemetery is the least of my concerns. I said earlier that my host Oma has had 200 students here. She has one spare bed. Ergo, I’m sleeping in the same bed as 199 other people. Somehow the garden looks prettier now.

But as pretty as Radolfzell may be, the grass is always greener on the other side of the Bodensee. The Language School planned a trip to Zürich for a day and anyone in the school could go. Our tour guide would be a teacher at the school who lived in Zürich for a year after high school. Good enough for me.

We left in the morning and were in Zürich before noon. We had to change our euros to francs, because the Swiss can’t stand to be the same as anyone else. Never mind that Italy, Germany, Austria, and France all use euros, the Swiss Franc will never die. In addition, the franc looks hilarious, like a colorblindness test.

There are so many things to say about Zürich. Zürich is rich, there is a main drag of stores there and its got everything from a flea market to an Armani store with a guard. A friend of mine considered fake puking outside the Louis Vitton store just for the irony, but he didn’t, and that self discipline is why we were chosen for this trip. I did get some chocolate for my host Oma from the most expensive (and ostensible best) chocolate store in the world. I don’t know if I should brag about paying more than is reasonable for chocolate, but Sprüngli is fantastic chocolate. Even though Zürich is rich, it doesn’t seem large like DC, New York, Chicago. It is very much a European city with winding streets connecting unexpected open areas. Another cool thing about Zürich is that all of the city’s fountains are filled with potable water. We didn’t believe it at first. Actually that’s a lie, when out guide told us this, we trusted him like sheep. But eventually we did see other people drinking from the fountains too. I also saw a pigeon stick its head in the fountain, so potable water or not, the water can’t be that clean.

After a few more sights we climbed back onto our train. But our trip had one last surprise in store for us. On the return trip, we passed the Rhine river, which is no different from any other river, except that it has a gorgeous waterfall on it. I had my camera (sort of) ready.

We arrived in Radolfzell just in time to grab dinner and hang out on the beach.

die Abhängigkeit

The grammarian in me could talk for a long ass time about the word Abhänigkeit, but I’ll skip that and just say that the word means “addicition.”

My name is Alex and I have an addiction. I use several times a day usually and when I do I’m in a trance and I don’t care about friends or family or responsibilities. Any place I go to I can find a hook up. Most of my friends use too, so they’ll always help me out. I’ve used until 3 o’clock in the morning sometimes. My addiction is (among other things) the internet. Lemme describe where I’m at in my addiction. So put down your Big Book, grab some stale coffee, and listen up.

I arrived in Radolfzell about a week ago from Eppstein and I’ll be here until October. It’s been a whirlwind so far. The city is located on the largest lake in Germany, maybe in Europe, I’m not sure. It’s called the Bodensee. My town’s real name is actually Radolfzell am Bodensee. The first night we got to the Carl Duisberg Centrum and met the director, Petra. She’s fantastic and hilarious, but still very German. Imagine if Mrs. Frizzle from the Magic School Bus were actually Frau Frizzle. Seriously though she’s very helpful and I like the class.

That same night, I met my host mom. She’s actually in her seventies, so she’s more of a host Oma. When I got there, she and I had a glass of wine and got to know each other. I could not have asked for a more perfect lady. She has two guest books FULL of letters from past exchange students so she’s a veteran at this. I’m hesitant to say too much about her; Germans are very private people. Out of respect for her, I’m not gonna post any pictures of my room or her house, but know that it’s very pretty. This does however, bring me full circle to my addiction. Her (very nice) house does not have an internet connection. I’m getting the shakes just thinking about it. We were told this was a possibility. Hell, I’ve told people this myself when I worked in the Study Abroad Office, but reality is a kick in the teeth.

Other than needing a shot of Naltrexone in the morning, coming back to Germany is like riding a bike again. You totally suck at first, but you get good quickly. It’s all coming back: the weird pillows, the stunning castles, a train system that works, carbonated water instead of real water, döner. My German is much better. I can talk more readily and easily with the people around me. I even managed to get a cell phone plan without too much hassle. The CDC classes are good, but really the best German practice is to go to the store and ask a ton of questions. I walked into a tee shop in Radolfzell, and the owners asked me if I needed help finding anything. I hate tee, but it was an excuse to talk. Butchers and bakers are like fish in a barrel. Normal Germans don’t talk to strangers, but shop keepers and salesmen can’t ignore you.

I’m still in the honeymoon phase, but I like it. I’ll try to keep posting regularly; I need to find a dealer. I’m only gonna use the internet this one time, it won’t hurt anything. I just need to check Facebook too. And Twitter. Oh, but what about the news? You know, if I got mobile internet on my phone…

das Dorf

I’ve made it to Germany safe and sound. We arrived in Frankfurt Monday morning and then drove to a small town nearby called Eppstein. I really don’t think “small town” does justice to what Eppstein really is. Eppstein and many other places in Germany are technically called Dörfer, one of them is called a Dorf. The real translation is “village,” but I don’t think calling it a village does it justice either. Maybe this is just me, but I think of villages as something medieval or at the very least things that don’t exist anymore. Like with thatched roofs and horse-drawn carriages. Plus I just like using the German word Dorf whenever possible.

To illustrate what I mean by a Dorf and the weird position I think it deserves, let me tell you about Eppstein a little bit. Eppstein is where we stayed for two days after arriving, and it has some sort of training academy for bankers, I think. It’s a hostel with bank logos everywhere, but it’s a nice hostel. The dorf also has a castle and a ridiculous hill to climb in order to reach the castle. There are some really cool cars there and the place is very pretty. Now, when I left Kansas, I forgot to back a belt and have been using a bundle of embroidery floss as a make-shift belt since last Friday. I went up to the ladies that work the front desk and said (in German) “Is there anywhere nearby where I could buy a belt?” And the ladies instantly laughed at me. I was a little bit nervous about this conversation to begin with. For one, my German is rusty, and two I never learned the word for belt, but a friend told my it was “Gürtel” and I trusted him. So when the ladies laughed at me, I thought that Carl had told me something hilariously wrong, like when my mom told me that the past tense of squeeze was squoze (her joke lasted for 15 years though). It turns out that Carl didn’t lie to me; the ladies were laughing because of course there is no place to buy a belt in Eppstein; it’s a dorf. Maybe I could find a belt in Frankfurt instead. I guess I’ll have to keep my MacGuyver-style embroidery floss belt for a few more days.

This sort of shows the weird place that a dorf occupies in geography. Most of the people in a dorf would have to commute to another town for basic services like groceries or shopping or work, but the town itself isn’t necessarily old and it’s not cut off from civilization. A dorf is more like a suburb that lives on its own. Logistically I don’t think this is really that different from American cities. Imagine if you took an area like Phoenix. You have Phoenix proper and then you have the Phoenix metro, which sort of sprawls around Phoenix, but doesn’t really have distinct borders for places like Glendale or Sun City. Glendale and Sun City have center points though. Now if you took out all of the parking lots and condensed the neighborhoods toward the city center like in Germany, the distance between Phoenix and its suburbs would still be the same, but there would be a large buffer between them. This is basically how German cities are arranged, fundamentally the same as American ones but with less parking.