Weekend in Brussels

So we just had Pentecost (fiftieth day after Easter Sunday, feast celebrating the Holy Spirit coming to the disciples), which meant that Monday was a holiday. Three day weekend! I spent mine in Brussels with my friend Stephanie who's been studying in Mulhouse, France (blog here). We arrived Friday evening and left Monday afternoon. 

Friday we didn't do much. We found food (doners) and chatted, and then we went to bed. We stayed at this pretty nice hostel, called the Hello Hostel. It was clean and the manager was nice. The breakfast was terrible, but it was free so no complaints. 

The area we stayed in

Saturday we got up pretty early, which ended up being a pretty good thing as we spent way too much time trying to find the atomium. Lesson: don't just assume that an arrow on the map means it's nearby or that you are headed in the right direction. Always look up exact locations for anything you want to see. We ended up giving up on it until we could figure out exactly where we needed to go and headed for the comic strip museum. It was awesome. Everything you could ever want to know about the history and development of European comics in French, Dutch, and English. It wasn't exclusively european, per se, but frankly, the creators of the museum clearly felt a little bias. Interesting stuff though. Many comics I had not heard of, partly I think because I'm only 21, and partly because many comics don't bridge the Atlantic. I did get to learn about the Smurfs though. They're actually a Belgian comic strip, so when we got to the gift shop I couldn't help buying myself a souvenir: a copy of the first book of smurf comics, in its original french. Les Stroumpfs. 

Outside the comic strip museum

After the comic strip museum we headed over towards La Grand Place. There are many Places in Bruxelles (the Museum Place for example) but this is the big one. It's huge, and the buildings are centuries old and ornately decorated. It's filled with tourists of course. We decided to have lunch there and settled on sharing an order of moules frites (a very good idea because they give you a lot). Moules frites (or mussels and fries) is almost a national dish. It's sort of a "must-have". It was delicious. Stephanie ordered a beer, which I tried (because you can't go to Belgium and not have any beer), which was not delicious. Whenever I took a tumble in the waves at the beach my relatives would laugh and say "well now you know the ocean's still salty". Well I took a sip of the beer and it still doesn't taste good. 

La Grand Place

Moules Frites!

Following lunch we headed out to find the Mannekin Pis, the famous statue of a peeing boy. I have a thing for strange or funny statues so I was looking forward to this. Sadly, it's a tad anticlimactic. It's really small, and on this sort of side street. We almost missed it. It was sort of like, well, ok, I guess I'll take a picture...Not that cool. Not sure why this is so well known. We next went to the bourse (or stock exchange) and then took the metro to the stop for the Atomium and Mini-Europe (thank you free brochure from the comic strip museum). 

A random parade/procession thing that went by

the Mannekin Pis

La Bourse

Next stop: the Atomium. The Atomium is this giant metal structure representing an iron crystal built for the 1958 world fair. It's sort of akin to the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. You mostly go for the view. Which was worth it. It was also worth it just to get a picture of a giant iron crystal. 

Atomium

Mini-Europe is a major tourist trap. Just a warning. It is especially attractive to families with small children whose parents are overly indulgent and incapable of discipline. That's all I'm saying. It was fun though. They had representations of all the different EU countries' well-known cities and landmarks. They even had little miniature people and moving parts. Each country also had a button which played it's national anthem, but they all sounded the same to me. 

La Mini Place

That sort of rounded out Saturday. We had dinner at a little Italian restaurant on a street indicated by our map as having lots of food. The street is literally one italian restaurant after the next, with pretty much equivalent menus and prices. You can either just pick one or allow the Maitre D's to fight over you. The Maitre D's are hysterical. They stand outside trying to convince people to eat at their restaurant and pick playful fights with each other ("Don't eat there! They'll poison you! Don't listen to him! He's french!). We just picked one and ate off the 12 euro menu. Pretty good, and it included dessert. 

Sunday. We slept in a bit more knowing things wouldn't be open for a little while but we headed out around 10. First stop: Le Palais de Justice. Unfortunately, it seemed to be undergoing some maintenance that requires scaffolding to be placed over the entire front of the building. So I only got side shots. Across the street though was this neat looking war memorial commemorating the soldiers who had died in the first or second world wars. At least, I thought it was neat until I turned the corner to look at the other side and realized it was a tomb. Then it was just creepy. 

Le Palais de Justice

War memorial/tomb

We then headed towards the royal palace. On the way, we stopped at the fine art museum and went through like a gazillion exhibits of mostly religious art covering like 4 centuries. We walked away feeling very cultured and continued on to the palace. I love castles, palaces, mansions, you name it, so if there's a royal palace to be seen, I'm going to see it. No tours though. You can look from the outside but that's it. Sad day. Guess that's the downside of still having a royal family. 

