A Pumpkin Baby - Ein Kürbis Baby

Halloween in its commercial sense hasn't yet infected Germany, so naturally I made it my personal goal to bring Halloween to them.  I couldn't find any Halloween costumes here, and even though my mom sent me one it wasn't quite here yet, so Sandra and I bought some supplies in Gütersloh to make Mathis a pumpkin outfit. The process involved dying baby clothes Clemson orange, as well as attaching a felt leaf to a green hat. Pumpkin, done!

After a great week back here since all of my travels, we headed Sunday morning to Münster (which has won several international awards for being 'The Most Livable City') to meet friends of the family. They were super friendly and had a cute baby boy that was only a month younger than Mathis, so it was fun to watch them "play". The friends had no idea it was Halloween. 

A week out I learned the word for "pumpkin" in German and went to great lengths to find one the entire 7 days. I couldn't find one, and Saturday I gave up a bought a little pumpkin so at least we'd have something. It wasn't until today, though, that Christof came home with two of the largest pumpkins I have ever seen. Real pumpkins, done!

We had to get ready for the party! Sandra was great at carving pumpkins and I set out the Halloween feast that I had made the day before. It included rice krispie treat ghosts, cupcakes of monsters, caramel apples, and those mud pudding things that don't really taste great but are cool because they have gummy worms. Julia, the sister-in-law, bought chocolate monsters and eyeballs for the party, and they looked great on the table.

I dressed Mathis up and even though he didn't like his hat, he was a good sport. Kara looked hilarious in my old dinosaur costume and totally stole the show away from Mathis. The whole family came over and we ate the desserts that are way too sweet for the Germans. Their desserts are never sweet enough for me, and I think my homemade icing put them in a sugar coma today. Ben declared he didn't like any of it and went to bang on the piano for awhile, but I think the rest of the people liked the rice krispies the best!

The night was a success and I hope that I gave them a good view of the Pagan holiday. The Grandmother made all of my effort worthwhile, when at the end of the night she rode away on her bike with one of the lit Jack-o-Lanterns tied to the back and wished us (in English) a "Happy Halloween"!

Mathis watching me carve the tiny pumpkin.

Mathis LOVES Halloween.

Mathis with his pumpkin hat.

Sandra carving her pumpkin. 

The Tiny Pumpkin!

So happy that it's Halloween.

The Halloween Feast

The Grandparents brought their own Halloween hat!

Christof with the sleepy pumpkin.

Kara was a dragon.

Ben is really good at making up songs
 and singing them super loud.

Happy Halloween!

PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC

Just when I thought a language couldn't be harder than Hungarian, I am introduced to Czech. And to top if off, my introduction to Czech was not casual and friendly. It instead involved the train attendant slamming open our train cabin door, screaming something in Czech, and then walking away. April and I walked into the hallway of the train which happened to be stopped in the middle of rural Czech Republic, and noticed that no one else was still on the train. The attendant hollered, "BUS!" at us and, with all of our stuff, we were seated in the back of a bus and driven around the Czech Republic. The bus would stop every now and then, and April and I would get out, check to see if it was our stop, they would scream at us in Czech, and then we would get back on the bus. Eventually somehow everyone knew to get off the bus and back on a train, and we followed and made it to Prague.


Our hostel there was probably the nicest place I stayed on my whole trip. Two boys from Clemson University had decided in college to open a hostel, and they made it happen in Prague. They had great American food in the restaurant downstairs, showed movies or had live music every night, and had a great continental breakfast. At dinner April and I tried the Pilsner beer that is famous in Prague, and we didn't like it. We explored the city a little after dinner and I found it to be absolutely beautiful. The Charles Bridge at night was awake and busy, and the castle was lit and beautiful. Back at the hostel we met our roommates, Damion, a guy from Australia, and Skeeter, a girl from the Philippines, and we went everywhere with them over the next couple of days. 


The free walking tour in Prague was awesome, and our tour guide had lived in Boston, Charleston, and Virginia, just like me! We learned about Prague's past under the Hapsburg dynasty, its darker days under Nazi and Communist rule, and my favorite part was the Jewish history. The oldest jewish synagogues and oldest Jewish quarters in Europe are in Prague, which coincides with the fact that Hitler wanted Prague to remain forever as a city with the evidence of the extinct Jewish race. I loved the Jewish cemetery, that contained stacks of graves over 20 feet tall. Since Judaism requires their followers to be buried, they had no where to bury but up, since they were only allotted so much space for over 400 years.


