Hello again!

I just spend 5 minutes figuring out how to start my first blog in over 2 months, but i don't think there is a good solution to that one. It's been hard to actually get around to it, it's quite a task putting the past 2 and a half months of my life into one blog post. It's like when people ask you after a month or two what is new, how are you supposed to respond to that? But I have felt guilty about not letting you all back home know about what's going on in the wonderful world of Freiburg. In my German class last Thursday we did an exercise yet again about what it means to be from the US, and what we miss the most about home. The list went on and on, it was quite different doing it now than it was the first couple weeks. But it hasn't changed that I miss all of you and can't wait to see you all again.

First of all I love it here! it is better than i could have ever imagined. So far I have no regrets about anything, i am right where I want to be. The biggest thing is learning the language, i think i have a new opinion every other day about whether i am where i want to be with it, but right now i feel like i have come a long ways and am doing very well with it! I broke a barrier last week where i can understand just about everything without trying too hard. This helps a lot when it comes to class, which are all in german and takes extreme concentration to pay attention. It is very difficult to bring yourself back into the lecture after zoning out just for a few seconds, not that I ever have to do that... The next thing is that I have made quite a few German friends in the past few weeks, mostly through my roommate. I hang out with him and his friends quite a bit now and almost always speak german. Another thing I am happy with is the amount of travelling I have been doing. Anytime someone talks about somewhere in Germany, i can almost always say I have been there. People are always telling me that I have been everywhere, and i take pride in that. I have been to over 12 cities in Germany: to Freiburg, Marburg, Heidelberg, Munich, Nuremburg, Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Cologne, Düsseldorf for three hours, Dresden, Leipzig, Erfurt, Berlin, and a few smaller cities around Freiburg. Not to mention the many countries I've been to. After seeing all of these places, Freiburg remains my favorite place, it is the perfect town! perfect size and there is always stuff to do here.

Next weekend I will be adding one more to that list and going to Augsburg in Bayern with Britta to visit some of her relatives. I am very excited about this, to meet them, I have heard they are wonderful people!, speak german with them and to stay in a house which will be wonderful after my apartment and hostels, and of course to see Britta! Along with that, Britta and I have been planning a trip to Ireland for the end of May for my week long Pentecost break. We have already booked our flight and all three of the hostels we will be staying in. We are spending two days in Dublin, two days in Galway, and two days in Killarny. I have heard Ireland is a beautiful country so we wanted to see all the parts of it we could, not just go to see Dublin but actually get out into the countryside.

One of the best experiences I've had in my trip so far was last week on May Day. May Day is Germany's version of labor day. All the students, including me, got the Tuesday off. Monday night I asked my roommate what the best thing to do at night was since it was supposed to be a good night. He told me the best options and then just invited me with him. So i went out with a few people from IES and him and his friends. It was a great time and then his friends invited Jason, one of my best friends on the trip, and I to go hiking with them on May Day, which was my best experience: we hiked for 5 hours and saw a part of Freiburg I had never seen before and spoke German the whole time. they were all great and told us we couldn't speak english the entire time which is just what i needed instead of people just speaking english to me. It was a wonderful time! Then they invited us both to an apartment party of their friends on Friday which we went to and I had a blast at that as well, and even learned a German drinking game :)

At the beginning of April we had a week off for Easter break, and I took that opportunity the travel around Germany. For the first 5 days of my 7 day trip I spent travelling alone. I have heard from many people in the past that everyone should travel alone at some point their life, and I am so glad I did. It was very difficult at times, especially since I am usually not a planner but a follower, at least I used to be, i found that has changed when we took a group trip to Munich and I found I could not mindlessly follow people anymore. The last two days of my trip I met up with 5 people from my program in Cologne and had a wonderful time there as well. Despite the great experience of travelling alone, i was so happy to have company again. Cologne is one of my top three favorite cities is Germany, it had everything you could want and the Kölner Dom was an amazing sight. There are more stories along with that trip but those i will save for my return.

