Hostel on acid

So this is how I am going to introduce the city of Nurnberg...by introducing my hostel. Lets just keep in mind here that this is the first place I am traveling to on my own...which is such a change! I left Munich yesterday, caught the two hour train to Nurnberg (northeast of munich) which is the second largest city in Bavaria. It is one thing to stay with a friend and do some sightseeing on your own...it is quite another thing to actually physically travel by yourself. First thing to know, it is incredibly how and muggy here right now. It actually reminds me of a really humid day in downtown Toronto. I get on the train yesterday, fell asleep asap and woke up covered in sweat and alone on the train. No idea where I was (what city or country!) or where everyone else went. So naturally I panicked, grabbed my things, jumped off the train (which wasn't easy considering I have a giant backpack, my camera bag and my shoes weren't on) ran up to the first person I saw and started blabbering away in English asking her where I was, what happened to the train going to Nurnberg etc? Think I scared the crap out of her..but luckily there was a nice man who overheard and assured me that it was the right train, going to Nurnberg and that it had only left Munich 10 minutes ago. I was slightly embarrassed at this point, but I will blame the hot weather for my disorientation! The rest of the train ride passed fairly uneventfully. 

So once in Nurnberg I had to find me hostel. These are the directions the website gave me. Turn left outside the Hbf(trainstation) , walk 400m along a brick wall, turn right at the opera house, then turn left down the first alley way (the alley way should have been my warning sign). No street names or anything! Of course I get lost, but at this point I can ask for directions in German so that wasn't too hard. Walked into my hostel with two other guys, and first thing one of them says is 'wow this is sketchy', which was my thoughts exactly! The walls here look like they were painted by someone on an acid trip. No lie. My room is called the 'Italian Ambassy, its a large room painted bright lime green, purple, orange and red with 8 bunkbeds, steel bars on the windows plus those spiked things that stab people who try to climb through. Very welcoming! My roommates on the other hand are wonderful.  There is a group of 12 year old Italian boy scouts and their leaders (side note: who ever heard of staying in a hostel for boyscouts!?!? aren't they supposed to be roughing it in the outdoors? europe is different...), a brazilian student (who I am going for drinks with tonight) and a group of students from a university in Kansas on a study tour. Plus an American couple and an old man who just nods at me when I say hi.  The italian boys were nice enough to wake me up this morning by tickling my nose with feathers. Never a dull moment! They say hello, by the way (two of them are watching me type this right now)

So after settling into my sketchy accommodation, I headed out (with a poketmap) to explore Nurnberg.  Walked for what felt like forever and finally found a nice platz with churches, a bridge over the river and an Italian restaurant for dinner.  It was really enjoyable sitting by myself, eating tomatoes, cheese, drinking wine and people watching. Strange at the same time to have no one to talk with...I found myself narrating my day (sad to admit) But I found all you need to do is sit with confidence, look like your supposed to be there by yourself and instantly your more comfortable. After my dinner I was approached by a young Turkish man who asked me out for icecream...he seemed nice enough but I declined just to be on the safe side. So I started walking back since I couldn't entirely remember where my hostel was and it was starting to get dark outside. Well 'couldn't entirely remember' is the understatement of the year!!! I walked for almost 2 hours in circles. You know that sinking stomach feeling you have when you just spent the last half hour walking away from a particular landmark, then you turn a corner and it's right in front of you again? Three times with one landmark! I couldn't bloody get away from this one church...every road I took led me in a circle back to the same place. With the help of my poketmap I finally made it back to the street my hostel was on...only to realize I had no idea whether I need to go left or right. The old city part of Nurnberg is laid out like a circle, with an old fortress wall going all around the sides. My hostel is on the outskirt street that encircles that entire area. Eventually I put my problem solving cap on and walked outside the fortress walls...once I was there I could see the opera house which I knew was close to my hostel. So I turned left. And walked right into the red light district of Nurnberg. I wanted to cry...but I didn't! I laughed instead and just decided to blaze on through. It was what I expected to see in Amsterdam...not Nurnberg. There was actually red lights! Every window had a women leaning out and catcalling...which wasn't as disturbing as the types of men you see walking the dark ally. Creepy would describe them. But nevertheless I made it down the road to my hostel, completely unharmed although I was mentally preparing myself to pull out my swiss army knife if I needed to! About 10 minutes later I'm sitting in my hostel, having a beer when some guy runs into the common room and yells 'DID you guys know were staying in the RED LIGHT DISTRICT? Don't go that way unless you want to pay for sex!!!' haha I can imagine the abuse he got walking down the road because even I was getting harassed by the women! 

