ain't no sunshine

week 6

How in the world did we get here? The very last week of the program. Let’s dive right in.

Monday was our very last day in Bonn. Lol what. It was chock full of lecture. We had a NOM lecture in the morning, followed by our predeparture meeting for Berlin (!!) and then a shortened lunch break. Even though we only had about an hour for lunch, we decided to do some last minute Bonn shopping. We went to Rednib for t-shirts, among other stores, and split up for food. Alana, Hailey, and I headed to the market, where we got some chicken wraps and French fries. We were actually the only ones to make it back in time for Dr. Wasser’s lecture. Everyone else was late, by varying degrees. It was kind of funny. The lectures of the day were once again, super interesting. Prof. Waltz’s lecture started to bring emotion into the equation of hearing while Dr. Wasser’s focused on the Nazi Doctors’ Trials and anesthesiology. Once we finished up with lecture, we headed to an anesthesiology museum that was pretty interesting, despite how tired I was. We even got to see an iron lung, which was pretty cool. Also pretty creepy. But hey, it worked. Kind of. After we finished up, there was what seemed to be like delays with the busses, and we ended up waiting at a stop for over half an hour for a bus that ended up coming as soon as we decided to abandon hope and go to another route. Either way, I made it back to my host home in time for dinner. This was pretty special because it was our last night all together, and I was kind of sad because Noura couldn’t make it because of her ballet class. It was still really great, and Maike actually surprised me with a really thoughtful birthday present. The gift consisted of chocolate I had eaten the first night I was there and had really enjoyed, Hanuta hazelnut sandwich wafers they had introduced to me (can you tell they know about my sweet tooth?), and a brand new mug that was identical to the set they had that I had complimented during the first week I was there. So overall, a truly thoughtful and special gift that will always remind me of them. I don’t know how I got so lucky with my host family. Maike was always so courteous and kind, always made sure I was comfortable, and genuinely really cared about me. She always asked questions but still respected my space. And it was so great to actually become friends with Noura (although I never got the chance to ask her about how she feels about Gabriel) because she really is so sweet and funny. The rest of the night consisted of procrastinating and packing (two things that have gone hand in hand with each other on this trip) and I of course went to bed late for the very last time.

On Tuesday, I woke up nice and early to finish up packing and somehow got it all to fit. We all met up at the train station, all 25 of us with all of our bags, and got on a pretty busy train to Cologne. Looking back, we must have been a truly hilarious sight, all of us trying to drag around our multiple pieces of luggage. Anyway, due to some unforeseen circumstances beyond our understanding, our train ran late. Meaning we missed our connection to Berlin. So we had to wait an extra half hour or so to get on a train (all 25 of us complete with all our bags) with no seat reservations. Most of the first part of the ride was a stressful game of musical chairs, until Kathryn and I got fed up with it and moved to a completely different, much emptier car. We wrote blog posts right until the last bit of the ride, when I started to get antsy and had to move around. We got to Berlin and made our way to the hotel. It was kind of difficult to lug around the bags, but honestly Kathryn takes the cake. We got off the train to start our walk to the hotel and you had to climb this very large staircase. I was at the front of the group, so I got up to the top with my bags fairly quickly and I looked down to see how everyone else was doing, and Kathryn. was. struggling. Gabe had already taken her carry-on rolling bag, but she was not doing well with her large bag. Kathryn is a short lass, so in order for her to carry a suitcase that big up a flight of stairs, she has to hulk it up to like her shoulder. Meanwhile, I only have to lift it to maybe my waist. So, I headed down to try to help her out, but ultimately just ended up carrying her suitcase for her. It was quite humorous. We got to the hotel, checked in (all of the boys shared one apartment, which was also quite humorous), and left to go start our bike tours. We split into two groups and headed off. Ryan was my group’s guide and I really enjoyed it. He had a lot of good information to share and did so in an efficient and effective manner. We made a lot of stops, including Brandenburg Gate, the Parliament building, etc but my favorite stop was the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. It was so powerful. Ryan said the creator of the memorial didn’t tell anyone exactly what his reasoning was, preferring to leave it open to interpretation. As you descended deeper and deeper into the memorial, the heights of the “gravestones” increased, and you got this feeling of being trapped, but with just a few steps in any direction, you could see the way out. One thing that did make me pretty angry was the number of people disrespecting the memorial by playing tag in it and standing on it. After the bike tour, Alana, Gabe, Carter, Kathryn, Hailey, Emily, and I went to Vapiano for some pretty good Italian food, followed by pizza. Once we got back to the hotel, we hung out in the guys’ apartment while they did flips and stuff until I decided to go attempt to work on my paper. Then I went to bed.

On Wednesday we got up to head to Sachsenhausen concentration camp and, just like Dachau, it was quite the experience, but certainly a unique one. Ryan joined us once again, and on the walk over, he answered some questions I had about how the Germans are exposed/taught about the Holocaust. Once we got there, Ryan gave us a tour, showing us the major sights, including the crematorium which had a beautiful memorial statue and the museum for the medical experiments the Nazis performed. I didn’t get quite as emotional as I did at Dachau, but it was extremely sobering nonetheless. Next, we had a group lunch at a restaurant that specialized in potato dishes, so I got me some potato pancakes. After we finished, Carter, Kathryn, Hailey, and I went to the local Rossman’s to buy hair dye for Carter. That’s right. We dyed Carter’s hair. Well, actually Hailey did (and did a pretty good job too!). That night was a fun one. We thought we were going to dye Carter’s hair and work on our papers intermittently, but in actuality, we ended up just hanging out, laughing, dancing, and not doing any work. We ended up splitting up and going to bed pretty late of course.