It is strange that i chose today to finally update my blog because i have many midterms, projects and papers coming up this week and the week after. It is very strange to be just starting mid-terms when almost everyone else I know is either done or almost done with the semester. I am not sure how hard the mid-terms here will be, i have heard not to worry because they are such easy graders, but i can't help but thinking they will be pretty hard. I am taking classes that i don't normally take and aren't really my specialty and they are in a different language. I am taking the required normal German class which is by far my favorite, my teacher is one of the best teachers i have ever had and i am learning so much in that class, then i'm also taking, Art History, German Literature after 1945, I can barely analyze texts in english and now i am attempting to do it in german, Medieval history, and Authoritarian and Democratic Traditions, another history class. I never thought i would miss math and engineering as much as i do.

Dalton is coming to visit in less than two weeks and i am very excited to see him and show him around. i think my friends are just as excited to meet him as i am to see him, so dalton you better be ready! i tell people they won't be able to tell us apart and they don't believe me so we will have fun messing with them. you can even go to class for me if you want... Britta has already visited me and it was great showing her around! i love to show people this world i am living in. i wish i could show you all but i will just have to do the best i can with words and pictures, or there is still time for you to plan a trip here and visit me! I will have to put pictures up later, hopefully, for all of you to see. don't worry i have been taking them.

Besides family and friends, and the food, free water and refills, both of my homes, and many other things that i miss very much, i find that i another thing i am excited for when i get back is to try all the different kinds of beer and see how they compares to how it tasted before i came here. i think they will taste much better now, so mom you better have some amberbock in the fridge! I am also one of two sophomores on my trip, everyone else is a junior, so i frequently get made fun of that i will not be 21 until January. It will be quite a shock going back to that.

Hope all is great!

Travels

It has been about three and a half weeks since my last post, and a lot has happened since then! I can barely believe it myself but since January 28th I have been in 5 different countries: Italy, Austria, Germany, Prague and Switzerland. Currently I am in Marburg, Germany with Britta and she had to go to class today so this gave me my first chance to update my blog. She was very good about giving me options of places to go and I chose Basic coffee next to the main train station. Despite having walked here about 6 times with Britta I got lost on my way, but of course I found it in the end.

I will now try to go back to 3 and a half weeks ago to when I was in Venice, it seems like so long ago but at the same time it feels like the time since then has gone so fast. Venice was a very unique and interesting experience for me. I went there by myself and stayed in a hostel: A Venice Museum. I spend my first two days exploring on my own, just walking around getting a feel for the very different city of Venice. Then the second night I was there I had dinner at the hostel with 11 different people from all over the world. There were people from Brazil, New Zealand, South Korea, England, Mexico, and Italy. I spent the rest of the night hanging out and talking with these people and it was an awesome experience to be able to talk with all of these people and share stories and experiences and things about our culture back home.

After Venice I had one of my most stressful travelling experiences on my way to Vienna to visit my bro the Dietz. I had to take 4 different means of transportation that took a total of 11 hours before I finally arrived in Vienna at 11:30 at night. Being tired after a long day of travel did not mean I got to go to bed however, I had to/got to go meet all of Dalton’s friends and have him try to explain to me a bit about the city. The beginning of my visit in Vienna started out sehr interresant. We went to a ballet on a Sunday afternoon, something I never thought I would go to. I wouldn’t say it was the most fun thing I’ve ever done but it was still cool to go to. During the week, Dalton had class and kind of a lot of work to do but we still managed to go skating in front of the Rathaus, go to the aquarium, get 50 cent cocktails, go to the biggest club in Vienna where I was treated to 50 Euros of free drinks because my birthday was in January, eat doeners, SCHNITZELTAG, see a marching band and just hang out in his apartment and meet his roommates and his friends.

