Spain!

So I've now passed my first week here in Spain, and things are settling down into a steadier rhythm.  To my immense relief, most of the family speaks decent and very understandable English (much better than my Spanish) and the one who doesn't provides opportunities for me to try my halting Spanish and to work on my comprehension, which is terrible.  So the more practice, the better!

I've done a lot and tried a lot of new things so far.  The first day, I went to the street market with the parents to get the ingredients for paella (more on this later) and saw the normal (fruits, veggies, bread) and the not so normal of bloodied carcases hanging from the ceiling.  Though it's all very normal for the Spanish.  I actually watched as a butcher took the skinned body of a rabbit and carved it up into pieces, including the matter-of-fact finale when he split open its skull with his huge knife.  I couldn't help but wince, and the butcher and my Spanish family enjoyed laughing at my squeamishness.

Aside from the rabbit, we also got a massive amount of seafood for the paella.  Paella is a very Spanish dish, which has a bunch of kinds of meat mixed in with yellow rice.  When the mother brought it out, it looked so pretty I just had to take a picture.  Anyone who knows me, however, knows that I'm not that fond of seafood, though I'll always try anything once.  In this case, I had a little bit for lunch that first day and on Monday when I was left to my own devices and everyone else went to work or school.  The dad said that paella usually takes better the second day anyway, as the flavor can soak more into the rice.  I'd say that's true.  So a seafood paella isn't my favorite dish, but I tried and ate the clams, muscles, shrimp (yes, there were entire shrimp bodies in there) and even some of the rabbit (but not the brains) with my rice.  I really feel bad because I'm sure there are so many other seafood fans out there who would have appreciated the feast so much more than me.

There are a lot of things I've had to get used to that are a little different from back home.  The biggest is obviously the language barrier.  I've found that I can say a lot of things in Spanish, but not necessarily anything that's relevant to the particular situation I'm in at a given time.  It's hard to come up with Spanish on demand, but the mom came with me the first time I needed to explain what I wanted in a cell phone, and I've struggled by after that.  Comprehension is definitely my biggest hurdle, because I'll recognize words or phrases, but by the time my brain processes and translates them, the person talking is three sentences down the road.  Slower is definitely better!  The first night, I had no comprehension at all, but after a week I'm picking up on some of the spitfire conversation across the dinner table.

The other main difference is the meals and eating times.  The biggest meal of the day is lunch, which is usually a few courses around two o'clock in the afternoon.  And by a few, I mean three or four LARGE dishes, where you're expected to want seconds.  It's a good thing I'm left to my own devices for most of the lunches.  Dinner is a smaller meal, which I thought was typically going to be around eight or nine in the evening, but oftentimes it stretches until ten or ten thirty, like with tonight when everyone is busy. 

But when I say a smaller meal for dinner, I'm only echoing what the family has told me, because their smaller meal is still two courses and size of a normal/large dinner for me at home.  And that's not to mention all the snacking they do in between!  Tapas are always eaten throughout the day, it seems, and they don't mind having cheese, ham, and chips even right before dinner.  There's no such thing as spoiling your dinner here.  And right after dinner is dessert!  It can be sweets, but often it's just fruit.

So much food!  It's a good thing my new home is up a series of minor hills and on the third floor of a building without an elevator.

Dover

Dover might be my favorite little town in England. The entire time I've been here, people have been friendly and welcoming and going out of their way to be helpful. My kind of people.
I stayed at the Castle, a really nice pub inn in the middle of town. It's been around for centuries, and is perfectly situated between the train station and the trails to Dover Castle and the cliffs. I made friends with Dave, the bartender, who hung out and played darts with his son even when Paul, the owner, took over tending. Dave was in the army and had a bunch of buddies coming to town Saturday, and was sad I wouldn't be around long enough to join them. His son was going off to the army as well in January.

Paul was an interesting guy as well. He bought the place for a picture of Angelina Jolie smacking Brad Pitt during a tiff, apparently. Once we begged him enough, he played a lovely bit of piano for us as well.

Once I got in, I dropped off my bags and made straight for Dover castle. It was raining, but seeing as I only had a limited amount of time to explore, I was willing to rough it.

