The Butterfly Paper

I have 164 pictures from this weekend. Well, Sunday morning, actually. The morning Mary read her e-mail and my mom e-mailed her and said she had to take pictures, and we hadn't taken any.

Photobucket takes one minute per picture. Picasa is a lot faster, but only works for publishing straight to Blogger. Maximum of 4 pictures per post.

So I started a new blog. A blog just for pictures. One that will be updated far less frequently. It is called Butterfly Paper and it is for your enjoyment.

FRIDAY, ACCORDING TO MY NOTES
Piff got out of school early because it was the last day before Ferien. My school is not nearly this nice. I was jealous. We had lots and lots of cake left over from the Schulefasching thing, and that meant Delicious. We were going to have movie day in Bio, and then our teacher tried to tell us the tv would work without electricity, and then it still didn't work and he complained about the school falling apart and being worse than Russia, and we ultimately had to do work and not watch a video. Math was, well, Math. "So who's absent today?" "Our brains." "Gellie, what is that in your hand?" "A magic stick." "It does her homework for her!" And in German, we listened to some random, boring 1930s German comedian. I took a nap.

I went to see Mary this weekend! I got up all early Saturday and rode the train forever. In Koblenz, the stop before Bonn, the train decided it couldn't go to Bonn anymore, and I had to get off somewhere else and take the S-Bahn to meet Mary and be 40 minutes late. But she had a chocolate crossaint for me! Mary loves me, I think. We went to Pizza Hut and were loud and silly Americans (myself, Mary, and Casey), and we had a delicious pizza and couldn't decide what language to speak. Once our hunger was slaked, we had to go to the post office, and Mary bought stamps and stood at the mailbox FOREVER finishing her letters (who doesn't finish their letters before going to the post office?) and Casey and I eventually left her to go to Karstadt to buy silly Karneval costumes. We looked forever and I bought a flapper dress and a boa and a feather for my head and we bought spray-in hair dye and face crayons and it was great. Mary put the glitter in her hair in the bathroom because she is very impatient. I got to wear my boa immediately. I love boas. We went to McDonald's because Casey needed a balloon, and I waited outside while Mary and Casey tried to get one, and succeeded. Then we decided it was time to go to Mary's house, so we got our stuff from the train station lockers and got on a bus and Casey and I had an iPod war and it is a long way from the bus stop to Mary's house, no matter what she says. We got there and dropped our stuff and had some tea and I wanted to watch the Olympics, but Casey was mean (and controlling the remote) and made us watch Germany's Next Top Model, which isn't nearly as cool. We had dinner sometime, and it was delicious, as was everything Mary's host mom made, and then we went down to Mary's room in the basement and her host brother got us hooked up with the DVD player and tv and we watched the Notebook, which I determined was a silly movie, and Casey and Mary hate me for thinking it was silly. I should mention I was dressed like a flapper at that point. Then Mary's host brother Christian came back down and we watched Gangs of New York, which was so much better, although Mary and Casey slept through most of it. It was late, and we went to bed. The next morning, Mary got us up for church, and church is closer to Mary's house than the bus stop, I think. In any case, it is really close. And it was an American church, in English, with Methodist hymnals! Casey's a Methodist, too, and we got all excited and told Mary she was going to a Methodist church, because it was just like our church at home. Mary disagreed. After church, we hurried home for lunch and then got ready to go to the Karneval parade in some village with Christian and his friend. We had lots of fun standing there and screaming for candy at every float that came by, and mostly it seemed like they would throw it beside us, directly across from us, and then on the other side of us, so we didn't get much. Casey got a horse calendar, though, and a juice box, and she's pretty proud of that. We headed home after the parade for Board Games, and we started with PayDay because they wouldn't let me play the Texas oil drilling game (it looked like fun) and then we moved on to Deutschlandreise, which turned out to be the coolest game ever. It was a big map of Germany with a bunch of cities on it, and cards for all the cities, and you got 8 cards and had to go to all those cities and then get to a special goal city first. It was way more fun than it had any right to be, although Casey won constantly due to being able to find super-short routes between cities and being very very lucky. We drank a lot of tea and ate a lot of cake, too, until it was dinner time. After dinner, we started watching American Wedding, and then realized that it was the most boring movie ever created, so we played more Deutschlandreise and left it in for background noise. Our next choice of background noise was Robin Hood Men in Tights, but of course we ended up watching it instead of playing, and Casey, who has never seen this amazing movie (I don't know why not) got bored with it (she must have problems) and went to take a long bath while Mary and I enjoyed our movie. We went to bed thereafter and Mary woke us up too early the next morning for the next parade. As we were eating breakfast, it started to snow, and we were lazy, and we finally decided to be wimps and make more tea and stay in. Of course we ended up playing a lot more Deutschlandreise. We packed and we dyed our hair (of course) and we took millions of silly pictures, which are on the other blog. We eventually went out into the snow and to the train station to go home, but we were a bit early and grabbed another cup of tea in the bar, and then I faced my 5 hour ride home, which was uneventful.

I spent today uploading pictures. Good thing it's Ferien.

I'm Off

Shortly, I will be hopping on a train and going up to see MARY and CASEY for the weekend!


I AM PRETTY EXCITED.

I Know, I Know

You're freaking out because I haven't blogged. There's just not much to report. Let me check my notes.

TUESDAY
"no Math!"
"www.booklooker.de" (reminder to check there for German project)
"used my first free period for shopping- paintbrushes, post office, chocolates. . . and the second for drawing pretty girls." Yea.
"We are having some Olympics problems." Just look at that medal count. It's not getting prettier.
"SUNNY!" I was excited about that.

WEDNESDAY
"it's much grayer today" Weather.
"Johannes Nachhilfe" I started tutoring Johannes, Berni's brother, in English. I get €8 a week!
"no Math!" again.
"do identical twins have the same fingerprints?" I need to know.
"so does the blue elephant exist or not?" The blue elephant is God. This was our discussion in Reli. It was quite interesting.
"'Say what you think and stick to it!' 'I'm not thinking anything, and I've stuck with that.'" That was an exchange between my Bio teacher and a student. I thought it was funny.
"Germans, there is an h in ghetto." They don't know this.
"H.F. really smells like beer today." Herr Friedl, my German teacher. Yea.