After Vienna, I traveled to Leipzig to see my exchange student from high school that I hadn’t seen in two and a half years. Robert and his father greeted me at the train station and for the next week after that I spoke mostly German which was very hard but good for me. I found it took away a lot of my energy but I still tried to do as much as I could. The Lorenz’s hospitality is phenomenal. Bringing my bags down to my bedroom to find a basket full of German chocolate was a great way to make me feel welcome in their home once more. The first night I was there Robert took me to the place where the college kids in Leipzig hang out. It was cool to see that side of Leipzig because it’s a much different side of the city than what I saw when I was there before. During the week I got to meet his girlfriend Anni who is very nice, as well as some of his friends, and I got to meet up with another fellow GAPP student, Mareike, which was awesome to be able to catch up with her again. We also went to the Leipzig zoo, went rock climbing, watched many movies in German, played Siedlers von Catan, and enjoyed many delicious home-cooked meals! For the last three days of the week I was with Robert, the two of us embarked on a journey to Prague. Despite the minus 15-18 degree weather (around 0 F) I found Prague to be a beautiful city and we found a lot of stuff to do. It was enjoyable but by the end of the trip I was ready to return to Leipzig for the next day I would get to see Britta! It is sometimes hard for me to relax and enjoy what’s happening at that very moment because the next destination on my list is always an exciting one.

Britta did not lie when she said how beautiful the city of Marburg really was or that it reminded her of a fairytale. After travels to many big cities I find myself enjoying every minute in the quaint town of Marburg. This might, however, have something to do with the person I’m spending that time with. The first night here, Britta made me dinner: calzones, and let me tell you, those calzones were the truth. But seriously in terms most people will understand, her cooking lived up to the expectations she built for herself and she made me many delicious meals. The two days after the day I arrived in Marburg, Britta showed me around the city, we walked on the river and went to a German movie called Offroad. On Wednesday we spent the afternoon in Frankfurt and that night we were off to Zurich, Switzerland. The beginning of our travels were rough, hardly ever have my travels gone smoothly around here. Our first train was 5 minutes late and knowing we only had 4 minutes to transfer made the first hour of our trip quite stressful, but we tried to keep our composure. In the end we were 8 minutes late but luckily our connecting train waited for our train to get there before it left. 3 and a half hours later, half an hour past midnight, we arrived at our hostel, wet from the rain. Zurich was expensive but very fun! We seemed to keep getting rejected from everything we wanted to do but somehow we always found a way to have fun anyways. We walked around a lot, climbed a mountain, met some people at our hostel and hung out with them at night, went to a flea market, treated ourselves to an expensive yet delicious meal where the nice man next to us bought our drinks, and had a couple picnics in the middle of February. Even though Switzerland was fun, it was nice to return to Germany. Then in Marburg we experienced Karneval!

It is now my last day in Marburg and though I will be sad to leave, a new adventure awaits me in Freiburg. My program is finally starting and I am excited to for the main part of my journey to begin. I’m not sure what awaits me, but I am certain it will be an experience to remember. 

A group of us having a battle, i guess, it kind of just turned into people posing randomly, in front of the stadium in Greece where some important olympic games took place I believe and where the Greek Gods used to have races. 

Adam and I enjoying a beer at the bar one of the first nights in Athens. (Don't mind the size of the drink, let's just say I didn't need a big one ;) )

A group of us with the Parthenon in the background.

Adam, Sara and I drinking our Starbucks in the water of the Aegean sea on a 50 degree day. Our goal was to have Starbucks in every country but apparently they don't exist in Italy.

My Birthday!

Still my birthday! We got separated from the rest of the group somehow. Trying to keep 16 or so people together is very hard. Still had a great time!

Italia!

Some of you have been pestering me about an update and my class ended today so i finally have free time! and here we are. i am at my hostel in Venice as I write this, and I am having a great time! after getting past the nerves of travelling alone it has been simply wonderful! the beginning was rough, getting to venice with no knowledge except the address of my hostel. here is more of an update from the past couple weeks:


 rome was a lot of fun! i dont know if i like it so much as a city, its really busy all the time and by the end of the week we were running out of things to do. buut the second night there me and three other guys got upgraded to the apartment suite! it was soo big. so naturally we threw a party..there was also a group from indiana there so they joined us as well which was really fun. the public transportation there is really good though, and easy to use. the second to last day we went to an AS Roma soccer game and that was amazing. one of the best things of the trip in my opinion.. then we went to florence and i love florence! there is a river that wasnt too far from our hotel and it was very nice. though florence didnt treated me so well. i accidentaly left my suitcase at our hotel in rome, because there was a pile of suitcases for those who wanted to leave them there since we were returning for our last day. i didnt know i left it til we got here and so i had to wear sweatpants for the first two days and then luckily i borrowed someones jeans for the last 2 days. i still didnt have much else to change into. also, one night i went to an american bar with people to watch the football games, the first one started at 9 and the second one at midnight. so i only stayed for the first. but i had been so good about always having one hand on my wallet or having it in my front pocket. but this time, i had it in my jacket pocket but i took that off and so i had to put it in my sweatpants pocket, which apparently have very bad pockets. i went to the bathroom and 20 minutes later someone announces my name and returns my wallet, he said the security guard found it on the sink in the bathroom. luckily i got it back, but i opened it up and noticed all of my money was gone! all 80 euros of it. i had taken 120 out of the atm earlier that day and it is now all gone. but despite the misfortune i had a great time in florence and pisa when we went for the day! we also went to some city that i dont know the name of and i went on my first tandem bike ride. it is very tricky but that made it fun.


