Home Sweet Home

As I write this, I'm sitting on my couch... in CALIFORNIA! This is my 3rd day back home, and it's kind of... crazy. I don't know what to do with myself! Don't get me wrong; I'm excited to be home. Catching up with friends and family I haven't seen in 4 months is great and well worth the ridiculously long travel day it took to get here.

This picture is completely unrelated. Unless you count the fact that it's a picture I took of a rose in my backyard...

However, being back in the States is definitely surreal... kind of like, what was real? Heidelberg, or life before? Obviously they both were, but so much of it feels like a dream. It was a bit disorienting at first... or maybe that was just the jet lag? Speaking of jet lag, that definitely caught up with us last night... my parents and I were sitting in the living room relaxing and watching TV, and next thing you know, I couldn't keep my eyes open. At 7:30 pm! So i fell asleep at 7:30, and my parents fell asleep around 8. Of course we got up later to go to our actual beds, so it's not like I slept straight from 7:30 to 8 this morning... but almost! It's kind of ridiculous, but it felt so nice!

The pros of being home:

• Seeing family and friends 
• Getting to hang with my dogs again
• Guacamole!
• Free refills!
• Free water!
• Free restrooms!
• "Oh there's no place like home for the holidays..."
• I get to choose from all the clothes in my closet, rather than just the select few I brought to Germany with me
• I get to drive (I missed you, Chip!)
• Free time to read

The cons of being home:

• Not that much of an opportunity to practice my German.
• Living with 4 other people is A LOT different than living with 45 other people. You think this would be a good thing, but I miss being able to go down the hall or down the stairs and find just about any one of my friends to talk to. Now I have to plan and drive (so lazy, I know).
• On that note, I MISS EVERYONE IN MOORE HAUS!

So, I guess this is what it's like when you have two homes: you can't be in one without missing the other. With that in mind, I'm going to make the most of my time in each place. I look forward to all the amazingly fun times I'll have with my wonderful friends here, making up for the lost time of the past 4 months and the next 4 after that. However, I will be so excited to return to Heidelberg and all the lovelies back there, too!

Perfekt? Das macht nichts.

Here's what I've discovered: when it comes to writing, I'm a perfectionist.

This is not a good thing.

Let  me explain. If you read any writing blog, book, pamphlet, what have you, or attend any creative writing course, they will tell you that the number one stumbling block of any writer is PERFECTIONISM. Because if you're perfectionistic (just made up that word) with your writing, you'll get frustrated by your perceived insufficiencies (did I make that up too? Mozilla Firefox is underlining that one as well. I thought it existed, but if it doesn't I'm still going to use it because I like it) and most likely give up, not letting your work live up to its full potential.

Tonight I was taking a break from studying for finals and showing my friend Genesis some of the things in creative writing I wrote last year. Since they actually had to be turned in and graded, these are probably the only things (besides poems) that I have seen through to completion. Not because I necessarily wanted to, or because I had confidence in where they were going, but because I HAD TO fight through my natural writerly perfectionism and write whether or not I felt "inspired" to do so. And you know what? It turned out WELL, if I do say so myself. I mean, not to pat my own back or anything. That's not exactly what I mean. Basically, if I am pleased with or proud of any of my works of fiction, it would be those which I had to see through to completion.

The interesting thing about that? I had NO IDEA where I was going with those stories when I wrote them. Maybe an opening scene, an image, not much more. Characters emerged, as well as some semblance of a plot, and while I wasn't confident about any of it at the time, after looking at it with the distance of several months I see that it was worth it, that the only way I am pleased with my work is if I just roll with it. Forget perfectionism-- it only holds you back.

So where am I going with this? Well, two places, I guess.

One: I need to write on this blog more. Even if I think it's not that great of an entry, I should just publish it anyway, in case maybe it will be useful to someone. It doesn't matter if I didn't do anything "exciting" like jet off to another country. Sometimes the beauty of one moment is enough excitement for a whole day, and I should feel free to share that with others.