TODAY
"a little bit of snow" Just a little.
"the train is always so crowded on the way to Friedberg." From Hochzoll to Friedberg, the train is super-full. I didn't even have a seat today. Fortunately, it was just one stop.
"I like it when we do media because I know what's going on." in Sozi. It's totally mass comm stuff right now.
"'Patrick, did you read it?' 'Yes.' 'Then give me a 3-sentence summary, please.' 'I think you just did that, Herr Lang.'" More Sozi. That was a funny moment. Almost as funny as when Jakob appeared on the roof at the end of class.
"I no longer care to hear these translation debates." I am so bored out of my mind in English.
"Fasching's awesome b/c of 5th period rock music and party." 5th period is my free period. The Fasching party they were setting up outside meant some boys started playing loud rock music. It was great.
"Writing couplets about teachers." Noiby and Robbie and Viktor and David were writing awesome mini-poems about just about everyone in an apparent Fasching tradition. It was hilarious.
"It's more real when you learn about it here. It's deeper and multifaceted and sincere." The Holocaust. I really, really love my History class.

So that's that. I hope you're happy, Dad.

More Good News

In the mail today: Sweet Briar (safety school) accepts me, offers me a $15,000 per year ($60,000 total) Commonwealth Scholarship for being cool and living in VA, and notes that I qualify for the Virginia Tuition Assistance Grant of $2500 per year, putting me at $17500 in scholarship before they've even seen my financial information. Also, I am already accepted into the Honors Program.
Remember: Safety School. In-State School.

Otherwise, today was, well, Monday. It's 7° outside right now, so it feels like springtime, and I made certain to walk home today instead of taking the bus. My German teacher suggested I do a presentation on a topic of my choice, and I am thinking it is time the Germans learn about George Bernard Shaw. I bet you figured I'd pick him. We're listening to silly British radio programs, and I've determined that I am 100% over British accents- they are no longer fun, just annoying. Also, my German teacher asked me why we don't pronounce it "long-evity," to which I had to simply reply that it sounded silly, although I really meant that his question was silly.
Reli brought philosophy in the form of math, which, it turns out, is fun, much more so than real math. We have lots of math and physics LK-types in there, so they were all trying to make complex formulas and wanted to know if they could integrate the Ego to determine its relation to mind and brain, or something like that. It was awesome.
We had an X in Bio, which is basically a pop quiz, but because we'd been waiting for one, I had kind of studied during lunch and it wasn't too terribly hard. I am figuring on a 3. Poor Herr Wittmeyer complained about students who "always write so much, and then I have to read it." This is what silly German teachers get for always always giving essay tests and quizzes.

I came home from school and discovered that Piff, who was still asleep when I left the house, is wearing a yellow t-shirt over a black long-sleeved shirt, as am I. Same color yellow even. I swear we aren't really twins, but sometimes the similarities are eery.

Also, the mail brought me pictures from Blackstone. Granted, I had to use my Snapfish skills to order these myself, but they were free except for postage because I have all sorts of Snapfish credits built up. Still, it would have been cooler if someone had sent me surprise pictures. Is this a hint for the future? Who knows?

Happy President's Day!

Oh dear! I almost forgot the most important part! I have a half-packed package on my floor, and it needs chocolates to complete it! Thing is, I don't want to send random chocolates to random people- those of you who want something need to send me an e-mail expressing this wish TODAY. (This is for TUMC people, although others are welcome to send me e-mail, your chocolates will just go out in a different package, is all.) TJ was supposed to tell all of you this, and I've not heard from a one of you. Cindy, Bill- if you want some specifics (and I'm sure you do), could you drop me another line with those details? You are getting delicacies, no worries, but I'd like to hit your favorites! (Google should bring up websites for Ritter Sport and Milka so you can examine flavors, if you like.)

And: (this post just keeps growing) Scary-Go-Round really speaks to me today.

Where To Begin?

Thursday, I guess?

