Mom says I'm not updating enough

So instead of doing my German homework, I think I’ll blog instead.

This past school week has been good, low key as always. We’re staring to learn some really useful things in German, such as how to order in a restaurant. Soon we’ll learn adjectives so we can finally describe things, which I guess would have been useful for the oral presentation I had to make about German classical music.

I was SO excited about the two new episodes of Glee this week that I watched courtesy of Kristin Kasubinski (shout out, gurl). They were my two favorite episodes of the season so far.

This weekend was far more interesting than my school week, so I’ll skip ahead to that. I went back to the market that my class went to a few weeks back and bought some spinach because supermarkets here only sell fresh spinach when it’s in season. I bought some hummus and cheddar, which I figured was a safe choice after the “aromatisch käse” incident, which stunk up my whole apartment.

My program offers us three cultural event tickets as part of the cost of attendance, so Thursday I went to the Deutscher Oper Ballet, which was incredible. The performance was entitled “Malakov and Friends.” The performance was selections from many different ballets, and I would love to have known which selections they were, but alas, programs were 10 euro a pop. Oh well! The group I went with had a stellar time dressing up and then going out to Thursday night Stammtisch.

Stammtisch was in a really cool neighborhood this week, and it reminded me a lot of the Village, because there were lot of bars and people walking around. I finally found where all the students and people my own age live and hang out! I couldn’t get enough of it. We went to a hookah bar which was good, because it was cheap, but impossible to get a drink. We ended up leaving and we went to the less crowded bar across the street.

From there, we had a decision to make. It was 12:30 and we could have gotten the last train back home, or we could make the commitment to stay out until 4 when the trains start to run again. After some vacillation I decided to stay out and go to a club. We went to a nearby club where there was a cover band playing. This was another occasion of a fun German club being swarmed by about 10 Americans and being made into an awesome club. The cover band was playing a lot of American songs, so we were dancing and singing along, and then all of the sudden our friend Iris decides to get up on stage and dance around! Before I knew it, we were all up on stage dancing with the cover band. Unbelievable.  

As all good nights end with döner, we made the obligatory stop. We got home at 5 and crashed. I woke up at 11:45 to a knock at my door, and it was Vika asking if I wanted to go ice skating with her and a couple other friends. I put on my blue hat (and we all know what that means), popped 3 advil, chugged a glass of water and walked right out the door in time to catch the 11:55 train. We had a great time skating at the outdoor rink because it was so beautiful. It was sunny and perfect! We had a great lunch at a restaurant which, as Vika put it, looked like an 80’s prom. We came home and cooked an amazing dinner!

I hadn’t planned on going out that night, but a bunch of FU Besters were going out to a bar where the beer prices work like the stock market. You can watch the price of beer fluctuate on screens all around the bar and then sometimes it crashes and everyone rushes the bar to get a cheap beer. It was fun, and we finally found somewhere well lit and clean which I was personally excited about. I didn’t stay out too late because I was exhausted so I decided to call it a night early.

Yesterday a bunch of people said that they knew of a really good, authentic Mexican food place, so we decided to go there for dinner. We got there just in time for 2-for-1 margaritas, which made my day. We got a 6 salsa sampler with great chips and then I got a burrito for dinner. I called it another early night and went and hung out with Becca and Hannah at home and subsequently skyped with Becca’s entire family.

Today was pretty low key, Becca, Jacqueline, Hannah and I went to Starbucks to study for our midterms next week. I bought myself some chocolates for Valentine’s day (which I already dug into. They’re delicious). I called my parents and I’m going to skype with Sam a little later! 

In other news, my trips to Barcelona, Mallorca, and Paris are all booked! So excited! 

I might want to get some Deutsch Hausaufgaben done before class starts tomorrow, so I’mma call it now. Aufwiederschon!

This past week has been jam-packed! I’ll start with last weekend because I never updated. Thursday night was Stammtisch at a local brewery in Kreuzberg, which was really nice. It was a low key place with great beer. There was even a piano that I was bold enough to start playing. We nearly missed the last train, but thanks to some quick thinking and crafty maneuvering, we didn’t have to take a cab. One of the great things in Berlin is the public transit system. As students at Freie University, we can take any public transit for free. On Friday, Saturday and Sunday the buses and trains run all night, but that doesn’t exactly help us on Thursday night Stammtisch.

Friday was a bit of a downer. We had a mandatory field trip to the Stasi Prison, which is a former Soviet special camp and remand prison. This is the prison that the movie “The Lives of Others” is based on. It was absolutely frigid on the day we went, and completely overcast (essentially, it was just another day in Berlin). The prison is in the former East Berlin, and apparently there is even still a Neo-Nazi population hanging around. The whole thing was just a little too creepy for me. Many of the people who are guides at the prison are former prisoners, but our tour guide was a local historian. Our tour was extremely interesting, but ultimately left me feeling terribly uncomfortable.

That night I went out with a few friends, and ended up riding the S-Bahn and U-Bahn all night looking for a place to go. My friend Hannah and I had a great time doing this, but the rest of our group really wanted to find a place to settle into. After hours of searching for somewhere, and getting a little lost, we decided to cut our losses and head home. We stopped for a 2 AM snack along the way, and ended up having a great time at a restaurant in Potsdamer Platz. Saturday night everyone was really tired but I decided that I wanted to go out for a little bit, and I went to Kreuzberg and went to what all the guide books call the best döner stand in the city.