Everywhere you look in Prague, there are beautiful Baroque style buildings and churches, and I loved the red clay-tiled roofs all over the city. We had more good food, of course, chimney cakes, goulash, and braised beef. I didn't get a chance to try real Absinth, but I think I'll live. Damion, April, and I even ate delicious Mexican food! Mexican food is in the top things that I miss from home!


Our last day in Prague was c-c-cold. We went to the John Lennon wall and it was refreshing to see all of the art about peace and love. We hiked with our Philippine roommate Skeeter to one of the highest hills in Prague to a monastery and had great views of all of Prague. Our castle tour was later that day, but I hardly remember anything from that, since I was freezing to death. I do remember the Cathedral, however, because of all the beautiful churches I saw on my trip, the Cathedral at Prague castle was my favorite. It was understated while being magnificent and I loved it. Our last dinner was at an authentic Czech restaurant, and after, Damion and I went to get real Prague ice cream and saw French actors filming a movie. April and I left on Friday with the train, where got yelled at because I put my feet on the seat, and we said goodbye in Berlin. In my next train I sat with a really nice family and their two sweet boys taught me how to play "MauMau", a German card game.  Sandra and Kara, the dog, were waiting for me at the train station, and Christof had a great home-cooked dinner waiting for us. I'm glad to be back.


I am so grateful that I got to go on this trip. I can't believe the number of beautiful things I've seen, how many wonderful people I've met, and experiences I've had that really help my appreciate how sweet things can be. 


Pictures to come soon! 

SALZBURG, AUSTRIA

This trip has taught me a lot of things about myself, one of them being that I am no good with night trains. The one we took from Vienna to Venice was not terrible, but leaving Venice, we decided to save paying a night at the hostel and take another night train. This time it was only 6 hours, which is not a night’s sleep, and put us in Salzburg, Austria at 4am, which is not morning. Our entire night was filled with tiny, interesting men. In our reserved cabin we found the first short man, but we got in our top bunks and turned the lights off. He felt the need to wake us both up to say “Goodbye” when we got to his stop, and that’s when small man number two came and sat in our cabin. We tried and failed at falling asleep, but must of dozed off for a second because we both shot up around 1am to the police at our door and the strange, small man arguing with them in a language other than German, Italian, or English. We had no idea what was happening and once Aubrey Anne and I proved we had passports and were not with him, the policeman kept speaking Italian to the man in trouble. Once, the policeman tried to tell me what was going on in Italian, but I didn’t understand. We interpreted it as the man was an ax-murder and we were going to be in the news in the morning. When our alarm went off at 3:45am, we found the third little Asian man sleeping on my jacket on the seats below us. 

There is not a lot happening at Salzburg at 4am and once we got to our hostel, the nice attendant let us sleep in the lounge and use the computers since we couldn’t check in until noon. Around 5am, the finally scrawny man, this time from Ireland, stumbled into the computer room wearing only white underwear. He proceeded to talk nonsense to us about Yogi Bear and how he couldn’t believe his cell phone fell in a hole, and then shortly returned with the grey tube he’d broken in order to get his phone out and introduced himself as “the greatest”.

 

The best thing about our hostel was the fact they played The Sound of Music movie every day in the lounge at 10:30am. Once Aubrey Anne and I made it to 10:30, we knew we’d be OK, and the musical helped us stay awake until April got in at 12 and we could check in. We were so delusional from no sleep that when we were trying to find a place for lunch, we kept miss reading signs and could have sworn that one sign that ended up being a long German word had read “Al’s Chinese Palace”. April explored on her own while we napped, and after I talked to my parents for the first time the whole trip and met the boys from Iowa that were making faces behind me while I was talking to my parents, we met up with April and saw how beautiful Salzburg is. Salzburg is the smallest city I’ve visited on this trip and I really liked the feeling of knowing where we were (especially after Venice) and being able to walk to everything. 

