Hannover-Norderney

July 24, 2015

This last week with the program went really fast and there was a lot of traveling involved. After a recovery day in Bonn to do laundry, we took off to Hannover to meet with a cardiology surgeon and then with a researcher that shared a lecture with us on the regrowth capabilities of the axolotyl and the medical applications of spiders' webs. We got to see the room full of the cute little salamander-like creatures. They showed us babies that were born the previous day and also a cute couple that refused to mate with anyone else. Then we went to the OTHER room...the spider room. I have an extreme phobia of spiders. Somehow I forced myself to crawl under a web with a giant spider on it in the doorway to the room filled with 16 wandering spiders. Huge spiders. Did I mention that? I can't say that I was sad to leave that room.

The next stop was Norderney. After arriving, we went for a jog on the beach with a little workout incorporated and then did yoga led by Dr. Wasser's fiancée. None of this was very easy after scarfing an entire burger with a bunch of fries because we were so hungry. Then we had a delicious group barbecue out by the hostel. On Thursday we went to the Badehaus for the entire day. We got a lecture on the health benefits of the island and then gave our own presentations on alternative medicine. After the torture of public speaking, we got to enjoy the spa for the whole afternoon. The inhalation room was one of my favorites, right up there with the "fire box." The first was similar to a sauna with salt water in the vapors and the "fire box" was a hot tub surrounded by very tall walls and then open to the sky at the top. There was a cave that had a high concentration of salt at body temperature. Some of us chose to do the mud bath where we slathered our bodies with a mixture of the mud and salt then sat in a sauna.

Today was our last day on the island already and it was sad to leave. We went on a guided mud flat walk to look at all the creatures that live there and got covered up to our knees in sulfur-smelling mud. As everyone else climbed onto the train bound for Amsterdam I sat at the train station waiting for my train to take me to Düsseldorf and to my German friend. Not long after I sat down at the station, a younger man came and sat right next to me and pulled out a cigarette. It was disgusting having smoke blown into my face, but I wasn't about to move. Scenes from Taken kept flashing through my mind and I couldn't help but panic a little on the inside. I successfully changed trains on my own! I made it safely to Sarah though and I'm ready for a weekend in London and Aachen!