Ski Break Part 2: Germany

After our weekend in Vienna we drove up to Micha's home in Ludwigsburg, a town just north of Southwestern Germany's main city, Stuttgart. Micha had to get up early on Monday morning and fly up to Hanover for a series of business meetings but she generously left us the use of her apartment and her car during her absence. The first day we headed into downtown Stuttgart to explore the town. We procured a tourist map and flipped through it to find some things to do. It being Monday, most of the Stuttgart's numerous museums were closed. Then I saw that Der Hegel Haus, the place where one of the world's most important philosophical thinkers grew up, was open and free. For a nerd and philosophy major like me, this was thrilling.

Inside the Hegel house. It was good practice for both Taylor and I. Everything was in German so he got a lot of practice translating, and I had to strain to remember what I learned about him while studying philosophy in college.

"I wonder how many times Hegel tripped here..."

After spending a while working to understand the dialectic evolution of Spirit in the Hegel museum we decided to give our brains a rest with a stroll around Stuttgart. It was a beautiful, if slightly brisk, day so we had a nice walk. Then we stumbled upon something that we'd both been cruelly deprived of for 6 months while living in rural Hungary: Thai food! I had panang curry and it made me happy in ways words cannot capture.

The Collegiate Church is Stuttgart's most important Protestant church. A church of some sort has stood on this land since 1175AD.

Castle Square is the heart of downtown Stuttgart. Construction of the palace began in 1746 and the royals of Wuerttemberg moved between here and the below pictured Ludwigsburg palace multiple times. Palace choosing seems to have been a constant source of stress for the royals of Europe. Poor dears.

Speaking of the rich and powerful, after our walk around Stuttgart we made our way to the Porche complex to see the museum. It was little more than a room full of ridiculously nice cars, but that was cool to see. Stuttgart is perhaps best known today as the home to a lot of really cool cars - both Mercedes and Porche are headquartered here. Unfortunately the Benz museum was closed during our day in Stuttgart. Next time.

The world's first Volkswagon - or people's car - is in the Porche museum because Ferdinand Porche designed this vehicle in 1931. This is a particularly interesting factoid as Porche moves to become the majority shareholder in the VW corporation in the coming weeks.

After a full day in Stuttgart we made our way back to Micha's apartment in Ludwigsburg. We walked around the town's center for a while and then picked up dinner supplies from a grocery store. Back at Micha's we made a dish impossible to make with the ingredients available in Hungary: fettucine alfredo with sundried tomatoes. Parmesan cheese, high-quality olive oil, and sundried tomatoes all being unavailable in Szentes, the dinner was quite a treat. We spend the rest of the evening in trying to figure out what to plan the rest of our week on vacation.

The next morning we were up early to visit Strasbourg. Taylor had heard it was really beautiful and I knew it to be roughly the home of my ancestors (though I wouldn't learn until returning back to Ludwigsburg to read an email from my mom that I could have found records of my ancestors in the city library) so I was up for it. Strasbourg is in the Alsace region that straddles the border between France and Germany. The territory and the city have been banded about between the two powers throughout it's history, though since the end of the Second World War it has been French territory. It is one of the most impressive cities I've ever visited, both in history and beauty. Historically it has been an important place since Roman times and today is a world capital as the home of the European Council and the European Commission for Human Rights. Aesthetically, I think the pictures speak for themselves:

Our first view of central Strasbourg as we crossed the bridge over the Rive Ill, a tributary of the nearby Rhine that forms the modern border between France and Germany. Downtown medieval Strasbourg is situated on an island in the middle of the Ill. We divided our day between sitting in cafes sampling French specialties and strolling around enjoying the scenery. Below are pictures from our walk around the entire island along the Ill:

A tour boat continues via canal.

Me with the medieval Ponts bridge behind and the cathedral in the distance. This picture was taken from atop a huge barrier bridge that spans the Ill in front of where the island of downtown Strasbourg begins. In medieval times to defend the city the barrier's gates would close to flood the area in front of the city, acting as a defense against invasion.