As close as I can get to the Royal Palace

After the obligatory picture taking, we headed through the park towards the Belgian Parliament building. On the way we stopped for these: 

Belgian waffles!

You knew it was coming. I couldn't go to Belgium and not get waffles could I? Stephanie got pistachio ice cream on hers; all the white fluffy stuff on mine? whip cream baby. Be jealous. Another obligatory picture of the Belgian parliament and on we went. EU Commission: rather boring. EU parliament buildings: also rather boring. Belgian Arc de Triomphe: not boring. 

EU building

Belgian Arc de Triomphe and one of the wings

 I'm not sure what is in the left wing, but the right wing houses an enormous history museum. I know it's enormous because Stephanie and I went through all of it. It was very interesting, but you can't help but start to yawn at some point. It's a lot of stuff. But we left feeling very cultured. By that point we were getting rather tired, and running out of stuff we wanted to do. We had made what we thought was quite a long list, but we got it all done. So after dinner (I got a croque monsieur) we hung out in La Grand Place for a bit before heading back to the hostel.

In our wanderings we came across this, and I needed a picture.

We had one more morning in Brussels. We looked at the maps. We looked on the internet. We looked at the brochures. According to everybody, we had done it all. Now what? I'll tell you what. The Chocolate Museum. It was small, and not overly informative, but it had plenty of free samples, and a demonstration by a chocolatier. Worth it? Yes. Thus ended our Belgian adventures. Train rides home for both of us, in different directions. Fairly uneventful, though one of my trains ended up being defective so I got on another train to Hamm, though I had already missed my connection, and then took another train to Paderborn. A very full train. I had to stand the entire last leg of the journey (like an hour), squashed between a bike, a baby stroller, 8 other people, and a family with a dog. Between one set of stops it was so crowded I stood on one leg so the poor dog could lay down. Good to be back.

Bits and Pieces

Haribo gummy bears are very popular here. They have more varieties of gummy candies than I knew existed. Tonight I decided to try a bag of Original Happy Cola and now my whole room smells like soda. Pretty good though, and my room could smell worse for sure.

There seems to be a hose trend here. I've seen several girls walking around or on the train or something wearing black hose with a) shorts of lengths varying from hot pants to bermudas or b) a skirt or dress so short it could not possibly be covering everything it needs to. I'm not talking leggings or tights here, I'm talking about old fashioned black hose. It's not really an attractive look. And the girls who tend to be wearing this trend are not the super skinny wannebe models who are prone to wearing outrageous clothing; it's the girls with a lot of junk in the trunk if you know what I mean. I really want to walk up to them and explain that wearing shorter skirts is not going to get them the kind of attention they want. And Hosiery Should Never Be Used As A Substitute For Pants!

My love of Kinder chocolate has extended from Kinder Bueno to Kinder Riegel bars as well. Mmmm.

Everyone here eats their french fries with mayo instead of ketchup. I know people in the US who do this, but it's not really "normal". Really I could go either way. Ketchup or mayo, or nothing, it really doesn't affect my love of french fries.

You know how on plastic drink bottles they have the extra piece of plastic below the cap? And normally it breaks off when you open it the first time (or sometimes it stays attached and just slides off with the cap)? They're different here. They have the same piece of plastic attached to the cap, but it stays attached. It breaks about halfway around (thus allowing you to remove the cap) but it stays attached to the cap. Still not used to it.

Also, the high here is still only about 75 degrees. We've had one or two days where it got up to 80, but that's about it so far.

A lovely sunset out my bedroom window!

Ascension Weekend Part 3

Welcome to part 3 in which I go to Herrenchiemsee. If you're not sure what's going on here, go back about two posts and catch up. Ready? Let's go.

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I got up early and hopped on a train at 7 am. Some people make fun of me for the way I travel, but frankly I'll sleep when I'm at home and have nothing better to do. I'm here to see stuff! So I get up early and run around all day until I fall over from exhaustion. After I got to Prien, I hopped on the "Chiemseebahn", an adorable little train that takes you from the train station to the boat dock. One short boat ride later I was on the Herreninsel ("Gentlemen's Island").

Herreninsel, from the boat

Ok a little more history. Ludwig II was really big into the absolute royalty of the past. He fell in love with stories of knights and princesses when he was a little boy and never really moved on from that. He was especially inspired by the Sun King, Louis XIV of France, and often called him his "ideal". He basically saw Versailles and like myself wished he could live there. Unlike myself he had the money and power to build himself his own Versailles, which is essentially what he set out to do with Herrenchiemsee (pron: Hair-en-kim-zay). Like Neuschwanstein, he didn't get to finish this one either. He only got the main building built (no wings) and didn't finish decorating that. He had also planned on having the grounds cover most of the island but never got around to it. In building Herrenchiemsee, he wasn't going for an exact replica. He wanted a "perfected" Versailles. "Historicizing" was a popular trend at the time. Basically the idea was to take a historic style and then perfect it. So Herrenchiemsee is supposed to be a monument to world of Louis XIV but at a higher level and with modern conveniences. Historical accuracy wasn't really a concern.