I don’t know if I’ve explained döner, and even if I have, it’s worth another explanation. Döner is a traditional Turkish food with lamb, tomato, cucumber, lettuce and cabbage all on a toasted pita. I usually get mine with falafel. I find it a little revolting that there is a giant (and I mean giant) hunk of roasting lamb on a spit in every stand that is warmed with what looks like a giant hairdryer. Nevertheless, they’re inexpensive, delicious, and make for some great noms after a long night. I want to open up a döner stand when I get back to school as the “healthy alternative” to the fat sandwich.

Sunday I decided to go to Starbucks in a nearby neighborhood and take advantage of their free wi-fi. I ended up getting more work done than I anticipated! Uninterrupted internet (I suppose the antithesis of jenkityass) is truly a joy. I also had good hot chocolate with real whipped cream for the first time since I’ve been here and that was perfect.

School has been good for the most part. Not having to juggle 5 classes makes my workload a lot less stressful, though I am taking 15 credits (German counts as 8 credits!).

I didn’t have class on Thursday, so Becca and I decided to have a wine and cheese night, which turned into a delicious dinner! I finally found veggie burgers when I was in the supermarket, and I bought some cheese and crackers and some wine, and then Becca said that she had some frozen fries, and we had a decadent Amurrcan cuisine night of cheeseburgers and fries with wine and cheese. It was exactly what I was craving and didn’t know it. Thursday my German class met in the evening to go to a café and we ordered food and read a fairy tale together. Our class has been focusing on fairy tales, and we went to a performance of Grimm Brother fairy tales for adults.

I finally broke down and bought a cell phone, which has proven really useful. So there’s that.

There’s a German word “gemütlich” (ge-MOOT-lish) which really has no direct translation. It’s a really important word to the culture. A dictionary would tell you that it means “cozy or comfortable,” but it is more than that. It’s the feeling you get when you go into a log cabin and have hot, spiced wine and watch a performance with friends. And that is exactly what we did. Our teacher suggested we get Gluwine (I think that’s how it’s spelled) which sounds gnarly, but is really delicious. It’s a hot, spiced red wine that people typically drink in the winter here. It was fantastic. The performance was hysterical! I even picked up on some of the jokes, which was exciting for me.

I then went from the performance to pick up Mary from the airport. It was so exciting to see her! We came back to my apartment and were both pretty exhausted so we decided not to go out, but conserve our energy for the coming weekend. We slept in pretty late on Friday morning, but got the ball rolling at the crack of 1. We got döner, and then I told Mary that she could not leave Berlin without going to the Jewish museum.

I had already been to the Jewish Museum earlier in the week with my Art and Dictatorship course, and it had left such an impression on me that not only did I feel I had to go back, but that Mary needed to experience it, too. It was opened in 2001, and the architecture is absolutely phenomenal. It’s beautiful. The museum is very emphatic that it is not a Holocaust museum, but a museum about the history of Jews in Germany. We spent a couple hours there, and it was mind blowing.

We then went to Unter den Linden, which is the touristy part of Berlin where the Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag are. We went to the German für Anfanger (German for Beginners) Museum, and looked around the exhibit. We palled around in the area for a couple of hours taking pictures. Then we walked down to the Holocaust Memorial and then to Potsdamer Platz. We took the train back home to eat dinner and to get ready to go out. We dined on some veggie burgers and went out with Becca, Jason and Clayton. We wanted to go out dancing to Zapata, but there was a band playing there and it wasn’t a DJ (and there was a 10 euro cover…) so we decided to go back to Sliberfisch which was a dive bar we had been to a few weeks before. We made it home and passed out, to get up at 11 the next morning.

We decided that we had to go to the Pergamon museum because we had studied it in our Later Greek art class, and took a picture at the alter of Zeus Soter. We then went to the Museum of Islamic art. We then met up with Becca and went to the ONLY existing cupcakery in all of Berlin. It was fanstastic! I had a cookies and crème cupcake and some delicious hot chocolate. We came back to my apartment and got ready to go out, and met up with our friends Vika and Conor and went to a few bars in Kreuzberg, and ended the night with some delicious döner.

I saw Mary off to her cab this morning at 6 AM. I was proud that I called the cab company and asked  if they could come to my apartment all in German. Today has been low key. It’s been raining all weekend, and today is no exception. I’m going to make dinner with Becca tonight and then write my German essay. It’s gonna be a busy week with midterms looming ever closer.

BUT! I’ve booked my Spring break, and Becca, Jacqueline, Hannah and I are going to Barcelona and Mallorca. I’m going to stay in a hostel in Barcelona (or maybe a hotel if it’s cheap for a night) and then we’re going to stay in Jacqueline’s friend’s guest home on Mallorca. I’m so excited! I’m going to the ballet on Thursday, too! So many things are coming up.

Alright, after that epic post I’m gonna go chow on some noms. Tonight is the Super Bowl? I don’t even know who’s playing. I’m fine with that. I guess I’ll find out tomorrow!