 Two: If I may make a cheesy comparison, I would say that life is a lot like writing fiction. If you're an author like me who doesn't outline and just rolls with the story... well, that's life. We don't really know where we're going, who exactly we are (or will become) as characters, and sometimes we don't even know where we want our story to go. But if we let our perfectionist tendencies keep us from moving forward, from making the next chapter exciting, then we're not doing much of living. Of course we should try our gosh darn hardest to write with nice pretty metaphors and good character development and all that jazz. But we can't constantly look back on the few paragraphs we've already written and get all nitpicky about word choice. Does that make sense? I don't know if that translates outside of my brain, but I think I'll publish it anyway, since I'm doing away with this whole perfectionism thing. Because even if your writing's not perfect, at least your story is getting written and improving. And who knows? While it may not sound good at the time, maybe when you look back at it from the distance of time, you'll realize it wasn't so bad after all.

Sorry for the ridiculously cheesy life analogies. I promise I'm done with this for now :)

A Jolly Good Time in England

Ever since we both knew that we would be studying in Germany this year, my roommate Ashley and I knew we HAD to go to London together. Last weekend, our dream finally became a reality!

Getting there was definitely interesting. Being money-conscious college students who are currently suffering under the dollar-euro conversion rate, we wanted to go for as little money as possible. Therefore, we bought our tickets with Ryan Air, the budget airline that is widely used here. Ryan Air flies out of Frankfurt Hahn airport (which is not in Frankfurt, by the way). To get there, we took a 2 1/2 hour bus ride from the Heidelberg Hauptbahnhof at about 2:30 in the morning. From there we took a fairly short plane ride to London Stansted (which is not in London), and then another 2 hour bus ride to London itself, where we got on the tube to go to South Kensington, the location of the Pepperdine House. By then it was about 10 in the morning London time, so we had breakfast, rested a bit, and then began our whirlwind tour of London.

We saw most of the essential sights: Big Ben, the Parliament building, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey. We went into the National Gallery for a spell (side note: the museums in London are free. I highly appreciated this), ate dinner, and pretty much collapsed into bed (or at least, I did).

Buckingham Palace

Parliament

Big Ben

The next day, we spent a lot of time exploring Camden Market and all the cheap goods they had to sell there. I had limited space, so I only purchased an Oxford University sweatshirt (and some food). After that, we went to King's Cross station to get the quintessential Harry Potter fan picture. We ran around the train station forever trying to find it. We knew it was just a cart stuck into a wall, but we thought that, logically, it would be between platforms 9 and 10. No luck there. So we asked someone, and they told us it was by platform 1. We looked for that, couldn't find it, asked someone else, and they said it was around the corner. Turns out, it's outside the train station, in this little box. Definitely not as magical as you would think. However, it was still worth it for our picture :)

Yay, we're going to Hogwarts!

What it actually looks like.

After that, we went to the British Museum, which was so gigantic we could not possibly have had enough time to see it all. But it was really cool and had so many interesting artifacts. We got to see the Rosetta Stone and an Easter Island statue, among countless other treasures of history.

Since my companions, Mason and Ashley, are both Catholic, they wanted to go to mass, so I went along with them. We rode a double-decker bus (on the top level, of course) to the Westminster Cathedral (not to be confused with Westminster Abbey, which is Anglican). It was absolutely gorgeous inside and out-- possibly the most beautiful church I've seen in Europe. I really liked the inside because it was different than your typical cathedral-- they used colored marble, and in some naves there were mosaics on the ceiling made with glimmering tiles. I was pretty much in awe the whole time.

Westminster Cathedral at night.

By the time mass was over, it was time for dinner, so we headed back to South Kensington and stopped in a little restaurant, where I got fish and chips (which were just okay compared to others I've had) and sticky toffee pudding (quite possibly the best I've ever tasted. It made it all worth it). Since we had an early morning of travel ahead of us, we headed back for the night after dinner. The next morning we left around 8:30 and made it back to Heidelberg in time for dinner and the completion of homework.

I had a fantastic time in London, but I was definitely left wanting more. A two day trip, which we had to keep that short out of necessity, is simply not long enough to see all or even a large chunk of what London has to offer. So, basically, I have to go back sometime :)

Goals for my next trip to England someday:
1. Stroll through Hyde Park
2. Have tea and scones with jam and devonshire cream (and maybe a crumpet while I'm at it?)
3. Maybe see the tower of London
4. Go to Stratford Upon Avon
5. Maybe see Charles Dicken's house, and maybe Jane Austen's too
6. See the English countryside, and possibly go to locations where movies were filmed (Pemberly, aka Mr. Darcy's estate? I'd love to see the place they used for that. Or if there are any locations nearby where Harry Potter was filmed, that would be great too)

And I'm sure there's much, much more of which I simply cannot think at the moment. So, who's with me?