It was warm (okay, it was like 4, but that felt pretty warm) and the sun was out, in spite of the giant puddles all over the place. My walk to school was pleasant. I stopped by the bakery. I dawdled. Thursdays are like that. Then I got to school, opened the door to the K12 room, and discovered a river gushing from the ceiling into a trashcan. I closed the door again, looked around, and noted multiple leaks over trash cans. Fortunately, some classmates appeared, and we huddled to one side as men came and started taking the K12 ceiling apart and bringing ladders in and doing arcane things. My school is pretty ghetto, apparently. With our room out of order, we in the 12th grade took refuge in the library, which lacks couches. Sozi's highlight was watching the men on the roof outside the window, apparently digging a canal over the K12 room. English bored me to death, according to my notes, and then I decided that the totally dripping school was far too dangerous and that it was far too beautiful outside, so I went home. The fields between Aichach and Hochzoll are now crossed with rivers and dotted with lakes that weren't there last week. It's quite silly.
It was raining when I left the house on Friday, but the sun was out by the time I got to school, and the only note I have from school Friday is that the K12 room (now dry) really stank from being all wet. I got to leave early again because it was Report Card Day, and since I don't get one, I could skip the assembly where they were being passed out. Whoo!
Came home, chilled out, around 5, Anja called to get Philipp to get drinks for her, and we decided that I should go ahead to her then instead of someone having to drive me again. So Philipp and I went to the drink mart and, of course, neither of us had a euro for the cart deposit, proving that Germany is waaaaay too untrustworthy. (See, you have to put a euro coin in the slot on the cart to disconnect it from the other carts, and you only get your euro back when you return the cart to its proper place. Not so bad, unless you don't have a euro. Cases of drinks are heavy.) We perservered and went to Anja, where we drug the cases of water and juice and all my junk up in the tiny tiny tiny elevator (I hate that elevator) and then Anja and I played computer games until other people started showing up. It was Mädelsabend, of course, and so Franzi and Janika and Lea and Nadja all came and we immediately hit the kitchen, because we were hungry. We made some sort of delicious cheese-and-vegetable-based-thing-that-melts-on-bread and fruit salad and we also made lots of face masks, but those become important later. Post-dinner was Henna Time, during which we attempted to decorate ourselves with the henna Nadja bought. The package said to add black tea and mix until it was a consistency between toothpaste and mustard. Turns out that no one is entirely certain what that means, and I think we used way too little tea (which I said then, but no one believed me). Anyway, I used my crafty skills to cut the corner off a bag and use that to put henna on Nadja's arm, but it turns out that this method means you either get watery junk or thick paste, neither of which you want. Franzi was trying the paintbrush, and had no better results, so I felt better. I did smear a design across Nadja's arm, and other people got all decorated, but the end result was that Franzi's body markers (yes, such a thing exists) were way more useful and actually remained on the skin, unlike the henna. After that failed experiment, we decided the best thing to do would be to cover our faces in honey and eggs, so we did. People say that's good for your skin? I proved to be the only person who can have someone paint honey/eggs onto my face with a kitchen brush without cracking up. I consider this a skill. Of course, we ended up with sticky in our hair, and that was less pleasant. I'm fairly certain we then decided to point our now-amazing faces at the tv for a while, and we watched Love Actually in German and it was wonderful and we smiled and awwwed and sniffled at all the right places. Then came the cucumber-quark masks, from which experience there are apparently many entertaining pictures. Nadja promised to send them to me, so we'll see. [I went and ate dinner just now, so I've lost my train of thought entirely. New paragraph!]
By then it was getting quite late and things start blurring. We watched Save the Last Dance. Lea went home. We had something like smoothies. Franzi and Janika gave themselves trashy drag queen/five cent whore make-up (bright red lipstick, blue eyeshadow to the eyebrow, giant eyebrow pencil beauty marks, etc). We discovered that I hadn't brought a sleeping bag, although I was incredibly certain that I had. I borrowed Anja's. I guess it was around 4 when we finally got to bed? People say Nadja's handy went off at 6, and that's likely. Franzi and Lea were sleeping in the living room (Nadja, Anja, and I in Anja's room) and woke up at 9:30 or so. Within the next half-hour, we older, sensible people awoke (rather against our will- the phone rang once or twice) (it should be noted that this is about what time I get up on a totally normal Saturday) and we had breakfast and cleaned up a bit and there was some strange motorized spinning ball? It's impossible to explain, but it dominated our morning. Franzi and Janika's parents came, and I got Piff (the only boy up at home) to come pick me and Anja up (it being Basti's birthday and all) and came home and showered and I think I'm going to end this sentence now. There was Basti's Birthday Lunch, and then Basti's Birthday Afternoon Tea and Cake, where things got stranger. As we were chilling, enjoying the delicious cake Steffi had made (although Steffi was not yet there), Philipp suddenly looked strange and then had a random and fully unexpected seizure. (Before you freak out, he is fine now.) See, two years ago, he had a burst blood vessel in his brain (is that what it's called in English? "Brain hemorrhage" sounds entirely wrong.) and, according to the doctor that came with the ambulance (an English word for Notarzt would be nice), this sort of thing is relatively normal, but no one bothered to say that two years ago. So, you know, we were surprised. Ambulance came, things were crazy. Philipp remembers nothing of this. Ambulance left, my host parents packed things for Philipp and left, Basti and Steffi and Piff and Anja and I played the Autobahn game (you get cards, you build roads, it's fun) and the "Who Am I?" question-based game (me and Piff and Anja v. Basti and Steffi; they complained that people we picked, such as Red Riding Hood, were too difficult). Eventually, Basti and Steffi left and Piff and I settled down to watch the Olympics, and then my host parents called and said that since they needed to stay with Philipp at the hospital, two of us should go to the theatre in their place. To a play starting in one half-hour. Piff claimed that he needed to stay home and figure out the details of going snowboarding with his friends Sunday (today), so Anja and I headed off downtown with tickets to a play we had never heard of. It turned out to be a really funny play about late30somethings at Christmas, people who are starting to wonder if their marriage works and if they've made the right choices. Also a really funny puppet version of the three little pigs. It was great, which was a pleasant surprise. Of course, it lasted until 10:30, and since Anja and I had been up until 4 am the night before, we were happy to get home (Anja dropped me off and then took Basti's car and drove herself home). Host parents were back and reported that Philipp was doing okay and being kept overnight but should come home in the morning, and I collapsed into bed.
Fortunately, church was later this morning (11) because of the Magic Worship Service. I woke up around 9 or 9:30 and moved slowly into my day. My host dad came home with Philipp at 10:30 or so, and dropped him off, and then we went on to church (my host mom staying home so someone would be with Philipp, since Basti was at Steffi's and Piff was snowboarding). So what is a Magic Worship Service? First, it's a bad translation on my part. Second, it's an awesome magician doing magic tricks and throwing in cool little messages. It was funny and lots of fun and we had lunch afterwards and I discovered that potato salad is the German version of macaroni and cheese- i.e. we had about 10 different kinds in the potluck sidedish smorgasbord. Also, I had veal? It was good. After lunch, the magician gave a little workshop for the youth group and I now have a length of rope to practice fancy knotting tricks on, and I know how to make a flat die (singular of dice here) and a few other fancy things. Heehee. Eventually got home, determined that Philipp is, indeed fine (well, he's not allowed to drive for a year), and Anja came over again and that meant more games! We (me, Anja, Philipp, my host mom) played Mahjong and it is not at all like the computer game but it's fun, even if I lost really, really terribly. This is what happens when Piff isn't here- I lose, and I can't comfort myself by being better than him. I started writing this blog, then it was dinnertime, I saw Germany win a gold medal (I think) and was most upset and Piff came home but then left to take Anja home and I think that brings us up to date.

Happy, Mary?

Let It Rain

I haven't seen rain in quite some time. The fact that it rained all day long means: hey! It got above freezing! YEESSSSSS!
Reli was really, really interesting today. Really. We're discussing free will, and we got into one of neuroscience's favorite current theories: that all decisions are actually made in the subconcious before we conciously become aware of them. This means that all the reasons we think we have for these decisions aren't our actual reasons, because those reasons are concious. Naturally, a lot of people don't like this theory. I love it. Just because you make a decision subconciously doesn't mean you aren't responsible for it- it's just that we can't judge your decision based on motive, because motive is an afterthought, something we create to make us feel we've made the right decision. Our brains are great at justifying things- man, I had to spend most of Bio convincing myself that the choice to stay at school although I was so, so tired was the right choice. Anyone who's ever gotten in trouble knows that the first thing you do is try to find a beautiful reason or excuse to make your behavior seem less terrible. Thing is, nothing we do has reason. I figure, the sooner we quit searching for the "why" behind our "what," the sooner we can make some real progress in making the right decision, next time. The subconcious isn't stone- it changes as easily as our concious, we just don't know how to make it happen. But every kid learns that there are things you don't do, things with unpleasant consequences. The subconcious accepts this fact and makes decisions based on it. Sometimes it ignores the consequences, but it's not unaware of what the concious is aware of. In fact, the subconcious should be hyperaware of things the concious knows, by my logic. The problem is that people tend to feel the subconcious isn't Me- it's some puppeteer, some ancient collection of instincts and whatnot that, since we have no concious control over it, should be ignored or overridden as often as possible. What excites me about this whole subconcious-as-decision-maker thing the most is that it forces us to realize that our subconcious is still 100% Us, perhaps even moreso than our concious, without the constant attempts to fit into our world and be acceptable to others. Should we learn to accept our subconcious so fully, and understand it as the real drive behind our every thought and action, I can't begin to imagine what could happen. But it makes me excited, somehow.
Good thing Hampshire's got an amazing Cognitive Science Department.
(Update on the "What I Want to Be When I Grow Up" front, because things are moving around: the whole diplomat thing is still cool, but it's becoming my "acceptable" option. I kind of really (ignore the kind of) want to be an Event Manager, because that is about the most exciting job I can think of. Also, Brain Researcher, because this stuff gets me all worked up and interested in life again. Diplomacy seems kind of hard, in comparison?)