Peace,
Dusty

Pictures

This is a picture of the famous blue mosque. It is only a 10 minute walk from out hotel. It's one of 3000 mosques in Istanbul but it's the only one with 6 minarets (the tower things).

The 6 sophomores on the trip in front of a beautiful view that you can no longer see because we're in the way.

This was taken from the ferry I was on on my way to Asia. That ship right there is the kind that I was currently on with Asia in the background.

The next two photos are from the same place but it was my favorite place so I thought i'd put two. It was the Basilica Cistern (or the underground cistern). It was where they stored the water. The first picture to me looks like the belrog if about to come out of the darkness. This place was in used in a James Bond movie as well as an episode of the Bachelorette, not sure who cares about that last one.

 Here is an example, not the best, but still, of how people in Turkey park wherever they want. They just go up onto a sidewalk and I guess that's good enough.

My favorite picture. It was taken at the Archaeology museum.

Onward

so much for that morning post...i'm really bad at this. also, the pictures are hopefully coming! theyre on my computer, so half way there! I did make it over to Asia a couple days ago so i can now officially say ive been there! it was pretty much the same as the european side but the ferry ride over was quite wonderful! and only for 2 turkish lira which is just more than a dollar. Stuff is very cheap here, i've been getting meals for 4 or 5 lira, that still doesnt mean i havent spent a lot of money though. oops. bargaining or haggling is one of my favorite things to do here! i've discovered i'm quite good at it, except for my little experience today. the price was 50 and i said that was a lot for what i was getting and he looked me in the eye and said unhappily, "excuse me my american friend, this is a fixed price". some people don't like americans too much over here.

tomorrow, i am headed to Greece where where i will have no internet apparently, so unless i pay there will be no updates until I reach Rome on the 15th. I am very excited to move on, Istanbul is fun but we've done just about everything there is to do here and it's time to move on. It's rained the past 4 days here, hopefully Greece will bring much better weather.

onto gyros!

for those who didn't know, my email is sher0145@stthomas.edu
now you can email me! funfun.

Istanbul, Turkey

After a day here I thought I should let everyone know that I have arrived. it is now 7:30 in the morning, it's hard to sleep through the turkish chanting coming from all of the mosques. Istanbul is one interesting city, it is very third world which is weird because i have not spent time in anything like it before. The city itself is divided into 2 parts, the European part and the Asian part. the European part consists of 9 millions people and the Asian part a little over 4 million. this is crazy to think about seeing as how minneapolis and st. paul combined are somewhere around 6 thousand. my hotel is in the european part but on saturday we have a free day and a group of us are going to take a ferry to the black sea which is in Asia, just to say i have been there :)

The city is filled with mostly shops, restaurants, apartments and alleys. there is hardly no grass anywhere which is kind of depressing for me. oh and there are stray cats everywhere too. the most interesting thing for me to look at in this city is the driving. i cant get over how insane it is. they hardly have street signs and just go wherever they please. there will be a street barely big enough for one car but it is still not a one way, they just look and if it looks clear they go for it. watching our bus driver drive is amazing enough in itself. our tour guide even said, if it red for the cars and you are supposed to walk, always look because its up in the air whether a car will go anyways or not. they also park wherever they want to, they'll just ramp up onto the sidewalk and get out of the car. i have some interesting pictures of this.

the pictures will come later though! once i get some more taken.
-Dustin, reporting from Istanbul, Turkey.