Germany

[mattp]

It's been a couple of days since I've been back, so I'll give a quick update of what I did whilst away.

I'd booked off these past 10 days a good few weeks ago, with the intent of seeing people in various cities. (And also was a week late to coincide with Whitby, but that wasn't something I was considering when booking the holiday, else I'd've probably have gone to that) On wednesday I was pondering what to do when flufybumblebee contacted me via MSN messenger saying he was going to Germany for a week. Fantastic coincidence. We decided to meet up. In the end it turned out that I stayed in the same place as him, with raumfahrer. I left on the 1st, having had 2 hours sleep.

We did so much there. Ate out loads, bought CDs, walked the remaining section of the Berlin wall (about 0.5 miles or so) and viewed the artwork thereon (but sadly have no photos)

Our host was flufybumblebee's ex housemate raumfahrer (yay! I got a new recruit :-) Please make her feel welcome ). Her and her friends' English was brilliant meaning that I didn't need to speak much German.
(Though we did it on purpose, on occasion, to wind up flufybumblebee ;-)

I did find though that after a few days it all started coming back to me and I could even remember obscure words. For the most part I was still very much thinking in English but two occasions stick out:
1) I was ordering food in a fast food place as was asked whether I was eating in our out. I answered instictively in German. It was a little bit surreal; I don't even remember thinking about the semantics of what was asked, let alone it being in German. I guess I must have been day dreaming. (Being such a simple question certainly helped)
2) I remember waking on the Friday from a dream which was part in German.

Having a paid account meant that I was able to do a user search for people by location and aged similar to us. I sent off a few emails but unfortunately didn't manage to meet up with anyone.

Also did a bit of geeking:No surprise there ;-)

• got a software DVD player working (additional thanks to dineleeeee
  
• Introduced raumfahrer to the wonders of the all-in-one IM client Gaim
  
• Installed Apache httpd on a windows machine
  
• Helped out with some predicate logic coursework
  

Watched a couple of films The Mothman Prophecies - which was scary and yet intruiging as it was based on a true story, I believe, and also something else of which I've since forgotten the title.

Oh, and I brought back some Schwarzbrot which was annoyingly absent from last year's European market in town. (It's also on again this year - does anyone fancy a wander with me?)

Was watching films until stupid o'clock on the final day, so had another 2-hour sleep night :-) Caught up sleep on the planes, and managed to stay awake for a bit of the day but kept on falling asleep in the evening. Decided to stay awake until 11pm else I'd end up shifting my body clock.


All in all it was a great break away, and well needed.

Comments

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

Mmm, Schwarzbrot.
One of the things I miss from home...

[elfgeek.livejournal.com]

Sounds like you had a really great time! I always bring loads of Schwarzbrot back from Germany everytime I go. Still need to watch 'Mothman Prophecies', but intend to read the book first.