Once again, I got assigned to an English tour, but it wasn't for a little while so I did some meandering. Saw an old church, some farm buildings, an orchard (apparently growing citrus fruits was the thing to do to show how rich you were). Then I started down the walk towards the palace. The original landing point that Ludwig would have used doesn't leave any room for a ticket booth or souvenir shop, so they make the boats dock on the other end of the island. However, it's a pretty island and I passed by some German cows.

German cows

 The path runs sort of perpendicular to the way the palace and gardens are set up, so you're walking along and then all the sudden you turn your head and there it is. Gorgeous. The fountains and front lawn are just lovely and then you walk up to this huge imposing edifice.

Herrenchiemsee with front lawn and fountain

Gardens, fountains, and palaces, oh my!

The Fama fountain

Now I have seen Versailles. I have been through that palace, and all over it's grounds. I am here to tell you, Herrenchiemsee is more elaborate, more ornate, more over the top. Ludwig's King's Bedroom and Hall of Mirrors are better than the originals. When you come in, you're in this large foyer with a double staircase. He wanted it to resemble the room in Versailles with all the different types of marble (which it does), but instead of using marble, he used this stucco stuff that's actually more expensive than the real deal. Only the floors are actually marble. Then you go through the first and second antechambers which have these huge crystal chandeliers. Each one weighs over half a ton. No worries though, they're each being held up by a golden angel. The King's Bedroom is magnificent. The gold leaf alone took 7 years to finish. Everything is gold. It's just dazzling. Strange thing though: Ludwig never used it. He lived in the palace for like a week (remember it's still not finished) and he chose to live instead in a second apartment he had built for himself. I personally would not be able to resist sleeping in that bed. How you could build that room and not sleep in it is beyond me. Maybe he was crazy after all. Anyway, the Hall of Mirrors is unbelievable too. It's longer than the original, has more chandeliers than the original, and is just more sparkly than the original. All of the chandeliers are lit with candles, and it took a crew of servants about half an hour to light them all. Ludwig never bothered having a banquet in here; he only had the candles lit for himself. Unlike the original Ludwig also had the ceilings covered in paintings. The artist suggested painting Ludwig as Helios, but he refused and made him change it to Louis XIV. He was rather finicky about this being a french palace. He wanted very few references to Bavaria and there are no portraits of him in the entire building. His own apartments are nothing to sneeze at either. Gorgeous, but not quite on the scale of the official rooms.

After the tour, I went into a special exhibit on Ludwig II's life and castle building. They showed some stuff about his childhood which was kind of fun. For one Christmas, his grandfather Ludwig I gave him a block set of some famous castle so he could build it and commented in a letter that his grandson "already shows great skill and taste in construction". There's also a miniature bayonet that was made for him so he could start military training when he was seven. They also showed a typical weekly schedule he would have had as a kid. Literally every minute of every day was planned out for him, even when he was on vacation. They had a lot of stuff about the war with Prussia and then Bavaria losing its sovereignty. I have to admit, I lost interest in this part. I've just never been that interested wars and battles. The next room however was great. They had computer animations showing how Neuschwanstein was built and virtual tours of some of the rooms he had planned but been unable to finish. They also had a virtual tour showing another castle that he had planned but never started. It was really cool to see, especially after having just been there.

The back lawn, which was the original entrance

Taste the rainbow! My afternoon snack

This palace is known as the "new palace" because there's also an Augustinian monastery on the island which had served at one point as a royal home (the "old palace"). So I went over there and walked through it. Very boring, sorry to say. Only about three rooms were still as they were when Ludwig would have been there: his bedroom (very plain), his living room (also rather plain), and the dining hall. The dining hall was kind of cool in that the walls were painted with portraits of various Roman emperors. The rest of the building is a museum with some stuff about WWII that I did not understand, and a lot of paintings by a local artist who apparently enjoyed painting naked women.

I still had a few hours before the last boat left the island (to be followed by a two hour wait for my train) so I started walking around. There are paths all over the island taking you to different look out points and the like. My first destination was a really old church that is apparently one of the oldest in Germany. Who knew. It was tiny so I'm pretty sure only about 15 people could have attended at any given time. 20 if they were all very skinny and sat very close together. I then walked down to the other end of the island to a pretty little spot called Otto's Ruhe (Otto's resting spot) where I rested for a few minutes. Then it was time to head back to the dock, passing by Herrenchiemsee one last time.

