Life and Germany and Europe in general have entered a new phase.  Yes, my friends, I report life from a country obsessed with the Euro 2008 tournament, the Europameisterschaft in German (EM as I will call it from now on).  And football (soccer) mania is in full bloom.  Especially now.  In fact, it has so totally taken over that I find it very difficult to believe that in some parts of the world (read: most parts of the world), life goes on like normal and there are actually people unaffected by and indifferent towards this crazy tournament.

The quote above is from Michael Ballack, captain of the German national team.  It’s full form is: “Unser Ziel ist aber ganz klar: wir wollen Europameister werden!”, or “Our goal is, however, very clear: we want to be champions of Europe.”  A fitting quote for my past few weeks.  We have yet to see if it will pan out.  But I thought I would toss that small bone to Ballack, whom I am mildly in love with.  (Also, turns out I share a birthday with Jens Lehmann, the goalie, though he is a tad bit older (try… um… 19 years).  And am only one day off from Philipp Lahm, though he’s only 3 years older).

Anyway, it all began a few weeks ago.  Germany’s first game was against Poland, with Podolski, the Polish born dual citizen, scoring both goals.  I actually missed that game, since I was en route home from Bavaria.  I caught the end by radio, but nothing too exciting.

Game 2 was against Croatia, which was not a nice showing.  We (yes, we) lost 0-2, and quite frankly, the Croats dominated.  This was when Marina was in town for a visit, so she got dragged to the games (and got TOTALLY HOOKED! Points for Germany/Europe/Football/Soccer).

Game 3 was against Austria, and Germany needed to win or tie to advance to the semifinals.  In another not-very-well-played game, we came out on top, 1-0.

So, that covers Germany’s prelim games.  Certainly viewing was not limited to those.  I paid particular attention to Russia, who played well against Sweden, bringing them on.  And in general, I managed to find myself watching (or at least following) football every single night.  And things only got worse when we moved on to the quarter final rounds.

Germany played in the first quarter final match against Portugal.  Marina was in town, and we found ourselves a decent restaurant/bar on oranienburger str. and enjoyed cocktails and pizza, followed by a celebratory beer after Germany’s 3-2 victory over Portugal after a very intense, well played game.  From the opening minutes it was very clear that we were playing on a much higher level than before.  Which made me extremely happy, because it seemed like Germany was not going to go far at the rate they were playing.  So that was Thursday.

Friday was Turkey’s quarter final against Croatia.  Turkey has proven to be somewhat of a “better late than never” sort of team this tournament, having barely beat out Switzerland in the last minutes, barely scraping by the Czech Republic with two goals in the last 4 minutes, and then tying Croatia in the very last kick of the overtime and overcoming in the penalty shots.  I was principally for Turkey’s advancement, but not particularly excited about the fact that it meant Turkey would be meeting Germany in the semifinals.  After the game, I sort of accidentally found myself at Ku’damm, with 50,000 other people celebrating Turkey’s victory.  Needless to say, it was very, very intense.  A picture to illustrate perhaps?

the other two games were also interesting. i watched the russia v. netherlands one carefully, rooting for the motherland the whole time, of course. they prevailed, and i was happy. a good game, too, for the most part.  ended in overtime, but no kick out, which is good, because i am not a fan of them.  and then, the game i cared least about, spain v. italy. spain lost in penalty shots. kind of anticlimactic.

but then things keep on moving. tonight was the semi-final, the contentious germany v. turkey game.  contentions because, for example, there are upwards of 150,000 turks living in Berlin.  which is still, granted, a minority, but dang, a huge one.  the games, from semis on, are being screened on the so-called Fanmeile, the long strip in front of the brandenburg gate. and it was there that i watched a very sloppily played game on Germany’s part. me with 500,000 of my best friends, evidently.  Germany was all over the place.  seriously. it was kind of sad to watch. so many missed passes and lost opportunities!  But, all is well that ends well, and the insanity ended with 3-2 victory for Germany!  Finale, here we come!  But that was not to say it was without its excitements.  The Turks scored their first goal early, which was returned by Germany fast enough, leaving the game tied at halftime.  And then, Germany scored again sometime in the second half, but with 10 minutes to go, in true Turkish fashion, Turkey shot in an equalizer and tensions rose.  But, Philipp Lahm, the Bavarian, shot in a final goal for Germany some 4 minutes from the end.  And that was the game.  All pandemonium broke lose, naturally. The New York Times featured an article about the game-day tensions and dual loyalties here in Germany.  Was sort of simple and obvious, but then again, not everyone is intimately aware of modern day diversity in Germany (I am aware that it is, after all, one of those weird obsessions of mine).  You can find it here. And also, the NYT overview of the game here, just In case you didn’t follow it (I really am having trouble coming to terms with the fact that there are many people who didn’t…).