The Sound of Music Tour took up most of our Monday and I am not embarrassed to admit that I loved it! Even though April, Aubrey Anne, and I were the only ones participating in the Sing-A-Long part, it was still beautiful to drive out into the country and see the hills that are “alive with the sound of music”. At the suggestion of our fantastic tour guide, Gary (who would laugh at his own jokes in a similar manner to the cowardly lion from The Wizard of Oz) we had the best apple strudel I’ve ever eaten in the tiny town of Mondsee. The rest of the day was filled with visiting a fortress from around 1000AD, an abbey from about 650AD, and an Augustiner Monastery that has been turned into a beer hall, which served the beer that the Monk’s brew themselves. A cute, 85 year old man with his own personalized beer stein vigorously waved us down to sit with him, since all of his party had left early, and spoke in German to April for a long time about how lovely we were and that we have our whole lives ahead of us so we’d better make it good. Later, a super nice couple from Colorado heard us speaking English and came to sit and talk for awhile. We had great conversion and they were very worried for us traveling alone, and kept asking us about European boys, about if we felt safe, and telling us they felt sorry for our parents. They gave us their email, phone number, and address in Colorado, and now we all have a free place to stay when we ski the Rockies. 

Two days was the perfect amount of time to see Salzburg, and it would be a great place to go on a weekend retreat to relax. The beginning of the Alps looks breathtaking, the shops and streets are so quaint, and hiking, caving, and skiing would be perfect there. April and I are on a train in the Czech Republic on our way to Prague, and so far no strange, little men yet. We can only hope.

VENICE, ITALY

I have never seen anything like Venice. What a confusing, mysterious, decaying, enchanting, wonderful place!  Arriving at the Venice train station at 8 am on Friday morning, Aubrey Anne and I quickly took the attitude that getting lost is the only way to find our way anywhere. The only problem with that plan was that our giant packs got really heavy after an hour or so, but even with horrible directions we found our hostel and put our bags down until we could check in at 1pm. Our hostel was in a great location on the main island and our front door was 2 feet from a canal with gondolas. 

All I had heard from Aubrey Anne about her last trip to Venice was gelato, pizza, gelato, pizza, and gelato. Even though it was early, we headed straight to a great pizza places I had heard of, and by headed straight I mean we walked back and forth across the Rialto Bridge about 6 times trying to figure out which way was up. Once at the pizza place, the only people that came in to order pizza were locals, and we took that as a great sign. They assured us that sharing one pizza would be more than enough for both of us, and after eating two of those, we left happy on the search for chocolate gelato. 

All we wanted was a nap in the afternoon, but no one at the hostel seemed to know how to put our bunk beds together, so we ended up napping on our packs on the floor. The next morning, our beds that were finally put together caused problems again, since my phone fell off the top bunk in the night and the battery popped out, so my alarm didn’t go off. We had met a girl from Scotland the night before who also wanted to become an Art Therapist, and we decided to travel by water bus around to the smaller sights of Venice for the day with her. Even though the water bus was the most inefficient form of transportation I’ve ever partaken in, it was a great way to see the city. We went St. Georgio, an island that used to be the religious hub of the city when Venice was a brand new city. The church had a basilica with a great view of the main island, and even though I believed the attendant when he tried to trick me that it was closed, it was cool, figuratively and literally, from the top.

Alicia the Scot, Aubrey Anne, and I ordered pizza’s and ended up having to run back to the water bus with our boxes so we wouldn’t miss it. We headed to Burano. Of my whole trip so far, Burano is probably the best thing I’ve seen. It was a little colorful island that you would expect to see in the Greek Isles, but it is built on canals like Venice and they have great prices on the famous Murano glass, the island that most tourists head to instead of Burano. I don’t know what to say about it except go and see. You will love it too.

An older couple suggested to us at St. Georgio to go see Torcello, an even more remote island off of Burano,  because it holds the oldest preserved building in all of Venice. The 8^th century church was closed for renovations that  day, though, and the island was pretty remote, so we quickly water bused from Torcello to Murano and got some more gelato. I was fascinated with the cemetery island off the Venice, since after all of the residents buried there had to be moved after 40 years to make space for new Venetians who’d passed away. I was nervous the whole time because I thought the sign written in Italian told us that the cemetery closes at 6pm, and I wasn’t trying to spend the night there. We ended up seeing a beautiful sunset from the cemetery boat bus stop and then Aubrey Anne and I were off on a mission to get lost in Venice.

We figured that the best Italian restaurant couldn’t be on a tourist’s map, so when Aubrey Anne’s dad agreed to pay for a nice meal out, we tried too hard to find that hidden gem restaurant where the locals eat. Venice is funny like that, I guess, because we kept ending up in St. Marks Square, the biggest tourist trap of all, or in a maze of streets that somehow all ended in canals. We found a great restaurant even if it wasn’t as secluded as we’d hoped, and went out on the town with the entire loud group from the hostel that night.