The extremely old and extremely tiny church

Otto's Ruhe

Herrenchiemsee in the late afternoon sun

The original entrance as seen from the boat as we were leaving

Then it was a boat ride and several train rides home. What a weekend. I wish we had castles in the US. Democracy is great, but if you don't have a king, there's no one to build a castle. The white house just isn't the same. If the government is so intent on wasting money, the least they could do is waste it on something beautiful.

Ascension Weekend Part 2

Here we go with Part 2 of my Ascension weekend adventures. Go back one post to read the first part and then you'll be caught up. Part 3 to follow.

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Fussen

Ok, at some point in all this you are asking yourself, wait, this is a 4-day weekend, why is she only doing two days? There's a fairly simple answer though as usual I will spend a paragraph explaining it. I had planned three days with a day at Linderhof, another of Ludwig's castles. However there were absolutely no hostels available for Friday night. Not one in all of Bavaria. So I cut out Linderhof. Then when Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau only took a few hours I started to think Linderhof might be back on the table. Alas neither bus nor train could be induced to cooperate, leaving me with an empty afternoon in Fussen.

It's not a large town (ok, it's pretty darn small), but like most it is filled with signs promoting its points of interest. So I started going down the list. The cathedral is a real gem. Quite unexpectedly given the size of the town and the plain exterior, the doors open to reveal a light airy chapel with the most beautiful ceiling. Almost everything inside is white, except for the organ, the altar, and the ceiling. The ceiling is decorated with paintings ranging from biblical scenes to important bishops reading to small angelic children. The color immediately draws your eye upward. It's amazing I didn't bump into anyone as I circled around with face up at the ceiling. The gold and marble organ is something to behold as well, though at the moment they're fundraising to have some apparently much needed repairs done.

As I wandered on I came across the ruins (and I mean, literally only the front and half of one tower were not yet caved in) of an old castle that must have once been quite pretty with its double staircase and fountain.

The poor ruined castle

Next door is the town castle/fortress/monastery. Part of it is now an art museum with I did not go in seeing as I'm a cheapskate, but the roof garden and tower are free. The tower is maybe six stories high but it has great views of the lake/river and mountains.

One time monastery, then fortress, then castle of sorts

View from the tower

I love the color of the water

Also of note: an old creepy cemetary in which the graves are facing in all different directions. I felt weird even walking on the path, like I might be unwittingly stepping on somebody. I found a gelato place and got tiramisu gelato. Be jealous. I also came across a random jazzband on a street corner. (Name that tune:  Cause I ain't got no-boooood-dy! .... I am so sad and loooone-ly!) My feet were officially not happy campers by that time so I started following the signs for the youth hostel.

The signs said this was important

From the bridge over the river, such a pretty area

My first youth hostel experience began with me walking into a lobby full of screaming children. I got checked in at the desk no problem where I also learned that besides the youth dorms they also offer private rooms for families. I swear the kids were running up and down the halls yelling at the top of their voices continuously for the next 4 and 1/2 hours. If my sister and I had ever even thought of making half as much noise as these children, I would not be alive today to tell you how awful these brats were. I was beginning to fear for my sanity (and my ability to sleep) when suddenly at 10 everything went silent. Thank god for enforced quiet hours! Other than that, it went great. It was very clean. I shared a room with five other girls one of which was from Canada. It was nice getting to speak English for once. The others were Asian, so they didn't say much but were very nice. The bathrooms were not my favorite (smallest shower I have ever seen) but high pressure, hot water makes life better. Free breakfast in the morning didn't hurt either. All in all I had a nice afternoon in Fussen and a good first hostel experience.

This is what I woke up to the next morning!

Ascension Weekend Part 1

Thursday was Ascension, a national holiday in Germany. Because it falls on a thursday, friday is sort of a holiday too. Four day weekend, woohoo! (Side note: school was still in session on Friday, which I know because a whole bunch of high schoolers got on the train out of Fussen with me and then deboarded a few stops later in front of a large building). Anyway, I used my holiday to go castle-hopping. First Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau, both near Fussen Germany, on Thursday and then Herrenchiemsee near Prien on Friday. There so much to talk about so this is going to be a three part posting.

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I love traveling by train, watching the scenery glide by your window. You get a wonderful feeling for what a country looks like when you travel by train. They're so convenient in Europe too. I left Paderborn at a quarter to 8 on Wednesday evening, so I got about 2 and 1/2 hours to see by.

Germany is so beautiful. Sparse pine forests cover the somewhat ungently rolling foothills of the mountains. Quaint villages nestle between the folds of the land looking in all probability just as they did a hundred years ago. When night came and I could see nothing more, it was as if the lights had just come on at the end of a movie.