A picture or two, perhaps?

meghan and i, lest anyone should doubt where my loyalties lie:

so sehen sieger aus! (this is what victors look like!)

insanity on the ubahn going home. American’s just don’t get this excited about sports.  I mean, certainly when Boston won the world series in 2004, the atmosphere was mildly similar, but ON A MUCH SMALLER SCALE.  And I think the absurdest part i the fact that it is for the country, too.  Like, when was the last time you watched a US national team play in a tournament and watch it at a public screening with 500,000 people?  Truly this is a cultural experience!  And boy do I love it!

Tomorrow Russia takes on spain, and I will be donning the ol’ red, white, and blue in good form.  I even know half the words of the national anthem (by the way, I know ALL the words of the German one–it was my little side project when I was taking a break from paper writing).  Haven’t decided what to do about watching the game, but we shall see…

Aside from football… um… I have little to report.  I showed some girls around Berlin a couple nights in the past few days. I am almost done with my first 12 page paper (currently 12.5 pages long, with probably at least half a page to go).  And I only have three more meetings of each of my classes.

And of course, most importantly for the next few days:

Germany is playing in the finale on sunday!!  mmmm football!

(part of me feels obnoxious/elitist about calling it football, but the truth is, I really think of it as football now…)

i have traveled a lot in these past few weeks. Before this weekend, I was out of town for 4 of the 5 past weekends, only one of which has been covered. I am getting behind. So my past few weeks…

First, the weekend in Dresden and Leipzig. And Görlitz. Where I displayed my deep love towards the Fatherland:

So there is an special ticket here, called a Schönes Wochenende, where, for 35 Euros, you and up to 4 people can use regional trains to your hearts content from 12 am until 3 am the next day. So Meghan and I planned a trip to Dresden and Leipzig and gathered a few others to come along. We had only been in Dresden a few hours before we decided we had seen all we really wanted to see of it, so we got aboard the next train to Görlitz, a city directly on the Polish border, and walked to Poland. Oh, and somehow in the course of the day, I managed to eat ice cream 5 times (oops!). And the next day we did Leipzig. A successful Schönes Wochenende.

And then, the next weekend, I headed off to see “the Germans” in Bielefeld. Which was absolutely fantastic, of course. I finally saw the unsung beauty of the University of Bielefeld, and spent a glorious weekend catching up with two friends. It was particularly brilliant because I didn’t speak any English the whole weekend. And seeing Julia and Joanna was wonderful. Hey, look, here is Joanna and Julia, approaching the lovely building that is their University:

and then the next weekend, last weekend, I visited my mother’s cousin, Ingrid, in Ingolstadt, a city about midway between Nuremberg and Munich. I headed down on a Thursday. My original plan was to go by way of Nuremberg and see the city on the way down, but I decided in favor of sleep, and cut out the stop in Nuremberg (it was supposed to rain that day, anyway). On Friday, I went to the private school where Ingrid teaches 8 and 9 year olds, and we followed this up by an afternoon of wandering around Ingolstadt, a small city that can be pretty thoroughly seen in about… 2 hours or less. And then, Saturday, she took me to Nuremberg (so I got to see it afterall), which was really a nice place to spend a day. The city is big (500,000–I mean, not NYC or anything, but decent!), and it has an interesting history. There is a nice Burg in the city, and most interesting, the Nazi Party Rally Grounds, which was completely fascinating. Although I learned almost no new facts from the exhibition, I feel like I came away from it with a completely different understanding of the Third Reich. I highly recommend it. And Sunday I had thought I might go on to Munich, but having read the weather (though it was supposed to rain, I think it was actually nice there) and having no particular plans, I decided instead to spend the day with my cousin again, and we went to Eichstätt, a little town near Ingolstadt. And I caught the train at 4 pm and was back in Berlin that evening.

…both short and long term.

short term?