Berlin: Part 2

The second half of my weekend in Berlin was simultaneously relaxing and jam-packed. Evan and I came to Sina's house at the end of a long (but fun) day and were picked up at the train station by Sina and her mom. It was so wonderful to see Sina again! She was my friend Kelli's German exchange student the first half of our senior year of high school, so it'd been almost 2 years since we'd seen each other in person.

When we got to her house, her parents had prepared dinner for us, which was so sweet of them (and it was delicious, i might add). Having something homemade prepared for us was a welcome surprise, and it was lovely to have vegetables! Because I have to admit, while the restaurants we go to for our meals are delicious, they seldom serve many vegetables to us.

After our dinner and pleasant conversation (seriously, her parents are SO SWEET), Sina showed us our rooms. We were so fortunate that not only was there a guest room for Evan, but also Sina's brother's room was unoccupied so I could stay in there. After a night in a hostel (which really wasn't that bad, but still), it was really nice to each have our own rooms without random people coming in. That night we went to bed so early-- probably around 10:30 or so. It felt GREAT.

It was fortunate that we were able to get to bed so early on Friday night, because on Saturday we woke up early in order to go to a tour of a WWII bunker. Evan and I went without Sina because she needed to sleep in, so we agreed to meet up with her a little later so she would be sufficiently rested.

The WWII bunker was so fascinating. It was tucked away in a subway station, and you would never even suspect it. I think one of the most interesting things was the fluorescent paint they had on the walls. Whoever came up with this was so clever-- and I was impressed, considering that this paint dated back to the 1930s or so. Basically, in case of a power outage they wanted to be sure that they could still see, so they painted the walls with this fluorescent paint that would give off a faint glow in the dark. The really cool thing is that if you "drew" in the air with a flashlight, your picture would briefly show up as a glowing image on the wall. The paint was really strong, and I can only imagine how well it all worked 70 years ago when it was fresh. The bunker also really got me thinking about how scary it must have been to be a civilian in Berlin at that time-- can you imagine expecting a bomb raid at any moment, then having to hide in dark underground rooms without windows, all the while forced to live under an immoral regime?

Sina and me inside a Trabi

After that, we met up with Sina at the DDR (Deutsche Demokratische Republik) Museum, which is basically about life in Eastern Germany. It was so fascinating to hear how life was in the DDR-- for example, a brick layer was almost paid as much as a chemist. As time went on the regime started to fail because of economic problems-- their system simply didn't work. We got to sit in a Trabi, the car of the DDR. If you wanted one, you had to wait for a VERY long time, and they were pretty junky cars. They broke down all the time, and later in the day we actually saw a real Trabi (you can rent them in Berlin and drive them around for kicks) break down on the street.

Our day had only just begun by the time we finished that-- we went to a cafe, then to the Checkpoint Charlie museum. While Checkpoint Charlie may be a standard tourist thing to see in Berlin, I have to say that it was worth it. There were so many stories in the museum about escape attempts and successes that I couldn't even read them all.

There was only one thing left on our itinerary for the day after we finished at checkpoint Charlie: the dome on top of the Reichstag building. Evan had made reservations for the three of us to tour it, and the only available time was that night. However, once we got there the woman in charge told us that our names were not on the list. She must have been feeling merciful that night or something, because she let us in anyway, which I'm pretty sure is not protocol. Then again, we weren't allowed to go inside the Reichstag building itself, but still. We had to put our bags through an X-ray machine and walk through a metal detector, just like at the airport. We, along with a few others, were escorted into the building and up a few floors in the elevator before being dropped off at the spot where we picked up our audio guides for the dome (which basically told us interesting things about the architecture and pointed out points of interest in the city).

At the top of the dome

All in all, I'd say that the trip to Berlin was fantastic. I learned so much over the course of only a few days, and left feeling like there was still so much more to do and see in Berlin. But alas, I am studying abroad and therefore have to plan my trips within the confines of my weekends and return to school when it's all over. So we returned, relaxed and enlightened at the end of a fun and informative weekend.

Berlin: Part 1

If there's one cliched phrase that applies to traveling in Europe, it's this:
"Expect the unexpected."