When I finally arrived in Fussen the next morning I was exhausted, freezing, and dying to find a bathroom. (For the record, there are free public WC's at the Fussen train station and at Hohenschwangau). The bus to Hohenschwangau (the town) was pretty short (3.80 for a two way ticket, saving you about 50 cents), and the bus driver was super nice about my butchered pronunciation. Correct way: Hoshvangow. Traveler's Tip: get the royal ticket and see both castles. It doesn't take that long to do them both and Hohenschwangau is just as deserving. Also, go early. Most of the large tour groups come in the afternoon, but there were no lines when I got there. Sadly, no pictures inside the castles (this is becoming a recurring theme).

You have to do a guided tour to see the castles and they assign you to a tour based on your language of choice. It was great getting to be an American tourist amongst other American tourists for a while. Plus the tour guides spoke very clearly so I can tell you a whole bunch of neat stuff.

First a little history lesson. Hohenschwangau literally means the High Swan District. According to ancient legend, this is the Swan Knight's lake. Considering the fairy tale is of French origin, I think this a whole bunch of medieval hooey, but if there really were some medieval knights who built a castle here and were known as the Schwangau knights. The castle was called Schwanstein and swans later became a symbol of the Wittelsbach family (Ludwig II's family). Ludwig II is also sometimes called the Swan King. Anyway, the Schwangau knights died out by the mid-1500s, the castle switched hands several times (and fell into major disrepair), and King Maximillian II of Bavaria scooped up the property and built Hohenschwangau on the ruins. Max and his wife Marie had two sons, Ludwig and Otto. At 23, Otto (the younger son) developed a mental illness (probably schizophrenia). Ludwig became king at 18 when his father unexpectedly died of illness following a trip to Italy. His grandfather was still alive by the way, but he had abdicated the throne ages ago to let his son do all the work while he enjoyed retirement. Ludwig II built (or started to build) some of Germany's most famous castles and palaces. For obvious reasons I'm a major fan. He was also good buddies with Richard Wagner. Anyway, after he lost the war with Prussia, he got demoted. He was still King, but because Bavaria was no longer a sovereign nation, it really didn't matter. He responded by spending inordinate amounts of money to build his fantasy castles. The bank threatened to seize his properties, but the government sort of stepped in. They got a foreign doctor who had never even met Ludwig (they didn't even use one of the doctors who were tending Otto) to declare him "crazy", sent out an official proclamation telling everyone he was not fit to rule and formally deposing him, and they forced him to leave Neuschwanstein and come to Munich. The next day he was mysteriously found dead by the lake. No cause of death. Otto already being on the not-allowed-to-rule-the-country list, their uncle Luitpold ruled as Prince-Regent for 18 years until he died. His son Ludwig then took over and got the government to make him King instead of poor, crazy Otto (who at least got to keep his titles until he died). Draw your own conclusions.

Hohenschwangau, from the town below

The main entrance into the court yard

Ya'll know I have a thing for funny statues

Neuschwanstein, coming through the clouds,
 as seen from Hohenschwangau

Anyway, Hohenschwangau is where Ludwig grew up when the family wasn't in Munich. He spent a lot of time there as an adult as well. The family still owns this castle, and to my mind it's more of a "real" castle, a little more authentic. They have a lot of the original furnishings and decorations and stuff. The walls are covered in murals (depicting a variety of things but frequently the story of the swan knight) that still have all their vivid color because Maximillian had the good sense to have a clear protective coating applied on top of the paint. Apparently the way they lived was the queen had her floor, the king had his directly above it, and they put the kids in a separate building. Nice right? Max travelled to Turkey and loved it so much that he had his wife's bedroom fitted up with columns and Turkish-style decor so she could experience it too. He was very romantic: in his bedroom he had stars on the ceiling with tiny crystals so the stars would glow if you put a candle on the floor at night. Sound strange for a guy sleeping on a different floor than his wife? No worries: there's a secret door in the king's bedroom that leads down to the queen's. Most of what I marveled at though were the ornate pieces they had on display. Gigantic solid gold centerpieces, silver replicas of famous fountains, an ivory and gold cabinet with the coat of arms of each Bavarian district. One of the Russian czars gave Ludwig a cross for his chapel made entirely out of lapis lazuli. Someone gave Luitpold (the uncle) a gold statue of Diana the huntress on a green marble mountain because he like hunting.

I had some downtime before my next tour, so I wandered a bit, looked around the shops and such. Then after buying my mommy a present (it's a surprise! so she'll just have to guess) I started up the mountain. This is no wussy hill. This is a mountain and it is quite a trek. It's not very far, but it is very steep. Either bring a water bottle with you or be prepared to pay for the shuttle or horse-drawn carriage. I was especially glad to have my water bottle after I decided to go see Mary's Bridge. What can I say, my parents have raised a hiker. I'm sure it has magnificent views, but it was so cloudy all I saw was white. Down in the ravine some 150-200 ft below us (my mother would have hated this bridge), there was a nice waterfall. You can get an even better view of the waterfall if you go down a gazillion stairs to this sort of lookout point. I was quite glad I went down the stairs until I started to go back up them again.