Well, as mentioned in the last post, I am going to Dresden tomorrow with Meghan and two friends of hers. And we go from there to Leipzig on Sunday, making for a nice weekend, a “schönes Wochenende,” if you will. And then the next week, also as mentioned before, I am off to see “the Germans.” And then the next week? My mother’s cousin has indeed invited me for a visit down in Bavaria. Yeah, I know, I was just there. But my mother has told me probably a thousand times that I need to go visit Ingrid at some point this semester, because she is just that cool, apparently (I wouldn’t know… I have met her maybe twice in my life and 10 years ago at that). And it is really my last opportunity to waste a weekend for the foreseeable future. Besides. I like it there.

Then, there are more thoughts about my summer. Yikes. So I received a nice chunk of cash for my thesis research. By which I mean, I have more money than I can probably actually spend. I met with a professor this past week, a friend of Terry Martin’s, just to get a sense of what sort of material is available. The best piece of news: he basically told me not to bother trying to go do archival research in Moscow, so there is no need to go there (sweet!). Also good news: there is an awful lot available here in Berlin. In fact, enough that if I just wanted to hang out here for July and August, it could probably be justified. Which sounds quite appealing. But I really need to get a much better sense of what research I actually want to do. Because I am feeling momentarily lost. And if I do want to travel in August, I really need to be thinking about visas in the relatively near future. Gross. The question will be whether it is worth it to try and dig up some personal interviews in that great steppe… We’ll see… Need to spend some time in the archives here, first it seems.

And then, more thinking about the slightly more distant future. I mentioned my interest in coming back to Germany after I finish at Harvard. So I am also trying to think about the various ways this might be possible. The leading prospect? Some sort of English teaching position, theoretically through Fulbright, like Meghan is doing. The benefits are the relatively low commitment level (12 hours a week, and with limited responsibilities) and the acceptable payment (as in, as long as you aren’t living in Munich, enough to easily live on). But it does bring up an interesting question. About placement. Because you can give a preference, though it isn’t guaranteed. The problem? There are a lot of places I would be happy to live, but the Bundesländer (states) are too big. I think I would almost have to choose Berlin as my top choice, just because that would guarantee you are actually somewhere interesting. I mean, I would be just as happy to go somewhere like Bavaria or elsewhere in the south, but chances are you get stuck in some boring town in the middle of nowhere with not even interesting geography to recommend it, far away from ALL civilization. I am also, in theory, okay with the idea of living in a town, but that brings up questions of how you meet other people, particularly other young people, who are all off studying in university cities. Which makes it all sort of a question of luck. After doing a bit of research tonight, I realize there are some similar opportunities in Austria, which would be kind of fun, as well, but the same problem applies. Especially considering I would like to be somewhere where I could ideally take a class or two.

I also need to look into other ideas, because certainly these are not the only ways to get back to Germany. If only I had time to sit down and spend hours on end researching opportunities! It would be rather nice. But I think about the fact that I have 50 pages of writing (at 1.5 spacing) due in a month and a half, and all the research that goes with that, in addition to 4 presentations in mid June. And I am thinking, I should stop worrying about my future and get working on my present. Though, I think all I am going to accomplish tonight is send a couple emails to people about things related to my thesis.

In other news, I managed to have a few people over for brownies and ice cream tonight. It was nice to have a pleasant evening. LOTS of brownies. I went a bit over board. As in, I had five different sorts of brownies (plain, with walnuts, with cayenne pepper and cinnamon, mint-chocolate, and with beer (which were my favorites, personally–much tastier than the Guinness brownies that Ben, Matt, Susie and I made last year). It was sufficiently low key, though I was kind of amazed at how loud just a handful of people can get! I mean, it was an early evening affair with no alcohol served, and everyone left at 10, so it was not exactly a wild party). But still!

But that more or less brings my week in the apartment alone to an end. Since I am out of town Saturday and Sunday, and Max returns Monday. Excellent. And with that, I end. On to other things!

Another reasonably long hiatus. And thus time for an update. Especially since there have been some reasonably exciting going-ons.

Let’s jump back a couple weekends. My sort-of-spontan trip to Bayern was pretty much as all around a success as possible. And thus much better than I deserved, considering two days before deciding to go, I had completely decided not to go. And even more considering I planned nothing.

