Week Two: Never EVER forget your passport

Bonn is starting to feel much homier, and my host families home no longer feels like a place I am simply staying but a temporary home away from home. Carmen our host mom is the sweetest and every night asks us how our day has been and is starting to share more about her life too which is so interesting. This week in addition to our history of medicine classes and learning all about the history of sauna, we began our pharmacology classes. I've never had a class so discussion based and I love how interactive it is and challenges me to think rather than to learn information for the purpose of memorization and eventually regurgitation. This week on Wednesday we traveled to Cologne for the very first time, and Cologne is truly great. When we stepped off of the train I was amazed at the size of the Cologne cathedral and was equally amazed when we went inside and saw the tomb of the three kings, and even further amazed when taking a tour of the roof top. It's incredible the technology they had back then, like cranes and the ability to build such ornate gothic structures. The sheer size of this cathedral would be an architectural challenge during modern times, so it's so impressive that they were able to complete this undertaking with less "sophisticated" technologies. For lunch we ate at a traditional German restaurant which was so cool. After being in Germany for two full weeks, it was the first traditional German meal I had eaten, and it didn't disappoint.   

 Other highlights of our second full week in Bonn included but are not limited to: 

• Exploring the market in the Munsterplaz (they have the very best sandwiches for only 2 euros) 
• Mastering the trams and no longer getting lost  
• Learning more German and successfully ordering my daily gelato in German 

River Surfing 

This past weekend, I headed with a group to Munich, to experience the "Bavarian" culture. Munich was vibrant and bustling with tourists. My very favorite part of the city was the market with so many different vendors selling everything from fresh cold cuts to flowers to charming homemade wooden goods. We spent a long time browsing the market before heading to the marienplatz to see the "show" of the dancing figurines up in the tower. Other fabulous things that we got to experience in Munich were the English gardens and schloss nymphenberg. It was a slow-paced day but was filled with walking. In the English gardens we came across the part of the river that was used to surf. I honestly could have watched that for hours on end and was shocked at the bravery and audacity of these people that were throwing themselves into this river and attempting to surf it. Another yet less pleasant surprise was the nudity we stumbled upon in the English gardens. It is just so wild that their culture is so different than ours and nudity isn't seen as some taboo thing and individuals are comfortable enough sunbathing completely naked in the park.  

After that experience we decided to venture out of the park and grab a drink and snack at the renowned hofbrauhaus. I think I ate my weight in pretzels and us girls took one look at the beer and decided to split one amongst all of us since we had quite a bit we still wanted to see the next morning such as some of the museums. One of the girls in our group, Nancy, found that the museums only cost a euro on sundays, so we headed to the Neun Pinakothek. It was so much fun looking at all of the art and browsing the collection (which I probably could have done for hours), but my favorite was probably Monet's The Bridge at Argenteuil, because I love the serenity of water paintings.  

At the renowned Hofbrauhaus

We eventually caught our bus home (flix bus is becoming a new favorite of mine wow so chap and reliable got to love it) and had planned for a nice ride to Nuremberg where we would catch out connecting bus to Bonn. About thirty minutes into the ride, a police pulls in front of the bus and flashes a sign that says follow me. We sat there for a few minutes before the police boarded the bus and asked everyone to show them their passports. In this very moment I looked at the group that I was with (we all had expressions of "oh crap" written all over our faces) and calmly told the officer that we were study abroad students from America and we didn't have our passports for the weekend because we were not leaving Germany. He quickly responded that when traveling anywhere in Germany, any non-German citizen MUST have their passport on their person at all times. After a few minutes of going back and forth, we finally convinced him to check our Texas drivers license. He took them out side to his police car, set them on the hood and about ten minutes later, takes them and places them up to the sun to give them a closer look and then simply hands them back to us saying "passport next time" in a very frightening voice. Eventually the bus got going again and we got to explore Nuremberg (even if it was only for an hour) before heading home to Bonn and wrapping up another great week.  

In Nuremberg, eternally grateful to not be detained by the German Police

One thing I've learned in these short two weeks is that something is always going to go wrong during the weekend trips and you just have to look at it as an adventure and fun/new experience.  

-Arianna Lehuquet