Thursday started off with a visit to the T-4 Memorial followed by the Alchemie exhibit. I really enjoyed it and found it quite fascinating to see the pairings of old and new pieces of art. While we were in there, the rain started and would not stop until the next day but pretty much until the end of our time in Berlin. We split up for lunch, and Gabe, Alana, and I went to an Australian restaurant, where we finished up the meal with black forest cake…and pretty much as soon as we left the restaurant, Alana and I got gelato (two rounds of dessert yolo). We then headed to the Otto Bock Institute, which was SUPER interesting. Prosthetics is something I’m very interested in, and I probably could have spent all day in there. Unfortunately, my head was not in the right place, so while I did get some good information from our guide, I was a little distracted by all of the interactive things (whoops) and I wish we could’ve spent longer there. I’ll definitely be looking into their research and what they do. We went back to the hotel (battling pouring rain the whole time) to finish up our papers and get ready for the Blink-182 concert!!! I was super excited because I love Blink. A large group of us met up in the lobby and headed to the venue. We got there pretty late and only caught the end of A Day to Remember’s set (the second opener). The venue was strange though. When we bought our tickets, it said they were general admission, which to me means everyone stands wherever there’s room in the pit and that’s the whole venue. This one, however, was a venue with a pit and two tiers of seats, and the pit was extra money/another ticket (if I had known this I would’ve bought one. There was entirely too much room in that pit.) and the tiers of seats were all general admission. Because our group was so large, we ended up finding space on the second tier of seats off to the side. But man, the concert was a great time. Blink truly jams and some of their songs I know every word to, so I ended up having a one-person dance party. Concerts give me life. I love live music and this band was great and the people I was with I love, so it was wonderful. Not many people get to say they saw Blink-182 in Berlin. After the concert, Hailey, Gabe, Carter, and I went to a nearby burger restaurant run by this superwoman for probably the most American-tasting burgers I’ve had on the trip. Plus, we were all starving so it was super satisfying. We went to bed soon after.

Friday, we had a late start with lecture starting at 11 in the hotel breakfast area. Dr. Wasser gave two lectures, one finishing up the Doctors’ Trials and the second over Virchow. Side note, this day was actually my birthday, so all of a sudden in between the two lectures, Dr. Wasser said something and then Gabe goes, “so, today is Juliette’s birthday, so we’re gonna sing to her” or something like that. Other side note: when I am surprised into being the center of attention, I get very embarrassed very quickly. So to be honest, I don’t even really remember what Dr. Wasser or Gabe said or much of the time when they were singing to me. I’m slightly ashamed to say, I even started shaking and had a little bit of trouble writing my notes right after that (lol whoops). I really appreciated the gesture, though and was very grateful to be surrounded by some of the greatest people I know on my birthday. After the lectures, we went to the Charite medical school. First, we got a tour of their vast collection of anatomical specimens and had round two of iron lung. Afterward, a younger medical student who actually ended up being pretty cool showed us around their facilities, including their simulation rooms where Alana, Hailey, and Kathryn had to do compressions and shock the patient to try to get his heart rate back to normal. It was quite humorous. I thought that was a super great resource for the students there. Once the tour finished, we went back to the hotel and had less than 10 minutes to get ready for the farewell dinner, but somehow I managed. After a bit of a lengthy trip, we made it to the Moroccan restaurant which was incredible—great food, great atmosphere, great staff. Unfortunately, the six of us got split up, so it was pretty much just Gabe and me chatting the whole time. We finished up dinner with some speeches by Henning and Dr. Wasser and then proceeded to take a ridiculous amount of pictures (and shed some tears) before heading to the hotel. We also stopped at a little shop right before our hotel, and got some ice cream (Gabe bought my pint, thanks Gabe and happy birthday to me) of the delicious Ben & Jerry’s variety. We decided tonight would be our long awaited movie night and we watched Spirit and Shrek and just really soaked up each other’s company before splitting up at 3am. Carter didn’t even go to bed, since he still had to pack and be ready to go before 5am. Lots of hugs were dealt out until we decided to call it and go to sleep.

On Saturday, I started off the day with breakfast with Gabe and Hailey (well, really just Gabe because Hailey woke up late, but hse made it!) before heading back to my room to pack before the hotel kicked me out at 11am. I managed to fit everything, but did notice that my suitcase was tearing (huzzah) so that was a little piece of stress I carried with me throughout the day until I got my luggage back in London. I made it to the airport by myself successfully (I only struggled and sweat a little), whereupon Kalea and I stumbled upon each other and realized we were on the same flight! So that was a wonderful surprise. We talked quite a bit between waiting for our (delayed) flight and afterward in the customs line and I enjoyed myself. The flight was noneventful and I tried to sleep for most of it, but since I was in a window seat on an emergency exit row, I didn’t have a right armrest which I ended up missing a lot more than I thought I would. After a quick cab drive, I made it to my cousin’s house in Wembley where I’m staying for the remainder of my time here, where we popped a bottle of champagne and had some burritos that were quite delicious. Saturday was also Canada Day and (my cousin and I being Canadian) we went out that night to the Maple Leaf pub, which was quite the experience (and quite busy).

And I’m going to cut off the post right there and save the rest for my final week, since that technically marks the end of the program. Looking back, the week was a little dreary what with the lack of sunny weather and all the bittersweet emotions. This week flew by, and I’m sorry that I didn’t get to see more of Berlin because of the paper (yay procrastinating) but ultimately, I got to spend time with my friends and that was so valuable in and of itself. I’m going to save the reflections for another post, but man, this trip was probably one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. Truly unforgettable and irreplaceable.

JMD