To give you a good idea, I present:

So, reverting to my past love for overnight trains, I headed down on one to Munich last Thursday, with Max, my flatmate. We parted at the train station so he could go home to work on a video for a friend’s (or rather, for friends’) wedding and so that I could explore Munich at a quarter to 7 in the morning. I headed out from the train station of foot, and I managed to navigate myself to and around the city center without a map. I was overjoyed to discover that, despite having been to Munich only once before, and only for 36 hours and 4 years ago), I actually knew my way around quite well. Like, I know what none of the buildings are, but I know exactly what all the intersections look like and I know the buildings by sight. It being the early morning and having slept next to nothing, in good night train tradition, I drank a couple of 1 euro cappuccinos (der Cappuccino, by the way) and spent most of the morning sitting in the English Garden [waiting for the sun?], which is gorgeous. I helped an American couple (there is a trend here in Bavaria) by taking a photo of them in the garden (they returned the favor, so I can prove I was in Munich). I also sort of wandered the streets aimlessly, which is quite pleasant for a few hours. I started my sunburn that morning, though it was pretty mild at that point. And I boarded a train to arrive in Max’s hometown (to be greeted by Wolfi of previous post fame) at around 4:30 pm. And from there, real fun started.

A great program was designed for my visit. Friday night, Wolfi invited people over for an evening of pizza in a handcrafted oven. I spent most of the evening struggling to make sense of the bavarian dialect, which got progressively easier (though never easy) as the weekend progressed. After the last guests returned, I called it a night so that I could recover from the overnight train.

Saturday, we headed to the Zugspitze, the highest point in Germany, at 2964 meters. I am amused to think about how frustrating that must be for Germans. To be so close to 3000! The view at the top was quite nice. Gorgeous, really. I just want to say, though it is a love that I was exposed to from my early days, I really love the Alps. After we were there for the morning/early afternoon, we continued on to the Partnachklamm, a small canyon-like area which was really sort of neat. And then it was off to Munich for dinner and an opera. It was my first trip to the opera, and I enjoyed it quite a lot, despite its perhaps (overly) dramatic story line. The opera was Massenet’s Werther, based on Goethe’s work of the same name, only in French, with German overtitles (or whatever you call them). And then it was back to Miesbach.

Sunday took us on a hike, just on the other side of the Austrian border. The group consisted of Wolfi, his friend Martin (who went to the Opera with us the night before), Franz (Max’s brother), and me. We hiked to some summit in Austria, and I was a little distressed to realize I was easily the most tired AND, unlike the 3 boys I was with, I wasn’t even carrying anything. And I thought being able to run 6 miles was good evidence for being in shape… Guess not… But the hiking was nice. And when we got to the summit, Wolfi whipped out all the necessary supplies for cooking steaks, which was really amusing. And really loud. The other Americans (betraying an obvious Southern accent), were quite amused by what the Germans were up to, and I must say, I was quite amused myself. We returned to rest a bit before going to the Pfingstfest in the neighboring town… Which was also quite amusing. But then, most things generally are when you start out with a liter of beer. Which is how they serve it down in Bavaria, by the way.

And then Monday, my last day, we went took a car out to bike in the area around a nearby lake, which was quite lovely. I was a bit concerned that I would not be able to bike (the last time I tried, about 4 years ago, also in Germany, proved to be rather unsuccessful), but it was amazingly pleasant, and I now find myself deep down wishing I had a bike here in Berlin. I was again made aware of my general out of shapeness (working on it) and was surprised to find out just how hard it is to go up an upward slope that just doesn’t even look that steep. But yeah.

But that sums up my weekend pretty thoroughly, though I want to add a slight addendum that I was amazed at how much American English I heard from others. I mean, I knew, theoretically, that Americans love Bavaria. But they are really überall! For the record. And lots of southern accents in particular! LIke, Texas-ish. I was glad to be (sort of mostly) speaking German… But yeah. The weekend was pretty much amazing and more wonderful than I could ever imagine. And I am pretty much very grateful to all who made it possible. I also think, for the first time, I really understood why my great-grandmother would leave a happening place and move to a bavarian town. I might not be opposed to doing the same…

And then on Tuesday, I was back in Berlin, straight to classes!

And life goes on as normal, except now both Max and Florian have gone home and I am in the apartment, alone for the week. And I have been running. A lot. As in… probably nearly 30 miles in the last week. Over the course of Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday, Sunday, and yesterday. And Meghan came over to keep me company tonight, which was lovely.