What I expected for the long weekend of November 2-6? My friend Evan and I would leave Wednesday morning for Berlin, stay in the Heart of Gold (a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy themed hostel) Wednesday night, a different hostel (just for kicks) Thursday night (both of which were super cheap, even more so because we planned to stay in room with 6 other random strangers), and my friend Sina's house Friday and Saturday night, having plenty of time to see all of the museums and places of historical interest in Berlin. We're not the type of people who like to be rushed.

Here's what really happened. Monday night, Evan and about 6 others in our house got food poisoning (happy Halloween, right?). I didn't know about it until I came down for breakfast Tuesday morning and found Evan huddled on the couch looking miserable, and my friend Chris debating whether or not to eat cereal, because he felt a little nauseous (spoiler alert: he ate it, and it was a bad idea). They were sick the entire day. Two of my friends, Chelsea and Jaimy, were supposed to leave for Ireland at around 2 AM on Wednesday but decided for the sake of their health not to do so. Other people's travel plans fell apart due to people in the group being sick as well, so by Wednesday morning there were quite a few of us still in Moore Haus without a plan.

Evan and I decided to help our friends salvage their long weekend, so we invited them to come along with us. Thus, our Berlin group expanded to include Chelsea, Jaimy, Ben, Chris, and Andrew in addition to Evan and me. To throw another cliche in this blog entry (why stop now, right?), the more the merrier!

We departed Thursday morning instead of Wednesday, so unfortunately we didn't get to stay in the Heart of Gold Hostel. However, this extra day gave us more time to do laundry, pack, plan, etc-- and more time for all the sickies to get better. We took the ICE to Berlin, which was amazing-- we got there in about 5 hours. And to give you some perspective on how incredible that is, we were basically going from southwest Germany to the northeast. Almost all the way across the country in such a short time! It was a super comfortable train, too, with a cafe and compartments (like the Hogwarts Express!) and lovely views out the window.

Yay Berlin! Jaimy, Chelsea, and me :D

Our first night in Berlin we basically got established in our hostel and explored the city on our own. We went to the Brandenburg Gate and the Holocaust Memorial and just generally had a good time. Also, we had the craziest thing happen in the hostel. Evan and I were talking to this one guy around our age in our room, and after we told him that we went to Pepperdine he said, "Oh, I know someone who goes there!" I, of course, expected to have no idea who this person was that he knew (as is usually the case), but then he asked, "Do you know Brandon Scheirman?" Not only do we know Brandon, he is a friend/Moore Hausmate!  If you've ever heard that theory about the 6 Degrees of Separation (basically, everyone in the world is connected by 6 people), I'm really starting to believe there's some validity to it. I mean, seriously, what are the odds of meeting a random guy in a hostel in Berlin who personally knows one of your friends?! It was crazy.

 The next day we got up fairly early and headed to the German History Museum. That place was incredible-- it started from about 500 AD all the way to at least the Cold War Era (to be honest, I'm not sure exactly how far it goes because I barely made it to the middle of WWII, and that was even with a lot of skimming. I'm just a very thorough museum-goer, apparently, and that takes a lot of time which I did not have). After that we got lunch at Subway (I know, so American and uncreative, but we were hungry and looking for somewhere close/cheap) and headed over to the Ritter Sport museum/store. That place was amazing-- a little museum on the second floor, and on the first, all the flavors of Ritter Sport chocolate you could possibly dream of. I bought some with roasted almonds in it, which was DELICIOUS, to say the least.

There were lots of fun things to do there :)

Chris and me surrounded by CHOCOLATE!

After that we headed over to the Topography of Terror exhibit, which is pretty sobering. It basically tells about the horrors of the Nazi regime and how some of them got away with mass murder (not serving their full sentences, not being charged at all, etc.) Before that, we stopped by a large piece of the Berlin Wall that is still standing.

See this big concrete thing I'm touching? Yeah, it's the Berlin Wall. No big deal or anything.

"To Astrid: Maybe someday we will be together."

By the time we had done all that, it was early evening and time to meet up with Sina. We didn't meet up with her earlier because she's still in high school and of course didn't have a long weekend like us (that was just a Pepperdine thing). At this point we (Evan and I) split from the group to go stay with Sina, since the original, pre-food poisoning plan was for only two of us to stay at her house. While the rest of our group went to Checkpoint Charlie, Evan and I got our tired selves on an S-Bahn (train) to go to Zehlendorf, Sina's town about 45 minutes outside of Berlin.