Strasbourg's location on the border has sometimes meant great tragedy during wars. This statue commemorates those who died in the First World War. A mother is depicted mourning for two dead sons: one who died fighting for France and one who died fighting for Germany.

Johannes Gutenberg, inventor of the printing press, made Strasbourg his home for much of his adult life. Unfortunately some sort of carnival market seems to have ruined the solemnity of my shot, but you get the idea.

The Strasbourg Cathedral is one of the most important High Gothic structures in the world. Construction upon it began in the mid 12th century and it's northern tower was the tallest building in the world for over 200 years.

First view of the interior upon entering the cathedral.

Looking up the Nave to the huge Rose window. The stained glass in the cathedral was removed by the Germans during the Second World War and then sent for safe keeping to a mine in a small town near Micha's home. After the war the US military discovered the treasures and sent them back to Strasbourg.

Speaking of the US military, the cathedral has a dedication to the American soldiers who fought to free France from the Nazi occupation.

One of the world's largest astronomical clocks, just in case you were wondering not only the time but also Jupiter's location.

After a full day of walking around the downtime historical section of the city we decided to get out of the center to see the new European government complex.

The main building for the European Council, headquartered in Strasbourg. This is just one of many huge shiny glass buildings in the European complex in Strasbourg. When asked why the European bureaucrats need so many huge shiny glass buildings, Micha unenthusiastically replied "for meetings."

That night we arrived home just in time to meet Micha and create a big dinner consisting mostly of resurrected leftovers from the previous night. The three of us sat around for the rest of the evening discussing our trips and then catching up. The next day Micha had to make it through one more busy day of meetings and such while Taylor and I set out to explore some more of the local scenery. We made our way first to Schwäbisch Hall, one of the oldest cities in the region, founded on this location in the 5th century BC by the Celts. It was once one of the regions most important centers because of its designation as capital of Schwäbia. The town's long history has seen devastation during the Thirty Years War and blights of the bubonic plague, but now it's a charming city full of beautiful German medieval buildings and lively street scenes.

St Michael's Church standing over the city's main square.

The town hall was built in Baroque style after the destruction of the medieval style buildings in one of the huge fires that swept through the city in the 18th Century.

Views of the city from the river at the bottom of the valley it's built around:

After spending a lot of the day strolling around Schwäbisch Hall we bought a picnic lunch in a supermarket and hit the road to visit a few other small cities in the region and find a nice view to enjoy during lunch.

Our golden chariot and a really big bridge

After a nice drive through the countryside we made it to Langenburg, another small town with a nice castle. It seemed like a pretty touristy place and it being February still it was mostly a ghost town. We ate lunch on the patio of a closed cafe on the side of the castle and enjoyed a nice view of the valley below.

Langenburg's castle, unfortunately closed for the off-season when we visited.

After a day of driving around and seeing the little towns we retired back to Micha's to wait for her to be done with work. After she escaped from her 11 hour board meeting we geared up for a nice dinner in Stuttgart with Gert, a friend of Micha's who I also knew as he studied at William and Mary. We went to a local restaurant and had a big dinner of Maultaschen, a local specialty that is like mushroom ravioli. After that we hit a few bars and just relaxed and talked for a few hours before heading back home where Micha had been promised a day of sleeping in until whenever the hell she wanted. After our sleeping in we got up for a day seeing Ludwigsburg itself with our qualified native tour guide. Ludwigsburg is home to one of Germany's biggest Baroque Palaces. Indeed the city was pretty much built to support the monarchs who built the palace and ruled the surrounding Wuerttemberg from there. When we arrived we discovered that we had a few hours before an English tour began so we went outside to see the gardens. Outside of the palace is a really cool fairytale garden which Micha had shown me a few years ago when I'd visited and I thought it would be great to see again and relearn all of the Grimm's fairy tales. Unfortunately it was closed for the summer, so Rapunzel's tower was all we could see:

Rapunzel's tower

The park was closed *sad music*

Instead of reliving our childhood fairytales we walked around the mostly muddy gardens for a while before going to a really good pizza place Micha new. By the time we finished lunch it was getting close to tour time so we made it back to the Palace.