Needless to say I've painted a pretty bad picture of Nurnberg, but it's actually a really beautiful city (I've just been a comedy of errors!) Today I did a war tour of the city that showed where the rallies used to be, a holocaust museum and where the Nurnberg trials were held.  Connecting the history to the places is quite unreal.  This afternoon I went to the fresh market, bought cheese, bread and veggies for lunch, and took some more pictures of course. Then decided to wonder back to call Elvira, my moms second cousin (I think) who I'm going to go stay with in Wurzburg tomorrow. And did you think I could make it back to the hostel? Nope! Walked in circles again...ended up in the red light district AGAIN! Although it was totally fine to walk through during the day.  

So that concludes my stay in Nurnberg thus far. Lets hope I can make it through this evenings dinner and drinks without venturing into sketchy areas! 

The last of Munich

So today I finally said goodbye to Munich and moved on two hours North-East(ish) to Nuremberg. Before I get into Nuremberg though I'll finish up with my last of Munich stories...

After I left my host family on Sunday (which was done with way too many tears for my liking) I went to stay with a friend Philip, who interestingly enough I only briefly met in Mexico three months ago.  He lives in downtown Munich,  about a 10 minute walk away from Englisher Garten (which is actually the largest inner city park anywhere) and another 10 minute walk away from the old city downtown (which is home to the glockenspiel and vitallienmarket). Perfect location for some final sightseeing! Because his place is so amazing it's one of those 'revolving door' apartments that constantly has a ridiculous number of people crammed inside. It's a three roomed place with three official roommates and about another 6 unofficial roommates! All males, all loud German mid-20s males, who drank like fish and smoked like chimneys. None of them seem to work a 'regular' job but they are cooks, artists, musicians and the 'laborers of love' as they put it. Gentlemen too though of course...they let me have my own bedroom even though it meant 4 of them had to sleep on the floor. They speak a combination of German, Italian, Spanish, English and stay up until at least 4 in the morning doing a combination of the following...chain smoking, playing poker, drawing, drinking and discussing politics. Lets just say I was more then a little lost. I could barley keep up with the language changes, yet alone the conversation! Such a contrast to the quiet family life in the countryside!

Right now I love this lifestyle though.  This is the way I think everyone should travel and experience new places, by staying with people who live there and better yet the people who have lived there their entire lives. You get to eat at the good places, see the sights but only the ones that are worth it and meet tons of german people, not just other backpackers.  Don't get me wrong...I love meeting other backpackers too but for the sake of seeing more culture, staying with someone tops the list. Over the last couple of days I visited the beirgartens (obviously), watched the river surfers, walked downtown, went for coffee and croissants at Philips aunts chocolate shop, went to a neat nightclub, drove out to the 'beverly hills' area of Munich (man was that impressive..), went to a rooftop bbq and spent the afternoon by the river with friends where we played cards and listened to people play the guitar.  Also..just in case anyone is interested...it's true when people say that Germans are liberal with clothing. I felt over-dressed wearing a bathing suit. I was pretty attached to my country-side lifestyle but since staying in Munich, I can see a lot more of the beauty in the city.  Munich's a very pretty city and a very safe city...it was described to me as compared to the preppy high school kid, who always looks good and well put together. A socialite I suppose. Where in contrast a city like Berlin is like the scrappy kid with dirty knees that has a little more struggle and a little more character. Makes Berlin sound pretty interesting eh? I would love to go there too. 

Just a couple highlights to finish this off...

