What a blur!

Life in Germany has been traveling at 100 mph since I stepped out of the airport. The first taxi I took brought me to a university which was on the wrong side of Dusseldorf. The driver did not understand me at all, so I just got out and paid him. Another driver proved to be very helpful and allowed me to use his cell phone to contact Dr. Wasser and find out the address. After arriving at AIB, I was informed that Doug and my host family could not be contacted. We did the logical thing and proceeded to the nearest bar to use the one German word I knew (beir). Finally our host family arrived with their daughter (the daughter is the only one who speaks english and she lives an hour away). She helped us clear up all of our questions, and headed out. We went to bed early because it had been such a long day. Yesterday we met everyone in our group and had a few introductory meetings. Doug and I then went into the city center to watch the game with the Germans. The atmoshpere was amazing (as there were thousands of Germans packed into the streets watching the game on the many flat screens set up by the bars). Getting home that night proved to be quite the experience as we first took the train the wrong way and the tried to run another one down (as we were running it turned behind us and headed off in the wrong direction anyway). We ended up making it back without having to hail a taxi (a very impressive feat). All in all, the first two days have been a huge success and I'm looking forward to the rest of our trip.
Our host family is extremely nice, and even though we cannot communicate with them, they feed us much more than we should eat and even wash our laundry for us. Pointing, smiling, and nodding are great forms of communication.