The castle itself has a fascinating history. It was built in medieval times, expanded and improved upon by Henry II, the father of Richard the Lionheart and John, both of whom feature in the Robin Hood tales. Later on during the Napoleonic Wars, tunnels were built into the cliffs within the castle to house soldiers in case of attack. Those tunnels were then used during WWII, both as a hospital and as barracks for the troops. Operation Dynamo was headquartered here, which supervised an impossible troop recovery from France once the Germans took over, and the castle served as the front lines for England for the years following. It was bombed early and often, causing the placement of massive guns with the range of up to 30 miles, 10 miles into France. They had a really interesting exhibition that showed what they would do under attack, and the processes and procedures that had to be endured before the big guns could fire, at planes or at incoming ships.

I was really impressed with how the underground exhibits were handled. They had lights at the top of doors, red and green, which displayed when it s safe to move on, just as they did when air raids were taking place. They had a briefing room that displayed videos on the walls and on a map on the table that showed the German offensive and the French and British reactions. There was also a large tunnel we walked through with a huge video display projected on the walls, which gave an idea of how news traveled and how tense things might have been underground. They also had examples set up in the hospital area of how the cots and meals might have been, and had a steady drone of chatter on in the background to demonstrate how it had been with a lot of people living down there. We were also able to see the message tubes that were used to shoot messages around and the morse code stations where they heard the reports.

After that, I explored the rest of the actual castle, which was decorated up from King Henry's time. I love exploring all the nooks and crannies of places like this, and so much of it was open to poke around in. The grounds were also fun to explore, even in the rain.

The next day dawned clearer, and my roommate and I went for a two mile walk along the white cliffs to a nearby lighthouse. The trip there was nice as we chatted, but the rain came up again briefly on the way back, and being at the top of the cliffs with the rain and wind wasn't the warmest thing in the world, but we managed. It was so quiet and peaceful up there, compared to the bustle of the port, which we could hear again once we rounded the last bend.

After a parting drink (or two) on the house, I left the lovely city of Dover for my home away from home for the last time this trip: Northampton.

Oxford

For some reason, going to Oxford or Stratford always requires fudge.  I don't know why, only that it does, and I obey.  And in this case, the first decent shop that I came across that had free samples was directly across from a free (tipping) tour that was starting up as I exited with my fudge.  Talk about perfect timing.

It was nice hearing about the many schools that make up Oxford and the various rivalries and assumptions made about each school from a local.  As per usual, the guide was charismatic and eager to please, happily pointing out the various locations they filmed the Harry Potter movies for those who asked (it wasn't me this time, I swear!  There were other fans abound).

Bridge of Sighs

We saw all the usual famous sights, like the Bridge of Sighs, the Sheldonian Theatre (anyone else thing of BBT?), and the outsides of a lot of campuses, who were closed for tour groups, but which I snuck back into later for a peek because I figured I looked enough like a student to get by.  The insides are gorgeous just like the outsides, with old style courtyards and quaint gardens.  Imagine studying history where that history actually happened!

Sheldonian Theater

One funny thing that happened in the middle of the tour was when three people came up to us and asked to take a picture with our group, as it was part of a scavenger hunt to get a picture with 10 or more people!  So I'm famous somewhere.

Oxford is another one of those places that just has so much history and the trod of so many famous names across its cobblestones.  After the tour, I went over and had a look at the Eagle and Child Pub, where the Inklings, a writing group composed of such names as C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien.  I also went down the alleyway where it was said Lewis got the inspiration for the first scene in Narnia, and in coming out of building into the new world of the street, the first thing you seen indeed is a tall lamppost.

After hitting up the Oxford Covered Market and enjoying a pasty snack and a new scarf, I headed over to the Ashmolean Museum and wandered for a bit.  It's kind of a strange collection, very ecliptic, with a bit of everything.  Old Roman and Greek statues, part of an Egyptian wall full of hieroglyphs that made me feel like I was in an episode of SG-1, ancient pots, a couple of Stradivarius and a collection of china dinnerware that could rival the Queen's.

And while looking through all that was pretty darn cool, the Museum of National History and the Pitt Rivers Museum was even better.  It had dinosaurs!  Does that make me sound like I'm five?  But really, it had an excellent collection of skeletons, from dinosaurs (though those were only plaster casts) to a bunch of species still around today.  They had examples of just about everything natural, rocks, insects, you name it.  And the Pitt Rivers Museum was just as unique, with all sorts of masks, tools, and items people have made and used from the beginning of our time.  Again, I don't know if it was just the layout or what, but the museums seemed very inviting and interesting.