And, Meghan and I are off to Leipzig and Dresden this weekend! And next weekend, I have plans to visit “the Germans!” Which I know is a ridiculous thing to call them, considering now that I live in Germany, everyone here can be called that. But somehow Joanna and Julia will always be “the Germans” to me, and I am looking forward to a visit to Bielefeld. Sweet. And then I need to get down to work with all my writing. And presentations. Because June and July are sort of hellish, in the end. I literally have to write more this semester than I have ever had to write in the past. And all in German. Though, I might still try to steal down to Bavaria (again) to visit my cousin… We’ll see if she invites me for the one weekend I can do…

The end!

OHH. and in other news, I think I have more or less decided I want to be back in Germany after I finish up next year. Maybe forever. Hear that, former Soviet Union? You have competition. And you are losing.

the last few weeks have been more or less completely taken over by some rounds of visits, which has proven to be an enjoyable way to see more of berlin and it’s environs, though naturally, it is also nice to have everything wieder in ordnung. also, the high amount of english speaking from the visits makes me glad to return to my german life.

first came neil. alice, a friend of his teaching english here in berlin, and i were charged with making him like berlin more, and he came for a few days out of paris. we took him to potsdam on saturday, which was beautiful. and to sachsenhausen on sunday, which was depressing enough, though sort of child’s play when compared to auschwitz. we wandered berlin a bit, and ali did more of the entertaining, and we had a nice weekend of it, including much eating out and adventuring. nice to see neil again, too, of course. and i also discovered sunday brunch, which was pretty much as amazing as I could have ever imagined. to convey the beatuy of the day in potsdam, i present:

then, 36 hours after neil left, kate showed up, a full 25 hours ahead of schedule thanks to ukraine being… well, ukraine… we did all sorts of adventuring, ranging from walking down unter den linden (seeing the brandenburg gate is a necessity, aterall), exploring the various sections of berlin, cooking a decent amount (though with varying degrees of success), and more or less enjoying our five days together before she headed off to warsaw. it was about as good a visit as i could have imagined, and it came complete with a full on georgian meal, with homemade khachapuri and kharcho, and forcing max and florian to whip out their english for a few hours. it is really, really weird to talk to them in english, i must say.

here kate and i are, with the gate behind us.

and now, it being wednesday, i am through the week for classes, and i am now off until next tuesday, since monday is a holiday (pentecost monday). and max and i are headed towards munich tomorrow night for a bit of time in bavaria for a visit and to see the alps, in my case (he has a busy weekend ahead, it seems). i am really, really excited, i must say. hooray for the alps!

well, the semester has come to a start.  and life with it.  the past week has been relatively eventful, giving me a chance to see the university (putting the study back into study abroad), more of berlin, and an old friend.

we’ll go ahead and cut to the chase with the picture. a more detailed overview of the week is below. but first: me, rachel, and linden, with the berlin wall behind us:

but anyway, back to my recent activities…

Okay, time for a totally frivolous post, mostly because I spent an embarrassingly large amount of time the last couple days watching Cycle 9 of America’s Next Top Model. I do think it is brilliant that I can watch it all I want on YouTube, though I am almost ashamed to admit how much I enjoy the show. I don’t think I am about to go back and watch more, because it’s only fun if you have no idea who wins, and I think I could probably pick the winners from most of the other seasons. I am also, of course, up to date on the current season, so I’ve run out of things to do regarding my few American television frivolities…

Which brings me to the other side of things. Germany’s Next Topmodel (sometime, I think I am going to write a post about how to Germanize things, because the title is a great example: why would the insist on having an English name for a German show, but then turn one word into a compound word, just to be German? [a side note... how awesome is it that I did the same with "sometime"--a mistake I only saw after I finished this...]). Okay, so admittedly, I am not that familiar with the show, but I’ve watched an episode, and I think this is good enough grounds for comparison.

We had to provide a potential course list for our semester. 8-10 classes, of which we will actually take 4. So I made my list. And handed it in. I had only one important guideline. Any course meeting on Fridays was automatically out. But I was relatively satisfied with my course list.

I got an email back from our director. She was fine with my list, but offered one suggestion: strike one certain course from it. What’s awesome? It was the only course from my list that meets on Thursdays. Which means… chances are, I have a four day weekend, every weekend. If only I had something awesome to do with that…

It also means that I do have a really long weekend over Pentecost, since that provides a Monday off, meaning I have effectively a Wednesday night until a Tuesday morning completely open. Meghan will have already ditched me for the Baltics, so I am contemplating a few options, although I am indecisive enough that I won’t make a decision any time soon, at least, not before I know for sure what classes I am taking and so on. There is the Scandinavia plan (probably just Copenhagen and Stockholm), but that’s bound to be expensive and dull to be by myself. Or the other one: the Alps, which could take two forms: either in a proper, hardcore form in the form of going to Switzerland, or in a smaller capacity–going to Munich and heading south, which is, incidentally, the area of Germany I am most familiar with, though it’s been a while since I was last there.