It appears that this blog entry has become rather long and detailed, and I still have SO MUCH to say about my weekend in Berlin (it really is an incredible city), so to save your tired eyes I'm going to break my weekend up into more bite-size pieces and continue later. There's at least one more blog entry about Berlin to come, so stay tuned!

MooreHogwarts

Ashley and I even dressed up for the occasion :) I love my roomie

     Let me begin with a simple, undeniable statement: the people with whom I live are amazing.
     Basically, this week was stressful, filled with midterms and papers GALORE. However, by Wednesday the worst of it (ie the intercultural communications midterm) was over and we were ready to relax and just have fun. Our fantastic RA's John and Courtney and our student representatives Josh and Chelsea came up with the idea to turn Moore Haus into Hogwarts and sort all of the students into houses. Needless to say, I was sehr aufgeregt (google translate it :D).
     At 9 PM everyone went down to the Frühstückzimmer, which had been closed to the general population of Moore Haus for a few hours beforehand in order to preserve the surprise. Finally we were allowed to enter and found that our breakfast room had been transformed (as much as is possible) into the Great Hall. It was completely rearranged, with four tables in the four corners of the room (one for each house of Hogwarts). The lights were turned off, but the tables had lines of candles running down the middle, and there were christmas lights hanging from the ceiling. Basically, it was magical.

Someone's sock has been hanging out in the Frühstückzimmer. Before, it was gross. Now, it's Harry Potter appropriate decor!

   Our visiting faculty, Dr. Lemley (aka Dumbledore) was decked out in a blanket--er, cloak--and wizard hat. He welcomed us with Dumbledore's speech: "I'd like to say a few words before we begin: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!" (By the way, forgive me if that's not word for word what Dumbledore said-- I don't have a book nearby and my computer's not liking google at the moment. Close enough, though, right?). After that, we were summoned one by one to the middle of the room, where the sorting hat was placed on our head. To be honest, I would have been happy in ANY of the houses, because just being officially sorted into a Hogwarts house is fun enough on its own. However, I was absolutely overjoyed to be placed in Ravenclaw, which I've always said was the house I would fit in most.

The ladies of Ravenclaw making the claw sign and our fierce faces. Don't judge. Also, sorry Bri for putting this up even though you look like you're sneezing. It was the only one.

     I love my fellow Ravenclaws! We're going to have such a wonderful time competing for the house cup. And, of course, we're going to win. Apparently we're going to have a Quidditch match sometime too. Would it be too redundant if I said that I love Moore Haus?

