Berlin!! My last week in Europe...

It was pretty sad to say goodbye to mine and Michelle's host mom when she packed us up some snacks and drove us to the Huptbahnhof at 7am. It was a great experience to be able to stay with a German family and I did learn a little German....haha. So, after about 5 hours on a train to Berlin half of the group arrived at Alex hotel! When the other half of the group arrived from a late train from Switzerland we then took a bike tour of the city with Fat Tire Bikes. It was probably the best way to see such a big city that holds so much history.

The next day we visited the Reichstag building which is the German Parliament building. It was actually kind of set up like an art museum with the way it kept some of the writings on the walls visible that the Soviet's wrote when the first took over the building. They also had a display of fake filing draws with the time period during the war symbolically blacked out. Then was the trip to Sachsenhausen, a work camp during the Holocaust. It was very humbling to see where people were harmed, tortured, and even killed. I was also surprised to know that they tested shoe strength on different types of ground by having the prisoners walk around for hours wearing the shoes. It was a really important thing to see and tour when traveling to Germany and learning about its history.

On Wednesday, we visited the Charite Learning Center which is a training lab for medical students. We had a short lecture about the set up of medical school in Germany (which is quite different from in America) and how the process of applying is more based on grades than in the States too. We then got to see what it would feel like to be old and arthritic by putting on weights and difficult visibility glasses. We also put on gloves that shocked our muscles to make it feel like we had tremors and then tried to sign our names; it tickled my arms so much! We then had a guided tour of the Charite Museum which was really interesting! We had been given enough warning about "the fainting corner" and some of the stuff was pretty gruesome but all in all it was pretty cool. We were then surprised with our oral exam and we were able to have it in the room of the Charite where Rudolf Virchow gave a lecture on his 80th birthday! After that we also had two more lectures in that lecture hall.

On Thursday we went to Dresden! It is a city a couple hours outside of Berlin and was completely destroyed during the war. When we first got there we went to the War Museum which is one of the best organized museums I've seen on this trip. I loved the way it was very modern and had old artifacts (including helicopters) suspended on the walls! The tour guide was also very knowledgeable and the entire museum visit was exciting. The hygienic museum was also really well set up! We were paired up and given the task of explaining our assigned room to the rest of the group. Katherine and I had "Essen und Trinken" (food and drink) which mainly discussed the digestive system and food processing. It was so cool i could have spent over 30 minutes just in that room so I definitely could have spent hours looking at and playing with things in the entire museum! Afterwards we had a guided tour or Dresden with an AMAZING tour guide! She was one of the protesters of the Soviet reign of the eastern side of Germany. Also, Dresden was so beautiful! I wish we could have spent longer there to really explore but we did hit some of the high points like the Church of our Lady. We also stopped for real chocolate ice-cream and were surprised to end the tour right as the bells of the palace rang (which only happens three times a day!)

On the final day in Berlin (and in Europe!) we went to the MDC (the Dellbruck Center of Molecular Medicine). It was one of the few science centers that stayed open in eastern Germany under soviet rule. Our lecturer explained how they (also) did research with axolotls and naked mole rats! We then got to see a 7T MRI machine! Lastly we visited the Otto Bock center and saw the advancements of technology with prosthetic limbs. This museum was only one of the many interesting and cool things we saw on this entire study abroad trip! I've learned so much about science and medicine in the past five and half weeks that could have only been learned in the places where this history happened.

For our final farewell we went to a Moroccan restaurant called Kasbah and it was delicious!! It was so sad to say goodbye to Dr. Wasser and Olivia and I know this is an experience I will never forget. I'm also excited to meet back with the rest of the group for a reunion at the alleged legit German restaurant in Bryan when we all get back up to school! Only one blog post left.... so until then, Auf Wiederhoren!