The courtyard of Ludwigsburg Palace

Construction on the palace started with Ludwig (hence the name) but Frederick I elevated it to the huge structure that remains today. He was a husky fellow and stood over 2 meters tall. He gained much power and territory by allying himself with Napoleon. Just imagine little Napoleon meeting with this giant of a man.

Our tour guide was a (perhaps over)enthusiastic British woman who liked telling funny stories about the palace's history and inhabitants. My favorite story involved some Duke who was a notorious philanderer and eventually had to resort to crude tactics to see which ladies he had already been with in the royal court. Those who he had "known" were to come to balls wearing blue shoes, while the unexplored were to wear pink.

While our rotund King and womanizing Duke were living the high life, an enormous army of servants were there to attend to their every need. The palace is designed so that the outer rooms (with the nice big windows) are for the palace's regal inhabitants, while the core of the palace consists of dwelling space and passage ways for the numerous servants. Here is a dim servant gathering room behind the King's quarters.

The palace's ball room

The Ancestor's Hall, where one finds a plethora of ugly rich people on the walls of a very pretty passage way.

After finishing our tour of the drafty palace (marble is not good insulation) we warmed up in a nearby cafe and planned our next step. We wanted to go to the Mercedes museum but we didn't have much time before it closed, so instead Micha suggested visiting another well-preserved town nearby. We hopped in the car and soon made it to Besigheim.

Micha and I in Besigheim's little main square

As we walked around the town Micha's eyes narrowed and she began exuding signs of immense anger. She had spotted her enemy. Micha, you see, has a Big Important Job with the in the upper echelons of the gardening supply company that her father started. They produce mostly potting soil and sell it to stores, and she just had been in countless hours of tedious board meetings trying to figure out what to do about one popular German store chain that was fighting dirty and trying to seriously undercut them. And here, right in front of us, was one of their chains. We decided to stride in and check out how much they were really selling her products for:

Always cool under pressure, Micha smiles for the camera and poses with one her company's products in the location of a very difficult distributor. "They will pay for their insolence" she warned when the cameras were off.

Indeed Micha's Big Important Job was really going into overdrive the week that Taylor and I visited her. She's been working with her father's company for some time now - officially for over a year and she grew up in the business. As her father steps out of the spotlight she is taking the helm. The press loves the story: pretty 23 year old assumes dominant position in the board room. That week 3 large German national papers covered her story, one calling her "Die Torf-Prinzessen" - "The peat moss princess." Hilarious (sorry Micha). Then she was one the cover of a financial magazine. Then, perhaps most insanely, on Deutsche Welle, the German CNN. (click here it's the first segment of the show).

The Micha Media Maelstrom

Insane.

But even with all of the glamor of being one of the Goddesses of the fertilizing world, she still has her feet on the ground. She's the kind of person to have a nice laid back dinner with and discuss anything and everything, which is precisely what we did. Micha was happy to have won 4 days off from work and life in the fast lane, so after our day around Ludwigsburg we relaxed over dinner and prepared for the next day's journey to Holland.

Dinner at Micha's after a long day of sightseeing and before a long drive up to Holland.

Ski Break Part 1: Vienna

Hungarian for the day: Szeretek si szünetet! Pron: Sara-tek shee sooh-ne-tet. "I love ski break!"

Here in Hungary, a country without mountains (the "mountains" to the north being slightly larger than average hills), I was somewhat surprised to find that while spring break is merely a long weekend for Easter, an entire free week from school is given over to skiing. This is ski break, and it is my friend. I'd been looking forward to it for more reasons than just a break from school (and the delightful sleeping in past 6:30 this allows), for I was off to Western Europe in all of its well-organized glamor to visit with an old friend. My friend Michaela, or Micha to her American friends who can't pronounce her name, is an old friend of mine from Germany who I met while we studied together at William and Mary. More specifically, we were in the same study abroad program in St. Petersburg, took Russian courses together for 3 years, and spent a summer traveling together in Europe a few years back. We'd missed each other repeatedly since I moved to her continent but we finally made it work for this break. Taylor came along and the three of us covered a lot of ground over the 9 days of ski break - a whirlwind tour through Austria, Germany, France and Holland! I'm going to post our travels in a few different posts, the first one here for our time in Vienna with more to follow in a few days.