When the museums kicked me out at closing time, I still had a couple hours to kill before catching my train back, so I enjoyed a quiet dinner at a place called Giraffe.  The fire alarm started going off continuously while I was there, and there was quite the to-do once they managed to get it turned off again.  But they had the best soy, chilli & mirin edamame there.  Yum!

Chocolate

Chocolate is different in the UK.  A Mars Bar is what we typically call a Milky Way, and what they call a Milky Way is a Three Musketeer.  Why the name change?  I have no idea.  But I've also noticed that instead of T. J. Maxx, they have T. K. Maxx as well. Strange.

A Smattering of London

The London Eye

London is an awesome place to just randomly be, as I was a lot this trip.  I went down for the day to meet up with JS and D when they were there, had a lot of half days in between catching trains and planes, and then stayed for another week before S and Spain.  It really feels like my home away from home, and I love wandering around in it.

With JS and D, I hit a lot of the classics in the Westminster area, such as Buckingham Palace to watch the changing of the guard, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben and Parliament before making our way past Downing Street, a lot of monuments by the river, and the parade grounds, where I always feel sorry for the guards on duty who have to be photographed with every tourist.  Then Trafalgar Square, where a large screen was set up for viewing the Paralympics.  After that, we met up with one of JS's friends in a pub and heard some great stories about their travels together in Africa, including about how JS's nickname became something close to 'Rat Boy,' before I had to go catch my train back to Northampton.

The Regent's Garden

I spent another half day in London before catching the Chunnel to Paris, mostly walking through Regent's Park and enjoying the gardens.  Things might have gone a lot smoother had I realized I didn't need to travel all the way to Victoria to make my train, but luckily I figured out I was at the wrong station in time to still make it to Paris.

Buckingham Palace

The start of my week in London, after all the excitement of traveling around with everyone, was pretty quiet, but I visited a lot of the sights again, walking along the river and taking in the London Eye, the many bridges, the Tate Modern and the Globe Theater.  I went to the National Gallery one day and sketched some pictures, and went to see The Magic Flute at the London Coliseum another.  I spent another day in Greenwich, and saw them taking down one of the Olympic stadiums where they had apparently hosted dressage as I walked up the hill to the Observatory and wandered through their science collection and the Maritime museum.

Trafalgar Square

One of the best things about a lot of museums in Europe is that access to them is free.  They ask for a donation if you can spare it, but people who can't necessarily afford it can still come and soak up the culture and history of the cities.  The exhibits are a lot more family friendly and...can I just say cooler in general?  I don't know why.  Maybe I'm just so familiar with the offerings of American museums that the European take is refreshing.

I naturally chose the rainiest day to do one of the free tours of London, and though it was freezing and everyone was soaked by the beginning of the hour and a half (yeah, the beginning) I still had a really good time.  I think I've said it before, but the concept of the free tour then tip as much as you think is appropriate at the end is dynamite.  The tour guides you get are so much more outgoing and willing to please because of it.

The Australian War Memorial

And although I'd seen all the sights before, as I'd hoped, the stories were fantastic.  I learned a lot of history about the statues in the area, which I hadn't known before, and other little things about why the police in the UK are called Bobbies or Peelers (they were created by Robert Peeler).  Taking this tour also made me seem super smart when I went to a lecture at the Maritime Museum, as I was able to answer one of the questions from something I remembered a few days earlier from the tour about the battle of Trafalgar and Lord Admiral Nelson.  It was an interesting history.

I also picked up a week long London heritage pass for overseas visitors mainly for my trip to Dover, which definitely made it worthwhile.  The other little things to be seen around the area were okay, but nothing special, although there are a ton of things you can use it on if you're good about it and are able to travel.  I would definitely want to have one if I was living in England again for a while and had decent access to a car to drive to a lot of these places.  But I went into the Jewel Castle, which was neat but not much, and figured out that I could get into some of the back rooms of Westminster Abbey if you go in the back entrance by the school for boys.  They're very much on the honor system there, which is a nice change, and I was honest about it and didn't go into the Abbey itself, which would have been easy.  But I've seen it before.  :)

British Supreme Court

And the best thing was that it was chocolate week!  Free samples of chocolate everywhere, and I made the most of it.  Yum!