Wonderful Wien

     Last week we went to Vienna (Wien) for our educational field trip. I struggled with figuring out how exactly to convey the awesomeness of the experience to you readers-- a separate blog entry for each day? Each activity? Truth is, there's no conceivable way to express every separate moment's joy, so I'll attempt to condense it to the best stuff and, for the sake of time, give a brief overview.
     Day one of our stay in Vienna was, for the most part, taken up with travel-- going to the airport, waiting there, flying, driving to the hotel, etc. But shortly after our arrival in the imperial city, we had already begun our whirlwind tour, starting off the trip with a tour of one of Mozart's apartments. I expected it to be more like Goethe's house in Frankfurt, which was furnished much as it was in his time. Instead, it was filled with information, more of a museum than an exact preservation of his house. Still, though, I found it fascinating, especially because here I was within the same four walls that Mozart had lived and composed. To top off the night, we had a group dinner consisting of-- of course-- Wiener schnitzel and apple strudel.
     Day two was rainy and cold, but that did not at all detract from the experience. In fact, it made for the perfect day for going to museums. We saw two that day-- the Kunsthistorisches Museum (art history museum), which was incredibly gorgeous inside and had exhibits of Greek, Egyptian, and 17th and 18th century artwork. The other museum my group saw that day was the Albertina Museum, which housed modern art. Admittedly, I didn't like that one quite as much, since I'm not really a modern art fan. They did have a Monet painting though, which was so cool to see in person and catered to my tastes a lot more than other forms of modern art. After that we went to THE Cafe Sacher, which was pretty much across the street, and had the famous Sacher Torte which was invented there.
     Day three, which was Thursday, we went to the Stift Melk, which is a monastery and school in the town of Melk about an hour outside of Vienna. I thought monasteries were supposed to be bare and austere, but this one certainly wasn't! It was filled with gorgeous baroque architecture and had beautiful gardens. My favorite room was, of course, the library. Gilded books filled shelves which completely covered the walls-- if I remember correctly, there were ladders too! Basically, that room will have to be in my house someday. Then that afternoon we had "free time" in which we could do whatever we wanted. I went with a group to Belvedere Palace (yet another gorgeous place in Vienna-- there's no shortage of palaces, it seems) and looked at an exhibition of Gustav Klimt's paintings inside (among other artists' works). I previously did not know any of Klimt's works besides "The Kiss" (which is gorgeous in person), but I have to say that after seeing so many of his works I am quite the fan of Klimt's works. After that, almost everyone in our group went to the Circus Roncalli in front of the City Hall. It was so much fun, and the acts were incredibly impressive-- especially the trapeze artists and the strong man.
     I think Friday, day four, was my favorite. We started off the day with a journey to the Schloss Schoenbrunn, the summer palace of the Hapsburg Family (you know... like Marie Antoinette before she was married off to Louis XVI...among other important historical figures who lived lavish lives). It was rather cold but it was well worth braving the cold to traverse the palace gardens. We didn't have a ton of time to do so but a bunch of us walked up the hill to the cafe at the top. Only my friends Ashley, Evan, and I went to eat inside the cafe, though. The views were gorgeous and the prices weren't terrible, and we had a great conversation over lunch. So great, in fact, that we might have lost track of time a wee bit... the three of us went and found the subway station. We were only 10 minutes later than when we were supposed to meet the group, but of course they had left by that time. It was no problem, though-- we got on the subway, figured out where we were supposed to go, and problem solved. From there I went with my separate group to the imperial crypt of the Hapsburgs, where people like Maria Theresa are buried.
     Friday night was the best. We had LOTS of extra time to get all dolled up, and Ashley's and my room was basically a beauty parlor. After everyone's hair and makeup was done and we were sufficiently dressed up, we headed down to the lobby because the whole group was about to go to a Strauss/Mozart concert together. Seeing a classical music concert was basically the one thing I HAD to do in Vienna (it is the classical music capital of the world, you know...), so I was ecstatic that Pepperdine had planned just that for us. I loved every minute of music and soaked it up as much as I could. It was incredible and ended far too soon.

Stift Melk... can you believe this is a monastery?

pretty BOOKS! Cue drool...

The cafe at the top of the Schoenbrunn gardens. Can you believe we actually got to eat lunch in there?

     Saturday was, sadly, our last day in the beautiful city of Vienna. We started the day with a tour of Stephansdom, Vienna's famous Cathedral which was partially burned in (I believe) the 1940's. It was, like so many other things in that city, absolutely gorgeous. After that I toured the Kunsthaus Wien, an exhibit of the works of Friedensreich Hundertwasser, an eccentric artist (his first name, clearly not the one he was born with, basically means "peace kingdom"). He was very into the green movement and had some very interesting ideas about sustainable living, and his art looks kind of like an acid trip (at least what I would guess an acid trip would be like). While we were there, my friend Chris and I had a pretty intense discussion about the art of the future and how technology is changing everything-- what will our museums be like in the future? Will art on canvas be a thing of the past? How will people in the future define the culture of our day? All in all, it was a pretty cool day. After those activities I personally was exhausted and, after getting some cheap food, went back to the hotel lobby for the 30 or so minutes I had left until we were to depart for the airport. After that, we left Vienna. Our travel home was uneventful, and before long we were back in our beloved Heidelberg.

Schoenbrunn ist so schoen!

     That, in a nutshell, was our Vienna trip. It seemed like a VERY short 5 days, and I wish we could have had so much more time to soak it all in. But, conversely, I'm also thankful that we had so much time there-- Vienna was at the top of my list of places to visit whilst in Europe, so I'm glad that it ended up being the location of our field trip so that I had 5 days of vacation rather than trying to squeeze all that amazingness into a 3 day weekend. And now, it is back to reality: papers are due soon and there's always homework to do. Sigh. But I can't really complain; either way, I'm still in Europe having the time of my life :)

Rain and Apple Crisp

     Tonight was rainy and windy-- the perfect weather for a cozy night in. For the past week I've had quite the appetite for apple crisp (plus a desire to experiment in the kitchen), so I decided that tonight was the perfect night to see if I could come up with some kind of delicious concoction given the random supplies in Moore Haus available to the students (without stealing someone else's food).