I tried really hard to stay awake in Bio, although this whole gene research thing really is interesting. I've realized that I crash completely in third and fourth periods- it is just the worst time of day for me, no matter the class. (9:35-11:05 is the time period) In America, they gave me lunch during that time, which I think helped a WHOLE lot. Here, I get two breaks, one 9:15-9:35, one 11:05-11:15, so on each end of my crash. Eating during these breaks doesn't help wake me up. After lunch is hard, too, but I think that's because German and Math are really boring.

Lunch break got off to a good start, though, with David and Robbie and Viktor discussing all sorts of flying machines: first it was using magnetic force, then there were sillier things like winged shoes, and there was a long discussion of Van Gogh's flying machines, and lots of other silly ideas that made me smile. They also compared Back to the Future's concept of 2015 with our current progress, and it turns out that we are a bit behind! Flying skateboard technology, it is time to get on The Ball!

Afternoon classes proved pretty boring. The one highlight came in German, while discussing some terrible Romantic poem about some Artist who points the way we should follow, a road from which no person returns.
Michi: So why doesn't anyone ever come back?
Robbie: Well, all the artists starve to death, of course.

First semester is done without fanfare, Olympics are progressing nicely (I apparently went from some too-soon results and US ended up with gold, not bronze, yesterday, so 5 Gold US! WHOOOOO!)

We Should Have Each Other With Cream

OK Go and the Cure are my two favorite bands. So, for your Valentine's Day Song of the Day, you get the love song where these two bands kiss, metaphorically speaking. Yes, music buffs, "The Lovecats." You'd better go buy it if you don't have it now. Whichever version, they are both DIVINE.

[WARNING: AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST, THERE ARE OLYMPIC SPOILERS. IF YOUR LESS AWESOME TIME ZONE MEANS YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE MENS SPRINT BIATHLON, MENS SLALOM, WOMENS SPEED SKATING 100 M OR WOMENS LUGE, READ WITH CARE.]
So did I have a great day? Of course. I learned that the Romantics (who I hate) turned the Alps into an attractive tourist destination (the one time I was there, I had the worst vacation of my life. Correlation? Possibly.) Noiby brought cake because he loves us, and because it was his (I think?) first full day back at school after complex stomach-related surgery had him home since Christmas. I declared cake my Valentine, because it is very yummy. Sozi proved that Jakob has one of the keenest senses of irony I have found in Germany, and God said that it was Good.
Herr Lang: Unfortunately, this topic will not benefit from Jakob and Sebastian's uncalled-for side comments [discussing Friday's field trip, which both J and S missed].
Jakob: (without raising his hand) Hey now. . . Sebi's way worse than me! (pause, all laugh) Well, that was an exception.

Herr Lang: And the homework is. . . .
Jakob: Color the heading on the notes all pretty.


I came home to a full house (as opposed to yesterday), what with Philipp apparently on break and Anja over for laundry day, and Basti managing to be home and everything. We watched Sven Fischer win the Biathlon Sprint and celebrated, although I worried that Germany would catch up to the US's gold medals, making gloating harder. (more on that later) Also, my Mommy sent me a Valentine's day package with a pig that says "Hogs and Kisses" and a box of Tastykakes, which I immediately shared with all the host siblings, because I am so sweet like that. Of course, now I have no more, and that's somewhat sad. And, later, we watched the women's speed skating, and the Russian lady has the silliest outfit ever, but I guess it helped her win? The Germany chick was pretty bad, and I'm not sure there was an American? Also, yay for China, because I don't think they get many medals. And then we played cards this evening, because Anja is here, and we always play games when Anja is here, and I came out of the first round with -90 points, meaning a great handicap. I perservered, and managed to end up with More than Piff (my usual goal in games), who went into Round Two with 0, and thus less of a handicap than me. Anja was only third, which is highly unusual by our family games. The luge was going on during this, and Germany went away with all three medals, making me incredibly concerned for the US-Germany competition. As it happens, US and Germany both have 7 medals right now, counting the bronze US just won in the slalom, with 4 golds each. But BUT the US has 2 silvers and 1 bronze, and Germany has 1 silver and 2 bronzes. This means the US is just ever-so-slightly better. And since Germany has no chance at figure skating, I figure I can sleep okay tonight, confident that I get to gloat and Piff doesn't. Also, I am not watching figure skating. It is not a sport, okay guys? GET OVER IT.

What?

Saturday was Burt Reynolds Day.

And nobody told me.

So I missed it.

PRETTY UPSET WITH YOU GUYS


Also, I got home from school at 12:15. Before Piff by a good half hour.

YES

So the real blog, I guess:
School was boring? I went to German and I still hate Romantic poetry, although I guess it's seasonal? And then I went to English and it was entertaining, but I have nothing specific. And then I was done! Yay! I came home and I was the first one here and that was nice, and I watched the Women's Halfpipe in the Olympics after lunch and USA USA USA took gold AND silver, and I gloated because Germany couldn't even get a team together, and now USA has the most gold medals, so I can gloat (So what if Norway has 8? 4 of those are bronze, and that barely counts AT ALL.). Cause, you see, mostly the only events we see here are the ones where US atheletes finish like 37th, and that's just not cool.
Also, Kati Wilhelm totally screwed things up in the Woman's 15k Biathlon today- 5 misses at the shooting stand? What on earth? THIS IS NOT WHAT WE EXPECT OF YOU, KATI. Things best be better come Thursday.

Olympics is neat.

And iTunes told me that James Blunt has really terrible taste in music, which made me die a little inside. I was telling myself that he did have indie cred, that he got discovered because his talent IS that great, but he's looking more and more like a Top 40 clone every day. Makes me sad, because his music is good.

I Know

It's been 59 years since I've updated. Go watch the Olympics or something if you need entertainment.