Hohenschwangau from the bridge (it was really really foggy)

The waterfall, from the bottom of the gazillion stairs

Apparently this is the thing to do.
I however refrained because I am a girl scout
and I leave nature the way I find it.

Clouds were pretty much the order of the day. They made it somewhat difficult to get good pictures. It did add to the whole fairy tale aspect of it all though. Neuschwanstein is literally like walking into every fairy tale you've ever heard. The windows of one room were open and some clouds billowed in: I seriously felt like I was in heaven. God, if you're taking requests, I would like my room to look like Neuschwanstein. The sad thing with this castle (and most of the castles Ludwig built) was that it was never finished. Ludwig only lived there 172 days and he never saw it without scaffolding. The parts that he did finish are beyond description though. The throne room looks like a Byzantine church and its floor has a mosaic with over 2 million tile pieces. There's no throne though; it never got built (stupid stingy government). The Singing Hall is also amazing. The walls are painted with murals telling the story of Perzival the Grail King (the father of Lohengrin the Swan Knight). Actually most of the walls in the castle are depicting the story of somebody. St. George and the Dragon was clearly a favorite. The king's bedroom is probably my favorite room. It took a team of woodworkers 4 years to finish all the carving in that room alone. You can see into his bathroom and it gives new meaning to "the porcelain throne". It literally looks like a wooden throne with a leather seat except that there's a lid. That's the other thing about Ludwig: he liked his modern conveniences. The whole castle was built with modern plumbing (for the time), electric lighting, and central heating. He also had a telephone, but the only place he could call was the post office since nobody else in Bavaria had one. He also had a state-of-the-art kitchen and a nifty way of calling his servants. He would press a button which would sound a bell in the servants' waiting room and turn on a light telling them where to go. Not bad for the 19th century. I spent most of the tour with my mouth open; Ludwig had a flair for the ornate. It's sad he didn't really get to enjoy it. I mean, he built a fake grotto complete with waterfall for the acting out of of Wagner's operas, and it never got used. He never saw a performance in the Singing Hall. He never got to hold a banquet there. He never even got to finish building the thing, let alone decorating it. The guy created something beautiful but never got the chance to see his vision come to life.

It was not this hard to see I swear,
but my camera skills are lacking.

The front entrance to the castle

Around noon the clouds dissipated a bit and
I got a better view of the  castle from the town below

Before we feel too bad for him though I will tell you this funny story. He and the sister of Empress Elizabeth of Austria (Empress Sisi), Sophie, had a thing for like forever. They got engaged and then after 8 months he broke it off. By mail. Without a reason. Can you imagine? "Dear Sophie, It's over. ~Ludwig". Jerk. This may have contributed to the insanity accusations. Oh and the cinematic romance between him and Sisi? Completely made up.

Wewelsburg

Sorry I'm running a little behind on the posting so if you want pictures you're going to have to look on facebook.

Last Saturday I went to Wewelsburg castle. It's not super well-known, but it's actually Germany's only triangular castle (or so the brochure says). I mainly went because it's a castle and it's only a short bus ride away. I took the bus from the Paderborn train station to Wewelsburg, which was really only a fifteen or twenty minute ride though the website said thirty. It's in a tiny little village, very quaint. The castle is not hard to find (when I say village I mean it) but if you're having trouble look for the church. For 3 euros you can go in the castle/"historical museum" and the SS museum in the carriage house next door is free. Grand total for bus rides and museum entrance: 14 bucks. Not bad at all.

The castle museum is really neat. It's not just about the history of the castle itself, but also about the history of the  area. It's all in German, so I just sort of looked at stuff and got the gist of things. There were some cool old sculptures and portraits, some processional dolls from the middle ages, lots of old swords, and some stuff about the history of the city of Paderborn. Apparently at one point in the 1400s there was a terrible fire in the large tower of Wewelsburg. Also, apparently the area is known for wrought iron work, glass blowing, and wheat. And apparently the rhino is a symbol for the area because apparently at some point there were rhinos in the rhineland? I don't really know on this one, but there were some bones arranged to fit a picture of a rhino on a wall. I also got to see the dungeons and the interrogation room where the bishops held witch trials.