Taylor and I took a bus from Szentes up to Budapest last Saturday, and then left snowy Hungary behind on a bus headed for Vienna. Bus travel being the slowest (though also cheapest!) way to travel, by the time we made it to Vienna it was already mid evening. Micha drove down from her home in Southwestern Germany that day and met us at the bus station. After introductions and some hurried catching up we hopped in the car and punched the address of a friend of Taylor's into the GPS system. These two things, friends living in cool cities and a GPS system, are invaluable when traveling. Taylor's friend Heidi is a charming Finn studying in Vienna on an Erasmus scholarship to get a degree in social work and is living in basically abandoned dorms in northern Vienna. She offered us each a free room in the dormatories and it worked out perfectly. The GPS guided us quickly to her place and we chatted for a while and moved into our rooms. I must admit that we were quite suspicious about this deal - Heidi said that despite a room in the dorms costing only 35 euros a month it was so empty that she just asked a grounds keeper for three keys and he gave them to her. A hotel room in Vienna, even in the suburbs, would generally go for more than twice that a night, so this seemed strange to us. Surely this was some sort of Hostel like plot line, or we were going to wake up sans kidneys. It turns out that it was just a simple good deal - they still exist in Vienna of all places!

At any rate, Micha, Taylor and I set out for downtown Vienna to take in the city and get some dinner. We dined on schnitzel at Wienerwald and did some catching up. After that we braved the incredibly icy weather for a walk around the Ringstrasse. The Viennese buildings are works of art, if sometimes overdone, so the views were grandiose.

The Hapsburg Palace in downtown Vienna was once the nerve center of a great Empire that stretched across Central Europe and included Hungary.

Vienna's Rathouse, or City Hall, all decked out for a "winter wonderland" theme complete with crazy lights, ice skating rink, and stands selling mulled wine.

After the walk we were frozen so we drove back to the dorms and met with Heidi and the other 4 people living in the big creepy dorm building. They decided we were going out, so out we went. The jumped on the nearby U-bahn (metro) and spent the rest of the evening in a bar chatting. Pretty soon, however, heads were drooping and it became apparent that a big night out on the town was not in our future. The U-bahn was closed so we had to wait for not one, but 2 different night buses in the frigid weather. "I think I just froze to death" Micha replied as we finally made it back to the dorms. After facing the Danube's icy winter winds we figured that if a stolen kidney in our sleep was the price we'd pay for the warm free lodging, that was just going to have to be ok.

The next day we got out to see as much of Vienna by day as we could before we had to tackle the 6 hour drive up to Stuttgart. We started in one of the famous Viennese cafes with melange coffees and pastries. After that we spent much of the morning just walking around.

Vienna is the classical music city. Strauss is pictured here, though Beethoven, Mozart, Haydn, and many others have also called the city home at one point or another.

Eventually we decided that having only one real day to explore Vienna we might as well do the most Viennese thing we could think of. We'd already had coffee, weren't feeling up to kinky modern art on a Sunday morning, and didn't want to pay for opera tickets. The solution? A visit to an opulent palace, of course.

Schönbrunn Palace, located a bit outside of the city center, is where the Hapsburgs relaxed when they weren't doing the busy business of ruling. We didn't get to see the interior, and because it's February the famous gardens weren't much to behold, but walking the palace grounds was enough to get a sense of how ridiculously rich these Hapsburg fellows must have been.

Behind the palace and high upon a man made hill is the palace's Gloriette. Obviously we had to get to the top - here Micha and Taylor are feeling confident they will make short work of the hill and look good doing so in their shades.

The Gloriette. I looked up what that is just for this post, and according to wikipedia it is "a building in a garden elevated with respect to its surroundings." I also learned that Vienna's Gloriette is the world's largest and most impressive Gloriette there is. Erected in 1775, it must have made a hell of a breakfast nook for Franz Joseph and Maria Theresa.

View of the palace and Vienna from the Gloriette.