I also randomly walked into the justice building (okay, so you can't randomly walk into there, they have security and a metal detector like most justice buildings) and found out that it was the headquarters for the British Supreme Court, which has only actually been around since 2009.  Finally something we have in the US that is older than the British version!  Part of the building is older, but they do have a nice new room as well.  The security guards were really nice, too, and kind of told me a few things about the rooms when I asked.  I liked the crest, which brought together the flowers of Wales, Scotland, Ireland and England in a classy way.  But it was kind of hard to tell the Welsh one, because it's more of a plant than a flower.

The British Library

I had one more half day in London before I headed to Spain, and I spent it at King's Cross Station and at the British Library.  I'm really glad they made Platform 9 3/4 a permanent part of the station with the renovations, even if it's not where it's supposed to be or where they filmed it.  It is a working train station after all.

And the British Library is always fantastic.  It's impossible to get a pass to view the really old texts of course (it's only if you're a student writing a thesis on something that you're able to get in, and only after filling out exhaustive forms) but they still have a nice collection of important works on display for the public, such as the oldest version of the New Testament known to exist, which is where we take all our translations from.  They also had a lot of works written in the hands of their creators, such as Jane Austen, Mozart, Bach, Charles Dickens, Lewis Carroll, and people that only English majors would appreciate, like John Dryden, Chaucer, Malory, and Virgina Woolf.  And many others.  Definitely my kind of exhibit.  They had old Shakespearean folios and the Magna Carta too.

And that was it for my time in London!  Until next time....

US v UK

Things for Americans to know about British things:

Big Ben is not the clock tower you typically see when people are talking about Big Ben.  Big Ben is the bell inside the tower.  So you should never say, "Look, Big Ben!" because you can't see it.

The 'h' in Buckingham Palace is silent, while the 'h' in herb is sounded.

'Shire' is pronounced 'shur', not 'shire' as in Lord of the Rings.

Things for Brits to know about Americans:

Just because we're 'Americans' doesn't mean you should say we live in 'America'.  While strictly speaking it's true, we prefer to say we live in the US.  It upsets the Canadians (as well as Mexicans and South Americans, who are ALL technically Americans) a lot less.

Buddies USA is not really an American dining experience.  We don't usually eat mac and cheese on our burgers.  Really.  Even if it was pretty good.

Bohemia

The Charles Bridge

 

The rest of my time in Prague is a bit blurred, considering I was there for about a week and a half total, and got a bit behind on my writing. I stayed with B&T for another couple of days before they left to go back to the States as well. We still did a lot, like hiking up to Petrin Hill and going up the Eiffel Tower look-alike to see 360 views of the city.

We also crashed some sort of University Battle of the Bands going on nearby, with cheap beer and those cinnamon cuffs that Prague is apparently known for. They were kind of awesome. Soft dough with a crisp cinnamony outside, yum.

Then that night for my birthday, we went to this amazing gelato place that I'd found online. When we got to the doorstep, it didn't look like much, but luckily I knew to go upstairs, where the real goodies were. Gelato scoops were only an American dollar for us (which is about 20 Czech dollars) so we took full advantage. Their specialty seems to be a cookie flavor, which is amazing, but their fruit flavors are fantastic as well. B wanted to come back again to get the lime he had, and I did come back a couple of times to try the orange and watermelon, which were also lovely (wow, that's really British of me). They also had really cheap little sandwiches, which made this my favorite hang out spot in Prague.

Birthday yummies

B&T left early in the morning, and had an interesting adventure when they were trapped in the corridor between the stairs and the sidewalk. Luckily, the car sent to pick them up to go to the airport was driven by a Czech spy, who sprung the lock with a spare pen without much trouble. Which was a good thing, because I was totally oblivious to all the drama happening downstairs until I woke up a few hours later.

The Changing of the Guard

I checked into a hostel for the remainder of my stay and got to know Prague pretty well. I found most of the tourist sights I'd read about by accident just by walking by, including the amazing tower of books in front of the Prague library and the building painted and carved to seem to be in 3D. I saw Don Giovanni performed by marionettes, saw the changing of the guard, visited the Lennon wall, watched the Astronomical clock circle around on the hour and strolled through parks and the town, soaking up the culture and the people.

The Lennon Wall

I noticed a few interesting things while I was here. For example, everyone has a dog and goes walking it at night.  That's just what everyone does.  They also wait really patiently for the bus.  There's very little messing about with phones, mp3 players or books - most people just stand and wait for their bus, and stand and wait to get to their stop once on board.