The more I think about it, the more I realize there are all sorts of places I want to get to before I leave this crazy country. I have a promise to drop in on some friends in Bielefeld (to see their beautiful university [hahah]). And then, there are a number of places that I feel like I should get to, just because I haven’t been yet. This list includes, principally, Leipzig, Dresden, Köln, Bremen, and Bonn, and I still feel kind of bad that I never saw Nürnberg (how we got Nuremburg from that, I don’t know), when I spent so much time in northern Bavaria. I mean, I have technically seen all of those cities, save Leipzig and Dresden (which I will definitely not have a problem getting to), but not other than from the train as I passed through. Part of me wants to add a bunch of international destinations for places I would like to get to–principally: Amsterdam, Slovakia, Paris (take 2), Zürich, Stockholm, Copenhagen… but the more I think about it, I am plenty happy to stick around here.  I like Germany. And Berlin in particular! Plus, there would be financing such undertakings.

I like this crazy country. An awful lot. I think I’d move here forever in a heartbeat if given a chance (though another part of me thinks it would be sort of taking the easy way out…). There is something about it that has always felt both familiar and comfortable. Even despite their crazy trash system. And public transportation strikes. But as far as the Fatherland is concerned, I’m kind of a daddy’s girl…

I have also finally managed to move ahead with the necessary bureaucracy. I am now officially registered as a student (which means I can now use public transportation for free until the end of September (after I have returned). sweet. this is an even better deal than Moscow). And I opened a bank account in which I have exactly zero Euros to my name. I registered with the police last week, which was an amazingly fun, several hour process (the actual registration time was maybe 7 minutes, but I got to wait 2 hours and change for it). And now, I have one last thing to go–my residency permit, which is essentially a visa. I think. I don’t really understand it all, but I am pretty sure that it goes in my passport (on two pages, too, because the Germans are just that hardcore). But that’s an adventure for next week.

I don’t actually have any great picture from recently, since I haven’t taken one since the cake, so I will dig in my archives and produce one from the easter egg hunt on Easter. Here’s Mirjam and I, because we all know I like a goofy picture… By the way, I totally beat her in the egg-finding department.

Oh, and today, I went running for the first time since…  I don’t actually know.  Maybe even since the last time I was in Germany, which was in 2006 (summer of 2006 was sort of awesome: I ran 4-5 miles a day for almost the entire summer… and then I flew to Germany, ran maybe twice in 5 weeks, and haven’t been since…).  I don’t think I could have possibly run much more than 2 miles, but I can already tell that my legs are going to be disagreeing with me tomorrow.  But in other news, I still ran two miles (ish)!  Not particularly fast.  But I ran!

Tomorrow marks the end of my complete worthlessness as orientation starts tomorrow. I don’t know whether to be glad I have something to do, or to be sad that it means I don’t have all the free time possible. This past weekend has been… um… also pretty spectacularly useless. This past week, Max had a friend visiting, so I had an extra unsuspecting victim to impose my cooking on. I finally made my plov on Friday night, which seemed to go over well (as in, it was gone before the night was over), and last night, I delved into the world of borscht, which turned out well enough, though perhaps more spiced and with more vegetables than what Russians would put in it (but thus, better). My bread is long gone, my cookies almost equally so, so I think that means I can start again. Although yesterday I discovered that it is not just girls who cook out of a lack of anything else to do–as the Black Forest cherry cake, care of Max and friend, in our refrigerator should attest to. Perhaps I should wait until that has been finished before I start again…

I also managed to clean our bathroom today, which brought back oh-so-fond memories of my time in dorm crew. Except I did a much better job than I did back in the days when I was paid money to clean 3 bathrooms an hour. My flatmates are keeping me in line, and even my bedroom is far cleaner than I have had it in the past. Although, I think in terms of cleanliness, I tend to be highly impressionable. For example, I think living with Kate brings out the very worst cleanliness tendencies in the two of us… But when I set my mind to it, I can be neat. Especially when I have nothing else to do…

I also did a bit of American pop-culture catch-up. By which I mean I watched all the episodes to date from America’s Next Top Model on YouTube yesterday. Which was pretty fantastic. I am also now keeping up with the Daily Show, which reminds me of the good ol’ days in high school when I had cable and free time.