The SS museum is fairly depressing. This actually has some stuff in English so I understood quite a bit more. Himmler decided Wewelsburg was going to be a sort of West Point for SS leaders and was trying to use it to give the SS some sort of historical validity. Now for the record, this castle was built for the Paderborn bishops. It has never had any knights. The moat was never filled and has never had any military value. But Himmler came in and made a bunch of fake stuff, knights' armor, shields, swords, china sets, old-looking books, etc, with the swastika on them. I mean, the shear volume of stuff they had impressed me. The townspeople actually began to believe that the SS leaders were indeed descended from some ancient royal line. The Nazis effectively changed history. Apparently this museum is partly intended to wipe out some remaining beliefs in this myth. The nice thing about the SS museum though is you walk through the dry moat which they've fitted up as a garden to the large tower to see two of the rooms Himmler had started to renovate. They never got to finish and no one's even sure how they intended to use the rooms. The main floor has a bunch of columns and they think it might have become a meeting room. The "keller" or crypt below ground is just down right spooky. For a long time there were rumors that the nazis had made some kind of valhalla down there but it's just a domed ceiling with stone walls and floors. The whole place echoes like crazy (you can hear people breathing) and in the center there's an indent where they think the nazis had intended to put an eternal flame. I didn't spend a lot of time there.

It was definitely worth it. If you can read German, I think you could easily make this into a nice afternoon. If you're like me and you just look at the pictures, it's about 2 hours worth. I went back to Paderborn for lunch where I got some delicious fish and chips.

More Odds and Ends

So here's some more random little pieces for you.


Uni Paderborn does not have any school colors or an official team mascot. Dr. Tiemann did remember that occasionally a rhino is used on school pamphlets on the like, but maybe 1 of every 200 students knows this. I was like, what do you mean you have no school colors?? I can understand no mascot (sort of), but you have got to have a color scheme. Nope. What do your teams wear? No teams. Germany (and really the rest of Europe too) do not have collegiate sports. They have club teams and intramurals and the like, but no official school teams. Very different system.

Windows here open in two directions. Turn the handle sideways and it swings open like a cabinet door. Turn the handle up and it leans in from the top, to form an opening of about 3 in. Turn the handle down and it locks in place.

Everything shuts down on sundays. I complained about this when I was in France, I'm complaining about it here, and I will probably complain about it somewhere else. I'm sorry, but it's not like they're all in church all day or something. The least you could do is have the grocery open for reduced hours so I can go get fresh bread. Geez. Also, the whole town shuts down at about 6. Literally every thing is closed except the movie theater and there is no one around.

It stays light here until like 10:30 and the sun rises at like 5 am. I've never thought about it before, but people talk about "the dark Georgia night" as just so encompassing. I guess if you're used to this, the southern US would seem to have a very deep shade of night.

I've tried a few sodas over here. Mezzomix is pretty good. I'm not sure if I've only been getting the orange flavor (like Cherry Coke) or if that's what Mezzomix is: a coke-like soda with some orange flavoring. I was also in the grocery store and saw "The Spirit of Georgia: Traditional Refreshment". (It also clearly says "Made in Germany"). It comes in two flavors, Blood Orange, and Peach-Lime. I felt compelled as a person actually from Georgia to try both and test the validity of their claims. Neither would I call a "traditional refreshment", at least not traditional to Georgia, but that said both were pretty decent. The Peach-Lime is better than the Blood Orange.

Universities in Germany are almost never campuses. They're usually a conglomeration of different buildings around a city or an area. Steffi tells me that where she did her undergrad, the science buildings were located a full 30 minutes away from the university offices. Uni Paderborn is apparently very much a special case in that it is a campus university. However, it is still not  a residential campus the way you see in the US. In the US, most college students live in on-campus housing of some kind, with the rest in nearby off-campus housing, and commuter students being the minority. At Paderborn, they do have 2 campus "dorms" (loosely defined here), but the vast majority of students live around the city or commute from home. Two of the guys I work with come from small towns about 20-30 minutes away so they just live at home and commute. This accounts for the fact that the mensa only serves lunch and even the snack bar is closed by 4.

Where I live

 Dr. Tiemann teaches an experiment-based intro chem class. He's about to drop an egg onto a bowl of silica gel that theoretically will absorb the impact, leaving the egg intact. I say theoretically because his aim was a little off and the egg cracked on the side of the bowl. 

 This is the front entrance to the school. It's more or less one interconnected building, with many offshoots. The giant letters? Markers so you know which section of the building you're in. It goes through P as far as I can tell. The school was started in the 70s but they've added on and renovated several times.  

No campus is complete without an army of bicycles. 

The main walkway which I use to get home. 

My apartment house, Mallinckrodtstr. 60. 

My room. You can see my bed in the corner. To the left of the desk is a bookcase and behind the camera is my closet. 

My bathroom. Small, but clean. 

Pictures of the lab/groupmates forthcoming. 

Experiments in Laundry, Internet, and Climate Change

None of these topics are particularly related to each other, but none of them really deserve their own post either. So bear with me.