Another thing is that during the week, the kids are always out on field trips.  I don't know if it was just the particular two weeks I was there, but it seemed like wherever I went, there were little kids in school uniforms invading.  I wish we had so many field trips when I was at school.

The Prague Library

People in Prague do tend to speak a lot of English, which is great, but I still always feel badly when I have little or no knowledge of the native language of a place.  It does make it difficult when at stores too, because the labels aren't always totally clear.  I bought a bottle of what I assumed was chocolate milk, with a happy cow and a block of chocolate on it, only to taste it and find that it was a horrifyingly sour yogurt.  I didn't find any milk the whole time I was in the country, though at restaurants they did continually try to ply me with bread baskets that weren't free, something sneaky I'd read about in the guidebook and knew to refuse.

Marionette Opera

The checkout line at the grocery store takes forever.  They haven't yet figured out what to do if an item doesn't scan or isn't in their booklet.  Which astonishes me, seeing that it happened to someone in line every time I was waiting to buy my groceries.  But there doesn't seem to be a set practice to solve this widely occurring problem.  Also?  Coke Zero costs more than Coke.  I don't know why.

The Astronomical Clock

One thing that I was surprised at was how often people lit up their cigarettes in the middle of a room, be it a restaurant or a museum.  I thought that I'd become pretty accustomed to there being smoking and non smoking sections in much of Europe, but it still felt odd to be in the middle of a museum presentation and smell smoke.  It's just different.

Overall, the people of Prague are polite but distant.  I did get into a few good conversations around town, but for the most part, people were very reserved.  But that also might have been due to my lack of ability in speaking Czech as well.  It'll be a bit of a relief to be back in London where I won't have to worry about picking a restaurant that has a menu displayed in English.

Kutna Hora

Kutna Hora is a small town outside of Prague known for its small chapel of bones, built into structures such as a chandelier using every kind of bone in the human body. It took us about an hour to get there by train, which I very much enjoyed, in part because the train we were on had compartments just like in the Harry Potter movies. Cool!

The bone statues were creepy and strange as expected. It also kind of smelled funky, and felt like hundred year old bone dust being breathed into my lungs. Which it probably was. But it was still interesting to see. It reminded me of the catacombs in Paris and the stacks of bones arranged there.

After that, we caught a ride into the main town and looked around the chapel up there. It was a magnificent view above the vineyards and gardens, and we descended into the town for lunch, where J and B both got huge meat platters, keeping with the local tastes. J also tried the local cola, Kofola, which has kind of a licorice taste to it, and while it wasn't thoroughly unpleasant, I can't say I understand the local obsession.

Lunch, visits to puppet shops and sampling the differences in European magnum bars (the vanilla ice cream is much richer, I'd say) behind us, we walked back toward the train station and visited what ended up being my favorite church, not because of how it looked necessarily, but of what it had in it.

They had a really interesting exhibit on how they restore art, with before and after pictures of the piece nearby the actual artwork. Sometimes it's really difficult to know how to correctly restore a piece, and a lot of talking and politics comes into the decision on what to do with a completely washed it section. A lot of it is also trial and error with what formulas are working to help the degregation. In the case of this particular work, the restoration actually uncovered another original painting underneath it, and they had to decide if they wanted to try to uncover the even older work instead of restoring the (still old but) newer one. They ended up restoring the newer one, but after the old one had been carefully photographed and recorded for further study.

They also opened the upper level to the public at this church, which was amazing. We were able to walk through the upper beams and look through one of the smaller windows outside of the church, as well as to stand on the balcony and look down. It was really cool to see the old stone as well as the new that had taken its place hundreds of years ago.

We caught our train back to Prague in time for J to catch the night bus after a nice dinner.

The Start of Prague

Before JS and I figured out our plans for Tunisia, I was going to go with B&T and J to Prague. With Tunisia disappointingly out of the picture because of the recent youTube video depicting the Prophet Muhammad in an unflattering light, travel warnings were up for US citizens and our tour was canceled. Since JS and I were unable to work out anything else, I went back to my original plan of tagging along to Prague. The only difficulty was getting there. They were taking an express bus that was sold out online, but I figured I would try my luck that morning.

I did manage to get on the bus, but was quoted a rather high price for the ticket compared to the 'online deal'. I figured the guy was simply going to be taking a cut for himself and the driver, but thence actually came around and gave me a ticket at that price. So maybe it was legit after all. Makes me feel better, anyway, and I was glad to not have to figure out additional travel details and how to meet up with everyone later.