Saturday, Aubrey Anne and I checked our packs at the train station and went to see what else we could happen to find in Venice. We happened to find the same delicious pizza place from the first day and ordered a “maxi” pizza this time and a loaf of the bread that people who knew the owners and spoke Italian kept coming in the pizzeria to buy. While it was baking Aubrey Anne went to find a cheap bottle of wine and a wine key, and then we were off with our “maxi” pizza box that barely fit in the narrow alleys.  We eventually made it to St. Mark’s square, the tourist center we were trying to avoid for dinner the day before, and sat against a wall in the middle to enjoy our pizza and wine. Tourists kept coming up to take our picture and we were confused why whole tour groups would pause in front of us, until we realized with were sitting in front of a giant poster about the history of St. Mark’s square. 

We didn’t get in trouble for eating until we were already done (“Dis is not a picnic garden!”) and filled the rest of the day with a trip to the beautiful basilica mosaic-ed with glass from Murano and by writing post cards sitting by the Grand Canal. Rain in Venice is beautiful and I was lucky that is started raining a couple hours before our train left. I loved the winding streets crowded with umbrellas and we met a hilarious waiter in a coffee shop who, upon finding out we were American, kept pretending he was on American Idol. 

It was starting to get dark, so we found a small grocery store to buy olives, bought tomatoes from a street produce vendor, and bought wine and olive oil at a specialty shop to accompany our bread from our favorite pizzeria, and had our second picnic of the day on the steps of the Venice train station, overlooking the canal and the rain.

VIENNA, AUSTRIA

I would like to start by saying that Vienna is not boring. Numerous people we met in Budapest warned us that there is not much going on in this city, after 3 days there, I would like to say that they just didn't know where to look. 

Aubrey Anne and I arrived by bus on Monday afternoon and found out that Vienna is a large city. When ever I used to think of Vienna, I pictured large white mansions with gravel gardens and carriages (which is exactly what the Museum section looks like!), but the first thing we had to do here was figure out the subway system. The subway stop for our hostel was under some serious construction, and throughout our time there we never once came out of the same exit onto the same street. This made it especially confusing to find the front door of our hostel which was actually a block around the corner from the sign, and involved extra walking with our heavy backpacks.

Lucky, my friend April had arrived in Vienna earlier that day and scoped out the scene. We handed the reigns over without struggle, and basically followed April's lead for many successful days. On the agenda for the day was going to the Prater to ride the Giant Ferris Wheel of Vienna. The wheel is the oldest in the world, and while it may not be the tallest, it is definitely not the most stable thing, and I was so nervous the whole time. I was somehow convinced to do the giant swings also, and we all went home for the evening with smiles literally frozen to our faces.

Day two brought us the Schönbrunn Palace, who's wealthy residence included Marie Antoinette and all of her sisters, and the famous Sisi, a queen and popular fairytale here. I was worried about it being expensive, but it was really fun! The grounds were beautiful and all of the trees were slowly changing into fall colors. I had a little problem finding my way out of the maze there, but with shouts from Aubrey Anne and April I found my way out... eventually.

All over the city there are statues of the famous composers who made their mark in Vienna, and I loved wandering in the parks and coming upon Strauss, Mozart, and the very hard to find, Beethoven. To warm up after the parks, we went to an authentic Viennitian coffee house even though none of us drink coffee. It was really cozy with it's gray-haired, seasoned pianist and the dark wooden couches upholstered with red velvet. I let my German skills get ahead of me though, and ordered a really gross cake with poppy seed paste that I mistook for chocolate. The Austrian accent is hard to understand!

Besides the cake, the food was great. I ate my first giant wiener schnitzel and it was way larger than my head, and we were old by British boys in Budapest that the "ham and eggs are wicked in Vienna", and they were. The last day April's train left early, so Aubrey Anne and I had time to arrive late to the Glockenspiel show, attend an organ concert in the oldest church site in Vienna for some culture, and find the best falafel and kebab place I have ever tasted.  Aubrey Anne went back to the hostel to plan for her further travels and I headed to the Belevidere, an old summer residence that has been turned into an art gallery that hold the largest collection of Gustov Klimt paintings. It was so incredibly hard to find the entrance into this place, and I ended up walking along a wall parallel to my destination for a good half hour. It was worth it, however, when I got to stand in front of one of my favorite paintings for just as long while tour groups passed around me and as I learned more about it than I ever could from the prints I own.