I guess I never told you about Wednesday? My notes tell me I got up early and went to school, only to find out that my Reli teacher wasn't there, meaning I had second period free in addition to first, and could have slept in. I wasn't happy about that. In Bio, I had a giggle over the official-even-in-German scientific term "sticky ends." I wrote some things that were apparently funny from the lunch break down, but I don't find them funny anymore. I apparently spent the rest of the day analyzing the German educational system, noting that a 13/15 is basically a 99 in American terms, and that Germans still believe in the bell curve, which worries me. I hurried to get to the train station and did manage to catch the 4:40 train, and I went all the way to Augsburg to buy postcards for you, beloved readers. Watch your mailboxes sometime in the next few weeks. (If you wanted chocolates, you were supposed to e-mail me. You have a few days on that one.) I got home at 6:30 and prepared to collapse, which I did for some time. I drug myself out of bed at 1 in the morning to chat with other accepted Hampshire students, and it was a good time, despite the late hour. I got back to bed at 3, and was not particularly happy to get up at 7 the next morning, but 7 is better than 6. My notes for Thursday say I got to tell my whole Sozi class about how American college is super-expensive and they are NOT allowed to complain about paying €1000/year. We're doing a random debate unit in English, and I have a lovely quote from the anti-television side: "You know, think of all those hours people spend in front of the tv. Imagine how much money they'd make if they spent those hours working!" So, couch potatoes, you heard the man. Get another job. History is currently devoted almost entirely to gay Nazi conspiracy theories, so it's fun. Also, although I have no idea what the context is, I have the sentence "One option would be January 33rd" written in my notebook. That night, Piff and Basti and Basti's friend Daniel and I went to see Michael Mittermeyer, who is basically the funniest comedian Germany has to offer. I laughed extra-hard when he made fun of Americans, and the whole show was simply hi-larious. I'm glad, because a lot of German humor is, frankly, lacking. I got home at midnight and dropped right off to sleep, glad that I got to sleep in until 7:30 on Friday, because it was Field Trip day. I went to the Hochzoll Bahnhof, where I was supposed to be meeting my class, at 8:22, waiting for their train to come at 8:24 so we could get on a train together and go to Munich. Well, no train full of class. I waited. I watched the train to Munich leave. I kept waiting. Finally, I gave up and went home, where I found someone's cell number and called to ask what was up. As it happened, in the time it had taken me to get home, they'd made it to Hochzoll, and my host mom drove me back to meet up with them. We waited for the next train to Munich and then took the U-Bahn to the Ministry of Science or Whatever, and the U-Bahn adventures reminded me of Mid-Year, except there were only 19 of us this time. The Ministry was boring for a while while some bureaucrat talked about his law for higher education reform or something, but they gave us ham rolls as soon as we got there, so I thought that was pretty classy. After lunch, a bureaucrat who used to be a teacher started talking to us about how Bavaria's state government is set up, and it was vaguely interesting, but after a year of Mr Cox's first-hand experience, I always felt kind of ripped off when this poor guy had to give us third- or fourth-hand accounts. Bureaucrats in general do not give nearly as interesting presentations as real politicians, I noticed. But, hey, we had snacks and free lunch, and that's pretty cool. We also toured the Bavarian State Capital Whatever Building, which is only 4 meters shorter than the White House, by which I mean it is totally pretentious and not at all practical. We got to sit at the table where all the ministers meet weekly, though, which I guess was supposed to be exciting. I got home at 5, I think, and went to church about an hour later for youth group's re-showing of the UFO video plus special outtakes. So kind of like a DVD release party, if we had a DVD. And I made Philipp come pick me up when we were done, so he missed the first half-hour of the Olympics, about which he is still naturally upset. At 10 pm on Friday, DYC called me! I was very happy to talk to everyone, although I am still quite convinced that I didn't get to talk to everyone (I can't tell you who I didn't talk to, but there was someone) and some people don't talk long enough, but Pat and Betty talked forever and made up for it- I really miss them (also the rest of you!). I went to bed after that phone call, and finally got to sleep in Saturday, and went to Gabi and Markus's wedding at church, and I don't have any fun weekend stories. Sorry. I am resting.

And watching the Olympics. There's a naturally sad tone in the house that we didn't win the men's 15+15k skiing thing just now (did you guys see the #4 dude totally fall at the beginning and break his ski, then have to start like 30 seconds later, but end up getting silver? That was crazy!), but I am gloating a bit about the US's superior snowboard half-pipe skills. Because the US really sucks at the Winter Olympics otherwise, you have to admit.

Just One

So Emily finally got back from Austria and got her pictures up, and I was going to make another giant Köln post based on them, but you know what happened. I only have one picture that I need to show you.



So I was standing outside of the elevator at the hostel on Saturday, and I had a headache, and I was tired, and I looked at this sign. And I could not for the life of me figure out what it meant. I mean, clearly, fire, run away. Makes sense. But the second part, the part with the man and the woman in the elevator with the big red x, I just couldn't interpret. Best I could figure out was that maybe this was not a coed elevator, in which case we'd been breaking that rule for some time.

A few hours later, it occured to me that the sign meant not to use the elevator in case of fire.

Why I Love Hampshire

Snow dinosaurs. Yes.


Long day. Talk later.

It Turned Into a Ballroom Blitz

It snowed again today, pretty much the whole day. Stayed pretty warm, though, so it didn't pile deeper than 4 or 5 centimeters. I was really hoping we'd be in the part of Germany with 20- I want to have that much snow, just once.

The snow got me thinking, somehow, this morning how awesome it would be to have a Segway that could handle snowy sidewalks. I would so ride one of those to school. I mean, a bike would be great, too, but, man, a Segway. That would just be awesome.

Did you know that Germans sometimes use English phrases the way we use French or Latin? Actually, they do this a lot. I was reminded of this and mildly freaked out when my German teacher said "happy end" as easily as an American English teacher would say "denoument." So weird.

Free period was just me and Robert and David and Viktor, and the boys got into this fascinating discussion of string theory and other dimensions and such fascinating things, making it pretty impossible for me to concentrate on reading for Sozi. Also, I tried to explain the word dismay and failed (I am wearing my Robotania shirt), and Macguyver got brought up at some point and I was very happy that Germans know him. People came back from McDonald's at the end of the free period, and they had balloons! Balloons are great.

In math, I thought about how much I miss TI-83s. They don't have any here, no graphing calculators at all, and I really wish I had one to whip out and impress the Germans with.

I have a whole lot of Sozi homework. I downloaded some new Iron and Wine music, a compilation album with a band named Calexico (I have not heard of them before). It is good stuff, as Iron and Wine always is.

GUESS WHAT

HAMPSHIRE LOVES ME


ACCEPTANCE

$10000 A YEAR

A BRACELET

SO SO MANY PAPERS

AN EXCUSE TO GET VERY LITTLE SLEEP WEDNESDAY NIGHT TO THURSDAY MORNING


WHEEEEEEEE

I also went to school, and my English teacher forgot to make my English exam, so I had to take the one intended for my classmates (meaning translating English to German, which is so much harder). Reli was "Let's Have Mock Trials" day, so we ended up with the following:
"My client has financial troubles, you see. He does not drive, as stated by the prosecution, a Mercedes, but a- Herr Rothmann, what do you drive again?"
"The victim was a Lilliputian [this is simply the German word for midget, but I love Swift too much to change it]. Clearly, he was at fault. Lilliputians are always at fault."
(the other case) "He wasn't setting out to kill. He just wanted another victim to rape. It was the interaction with the victim that led him to killing- thus, clearly not premeditated." (Great defense, guys. He'll get off for sure.)