Most interesting things were 1. Sleeping two nights ago with Philips roommates greek grandmother, who kept yelling things in greek and gripping my arm in the middle of the night. She showed up randomly without calling and insisted that we share a room (ladies together was more appropriate!) She didn't really understand that I don't speak  greek or German and would ramble on and on...the only think I could say was 'yah yaya' hoping that I wasn't offending here.  Hilarious little women though.  When I left she kissed both my hands, my feet and stroked my face. Second most interesting event was... 2. Getting ticks. That was fun (not really)! It hurts to pull them out! One was under my knee (which philips brother removed) and the other one was in the groin region...which Philips brothers girlfriend removed! After that I had to spend the morning in the Doctors office making sure they weren't infected (if they are they can make you go mental) So all taken care of now..although I am the most paranoid person now! 

O.K so that was my three days in Munich...now for Nurnberg...

wow my first blog! And it only took me six weeks...

o.k so first off I apologize to everyone for my delayed blogging and lack of updates! It's been a whirlwind since being here (but I know that's no excuse!). I'll go back to the beginning a little bit and start with school.

So the school I was teaching at (and I say was with emphasis because I love that I can now use the past tense) was beautiful and amazing and quite the teaching experience. It's called the Bavarian International School (Bis) and the school itself is actually in an old Schloss (castle) from teh 1700s. I got the shaft to the middle school building (which was attached to the castle) but I did still get to go eat my lunch in the schloss every day! The entire building has been preserved so you pass these ancient ancient sculptures, paintings and beautiful archetecture on your way to class. Some of the classrooms are pretty amazing too..for example the gold room (which is basically just an ornate room covered in gold) is where high schoolers have art. Can you imagine sitting in a room covered entirley in gold for art class? unreal. It felt surreal being there most of the time. I was staying a 5 minute bike ride away, through the field in the German countryside. So in the mornings I would wake up, grab my bike and ride first through a forest beside a river, then through a horse pasture and finally to this giant castle in the distance. It sums up Germany though...green fields and castles! Anyways back on track...at the school I was teaching grades 6,7,8 math and science with my mentor teacher Phil. Interesting guy....Australian who used to have 40 snakes and do snake shows. Just before I left he got a baby corn snake for the classroom...which I didn't mind that much until I watched it eat the baby mouse. He's a great teacher. And I say the great part with emphasis because he really truley is one of those few great teachers. A good person to learn from but a hard act to follow I found. I'll start off by saying that the teaching was challenging. Really really good students from good families but some of the logistics made it difficult...including the fact that I had seven different classes (90 names to remember!) and a really challenging rotating schedule where I had to move rooms every class, and teaching the same lessons to different classes! This one day I was getting so pissed that one of my grade seven science classes didn't finish their homework...so i was off on a teachers rant about how the expectation is that homework is finished and I expect the same respect as any other teacher blah blah blah...when one kid in the back raises their hand and very politley says...'miss wolfenden...you didn't assign this for homework' and then comes the realization that I assigned the homework to my other grade seven class. I don't even want to think about how often that happened! Overall though I loved working with middle schoolers. They are SUCH a funny, energetic and totally loveable age. The grade 8's are cocky and have hella attitude fun in their own way. And the grade 6's are just wonderful and lovely. Some of my favorite memories...grade 8 boy raising his hand in class and asking 'Miss Wolfenden...would you ever date a younger man? which took a lot of effort not to give him a smart ass response! Another time I'm doing a research period in the library with one of my grade 6 science classes on body systems. So this one kid is researching the reproductive system (on a dare for two euro) and he asks me 'Miss wolfenden I understand what the system does, but I'm struggling with the ovum and testis can you help?' So I start trying to explain things and we get into a really good discussion about sperm and why the testis are outside the body etc. (and you have to picture this kid valentin I'm talking to...he's the popular, good looking kid with a slang english accent having a serious conversation about sperm) when this other student ben puts his hand on my arm (he's literally shaking with laughter) and says ' O.k I tried really hard to be mature but do you realize how utterly rediculous you two sound?' I honestly couldn't stop laughing...I tried to pull the mature teacher card after that but I was literally giggling like any other one of the grade sixes. So that said it was fun. I am however soooooooooooooooooooo happy that it's finished. Because I was teaching more advanced classes (grade 7 science was doing what we do in grade 9 science in canada) every night I had to lesson plan and study for what I was teaching. Plus I helped after school with math fun club (no laughing please!) , track and field, and I was the honorary yearbook photographer for after school events. Which was an incredible amount of fun, but made for some working long nights and weekends. It was neat too to figure out how international schools work...I hate to play the connections card but it helped with making contacts for different itnernational schools. I had offers to come back and teach in Germany, Taipai and China...pretty incredible! O.K so that doesn't even begin to describe the past 6 weeks of teaching but it's the best I've got right now.