Our first night train left at 8PM, and after a minor freak out about the correctness of the station where we were waiting, Aubrey Anne and I were headed overnight in our Harry Potter like compartment with uncomfortable pull down mattresses to Venice.

BUDAPEST, HUNGARY

I love Budapest. I'm not sure if it's because it is the first place that I traveled in Europe outside of Germany, or if it is because I felt so cool with my giant backpack, but the city was fasinating to me! Arriving in the Budapest airport, I was disappointed that they didn't stamp my passport, but found my way with two trains, and two subway switches to my hostel. Did you know that Budapest has the oldest subway system on the continent of Europe? Hungarian is by far the most confusing language I've ever heard (we later learned that the alphabet has over 44 letters and has 29 verb congigations!), but I have learned now to get along fine without understanding much from my time in Germany. The hostel, named NJoy Budapest, was very centrally located, but super confusing to get into, with its outside entrance into a courtyard that required a different code to go into the staircase to the second floor where the front door was located. Greg, the overly zealous attendent, gave me the grand tour of the place (which only had 2 rooms other than bedrooms) and I got my choice of beds for Aubrey Anne and me. I sat in the common room and read about Budapest, which I had failed to research ahead of time, and Aubrey Anne made it to the hostel shortly after.

We learned very quickly that Budapest is actually two cities, Buda and Pest, and we headed to the hilly Buda side to take in the views. We also learned, very quickly, that not only do you have to purchase your subway ticket, but you have to validate it every time, or you have to pay 6000forants, like we did! We vowed to hate the Hungarian subway system and validated the heck out of every other ticket. The strangely named Fishman's Wharf gave us the best views of the city at sunset (even though we had to climbs at least 24 sets of stairs to get there). We kind of stumbled on a Brandy and Sausauge festival happening in the courtyard of the old castle, and after paying admission and getting our free tasting glass, we both found out we didn't like Brandy at all. The food was still great, the atmosphere was breath taking, and the music was absoultely hilarious and included a scrawny man singing a song that we like to call "Music is the Best" because he just kept repeating that and kicking his legs in the air. It's starting to get cold here in Europe, so after exploring secret passages around the castle for a little bit, we headed back to the hostel to watch a movie with two Austrailians and three boys from outside of London.

The second day had us on a bus going to the outskirts of the city and looking for the flea market. It was really neat because unlike the used soap and chewed on Barbies sold at our flea markets, this one had beautiful (cheap) silver and real Soviet and Nazi artifacts. For lunch we went to a really cute resturant with an English menu and umbrellas on the ceiling, and I got a saladad with Hungarian goat cheese, which tasted a lot more like mozerella cheese to me. I made Aubrey Anne go to the Museum of Terror, which is the building where criminals of the state during the Nazi and Soviet reigns were imprisioned and executed, but it ended up being more confusing than interesting, since most of it was in Hungarian. The night ended after we paid to see a Battle of the Bands competition that was blasting great American oldies, but turned into Hungarian speeches, chants, and cheering as soon as we paid. We couldn't figure it out, and saw someone waving a gun and a panda bear in the air, so we left.

There are numerous free walking tours in Budapest, but we picked a great one on Sunday morning that was led by a local. She gave us great insight into their tragic past, proud statues and buildings, and their current backward and poor government. Making our way through the hated Budapest subway system, we got a little bit turned around and I started heading toward the correct platform, when I realized Aubrey Anne wasn't behind me. When I walked back I saw her, standing still and flalling on one leg at the top of the escalator. When I ran up, I saw that her shoe and jeans had been skewed by the prangs at the base, and that no matter how hard we tried to pull we couldn't get them out. I got to hit the emergency stop button (awesome!) and I eventually ripped her jeans a little to get them out (she only has 2 pairs for 3 months in Europe) and got the poor shoe out of the esculator, which now has a giant, gaping hole in the heel.. She is still wearing them right now.

Next, we learned that Turkish Baths are pretty confusing but very fun. There were baths that were freezing cold, and some hot tubs that were boiling hot. The outside baths were the best because they had super fast lazy rivers. We met four Irish guys that couldn't believe that our teeth were real. Later, we really enjoyed the fried Langos and spicy goulash they cooked for at the hostel for free, and had great conversation with the hostel owners about Hungary and the toxic mud that had destroyed the suburbs of Budapest.

