So This weekend started off with going right after class to a place called Sophie's Brauhaus that I had been once before, with a small group of people from my German class.
When in Germany drink beer and eat pretzels, right?
So we ordered a couple pitchers of beer, and me being the American touristy person that I am, took a picture of THE BEER ON THE TABLE, as in NO PEOPLE aside from the arms of people sitting at our table, in the background. Well, as our waitress walked by, the camera happened to flash, and she immediately walked up to the end of the table and told me that she needed to see my camera because I wasn't allowed to take pictures.
Well of course I started to panic for a second because I thought she meant I couldn't take ANY pictures inside ANY building in Germany without written permission, and I've already taken quite a few since I've been here.
So I asked her to repeat what she said, (which of course seemed to make her only unhappier) and she said that I didn't have her written permission to take her picture and in Germany you much have written permission of someone to take their picture.
Well of course I was super confused and thought maybe I didn't understand what she had said because I was just thinking to myself "It's a picture of BEER"
But she INSISTED I show her my camera, which of course I had no problem doing, and as soon as she saw the picture, she just let it go and walked away.
.... WAT?
Soo.... here are the pictures I took from the restaurant:
BIER (=beer)
BRETZEL (=pretzel)
[p.s. I know those translations are necessary for everyone]
Along with the program were specially designed tours of the city, basically bus loops that went to related destinations. For example, there was the wine tour that went to the wine museum and then to a wine cellar tour and then to a winery gallery thing, and so on.
[ Emz: This is the most Non-FRF FRFY thing I have ever seen!!! Sam would have loved it! It was a giant piece of plastic like an overhead slide, with red and black scribbled jellyfish and octopus shapes on it, suspened from the ceiling by one string in the middle so it could rotate, with a projector shining light through it an onto the opposite wall of the cargo container. ...?! ]
On Friday in class, our teacher told us that she was singing at a certain bar for the Museum Nacht, and so the group of us that ended up going out together on Saturday made it mandatory to go visit her, and because they happened to hear me talking about the tours that I thought sounded fun, here was our/my plan for the night:
7pm-7:30pm Hafen tour (take a boat tour of the city "Hafen" like the port or something)
8pm-9pm- Weinmuseum (wine museum on the wine tour)
9-9:30pm - tour the wine celler - at a further stop on the wine tour
10pm- 10:20 see our teacher's show and stay after and talk with her for a while
12am- be at the Marktplatz downtown to see the old Bunker Hotel beneath a city square by the Rathaus called the Marktplatz - it was a converted bomb shelter that is now no longer in use.
2am- go back to dorm and go to sleep
BUT, this is what actually happened
7:30pm- 8pm: Hafen tour - had to wait about 15 minutes after arriving 15 minutes later than expected. It also turned out to be waaaayyy more industrial based than I thought it would be.
a crane thing moving above the river
there were all these displays of trucks and machines on the river banks with bright spotlights
green spotlight building and crane
the boat we were on
8:30- 9:15 wine museum
drinking some wine and relaxing at the cute little wine museum. All the old fashioned equipment was really neat.
barrels!
Press!
casks! And super decorated and awesome looking too!!!
There was a statue outside, I don't know who of, but he was SO happy looking!
And then everyone else had to join around and poke the statue.
Outside the bus stop. Our group for most of the night.
9:15 - realize that we needed to skip the wine cellar tour in order to make it across the city in time to see our teacher's set.
9:15- 10:15: catch a bus, catch another bus, catch a U-bahn train, make a mad dash for the Bildbar artist bar place where our teacher was singing, and catch the last 2 minutes of her last song. Also crowd in around the door way because the place was so cute and tiny and there were a lot of people, and have her notice us standing there and jokingly scold us in German for being typical non-Germans and always being late.
10:30-10:35 Tell our super sweet teacher why we were running late and apologize and ask if she will sing for us, and then be delighted when she and her pianist did just one more song just for us!
10:35- 11:15- hang out talking to our teacher and hearing her awesome stories- half in English and half in German, about how she was a pretty well known artist around here back in the day but then moved to Barcelona where she discovered she was a no body and ended up having to teach German to make money when she could barely speak Spanish.... I love this lady.
11:30-12am- at our teacher's request: go to an awesome hostel/b&b type place where every 6 months an artist is allowed to design one of the rooms in anyway that he or she wants!!! So long as it can still be rented out (that's how the artist makes money) Except discover that I didn't care at all for the style of the room. It was cardboard +orange and white ducttape, plus weird minimalist "modern art". Not my thing. But a cool idea all the same
12:30 arrive at the Bunker, but discover that they had to stop giving tours because earlier in the night the place had an electrical failure and all the lights went out!!! :(
1am- get dragged to a bar with the group, have one drink, head home.
1:30 - make it to the train station with another person from the group and realize we have to wait a half hour for our train instead of 10 minutes because between 1am and 5am the schedule is different.
2am- make it home, go right to bed.
Soooo, all in all, it was a good night, and now I have things I have to go back and see someday that I'm here- in particular, tour the winery and wine cellar!
Sunday morning I was very unhappy when my alarm went off at 8:15 after only less than 6 hours of sleep. But I was determined to go to a Russian church in town and see what it was like.
The building is so beautiful on the outside, and as I discovered, even prettier inside. There are icons Everywhere! And a huge iconostasis, and all of the walls are painted with icon scenes or saints. The singing was also beautiful, but unfortunately, EVERYTHING was in Russian! Additionally, it was a very old style orthodox church in the sense that there was only standing room and everyone basically crowded on it, so that it was very uncomfortable. I also am fairly certain that the bishop was there today. I wasn't really sure, but he had a large crown hat thing (also very pretty and decorated) and had candle holder with 3 candles in one hand, and a candle holder with 2 candles in the other hand, and there was someone else who looked more like a normal priest. But anyway, the service was very nice, but a little too Russian for me, so I will keep looking. I am however glad that I took the opportunity to go and it was indeed a lovely visit.
The afternoon was somewhat contradictory to my morning in the sense that I was determined to celebrate Saint Patrick's Day, and so at 4pm I met some other international students at the only Irish pub in Stuttgart that I know of - I think there is one other, but it is less popular.
The special today was the "Paddy's Package" - Euro 7 for a pint of Guinness and double of whiskey.
The "this is my ___ friend" pose, with Irish balloon friend
These are people from my German class! And those are hats they got when they paid a Euro 10 cover, but that I somehow avoided paying by arriving early. That also meant however that I did not get a hat.
I stayed at the pub until shortly after 7pm, and then went back to my dorm. At that point I realized I should eat something for dinner, and since it's Be Irish Day and all, potatoes were the way to go. Therefore, I made a delicious pot of garlic-cheese mashed potatoes with peas. If I had thought of it earlier in the week, I could've baked soda bread, but alas I will have to save that for my next free weekend.
And so now, with a happy tummy and tired eyes, I am heading to bed.
Goodnight and Slainte/Prost
With love,
Val
YAAAYYYYYYY
ReplyDeleteI went to a Celtic Faire! It was nice, but way more Scottish than Irish! Aha! I'll letter you about it.
All the stuff is good stuff.
What fun! Stop hanging out with boys!
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