Laundry is something of a milestone when traveling. Lots of people travel, especially domestically. Being away from home is really not that alien a concept. Most people at some point in their life will have to pack a suitcase or duffel bag or whatever and spend at least a few days somewhere besides home. That's the world we live in. Vacation probably accounts for most travel, be at during the holidays or simply some time off. However there's a difference between traveling and going someplace on vacation. That difference is laundry. If you're not gone long enough to need to do laundry, you're not really traveling. You're just visiting. Laundry anywhere but home can be tricky, but in a foreign country it takes on an extra challenge.

When I was in a home-stay in France, I had to ask my host-mom about when I could do laundry, and how to use the washer, and where is the non-existent dryer, etc. David is staying in a hotel, which means he has two options: laundry in his sink or laundry at the possible laundromat somewhere by the train station (he chose the first). I suppose if you are not on a student budget you would probably be in a hotel with laundry service but I digress. For me, this meant going to the office at the designated laundry-token-selling time to get laundry tokens from the nuns. They were very nice, but they don't speak english. We sort of gestured back and forth for a bit, and finally I got what I wanted (3 tokens) and they got what they wanted (euros). They also wanted information. I could tell I was going to be the topic of discussion that night at dinner at the convent. All they could really get from me though is Studentin, Chemie, Studentin, USA, Atlanta, Ja. I have no idea if I answered the questions they asked, but I answered. Of course, that still left me with the problem of how do I use the machines...

The laundry room is in the basement and has about 6 washers and 4 dryers. I swear, I thought my mom's washer/dryer set had a lot of options. No. These things are old and crickety and they put hers to shame on the options count. I have no idea what I chose; I just went with what appeared to be the most popular settings . For all I know I chose everything wrong, but it worked. My clothes are clean. The dryer took forever (almost 2 hours straight), but I didn't have to pay for it so I don't care. I used the free sample of Spee laundry detergent I got, and I approve. I did not dry my jeans because that's iffy at home let alone with a dryer I don't know, so I hung them to dry in my closet.


Internet. Oh the internet. Nothing is ever as simple as it appears to be. You know how I said I bought a month's worth of internet? I was wrong. I bought the starter set which comes with 10 euros worth of internet time. Which of course I've already gone through because it was set to the daily rate. Oops. So I went back yesterday and bought 15 euros worth (with the help of a very nice british woman) and have set it to the monthly rate.


People talk about jet lag and being up at all the wrong hours and not being hungry at the right times. BS. I got over all that after like a day and a half. The thing that kills me is the climate. It is not only much cooler here, it is also much much dryer. I know, I know, I'm from the South. I'm used to ridiculous amounts of humidity; I'm not a good judge. I'm not kidding, this is comparable to when I've been on vacation (we didn't have to do laundry) in the Rockies. I'm using chapstick like there's no tomorrow and I think I'm actually getting the doctor's recommended daily water intake for once in my life. Maybe as it gets more towards summer it'll get better?

First Weekend

I've had my first weekend in Germany. For the record I plan on utilizing each and every one of my weekends to its fullest potential. This weekend was a Paderborn weekend.

Saturday David and I met up at the HNF computer museum. According to the brochures, it is the world's largest computer museum. Personally, I'm inclined to think it is probably also the world's only computer museum, but you never know. I fully intended to take pictures, but then completely forgot except for one picture of a Jacquard loom. My apologies.

Jacquard loom: it actually worked and everything!

It (the museum) really was huge though. It took the two of us three hours to get through the whole thing, and we couldn't even read any of the descriptions. If you know German, you could easily spend the whole day there. There was a lot of neat stuff. Remember when I took that History of Science and Technology class? Well, this was kind of like taking a walk through that text book. They also had an impressive collection of old cell phones, calculators, and computers. (Remember the original Macintosh?) They had a lot of cool newer technology in there as well that you could play around with. There was this one were you sat down and it scanned your face and then you picked a famous portrait and background for it to put your face on. Not that cool? Try doing it only using your eyes. It was really hard to control so I know have pictures of myself as Lara Croft on a beach and Napoleon Bonaparte on the startrek set. I would share but they're just print outs so you'll have to wait until I have a scanner again.

After lunch, we went to Schloss Neuhaus, the castle in Paderborn. It's not terribly big, but then neither is Paderborn. It's in very good condition overall. There's a small, free-entrance museum, but you can't go into the rest of the building. The gardens were nice though.

Schloss Neuhaus, as seen from the back, with garden

Yesterday, David found a cineplex that was showing the new pirates movie in english, so we went to go see it.  We had to see it in 3D, which ordinarily would have meant more money, but we had accidently stumbled upon their monthly Ladies Night. We got funny looks for paying seperately, but we only had to pay 8 euros instead of 9. Woohoo. The movie itself? Not bad. I rank it above the 2nd and 3rd pirates movies but it's not as good as the original.