I am apparently too lazy to blog...

Okay, for some reason I find it incredibly difficult to actually take five minutes and write a blog. Since I've been here for going on two months and have yet to make a single, real blog entry, I will try to recap with a few lists of things I have done.

Awesome things I have done in the last two months (in no particular order):

• Played the first few bars of More Than Words on a guitar just for fun, only to have everyone else in the room join in singing.


• Drank caipirinha with real, live Brazilians ;-)


• Went to heavy metal night at the student bar and won a free poster and CD. Note that heavy metal night in Germany means they play Dark Funeral and Slayer \m/, not like heavy metal night in America where they play Poison and Bon Jovi.


• Found innumerable, creative ways to open a bottle of beer, as there is no bottle opener in my kitchen.


• Traveled to the beautiful Cinque Terra region of Italy, hiked between all the towns, chilled with friends.


• Tried Slacklining in the rain (and still had fun!).


• Had a picnic on an island in the Neckar river on an idyllic German Sunday afternoon.


• Watched VfB Stuttgart kick the living crap out of FCN, 3-0 baby!


• Improved my German a vast amount (although I still have a long ways to go).


• Met a German dude who did a high school exchange program in Arizona (Desert Ridge High School).


• Probably a lot more things that I forgot (I may come back and edit this post later)

Silly things I have done in the last two months:

• Got on the wrong bus the first day of class and almost was late.


• Confused the word "Adler" (German for "eagle") with "Alter" (German for "dude"). Hence when someone asked me if I knew what animal was on the German flag, I told them "A dude's on the German flag!"


• Put too much spicy mustard on my food thinking it would be wimpy like pretty much everything else in this country that's billed as being "spicy." I kid you not, there were tears in my eyes, ha ha ha!


• Probably a lot of things I forgot (I probably won't add more to this list since I did way more silly things than I'd want to admit, ha ha ha)

Things I like about Germany:

• Politeness. At least here in Tübingen random people on the street are very friendly, as are people working in stores, restaurants, etc. For example, it's quite common for people in elevators to greet you when you walk in and say "Ciao" when you leave. I have not observed this as much in America (although granted I don't deal with elevators that much).


• Public Transportation. Buses actually show up early and wait for people.


• Food. Fruits and veggies taste better here (and being a vegetarian is at least as easy here as it is back home, more on this later). There are little bakeries all over where one can buy delicious bread, pastries, etc for cheap. Soda here is sweetened with sugar rather than corn syrup, making it taste much better. And don't even get me started about beer ;-)


• Nature. After walking for 15 minutes or so from where I live, I can find myself completely immersed in forest, not a building in site. I will definitely miss this when I go back home! Also, in March it wasn't uncommon to see it snowing with the sun out, which is strikingly beautiful to someone who's lived his whole life in the desert.


• Splitting checks. In many restaurants (at least in Tübingen), the waiter/waitress will come to the table with the bill and a purse of money, go around the table one by one and give everyone their correct change, as opposed to American waiters who make you suffer since all of your friends either only have $20 bills or debit cards ;-)


• On a similar note, the majority of ATMs in Germany seem "nicer" than their American counterparts. When I take out money, I get a couple of 5s, 10s and maybe one or two 20s, as opposed to American ATMs which only give you $20. Note that this doesn't seem to be the case everywhere in Europe. The whole time I was in Cinque Terra the ATMs would only give me 50s, which was rather annoying. You can also add minutes to your cell phone instantly at a German ATM if you have a German bank card.

Things I don't like about Germany:

• Showers. By American standards the showers here are rather small. As an American friend of mine pointed out, it seems that in America a shower is something to be enjoyed that refreshes you after sleeping/a hard day at work/the gym, whereas here it seems more like "Okay, let's just get this over with quick."



• The lack of peanut butter. Nutella is a basic human right here, but finding Skippy is a chore.


• The lack of good Mexican food, although I think coming from Arizona I'm particularly spoiled in this area.


• People telling me that all Americans are the same in a mildly condescending tone, but not being able to elaborate on any specific details as to how we're all the same (or how we are more similar than any other group of people), why us being the same is such a bad thing and refusing to accept that maybe, just maybe, they are a little prejudiced :p

Things I still don't get about Germany:

• Random English words and phrases all over the place. For example, I've seen the phrase "We're here for you" in a super market on the wall and the off-brand cola says "American taste" auf Englisch for some reason.


• The process of signing up for and taking classes seems like chaos compared to back home. In my computer science class, for example, the undergrads and grad students are mixed together and the amount of credits you receive is not fixed but rather dependent upon how many times a week you show up. It's enough to make you miss Web Reg ;-)

Okay, that's all for now, I will try to do better with keeping this thing up to date in the future!