We saw something that looked like a really cool church from the Gloriette and even Taylor, having studied in Vienna for 6 months a couple of years back, didn't know what it was. We set out to find it but miscalculated which U-bahn stop to disembark at and ended up just settling for another tour around beautiful palace grounds, this time at the Belvedere, an old summer residence that now functions as an art museum.

Micha just wanted to show off her new red gloves.

One of the many statues around the Belvedere. A fun, though worthless, doctoral thesis could be written on all of the cool statues in Vienna. This city wins my best statue city award for 2008.

After the palaces it was time to warm up. We went to another cafe and had another Viennese melange coffee. After that more aimless wandering followed, though we ended up at Taylor's favorite kebab place near the Opera House. I must admit that this kebab was better than any of those I had in Turkey, but maybe that's because it was so warm and I was so cold. After our kebabs it was getting on towards late afternoon and we had to make our way back to the dorms to collect the car and be on our way. On the way back to the dorms we saw:

When I think of McDonalds in Ameria I think of scruffy buildings in strip malls, but abroad McDonalds really cleans up its image to deal with more sophisticated clientèle. Even so, this particular location seems a bit overkill for a place with McMuffins on the menu.

Famous architect Hunderwasser designed this ultimately modern, if strange, waste to energy plant in Vienna. I think it's a clever notion, this turning what should be an eye soar and a land-value nightmare into something so weird it's put on tourist brochures.

Regretting that we had only scratched the surface in Vienna we set out for the 6 hour drive up to Ludwigsburg. The next day Micha had to be up very early to fly to Hannover for business meetings and Taylor and I would begin our exploration of Southern Germany, where I will pick up next time. Szia!