B managed to navigate us neatly to the apartment just in time to meet the owner. It was a really lovely little place, and it was great to have a kitchen and a washing machine! After staying in hostels for the past couple of weeks, it was nice to have a little privacy as well as space to spread out my stuff without worry.

We actually saw a lot of the city that night, fueled partly by J, who only had an afternoon in Prague with taking the train to Kona Hora the next day and then leaving for Vienna that night. With the bus system figured out, we visited Prague Castle and the gardens, getting a great view of the city as night fell. We then crossed the famous Charles Bridge on our way back across the river, with its imposing statues looming out of the darkness. There were a lot of things to be seen just in walking by, and we went through the old town square and Wenceslace Square on the way to catching the train back to the apartment, both which I visited again during my unplanned, extended stay.

Munich

Oktoberfest! It has various embodiments practically everywhere in the US, with celebrations of it all over the globe. And now I've been to the real thing!

Half of it was a lot like the fair, with rides and game booths and souvenir shops. But the other half is all about the beer. The tents, filled to the brim with people all wanting the same thing: to try some of the local flavor.

The first day we got all dressed up in our liderhosen and dirndls and stayed out to watch the parade that opened the festival. They had horses dragging wagonloads of kegs, just the way they did a hundred years ago. And then there were the bands and the traditional garbs and these guys who were carrying around huge whips, which sounded like thunder when they would demonstrate breaking the sound barrier.

By the time we actually got into a tent, it was raining pretty heavily out, and the tables were of course all full. Having gotten a few tricks from the locals, we didn't know how good we had it by getting in so quickly. When we couldn't get a table after a while, we gave up and went elsewhere. What a mistake that was. Because of the rain, no one else was leaving the tents. We got into a few more, including the candy castle one with all the desserts, but that one only had wine and that wasn't what we had come to Oktoberfest for.

We eventually settled for a beer garden in the rain, and managed to grab a table under an awning. Luckily, that was about it for the rain, and our table quickly became a hot commodity, which everyone tried to muscle in on whenever someone in our group would go to the bathroom. And we got our first beers! And Radlers, which are half beer, half lemonade mixtures. Yum.

The thing to understand about Oktoberfest beers is that they're huge. They're an entire liter, and that's a lot of liquid. One size fits all. And they're also about €10 apiece. They're actually less than that, but you have to tip your server every time, or they won't come back to serve you again. They've got a ton of other customers willing to tip. One of the locals was telling us that a server can make €50,000 in this one week, carrying 12 beers and getting €12 every time they go out. I don't know if that math is all there, but they're definitely making significant amounts just in tips.

People say that Oktoberfest can get crazy, and I guess that's true too. We were told that if you pass out or fall asleep they have bouncers that drag you out and drop you on the curb. We didn't see that actually happening, but we did see a lot of guys blinking on the curbs by themselves. The beer at Oktoberfest is also a lot stronger than many people are accustomed to, and there were people passed out on the street in some places. And lots of ambulances and stretchers going through, as well as police.

We stayed at our table for the rest of the night, vowing to get up early the next morning to snag a table in a tent. Half of us made it up and managed to stake out the Hippodrome tent early enough to capture a table. They had great music going and awesome food as well as the beer. I didn't like it as much as the other, but we weren't about to give up our table and leave until we were good and ready. Or they kicked us out.

I was surprised that the tents weren't really tents, but actual structures they put up every year. No canvas. When we did eventually leave the tent, we wandered and then eventually settled into another beer garden. It was really crowded, and we had to split up and sit at different tables, which was actually better because it gave us the chance to talk to some of the other people who had come to Oktoberfest. We met more locals who come every year, as well as people from the US and a great guy from New Zealand, Ben, who at 19 was randomly traveling around by himself all summer. It really does seem like most of the travelers I encounter are either from California or Australia, but I'm not sure why. Maybe we're more the adventurous types?

In one corner of the park grounds of Oktoberfest, there's a giant statue up on steps, where you can climb and see the best view of the entire festival. I think it put it in perspective a bit. It was such a huge area, and it was still a push to get through people everywhere you went, especially on such a nice day.

I think one of the best random parts of the day was when an old high school friend walked by and recognized me in the crowd. We stopped and caught up, which was amazing. I can never believe the randomness of the universe!

