Bonn, Luxembourg, and Beyond

The last few days have been busy! In the last 48 hours, I have partied in Trier (twice), visited Germany’s former capitol Bonn, and visited the historic Luxembourg City. If only I could find time to do my laundry…

As is customary in Germany, both Thursday and Friday nights consisted of heavy partying. Thursday, another pub crawl took place, and if I may say so… it was an epic success. I find little more joy than reminiscing through pictures of a night of good partying with fun people, and I took plenty of them! Friday was likewise… although somewhat more toned down. Not all can hang with the Irish and Italians, after all, and I happen to be part of both.

Saturday, we boarded a charter bus bright and early around 8am and headed to Bonn, Germany. During the ride there (which took approximately two hours), I discovered I am living less than an hour from the famed Nurburing racing track! For those of you not addicted to cars as I am, it is a track hailed as one of the world’s most difficult race tracks, and it acts as a breeding ground for companies such as Porsche, Lamborghini, BMW, Ferrari, and Aston Martin to test out new sports cars due to its long and constantly changing terrain. Naturally, I’m adding it to the list of places I want to visit.

Once in Bonn, I discovered a city highly similar to Washington, D.C. Architecture is very similar with many Greek and Roman-styled modern business and government buildings, and the beautifully landscaped Park Avenue-styled motorways matched those in American’s capitol as well. The first stop in the city was a modern German history museum, which I honestly had a hard time appreciating. While it was interesting, I do not consider the 1960s through today as “history,” but rather “culture.” Without being German or having a preview of “older” German history (such as that offered by Renaissance and other era museums), the exhibits really did not mean much to those of us not well versed in what it is to be “German.” I asked around, and I got a similar consensus.

Regardless, it was a great experience, and we were then shuttled to the city center. Here, the feel of older Germany was felt more, albeit a far fetch from the rich history of Trier. Bonn’s city center is gorgeous, though, in its own way; it shows a bustling, touristy modern German city while mixing relatively old churches and government buildings as elements of a truly German place. Luckily for us, a festival happened to be going on throughout the city, giving us insight into inner-Germany tourism.

I also found a Starbucks, which is probably the only American thing I miss in Trier (aside from easy access to internet…). The Finnish girl with us had never had it, so I naturally insisted on ordering her a Frappuccino, which she instantly loved. Ten points for American fake coffee!

Unfortunately, one of the Italian girls in our group somehow lost her wallet in Bonn, which is as close to the end of the world as it can get for an Erasmus student; identification cards, credit cards, money… pretty much everything you need while abroad is gone. This means she must visit the nearest Italian consulate (wherever it is) for a new passport and identification card, the German bank to get new account numbers and cards, and call every other company she has an affiliation with in Italy. All in all, it’s not a good situation.

Luckily for me, I know myself well enough to realize I’d lose my wallet, so I just keep my passport in my pocket at all times, along with my Visa card, Trier student ID, and whatever money I have. They only way I can lose it is to lose my pants… which, depending on how you look at it, has luckily not happened.

Upon return from Bonn, it was once again party time, and I spent a good deal of the night escorting random French people about the city and arguing with Germans about American politics. More on the argumentation later. Long story short, though, I ended up getting two hours of sleep due to my acceptance of an invitation to visit Luxembourg City the next morning around 8am by some random Bulgarian Erasmus girl I met in Bonn. Only I would do such a thing… but it ended up working out well!

Thus, bright and early, I caught the train with the Bulgarian and two of her friends from home… and we got along famously. I must say, though, I doubt I could travel with all three of them too often; they have a different view on life than me. By no means am I “grown up,” but these people are older than I am yet act younger. It’s possible that’s just my two hours of sleep talking, though.

Once in Luxembourg, we almost instantly ran into a random old man walking his dog who insisted on showing us around the key city sights for the next two hours. How lucky… a free tour guide! He, like most in Luxembourg (apparently), spoke fluent English, French, German, and Luxembourgish… which is actually a language. It’s French mixed with German, so I’m told. Even so, how’s that to make you feel instantly dumb!

In any event, Luxembourg’s cafes have outrageous prices, so we opted to try McDonald’s. It’s my first time in a European Micky D’s, and I must say… wow is it expensive! I paid 8 Euros for a meal… which is over $10! To be fair, the wrap I got was HUGE, but… odd that it was so pricy! Also, the McDonald’s was set up more like a restaurant whereby you ordered and you got a number for your trey… when it was ready, someone brought it up to you (two level restaurant). Strange.

But, the weather was beginning to decline by mid afternoon, so we caught the train back. The ticket from Trier to Luxembourg City and back was only 8 Euros round trip (yes, the same price I paid for McDonald’s), and it was just under an hour ride. After sharing pictures with my new Bulgarian friends, I headed for another group of people I had met the day before… although these I technically met in the wee hours of the morning of the same day. Brits!

We sat in an Indian restaurant that was highly expensive and not that tasty for quite some time before moving on to another bar for a bit, primarily discussing the differences between America and Britain/Europe. Here comes the argumentation again, yet these British are far quicker to point out America’s faults than most nationalities I have met. I find them highly amusing, truly… British humor, as I have said before, is my favorite!

But seriously, as soon as someone from Europe hears you are American, the favorite topic is American politics. Sadly, America still has an image of George Bush’s policies burnt into the eyes of many Europeans, and I am not lying when I say the primary jokes made against Americans are redneck jokes; many people I have met only want to know how many people I know who have married a sister or has the name of Cletus.

I have little interest in arguing with them, being that I have little interest in American policies to start with. Still, I’ve found it best to try to rectify the image “we” have somewhat by agreeing with them and then subtly making the same point slightly differently, thereby changing the mood of the argument. I surprise myself from time to time…

Although our image is not that great, the culture that has largely caused it is quite popular in Germany and throughout Europe, especially in the realm of popular culture. In fact, I spoke with someone from Italy wearing a Hollister shirt and a purse that said “I Love New York” who wanted to ask why Americans are so full of ourselves. Ah, culture.

Well, today is laundry day. Otherwise, I am going to have to buy an entirely new wardrobe… yet today is the first day I have been able to try; you must have a student ID with money on it, and being that I just received the card Friday, today was the first business day I could money-ize it. Classic. Not only that, but I’ve apparently breached my lousy 4gb internet allowance, and now have no internet in my dorm; they cut you off until you pay about $35 to reinstate it, and I have several choice words I can say for that, most of which have around four letters. So, here I sit at the University, 30 minutes from my dorm, typing for the blog.

Off to the post office to mail a few postcards to the family!

Here is the link to the photo album from Bonn:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2108357&id=1554191092&l=0c432a610c