Thursday was a typical day

7:15AM: Alarm went off. Mercifully, on Thursdays I don't have a class first period so I don't have to be at school until 8:30. This means that if I skip the unessentials (who has time to shave?) I don't really have to get out of bed until...
7:45AM: got out of bed, drank a full mug of syrupy Hungarian-style coffee (espresso) and ate a bowl of cereal. Dressed and washed up by...
8:00AM: out the door for my 25 minute walk to school. I could take a bus or buy a bike, but I kind of need the forced time of just waking up and listening to music (yesterday Vampire Weekend (thanks Roy)) to be ready for the classroom. Plus, now that the weather is so much better I don't mind the walk, which is mostly by the river.
8:30AM: In the teachers' lounge one of my favorite colleagues, Evelin, is brewing espresso. After a cup we are awake enough to talk about the upcoming day until the bell rang. My school is certainly a bit more laid back than your average American school, and it's understood that the bell signals that it's time to start walking to your class, not to actually be in class. If you need to halfheartedly shuffle papers around on your desk, fight with a vending machine, or gaze at the announcements board blankly for a few minutes this is also encouraged.
8:40AM: Second period with the second English group of class 10A. Their English is pretty weak but they're friendly kids so this class is a bit difficult to teach but always a pleasure. We discuss shopping and I basically write the grammatically correct sentences on the board to get them talking.
9:25AM: The ten minute break between classes. This is always a busy time for me because I must record my own participation grade for each student, make a write up of how the class went and what we did (to help keep track and find trends trends of what is and isn't working with which of my 16 groups), and then record attendance and activity info in the class's register with the school. It's a busy time for the students as well because they want to get as much smoking or making out/heavy petting in the hallway done as possible. It's icky.
9:35AM: The beginning of the third period with 9A's first English group. Usually a wonderful and enthusiastic class, they sometimes are impossible to control and refuse to speak any English because they are 14 and speaking English is difficult and much less fun then whatever is going on on the screen of their mobile phones. A few of the exceptional students were still with me and we discussed music types, likes, dislikes, etc. I harangued the rest of them, collected a few cell phones, and threatened to throw them out the window (this is one of their favorite threats and when I use it they understand that I mean business) until they finally quasi focused and discussion limped onwards for the rest of the class.
10:20AM: In between the third and the fourth bell their is a 20 minute break instead of the usual ten. There are no lunch periods so this is the only time during the school day that both students and faculty have time to grab something to eat. For the students intent on getting some during the breaks it is particularly trying because they need to eat, find someone to fondle (partners seem to change rapidly), and usually smoke a cigarette in precious few minutes.
10:40AM - Fourth period begins but on Thurday's is a free period for me as long as I don't have to sub. I went out to a bakery to get something to eat and then returned to my desk to go through my Hungarian flash cards.
11:35AM - Fifth period with 13A. This class is sometimes my best and sometimes my worst and walking in I never know whether I'm getting the Jekyll or the Hyde class. They have graduated from High School and for the most part are at my school because they didn't get into the University system last year and are gearing up for another chance/are just being forced to do something by their parents. Therefore, English abilities and enthusiasm really run the gauntlet from exceptionally high to why-are-you-here-wasting-our-time? We were discussing what they would show a foreign visitor in Hungary if said visitor was a sports enthusiast/history buff/outdoorsman and so on and so forth. A rousing discussion on handball ensued.
12:30PM:One of my colleagues has come down with something so I sub 12C for her. I usually teach them on Monday's and they are a nice class, especially considering they only have a couple of months of High School left. They've been quite attentive to me lately because they must all pass this huge series of exams in May and one of the major components is an English exam. My time with them has basically turned into practice sessions for the portion of the exam in which they must talk for a minute when given a question about anything from their family to their opinion of consumerism or Japanese cuisine. We've been talking about "society" lately and yesterday we discussed fashion. Black is really in right now in Hungary.
1:25PM: Seventh period with one of my favorite groups, the first English section of 9c. Now, some of these students might be considered traditionally naughty, but I love them because they are witty and sarcastic and hilarious and I probably let them get away with things I shouldn't because I'm too busy laughing at them. Yesterday we discussed television and music. During brainstorming music genre's they came up with an extensive list, including Gregorian chants and, this is paraphrasing because I don't precisely remember, "Underground funk hip-hop ska soul revival."
2:10PM: The school day ends! The teachers are generally happier about this than the students. I walk home listening to Liz Phair and reviewing more Hungarian flash cards. One the way home I stop at my little greengrocer and then the minimarket where the lady behind the service counter (Zsuzsa) already knows what I want (1 Pick diak csemege sausage, 300 grams trapista cheese, 200 grams sandwich turkey).
2:50PM: Back home. Unwound on the internet by reading the news and instant messaging. Lunched on a turkey sandwich.
3:30PM: Alternated between napping, finishing Ayn Rand's We the Living and having a good long think about totalitarianism. I guess Bush hasn't been all that bad.
6:00PM: Made myself baked ziti for dinner. A couple of times a week, particularly on weekends, I eat with Talyor, but last night I just watched a few episodes of Arrested Development while cooking, eating, and doing the dishes.
7:30PM: Hungarian studying (think I've got the locutive cases down so I'm moving swiftly along to the obliques) while trying to watch Hungarian TV. I like Dr. House even less dubbed.
9:00 PM: Searched couchsurfering for a place to stay next weekend when I meet Micha in Vienna. I think we'll be staying with a Portuguese chemistry Ph.D. student and going with him to the birthday party of some Canadian friend. Fun!
9:30PM: Went for a jog. Szentes at night is peaceful and charming and, as long as it's not unbearably cold, a walk or jog always puts me in a good mood. Especially on nights when I don't meet with a friend or have something after school to do this helps me cure the apartment stir crazies I get.
10:30PM: I don't know why I chose to do so before bed, perhaps it was the endorphins from the preceding run, but as was getting into the shower I could no longer stand how long it took my bathroom sink to drain so I tackled my first plumbing project. Success within thirty minutes, but ewwwwwwww. That's what's in pipes?!?! Took an extra long shower because I needed to feel extra spick and span after cleaning out congealed gunk that probably dates back to the Soviet occupation.
11PM: Early to bed because Friday starts at first period.

A new idol

That's one of the coolest things I have ever seen! Quite inspirational, and such good dance moves. More from this guy at www.wherethehellismatt.com, the travel journals are particularly worthwhile.

Life here is good. January flew by, as did today and I still have to lesson plan and talk to my mom on skype so I'm going to do a life update later (but soon!). Sziastok!