Week 4-Part 1

It’s hard to believe that we are already jumping in to week four of our study abroad here in Germany. Last week in Vienna was full of history and museums. To finish up, on Friday we visited the Natural History Museum, which had an incredible collection of taxidermy animals that I enjoyed. The huge collection of meteorites was also very impressive. And of course my favorite was the dinosaur exhibit. The decorations of the building were also intriguing. Since it was always destined to be a museum, it had statues of people holding strange creatures and paintings of various historical phenomena. After the museum we had the opportunity to check out body worlds, which I have seen before but never find any less interesting. My favorite exhibits in body world are the specimens that show arteries. I find it amazing that it is possible to plastinate arteries and leave them suspended to show three-dimensional structure and the amazing complexity of our arteries.

This weekend I visited Zurich. After a lengthy train ride from Vienna, I had a good night’s sleep at the hotel. On Saturday I walked around old town and visited the Fraumünster and Grossmünster churches. They were elegantly simple, and somewhat plain compared to the Cologne cathedral and some of the baroque style masterpieces that we visited in Vienna. One thing that I noticed was how clean Zurich was. The streets didn’t have trash laying about and the river and lake were also clean and a beautiful blue-green color. In the afternoon I hiked up Mt. Üetliberg. There I had a wonderful view of the city, the lake and the alps. On Sunday I got an early start and headed to the zoo. My favorite part of the zoo was the owls. Second to the owls my favorite experience were the goats; though not very exotic I had a blast feeding them and watching their antics. There was a large variety of different animals, but a lot of the enclosures weren’t laid out very well for the visitors too see the animals which was at times frustrating. Even just some trimming of brush could have made a huge difference. Overall the zoo was the highlight of my weekend. After the zoo I had lunch by the lake and relaxed before heading back to Bonn. I am most looking forward to the Haribo outlet tomorrow and am also excited about Hannover, Norderney, and Amsterdam fast approaching. Tschüss!