          Here is my (completely unofficial and unmeasured) recipe (I was definitely winging it...):

I promise it looks tastier in person...

     I sliced up some apples that they give us every morning for breakfast, laid them in a pan, and covered them with apple juice, cinnamon, and a bit of sugar.

     For the topping, I combined sugar, cinnamon, and "Schoko Musli" (kind of like dry oatmeal, plus chocolate), and some butter. I cut in the butter to create a crumble topping, popped it in the oven for about 30 minutes, and there you have it. Apple crisp is, thankfully, pretty simple.

     However, I wasn't going to be satisfied with the crisp alone. I went out on a ledge completely and decided to make up some kind of sauce to put over it. After stirring together and heating up some plain yogurt, honey, cinnamon, and sugar, I found that the sauce tasted good but was a bit problematic, as the yogurt made it kind of lumpy. Thankfully, at this point my friend Bri, a fellow baker, came into the kitchen and had the brilliant idea of straining the sauce. Once that was done, the sauce was rather liquidy but certainly scores better than before.

     The final assessment? Not too bad! It wasn't quite as crispy as I wanted (maybe too much butter or apple juice?), but I still really liked the flavor. And though the sauce worried me at first, I actually think it really takes the crisp to the next level of tastiness. I still think that the crisp could have used some brown sugar, but given that I made this without a trip to the grocery store and completely without a recipe, I'd consider it a success. I think I learned a lot about what to do differently next time to make it perfect :)

     And, if any Heidelbergers happen to be reading this... there's apple crisp in the kitchen!! Come and eat it!

Better Late than Never

Home sweet Heidelberg!

     I officially apologize to all of you who have been waiting (quite patiently, I might add) for me to start a blog about my travels in Europe. There's not really an excuse, other than the typical "I've been really busy!"... but it's true. Between homework, travels, and bonding with the people in the house, I've been so distracted lately that blogging was honestly the last thing on my mind. But here I am, ready to give you an update!
     It's currently 10:30ish in the morning here in Heidelberg. I was blessed with a pretty amazing schedule this semester-- Mondays and Wednesdays are ridiculous, with class from 8:30-5:10. But then on Tuesdays I only have German class in the morning and convocation from 10:40- noonish. And Thursdays I have no class at all! One of two-- just Patrick Rear and me, because we are in the same German class.
     Today, however, we will have "class," if you can call it that. We are tagging along with the English class as they make an excursion to Frankfurt today as they visit Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's house.
     And speaking of Goethe, I have to say-- that guy was amazing. A womanizer, yes... but a genius. According to our German teacher Frau Wuttke, he had the largest vocabulary of any German. At one point in his life he was in love with a woman who was engaged to his friend. He considered suicide but instead wrote the book The Sorrows of Young Werther-- in 4 weeks without an outline or any kind of plan. And he was only in his early twenties at the time. Just...wow.

     Anyways, I'm sure I'll have more to say about Goethe after taking the tour today. You probably are interested in how I've spent the past 4 weeks of my life (I really can't believe it's been so long already!). Well, I'll have to give you more details later as I'm a bit pressed for time at the moment, but I can say that I think these past 4 weeks just may have been the best of my life thus far. I've traveled so much farther than ever before and met so many lovely people. Maybe it's crazy, but I don't feel like I'll ever be ready to leave this place.
     Last night, especially, felt like a turning point in the dynamic of Moore Haus. We had small group, which usually lasts for about 30 minutes, but for some reason about 18 of us just hung out in the reception room for almost three hours, lost in deep conversation-- the kind where everyone basically bared their souls. Not like I didn't respect these people before, but now I feel that my affection and respect for them has increased exponentially-- every single one of them has a unique story to tell and I can't wait to get to know them further. I could have spent that time writing an essay, working on this blog, planning a trip, whatever, but I feel that there is no better way I could have spent a large chunk of my evening last night. It was a beautiful experience and now I feel that there's just so much love in this house.
     On that happy note, I'll leave off for now. Feel free to pester me if I take another 4 weeks to write a blog entry. More to come soon, I hope!