After walking the grounds a bit more, we went out to the city center where they have one of those traditional clocks that have characters that dance and spin at certain times of the day. We didn't get to see it in action, but it was still neat to look at. After dinner, we stopped in the square for a bit to listen to a trio playing Mozart. It was a relaxing ending to our last day together in Munich. Most of the group was headed home in the morning, and sad to go.

I had an awesome time with the group, most of whom I had never met before Europe. It was kind of amazing how well we all got on together. I guess I was just the right amount of geek to fit in, as many of our toasts were dedicated to Joss Wheaton and the crew of Firefly. Proust!

The Romantic Road

It's actually kind of scary to drive in these inner towns, because all the streets look like walkways, especially with tourists crowded around them and cafes with their tables and chairs set out in them. It's only the fact that I see other cars driving down them as well that I know that I'm okay, or at least that others are just as misguided as myself when it comes to driving around these towns.

We stopped specifically in the little towns of Rothenburg and Dinkelsbuhl, each which had its own charms but were similar as well.  Both were centuries old, surrounded by walls and entered only through gates that used to be guarded by the villagers. These are still the only ways in and out to this day, and these towns are frequently atop a hill with a view (all the better to see the enemy coming).

Snowball!

In the German style, there were a lot of Christmas themed decorations (as Germany officially began the tradition of Father Christmas) as well as clocks and snowballs, these fantastic webby dough balls covered in all types of flavors like chocolate, cinnamon sugar, caramel, you name it. You can probably guess what I got. Mi also got this fantastic apple juice that was fresh and delicious and the best I've ever tried.

The Night Watchman

In Dinkelsbuhl, the last small town before our castles, we had a traditionally heavy German dinner, then waited in front of the church for the bells to mark nine. When they did, a man dressed in a traditional cloak with a long spear in his hand emerged from the darkness holding a lantern with a single candle burning within. He began to sing a dirge in a lovely baritone, then told us he was the night watchman of the town, and we were welcome to join him for his nightly rounds.

We followed him around for about an hour, where he made at least seven stops at local restaurants and sang a little ditty after blowing his trumpet. Before he had finished singing, a waiter would be waiting with a glass of beer or wine in hand to offer him as thanks for guarding the town. He was nice enough to share with us as well, but it was endlessly amusing to see people pop their heads out with a free glass for him every time. I think Mi was trying to figure out a way to get the same deal in other towns. In the olden days, I'm sure it was the sign of a grateful bar owner to the night watchman who kept his establishment safe. Or it was like bribing the mob not to burn your shop to the ground. I suspect the former.

Neuschwanstein Castle

Our last day on the romantic road was filled with the castles of Fussen. Two of them to be exact, but one of them, Neuschwanstein, was the famous castle Disney modeled his Sleeping Beauty castle after which became his logo.

I do have to say that the tours at both of these castles were very confusing and not very thorough for someone unacquainted with the local stories and legends of the castles. We ended up reading the stories in the books offered in the giftshops after the tours to figure out what was going on.  The history of it all was actually quite fascinating, and I'm disappointed they didn't do a better job of relating it to the group as a whole.

The two castles are fairly close together, the first being the summer palace for the royal family and the second being one of the many castles the oldest son and later king had built because he could. The Neuschwanstein Castle was actually never finished in Ludwig's lifetime, and he only lived there a short time. But still, both castles, even the unfinished one, are remarkably detailed and similar. Every spare wall is either carved or has a painting on it, themed to the room, often. In the Disney castle, the bed itself took four years of work by master carvers to put in the details. And swans were everywhere, as the crest the family. There was also a random cave room that no one was sure what to make of, which was mentioned but not explained in the tour.

What we later learned about Neuschwanstein Castle was this. Ludwig became king at the age of 17, and was engaged to his cousin, but broke it off a year later. It was believed that he struggled with  homoerotic fantasies and never married because of it. He was known as a pretty eccentric king, and made servants who had ugly faces wear masks around him. He also didn't like having company, and would have players perform operas only for him. He kind of lived in a fantasy world, imagining himself in a number of Wagner's musical operas. Many of the rooms in his castle were painted with scenes from the stories Wagner drew inspiration from, like Tristan and Isolate. As king, Ludwig ruled from afar in his castles, but didn't pay much attention to matters of state, which made it easier for his Parliament to depose him on the grounds that he was insane. He drowned under suspicious circumstances a few days afterward. Mi thinks the story has great potential as a film, and I agree.  I can just see the film ending on a question - was the King murdered, or did he kill himself in the pond?