Lunch pause included some stuff I found very funny, but can't remember. I know that, at some point, Jakob stopped the people trying to figure out Physics homework (and to whom he hadn't been listening) and said "Guys. It's simple. Let me explain it. You see, 3 times 3 is 6" (this is another case of Germans with sarcasm!)

Bio Quote of the Day: "There are chemicals we don't let the students near, but an old geezer like me, we don't worry much." (that's my teacher, of course)

Mostly, I am super-excited about Hampshire. My bracelet says NON SATIS SCIRE

Nothing on the Internet Updates on Sundays

And you know why?

Because nothing happens on Sundays. I got up, I went to church, I decorated a candle, I talked to a bunch of people, I had some Sekt, I came home, I made lunch, I hung out with the Host Fam, I hung out on the Internet.

Totally normal Sunday. Nothing to write about.

As Promised

I have no interest in writing about my week right now, because I am lazy, but obligations.

So Tuesday, I overslept because I am talented. Missed German, got to school in the middle of my free period (second), and then went to math, where my notes say there was an entertaining comment about paint-by-numbers (in German, this name rhymes, making it 150% more awesome). History was fascinating on Tuesday, and I wanted to confuse you with historical propaganda, but my will is gone. Also, Herr Schäfer told us about how he and his college classmates cheated on their Middle High German (think Middle English, but harder) exams by sneaking the giant dictionary in under bulky sweaters, then asking to go to the bathroom and looking words up. I am not certain if teachers should be telling us these things! We also had a really, really amazing discussion about how and why Hitler actually got elected- it was wonderful, and I wish I could have transcribed it or something. I love my history class. That night, I went bowling with my Reli class! Bowling requires silly bowling names, and my favorite was Viktor's, "Vitjaaaaaa." Some random 13th grader was going by Goethe, and our teacher put himself in as Rothi (he is Herr Rothmann). It was a fun evening- Petzi (the only boy on our particular lane) was quite upset that Geli and Maria beat him in BOTH games, and Nadine did better than him the second time, too! I didn't bowl great, but I noticed that Germans hold the bowling ball in their first two fingers (Americans in the middle two). This is strange to me, but I guess they manage okay? I also reaized how awesome Germany is when I walked home by myself at 11 pm, and didn't feel at all weird about that, or unsafe or anything.
Wednesday meant I was super, super tired, and I had trouble staying awake in Reli (although the discussion was really interesting) or Bio. By history, I perked up a bit and pledged to actually try to read my texts (haven't done that yet). We got our Schulaufgabe back in Art, and I got a 12, which is a really good grade! I had the best grade on the practical part in the whole class, which made me really happy. I am drawing in my sketchbook again, and playing with color, and I will show you my pictures if you e-mail me! In the lunch break, I was amazed that Tassilo was sarcastic, and also that many Germans didn't get it. Sarcasm is rare here. (You see, Stiefi came in with two Döners and handed them to Tassilo to hold. Tassilo said "Mmm. I'm glad my two Döners are here." Someone else said "You're eating two?" Tassilo: "You bet. I am really hungry today." Someone: total belief. Tassilo: Explanation of Sarcasm.) Later, someone taped Tassilo's shoe because the sole was coming off? Mädi made a video on her camera phone, too, and couldn't get Nico to look at her, and told people to wave, and it was entertaining when it happened?
German had two very beautiful quotes (unrelated):
Student: Herr Friedl, do you actually care if students are here or not?
Friedl: There is nothing worse than a romantic essay. [Of course, we still have to read them. Yuck.]
THURSDAY
I caught that train that I have been having trouble catching for so long. I was proud of myself. I learned that Germany doesn't have seperation of church and state, and I got really terrified. I have since gotten used to it and discussed things with Kacey and I feel better, but it still worries me about their future as a multireligious society (ie, there are TONS of Muslim immigrants who are becoming an important but marginalized part of the population). I got annoyed in English at overanalyzation of individual sentences, but I'm over it. My free period had perhaps this week's best exchange. We were discussing Hitler (remember that this is basically the history LK here, plus a few physics people), and various reasons for him being crazy, one of them including potential homosexuality. Sometime later, the following thing went down:
One: You know Hitler had no citizenship at some point?
Two: What?
One: He gave up his Austrian citizenship, and for the two weeks or so until the German one kicked in, he was not a citizen of any country.
Two: And what does that prove?
Three: That he was gay.
One: Obviously.
Chuckles all around.
Later, somebody decided that the Chemistry LK people should build an atomic bomb for their Facharbeit (mini-thesis?) and the discussion of details was so full of geekery and was wonderful.
FRIDAY
Wait, I already covered this one. Oops.

TODAY
Got up early and went to church at 9 for a day-long First Aid Class. So now I can do CPR in German, I guess. It was kind of fun, actually, but also depressing when you think about all the ways people can be near to death and you might have to save them. Got home sometime around 3:30 (First Aid takes a while to learn), and decided I had the most distinct need for chocolate chip cookies. So I grabbed Piff and we made some, and they are delicious. Baking is fun. Baking is more fun when I can throw some ingredients into a bowl and hand it to Piff and say "Mix this" while he mumbles about America being in the stone age for using cups and not weighing the ingredients. He's right, I guess, because the metric system is way better. Cups aren't bad, though. Like I said, our cookies are great. We made them big- 38 when the chocolate chip bag says we should get 60. Has anyone ever actually made 60 cookies from that recipe?


GUYS, IT IS DADA MONTH, ONE OF THE 13 DAYS OF THE YEAR ON WHICH I MAY CELEBRATE MY BIRTHDAY.

Sleep Little Girl

Although I know it's been colder, it hasn't FELT so cold here yet as it did today. I finally understand Freezing Fog- the weather guy explained on the tv last night that the water remains gas until it hits a surface, at which point it immediately condenses and freezes and covers the trees in ice and is SO PRETTY. Early this morning, it was just fog, though, and bitter cold. So cold that the train was 25 minutes late, and that means I spent those 25 minutes standing on an unprotected train platform, waiting. And the walk to school was just terrible- it hurt to breathe, I was so cold. I didn't think it was really possible for cold air to hurt that much in my nostrils. I did make it to school, and decided that going to history for the final 15 minutes (remember how late the train was) wasn't worth it, and then I went to English to find all of 7 people there. Herr Kütz had some them debate beauty contests and vegetarianism, just trying to get them to talk, and Tinta had the funniest pro-meat argument, but I can't hope to recreate it. It was beautiful, though. There were only 6 of us in Biology, but Wittmeyer went on with teaching, and we managed to have 11 people in math- 2 full rows! We collected for German, determined that there were 6 of us, and that our teacher was nowhere to be seen, so we left. Leaving school a period early is really nice. I got the 12:40 train and ran from that to the bus, and ended up home 10 seconds before Piff- because he had to put his bike up, I got in the door first. I consider this a very great accomplishment. Spent the afternoon relaxing and went to church tonight for a video night- I don't recall the name of the film, but it was a really fascinating German-Canadian production about a German theologian who resisted the Nazis and, of course, was killed. It was great, but its heavy themes have me disinclined to be entertaining, and I have to be back at church at 9 tomorrow morning for some first aid course. So I promise a round-up of this week (it will be round), perhaps tomorrow, perhaps Sunday. I have many wonderful notes about it!