Another delightful development this week was that my mother decided to send me a bunch of Girl Scout cookies and other assorted easter treats. Which was fairly awesome of her. And very much appreciated. I am trying to minimally horde away some of the thin mints so that they’ll be around when Kate visits, but I can’t promise anything…

It has also come to my attention that a lot of people have much nicer blogs than I do, simply for the addition of a picture in every post. Which I might need to take as a challenge. I mean, I don’t need to turn this into a photo diary of my life (too much a throwback to my xanga days, I think), but since I have yet to post a single picture on facebook from my time in Berlin, perhaps a solitary picture per post might be a good goal. Especially since I have internet access at home nowadays and time is not a major issue.

So, as a picture for the post, I present (drum roll please):

the bavarians with their cake, which was quite delicious:

max, my flatmate is the one in red.

Anyway, here’s to the coming week. I can even meet some people (heaven forbid)! And also good, all my friends who have been out of the country in the past couple weeks should be back within the next couple days. A welcome break. I think I’ve had enough of having this much free time.

Also, taking Kate’s blog as my inspiration, I added a section on the people that have been a part of my life since being abroad, in case it helps to clarify who is who, since it is always obvious to me and perhaps less so to someone who is not me.

so, since moving into my apartment and having next to nothing to do, i have turned to the kitchen for the main source of my daily activities. so a quick overview of what i have been up to:

• brownies. i made brownies once, mostly because they are really easy, and i had all the materials, minus butter at hand (i have since stocked up on butter so that i could decide to bake on a whim). i was afraid they wouldn’t go over well with the Germans, so i figured i could also take them with me when i went to visit mirjam. fat chance. they were gone in 24 hours. and they were oh-so-tasty.
• assorted chicken dishes (i just tried to spell that disches–too much german, i think!), which have included a curry dish, and then other assorted pasta sauces, all of which have turned out to be more or less successful.
• russian cuisine: shchi (cabbage soup), beet salads, and a borscht sometime in the next few days because my cabbage will go bad (unfortunately cabbage comes in only a few sizes: unmanageably large, even more unmanageably large, and yet more unmanageably large, so when you can cook with at most 1/3 at a time, you have a lot of cabbage. especially because i just have no “Lust” to eat cabbage all the time (most of the time, perhaps, but all of the time, no way)).
• sugar cookies. mostly i was amused by the fact that my flatmates had a cookie cutter. a moose cookie cutter, to be exact. i was deeply amused by the possibility of making an entire batch of moose cookies. so… i did. though the consensus among the germans is that they are a bit too christmasy (sue me for liking cinnamon! but only half have cinnamon, I promise! the others have lemon, which is NOT christmas-y). oh well.
• last night, i helped a friend make a chicken tortilla soup for a bible study group. i offered to help because, since i was planning to go, it meant i had no dinner to prepare, and thus nothing to do.
• and last, but definitely not least, since it is my favorite of my new undertakings, is bread! which i have now made twice. the first time, i made it with a fairly generic berlin beer, 1/2 white flour, 1/3 wheat flour, and some oatmeal, and it would have been more successful if i had let it sit in the oven at least another 10 minutes (my father gave me an insufficient baking time, and i didn’t realize my error until it had been cooling too long to fix the problem). so it was slightly dough-y in the middle. but it was also gone pretty quickly, so i didn’t feel really terrible. but i was still frustrated enough that i resolved to make bread the next day, yesterday. and this time, i had everything on hand, except a cheap beer. so i made it with guinness instead, since it was the beer i had on hand. the outcome was a lot more successful. i corrected my errors (insufficient sweetness, salt, and baking time, mostly), so i upped the honey, added a bit of brown sugar, cooked it for almost an hour, and used no (NO!) measuring utensils. i was very satisfied with the result, though i have resolved against baking anything else, at least until next week.

coming up soon? well, i bought meat for plov, but i think i want to do it as a proper meal when both flatmates are around for dinner, so perhaps sometime this weekend. and i have more chicken on hand, though i don’t know how to be particularly creative with it. since even though i can serve it with all sorts of pasta variations, the end result is still… pasta.

but still, i really enjoy having a kitchen, and a very large part of me is incredibly sad that i will have no kitchen next year. though then again, i also do recognize that my culinary exploits will plummet when i actually get busy, which should be about 3 weeks from now.