Then, there was some more driving, some twisting and shouting on the side of the road, a crazy horse that we though was going to jump the low fence and crash into the car, and we arrived in Munich!

Amsterdam

The Flying Pig advertises a free walking tour of the city, and the three of us managed to catch the first one in the morning after an awesome breakfast for some chocolate spread stuff on toast. I don't know what it was, since the label was in Dutch, but it was better than butter. I don't say that about many spreads.

But yes, the tour. We didn't realize it was going to be three hours long when we started it, but the time flew by. I learned so much about Amsterdam that I hadn't known about before (granted, I didn't know that much to being with) and really gained an appreciation for the city. Here comes a lot of history and info, so if that's not your thing, you might want to skim from here. I found it all pretty fascinating, though.

First of all, Amsterdam is well known for being a very chill city where gay marriage is legal, people smoke pot on the street, and for the red light district where prostitution is legal. They're a very tolerant people, and have three rules when it comes to deciding if doing something is okay. 1. If it's not hurting anybody 2. If it's good for business and 3. If it makes money. This was accompanied by a tale about how Christianity was illegal for a time in Amsterdam, but on Sundays, a rich merchant liked to hold church masses in his house for those who still worshipped. Their singing could be heard out on the street. When people went to the police to turn them in, they were reminded that it was a Sunday, and that the police didn't work on Sundays. And when the police finally went around to look on Monday, well, all the houses looked the same, and there was no singing going on, so nothing to worry about.

Then he moved on to the example of coffee shops, which do sell coffee, but are mainly known for their variety of marijuana. Everyone knows what goes on behind closed doors, but because there's at least a covert attempt, they don't care. After all, it's good for business, even if it's illegal.

Then there's the legality of prostitution, which is perfectly legal as long as you work for yourself. No pimps allow! The red light district is basically a bunch of glass store windows advertising their wares, which are barely dressed women. Apparently boys are also available, but you have to call special. No window shopping.



The Amsterdam crest

During the tour we crossed at least three dozen bridges, each with a picturesque view and bicycles locked to the sides. There are barely any places to park in the narrow streets,so bikes and buses are the main methods of transportation. If you hear a bell ringing, you'd better be getting out of the way! Our guide also said that you had to be sure to lock up your bike at night, because a lot of them seemed to find their way to the bottom of the canals with alarming frequency otherwise. Apparently it used to be horses that fell into canals the most and drown before that. And we heard a clever tale of a man who invented a rig to pull horses out of the canals, and if it was too late to save the horse, he'd make the owner a good deal for the dead horse and would have fresh steaks to sell in his butcher shop the next day.
We also learned about the history of Amsterdam's beginnings and how it was founded by a pair of stranded sailors and their dog, all of whom were drifting after a terrible storm. They promised to start a colony if they made it safely to land, and so Amsterdam began.



Anne Frank's statue

Toward the end of the tour, near the house where Anne Frank's famous diary was written, the guide painted a haunting picture of Amsterdam under Nazi rule; how things changed slowly at first, from a curfew for anyone Jewish to dismissing Jewish professors from the Universities, then how they could no longer ride buses or even bikes, because walking was supposed to be good enough for them. One night, some guards were hassling a young Jewish girl, and a bunch of Jewish boxers put a stop to it, chasing them deep into the Jewish district and beating them severely. The next day, the district was surrounded and bolted in, and 5,000 Jews were rounded up and put on trains to concentration camps. Seeing what was happening, some of the people of Amsterdam got together that night and talked. And the next morning, people ready for work stepped outside to catch a bus or train that never came. The strikers and those who didn't know what was happening eventually made their way to the center square where a massive protest was held for what was happening to the Jewish people. It was eventually shut down by the Nazis, but Amsterdam remains the only place where any type of protest was held against what was being done. It's called the February Rebellion now, and is celebrated every year.

We hid from the rain during lunch, then left when it cleared up to get some shots near the I AMstersdam sign, where I yelled at people to get out of the way so we could have a clear shot. Then everyone wanted me to yell for them. We also visited a few bars Mi wanted to see, including the oldest one in town. After that, it was to bed for an early morning driving to Germany and the romantic road.