Information Overload

So many pictures. . . know that this blog was a TON of work. My hope is to move all of this and the previous reports to one cohesive post and date it for last Saturday or so, after giving you a day or two to absorb it all here.

WEDNESDAY
So I started talking about Wednesday already, and how we went to visit the mayor and some people go to be the mayor. That includes Whitney and Rose!



Casey, Emily, Mary, and I snuck out early via super-special permission from Christian, and walked forever to the U-Bahn to go meet Mary's host mom and sister and have lunch! When you're stuck waiting for the U-Bahn, you take pictures. This is common knowledge.


After we got off the U-Bahn, we ran into John F Kennedy! It was pretty exciting, and we all posed with him. I posed with him more because I don't carry a camera, so I end up in pictures more easily.
me JFK

Mary made us walk FOREVER to get to her house, and she walks really really fast and Casey and I complained the entire way. But we got there and her host mom was super-nice and none of us could believe that her host sister is only 13 and we had goulash-based soup and bagels and cream cheese and some delicious cake. Mary took us to her room, which is in the basement, and showed us what a terrible mess it was (it was bad) and then we grabbed some cake to take to Christian as a bribe in case we were late, and Mary's host mom drove us to the Haus der Geschichte! It's this really awesome museum about German history post-WWII, and we had this really interesting tour but were not allowed to take cameras in! We did take a few cool lobby pictures, though!

We found this statue when we went down to the U-Bahn after the museum. Everyone was supposed to pose all tough, but Mary has trouble with that, I guess! The statue played this "do not touch. step away from the statue." recording that was funny and creepy.

We took the U-Bahn to the center of town and checked out Mr Music, the clear highlight of our trip! We all bought Gregorian Chant versions of our favorite 80s artists- I totally have Elton John as interpreted by the Brotherhood of St Gregory now. It is amazing. We also determined that the monks' favorite song must be "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds," because they included it not only on the Beatles album, but also on Elton John and their Greatest Hits. The fact that this is probably the last song monks should be singing (except maybe "Baby Got Back?") makes this all the funnier.
After Mr Music, we popped in some pub for a cola, and then ran and grabbed some hair dye, and met back wherever we were supposed to meet for dinner! Dinner was mediocre, and no one took pictures, or at least no one has given me these pictures. After dinner, we went to the train station to head back to Köln, and I stole Dustin's wrist warmers, which he made from a pair of argyle socks. Mary yelled at me for a few days for stealing them, but he actually gave them to me, and she eventually laid off. As it turns out, boy's argyle socks with holes cut in them are pretty good for keeping warm!
We had some adventures I'm not allowed to talk about (says Mary, although she was not involved in said adventures) when we got back to Köln, and they were quite delicious. Then we returned to the hostel for hair-coloring adventures, and I somehow have none of the many related pictures? Hook me up, people! The day ended late, waiting for Christian to come for room check.

THURSDAY
Thursday started off with some meeting in which we complained for a long time, and then we had to split into small groups and Mary and Casey and Christine and Emily and Whoever Else were offended that I went to Rose and Dustin and Buster and Whoever's group. But I was smart, because our Betreuer was Cynthia, and she was jet-lagged, and didn't make us really do the whole talk-about-yourself-in-the-third-person-from-the-point-of-view-of-your-host-family thing. Mostly we talked about how cool or not our host families are. Then we had some unexpected free time after lunch, so a bunch of us headed down to the Rhine (it was basically across the street) and there was this amazing hill to run down and frozen mud puddles that squirted when you stepped on them and so so so many good stones for skipping. Dustin has something like 59 pictures of himself skipping stones, and someone has an amazing video of Dustin teaching Christine to skip rocks (I want it) and someone made a video of Christine and Emily being long-lost lovers and Mary and I collected shells and Mary got more than me but mine are prettier, and Mary gave them to the Betreuers because she is a suck-up and it was my idea in the first place. I put pictures below.



I have known Dustin for three years, and this picture captures our relationship perfectly. This is basically how we are all the time.

You can see the rock bouncing off the water!

My hair is so amazing. It is simply brilliant. Be in awe.

Later, we went to downtown Köln again to take a tour of the ancient Roman sewer system! It is not as gross as it sounds?

Here you see Buster, Rose, and myself clinging to each other for warmth and listening to the tour guide tell us about how the fine people of Köln put this part of the Roman sewer system above ground so they could put their modern one underground.

This is a pretty terrible picture, but I include it because Buster is doing the Trinity gang sign. I need to tell him that he is part of the gang now.

This is what it looks like inside a Roman sewer. Acute observers will note Casey's hat in the foreground, my hat and Rose's coat in front of the tour guide, and Mike in red just beyond the tour guide. I could identify more people, but I already have a headache. The next picture is also from inside the sewer, and myself, Rose, Buster's arm, and Allyson's hair are more visible. Buster, Rose, and I had to break our link a bit because it is hard to walk three abreast through the sewer.

After the sewer tour, we had a little free time before dinner, and Some People had a desperate need for Starbucks. Normally, I would be all "Starbucks? Shuck that jive!" but it was cold and I figured a hot drink would do me good. I bought tea, though! There are much cuter pictures from Starbucks, but I don't know who has them!

Starbucks was really really full, so all of us huddled around this tiny table with the one easy chair and a weird three-legged ottoman thing. Christine got one of the Starbucks guys to give her a cup of foam, and then she was talking about how she wanted another, and he brought her one! She started talking to him, found out he was from Brazil, took a picture, and got a total of four free cups of foam! I don't know where the picture is, or if Christine ever did call him. It was pretty funny, though.

We walked around in the Dom a bit, because we love the Dom (I love it in ways I shouldn't), and then Mary, Casey, and I killed more time by going into Douglas, German perfume store! Somehow, I, specifically Dustin's wristies, became the test strip, and I left complaining loudly that I stank like girl. I made everyone smell how strong the wristies stank of different perfumes, and many people went into coughing fits. I am wearing the wristies now, and they still stink very strongly of many mixed perfumes. It is terrible. I am tempted to throw them in one of my host brother's beds for a while to try to neutralize the smell (with boy smell, the opposite).
We eventually went out to dinner again, and it was once again pretty mediocre! Mary took lots of pictures of people looking sad, I guess because the food wasn't awesome but wasn't bad either? I put a few less depressing pictures here.