As for the rest of it...the family that I've been staying with is incredible. I don't think I could have lucked out anymore. Theres the two parents Karin and Stephen and two daughters Alisha (13) and Josepha (10) and the dog Yula...whose name sounds a lot like mine in German (Gulia) confusing at times. I think part of the reason why I haven't felt homesick at all, is thanks to being a part of a family here. It's helped to have a home here (and a mom that could help with things when I was confused upset etc.). The girls are a riot too...Alisha has typical 13 yr old attitude but shes got a gem of a personality and love her laugh. And Joshepha is just the sweetest brightest girl...she makes cakes (with really complicated recipes) by herself for every occasion! It's really amazing. The family also has a beautiful, old home that they've just finished completley rennovating themselves. It's an old school house from the 1700s that has a river that runs through the backyard. Beauitful! So there I go lucking out again. The area here is called Haimhausen, which is so small that most people from Munich have never heard of it. It's a really rural area (about 20 minutes north of downtown Munich) that's close to Dachau. Most of the teachers thought I was crazy for wanting to stay in Haimhausen but I absoloutly love it. I love being able to go for a bike ride every day or take the dog for a walk through the park. We had about 2 weeks of incredible weather and all we did was bike to the nearby lake (10 minutes), lay on the grass and have picnics of bread, cheese, tomatos and wine. We went swimming too, which was bloody freezing. Everything here just has a nice laid-back pace to it. For example yesterday (my last full day with the family) I biked to the nearby flower fields with Joshepha to pick a boquet. Basically you walk through the field and pick your own flowers and then leave whatever money you think is fair in a bucket (the german people have an incredible honor system). Then we jumped in the river with boogie boards...which left me frozen for the rest of the day. After that Hannes (a friend who lives 5 minutes away) and I went for a walk and took some pictures in the park, then we had a family dinner and roasted marshmellows on the fire outside. That's what days are like here...and that's why I'm sad it's my last day! But no doubts in my mind that backpacking will be equally amazing.

Few last things before I take off...I haven't talked much about Germany itself. As a country (well speaking only about Bavaria because I haven't been outside that area yet) it's incredible. I don't think I could ever live here permenently (germans are so anal about some things!) but these things I really fell in love with...
-Biergartens (and wine gardens in salzburg). There everywhere and amazing. It's really an incredible feeling to sit outside in the sun and have an unlimited supply of cold beer
- Wiessbier! Funny that the first two things on my list are beer! It's literally (no lie) cheaper then water here. But wiessbier is a wheat beer that tastes amazing
- Beer for breakfast. I know realize that this may seem like overkill on the beer but it's just so tasty! I went for a Bavarian breakfast at a friend Lars's house...it was wiesswurst sausage (veal sausages that have to be eaten befoer noon) with sweet mustard and beer at 9 in the morning. Most satisfying breakfast possible I think...
- How incredibley efficient germans are!!! And how they have bizzare rules for everything that are never enforced but everyone follows anyways. For example the trains are expensive and no one ever checks for tickets...yet everyone alwas buys them. Example of bizzare rules...you HAVE to have a red A-frame roof on EVERY house!
- Unlimited speeds on highways. If you see a section that has a circle with a line through it...watch out because cars pass you going over 260KM.
- Bike riders. There everywhere! There's no such thing as public parking lots for cars but they do have public parking lots for bikes...everyone bikes everywhere
- The honor system...I mentioned it before but if you lock your bike up, people laugh at you. There is such little crime here
- Spargel (WHITE ASPARAGUS!) amazing!!!! thats all I have to say...if you haven't eaten white asparagus you haven't really lived.

There is tons of other things but those are the important ones for right now! So today I leave my family and go into Munich for a few days to stay with a friend Phil. After that it's on to different parts of Germany to visit distant relatives (who I've never met before). So hopefully I will update more regularley so there not all crazy long to read like this one.

love you all and miss you all!