Dragonslayers, Wind Mills, and Bratwurst

  Friday April 1: Well, now it’s starting to get difficult, with like all the tenses and such to remember.We were introduced to the past tense and so now its alot of remembering because there no real specific rule, so essen now becomes gegessen and schlafen becomes geschlafen, and arbeiten becomes gearbeitet. I watched a movie about the last weeks of Hitler called the Downfall. It was an Academy Award Nominee. It was a very long movie, almost 4 hours long. It was on Hitler’s last stuggle at the endings of the war as Germany was losing the war. It didn’t have anything on the Holocaust; it was on the amount of soldiers sacrificed. It was set in Hitler’s bunker and the people supporting him and the dedication they had for him. It is crazy how much loyalty people with so for someone, including child soldiers who were so dedicated to support Germany. In the last days, when Hitler had lost hope and was planning to commit suicide, there were most who would follow his example, although some either took in charge to keep fighting or others tried to flee from the Russians. Hitler, because he didn’t ever want to be in the hands of the Russians as well as those close to him, poisoned his precious German shepherd Blondie, and he and his wife Eva drank poison and shot themselves, and had ordered for them to be immediately burned so that there would be no remains left of them. Even his children were put to bet and later poisoned, all because the idea was better to die now then be in the hands of others. Same went for lots of other Germans.  Later, those who had not yet committed suicide, were soon arrested and set on the Nurnberg Trials, where some then killed themselves before the day. 

 

Almond Trees in Blossom

Saturday April 2:  Well as I was about to go to bed last night, I realized a message from a classmate from school saying that she was going to Xanten with another Portuguese friend to visit the town and area of Xanten.  All this was so spur of the moment I was in shock; I wasn’t sure whether or not to accept. Well I woke up early at 6am and caught the train for 8 and we met on the train, and then met her Portuguese friends who likes in Münster and took the rest of the train to Xanten. It was great to see the change in scenery and It reminded me of home because it was the country so all you see are farms, cows and horses. When we got off the train, which was a 3 hour ride, all you could smell was cow. It was also quite exciting because we were actually very close to the boarder to the Netherlands, so what was something I was excited to see, which I had never actually see so up close; the giant windmill towers. After we got off the train be took a bus to a down nearby called Kalkar (Nordrhein-Westfalen area of Deutschland) so see a castle Schloss Moyland. The cost of the bus was outrageously expensive so that was not nice. It was a gorgeous moated castle that is said to be linked to the tower of Rappunzel and the Terrace of Romeo and Juliet! Let’s just describe it as a very beautiful and romantic place. The place itself is actually an Open Air museum of modern art, but we never got to go inside because it was closed for the day, but it was just as nice to soaked the hot sun and walk the little trails around it with Gloria and Sofia, while looking at some statues and awwing over the beauty of the blooming almond trees. We stopped for an Eis Kaffee while waiting for the bus. Both girls were sent to Germany through a Portuguese embassy to work. I can’t believe all the work these girls are responsible for! One as I said, works at Deutche Welle as a journalist and the other is a Environmental designers and there have so many other responsibilities and tasks that they must do; it’s incredibly exhausting for them.  We stopped at the Kalkar Centre and believe it or not stopped and ate at a Subway (the girls had never been to one before), and boy was that delicious! After we went into the local museum and looked around. The little of lady there was so cute and so very nice. She spoke very good English, which was very surprising. She had said she had done a lot of traveling in her earlier years, like around the world. Kalkar and Xanten have a lot of history and go back to the Middle Ages and were also settlements of the Romans. We were also noticed pleasantly, that everyone there were exceptionally friendly and warm.  We then went into the St. Nicolai Church there and I was soon very shocked. Plain on the outside, I am still in awe of the incredible stained glass windows. The church had very beautiful wooden carving, but windows interested me the most. The colours in them were brilliant and so intense! They’re not the typical church ones, with depictions of people, but just many different colours and patterns! They reminded me of a gorgeous collage of psychedelia.  We stopped for an Eis while waiting for the bus. Unfortunately by the time we actually got to Xanten it was already getting late, so I had only a little time to walk around. Xanten has lots of history and can go back to the early B.C. It is rich with a Roman Museum and an Archaeological Park so the fact that I did not have time to look around is very disappointing. It is rich in remains of the Romans, as well with much history of famous people including Siegfried the Dragonslayer of Xanten, (The Nibelungenlied is a famous epic written in the Middle Ages.
The main protagonist is prince Siegfried of Xanten who became almost invincible when he bathed in the blood of the dragon that he had previously killed. When he was killed, the victim of a scheme against him, his wife Kriemhild took bloody revenge.) Priests, Countess’, philosophical writers, painters, composers (Engelbert Humperdink, Hansel and Gretel) and others.  

Schloss Moyland, Kalkar

(http://www.xanten.de/en/tourism/culture/historical_personalities/) We did get up close and take pictures of the Kriemhild Windmill. It was awesome but it was actually spinning really fast and it was wonderful hearing swish as it went around. I parted from Gloria and Sofia because I wanted to catch the 7pm train home. I befriended this man while waiting for the train (he has been watching a soccer game that day). I ended up sitting next to him on the way to Cologne (he was going the same way anyway) and he quizzed me on my German and talked of life etc. He even made sure I got on the right Subway, as we had gotten off on the same train stop. Sweet man. I stayed the night at Julia and Nadine’s. Nadine was having some of her friends over since it was her birthday. It was nice because I have already met some of them with previous encounters. I even talked about The White Stripes with one guy. 

Romeo, Romeo, Where Art Thou Romeo

 

Sightseeing



Rappunzle, Let Down Your Hair

 

Kalkar

 

Gloria and I, Kalkar



St. Nickoli, Incredible Windows, Xanten



Windmill, Kalkar



Sunday April 3: The weather was really crappy today. Es ist regnet. It rained hard pretty much  all day. I was going to leave in good time to catch the rest of Bonn Fest, but  ended up leaving later, coming bad home to Bad Godesberg, had some lunch, then finally later it had stopped raining. In Bonn there was classical Music playing and booths all set up around the Munsterplatz and around the Beethoven statue. It was also a significant day because all the shops were open (stores are never open on Saundays). I bought a delicious bratwurst and watched watched the rest of the music. The last one was great because all the crowd recognized it, (even me, and love it) a choir sang Beethoven’s Ode to Joy. Music papers were handed out and the crowd dang along. That was nice. I found out later from someone that they had made the song into a European National Anthem. Cool! At 6pm everything completely closed, but I gave in and bought a crepe with Nutella and bananna...mmmmmm.

Monday April 4:  Today in class seemed less stressful. What we had learned on Friday seemed to have sunk in a little more. Perfekt= haben + partizip II is something we have to know. Ich habe die Milch gekauft., is a sentence which follows that. All morning I was craving Sushi; I guess I’m getting tired of eating salami sandwiches. So i went to a Bad Godesberg grocery store and found a nice sized tray of Sushi and bought it. It was a little expensive for my liking; 7 Euro, but it was well worth it!! Homework just took a long time, because I had to find the meanings of words in a long list in the dictionary.