You are currently browsing the daily archive for June 24th, 2008.
As I walked to work today (leisurely, since I’m actually listening to my alarm again), I passed the cutest little girl. In the field that lines my path and is behind the Kinderhaus, they were cutting the grass. But with thing I had never seen before, where the blade is like a weed-wacker, but spins vertically like a plane propeller. And this little girl, all decked out in pink (shoes, socks, shirt, hair ties), a pink, bright blue & green skirt, covered in some kind of cartoon character was just amazed.
She would tip-toe over the line to pass and watch the man cut the grass, and when he turned around, she would hop back. The entire time, her eyes were just huge, in that fascinated yet bewildered way. And as she walked, she came up on where the guy was cutting, and surprise! got sprayed with some grass. At which point she clearly decided that although neat, she was going to have no more of this, and continued walking with her lollipop.
Other than that, typical day, but I got another new roommate. Phillip, professor of Economics History from France, and he seems really nice.
Random German Fact of the Day:
Men’s wallets have these cute little internal coin purses. The rest of the wallet looks completely normal, but since €1 & €2 along with normal cents are in coins, they’re a necessity. A cute necessity.
But with real Black Forest… and perhaps more importantly, Black Forest Cake (Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte). The cake was really great, and I cannot wait to visit the Black Forest again just to another version of it. Unlike the US version, the layers of cake and the cherries are soaked in cherry liquor, and the frosting itself contains it. Tasty! Authentic! Needed more cherries!
The Black Forest was beautiful, but at least in this part, beautiful like any forest. Not like I had imagined. I had always thought of the Black Forest as this very dense woods, like in the movies – or like in the Disney’s ‘The Sword & the Stone’. And yes, I realize that this takes place in England, and that it is indeed a cartoon. And that I really want to see it now. But I digress. The trees weren’t quite as tall and it was not as dark I thought it would be, and it almost felt like I could be in California. It was the same situation as the waterfalls – while they were beautiful, and worth the €2, I have to admit I found myself thinking about Yosemite.
But the hike was great, and we were fortunate enough that the weather was perfect, cool – but not at all necessary to break out a jacket. Now that I’m traveling with Mike I realize how much better it is to travel with someone -We joked a lot, covered each other as we took (or attempted to) take pictures of heinous things, and yes, posed/joked in front of confessionals at the Maria en der Tanner when everyone left. It was a great time. It may have also been blasphemy. oops. I also loved our tag-team picture taking of a goth girl at the station in Triberg. Classic, especially with the old lady next to her. And we both missed the opportunity to get a shot of this bicyclist in a full on jumpsuit – that was better.
It is also great to get to know him as more of a co-worker than a boss. It’ll be interesting to see how that works when I get back, and because I’ll be living with another grad student. And that I’ll be able to go out to drink!
Overall, it was nice to take a trip away from Tübingen and get some more of the German outdoors experience, which is also really nice here in the Schönbuch forest. Also great is that I learned about these tickets that DeutscheBahn offers for any Bundesland (state). You can travel almost anywhere in that state, all day for €18 for one person and €28 for up to five people. If I had known about this, I would have skipped the BahnCard – this is usually (although not always) cheaper than my 50% off.
*I added a picture of man capris…. I’m still searching for a better example.