Aubrey Anne and I ended up meeting the Irish boys at an Irish Pub near our hostel, and got to see first hand how to play exciting Irish games like "Pass the Stool", where you literally just pass a bar stool around the bar until the owner yells at you, from what I could tell. Our tour guide told us about "ruined bars" that are now poping up in the old Jewish part of Budapest. Since most of the Hungarian Jews were misplaced or murdered during the Holocast days, bars have opened using the materials and furniture that was left behind by the old residents of the apartments, and the bar we went to was a whole apartment complex. We played fusball with two guys from Budapest and talked a lot about politics and New York City.

We had no trouble finding our Bus on Monday morning, and then we were on to Vienna!

I forgot my camera cord, so I'll upload pictures at the end of two weeks!

Prost! - Cheers!

Everyone kept telling me the entire weekend that it was a must to experience the real Oktoberfest once in my life and live to tell about it. Well I am happy to report that I have returned in once piece and could not have been luckier with my company or my experiences.

With Sandra being sick the last couple of weeks things have been more complicated around the house, and that explains why, in the end, I headed to Munich on Friday morning with the only two members of the family that don’t speak a word of English: the grandparents. My German must be improving because we made the six hour journey without any major problems, all the while making light conversation. My hotel room was wonderful, had a great kitchen, and was just big enough for my two friends from the States to be able to squeeze onto the floor to sleep. My old roommate Aubrey Anne and her friend Ellis are traveling around Europe until December and were also advised to experience the Oktoberfest, so I met them after I arrived that afternoon just long enough to let them in my room. I was glad to have some English speaking guests! 

Christof and Sandra’s extended family and friends were all getting together to party for the weekend, so Friday night I went with the grandparents to eat at an old Bavarian restaurant with the large group. I have never been to a louder restaurant in my life and everyone was laughing and yelling and toasting up a storm.  After many loud, German recommendations from real Bavarians, I ordered the german version of prime rib and it was, of course, delicious. The Bavarians speak a very difficult dialect of German with many added S’s and new words all together for things, so any hopes of participating in dinner conversation were quickly squashed.  After, I conquered the Munich subway system and met Aubrey Anne and Ellis at the fair grounds where everything was starting to shut down. I was a little confused why it was closing at 10:30pm, but then I remembered there had been constant drinking happening at this place from daybreak until dark, everyday, for 3 weeks. We settled for candied almonds and getting a good night’s sleep to prepare us for the day ahead.

I have no idea why we are so lucky, but in Sandra’s and Christof’s absence extra seats were available on Saturday at tables in a beer tent. After meeting up with the group if 30 family members and friends dressed in liederhosen and the corseted dresses, we followed Jürge, the boss man, as he spun his wife's scarf above his head to guide us. We wove in a long, single file line through the subway system, up the escalator, through the crowd (who drunkenly, without shame, would run smack into you), past all the unsafe rides, and through more crowds to the beer tent. Not just to any beer tent, to Hacker-Pschorr, one of the oldest and best. And not just any seats, seats at tables that needed to be reserved TWO YEARS in advance because of the quality and view. We sat in awe in our fantastic balcony seats from 1:30 to 5:30 and watched the dancing, passing out, music, fights, throwing up, kissing, and drinking that was happening below with the almost 7000 other visitors to this particular beer tent. And we also were very impressed at the partying that was happening at our own table. 

So much of this extra alcoholic beer was drunken by our table that I am certain I have never had so much to drink in my life. And my friends and I were put to shame by our seasoned elders. Aubrey Anne, Ellis, and I separated from the group when our reservation was up and ended up touring the rest of the city on the backs of bicycles driven by locals until midnight. On the car ride home Sunday morning, we looked like soldiers returning from battle. I went home with bruises on the back of my legs from uncomfortable backseats of bikes and a headache that I still currently have while I’m writing this. The grandpa went home with two black eyes and a scraped up, broken nose from an event later on that night at Oktoberfest that he can still not pin point, and the grandma went home with a bill for his ambulance ride. 

When I got back to the house, Christof took me to the small Oktoberfest in Wiedenbrück and it was really nice! We rode the ferris wheel and took in the views of Germany, and it was a really nice end to a crazy weekend. I read today in the German newspaper that a record 7 million liters of beer was sold at this year’s festival. Oktoberfest 2010; one for the record books. 

the Boss Man trying to pick up
the stranglers.

Our table!

Bretzel and Beer

Aubrey Anne, Ellis, and me with our tickets!

view of the masses below

The Grandparents

A "mas" of beer!

and there was dancing.