Sometimes German buildings have funny signs. Rarely do you have a camera to capture them. After dinner, we did.
We bought a whole bunch of junk food from a kiosk and went back to the hostel to have a Futurama/Aqua Teen Hunger Force marathon party via Allyson's laptop- basically it was like college, except there was neither alcohol nor marijuana, just Dr Pepper (which we react to like some sort of addicts, since it doesn't exist here) and Haribos and Doritos. Mary did not understand ATHF at all, and we spent a while explaining that it doesn't have a deeper meaning, is just really, really funny. She left out of frustration. I still love Futurama so deeply in my soul. Mary wasn't very amused by that either, but I guess her sense of humor doesn't do cartoons? The rest of us enjoyed the night immensely, and felt very American again, but in a good way.
FRIDAY
Friday morning was so terribly boring that I do not remember it. There were meetings, I know, and we sang happy birthday to India, but nothing of real interest happened until we went to the ZOO. It was me and Rose and Allyson and India and Mike and it was SO. MUCH. FUN. Man, Zoos.

This camel is the coolest guy on the block and knows it. I mean, look at him.

These camels kissed and Rose did not get a picture of it!

She did get them kissing the zookeeper, though. Camel kisses are so cute!

Otters are just so great. This one even peed for us. All the animals decided to pee as soon as we came by. It was quite disconcerting.

German winter is a bit cold for meerkats, so they all sit in their little baskets under the heat lamp!

The chubby one is their king. That log is a throne in the world of the meerkats.

The cheetahs were a little bit sad because they just walked around in a circle in their enclosure, which wasn't really big enough for a decent run. They were kind of camera whores, too, though- this is such a money shot.


See how sad he looks? Just walking the circle.

We didn't take any pictures of the monkeys in the monkey house because the heat fogged up the camera lense. There were some really adorable tiny tiny tiny monkeys, and some larger, sadder monkeys that were too much like small children. One of them just gripped the bars on the door, staring out. India and I felt really, really bad for them. This drawing of a monkey asking for donations at the end of the house seemed pretty wrong to us, but it was funny!


Zebras are awesome. Don't ask me what they are doing.

This picture does not begin to capture the chaos of feeding time at the Baboon Rock. We walk over, and there are about 100 baboons running around the rock, screaming and making the most terrifying noises and generally being really weird. Then we spot the zookeepers starting to chuck apples at them, and all the baboons stop and start diving for the apples and getting vicious and it was INSANE. Some big monkeys would share with littler ones, but some were greedy and mean and some little ones got barely any. It was really strange but hilarious. Also, a lot of the baboons were in heat, meaning their hindparts swell up, and it looks really, really gross. If you look at the leftmost monkey in the above picture, you will see that he is very greedy and has 3 apples. I was happy when he caught the first one, but then he just stuck it under his foot and grabbed a second, proving pretty good catching skills. I couldn't believe that he continued to hold this one and caught a third, which he then began to eat. Notice that the two monkeys above him have nothing.

These monkeys have their apples and are thus calmer. They look really cute in this picture. It was not the case in real life. They were SCARY in real life.
We walked past the rock sometime later, and there was not a monkey to be seen. I guess they all go inside when no one is chucking fruit at them. There were seriously about 100 of them, and we were amazed that they could all disappear like that.





I guess Rose really likes penguins. Don't get me wrong, these dudes were awesome. But a picture can't quite capture the true Shaking of the Tailfeather.

These are those awesome prehistoric horse ponies that that guy made or whatever. We caught them at feeding time, too, and these things can SLOBBER. It was gross.

This picture is pretty cute, though. Pony Kisses!

The sea lions were all swimmy. I don't think there were any cool stories, but they were just cool.

They came out of the water to say goodbye to us!

The girls loved the baby llamas a lot more than Mike did. He found us pretty silly.

But look how adorable they are! Baby llamas!

I like elephants. This zoo had a whole elephant building. We were short on time, so we didn't get to see it all, but ELEPHANTS.



Rose is an animal, too, I guess.

Leopard.

I have never seen so many baby animals at a zoo! These are the baby snow leopards. The snow leopards were probably the highlight of our day- just the prettiest cats ever, and a baby, and the Mama was making all sorts of noise, and they were just amazing. Look at these pictures.





This lion wins some sort of award for being really awesome. He was just kinda chilling as we first passed, but when we came back, the lioness came out, and he got horny. It only got funnier from there. These two pictures capture it nicely, but they don't show the awesome roaring sounds he started making- it was HILARIOUS.


The tiger was in one of those moods that cats get where they go chasing after things that aren't there. I've see my cat do this so many times. Matter of fact, he looks a good deal like my cat in the last picture.



We eventually had to leave the zoo, and return to the hostel. Casey and Emily showed up with the intent to dye their hair. Emily had one of those fancy sets where you also do highlights, and it had a silly bonnet. Naturally, we played with the bonnet.

Emily is the only one of us who can dye her own hair. She is our designated colorist anyway. And she is good at it.

Later that night, Leo (one of our Betreuers) proved to me that he is the nicest person ever. I won't tell you why. Also, he took funny pictures with his camera phone, and I probably shouldn't tell Emily about them.
SATURDAY
Saturday morning brought a boring questionnaire and a more boring test of our German, and at some point Rose and Band debuted the Leo song, written from Tootlez dreams, and it was hilarious. They also played the Steffi song for the first time Steffi heard it, and did repeats of other lovely Betreuer songs. They promise us a CD for Berlin!
Later, we went for dinner at a strange restaurant that played a projected version of a VH1 special about Kurt Cobain and then Fight Club, all without sound because they had to play weird music. The food was mediocre again, and then dancing started when they brought out "Sweet Home Alabama" but I left with a bunch of people becuase Emily was going to get on a train and go to Austria for skiing with her host family!
We rode the S-Bahn and took silly pictures. Naturally, this included a picture of Leo's shoe (Mary was fascinated by it).

Mary also took some pretty terrible pictures of Leo! She loses at life.

We got back to the hostel and Emily grabbed her stuff and Leo asked someone to "borrow him €10," and also let me know that I can use the word "bucks" to refer to euros when speaking English, which makes me glad, because Germans have no slang for their money. Saturday was a late night, and Sunday came too early!
SUNDAY
I have no pictures for Sunday. We spent the day saying good-bye as various people peeled off, and there was a long period during which Jeff and Joe and Dustin and Drew and various other people told racist jokes and dead baby jokes and generally attempted to horrify Steffi and Leo. Also, we saw Leo's driver license pic and it was very funny.

So that was Köln! I have spent way too much time putting this together, so I want gratitude and e-mails and maybe presents! I will pull together highlights from this week tomorrow or so. I have a headache now from digging through all this code.