Blogplatz.

Today was an adventure.

We had Turkish food for lunch, go figure. They are the largest immigrant group living here, and their food is stinkin’ good. So far I’ve had no sausage and not enough beer. Totally not what I expected?? but I’ve found a few things I think I’ll be missing back in the states. Tomorrow I’m going on a hunt for my favorite Magnum bar and NOTHING will get in my way.

We had our first lecture today at the Goethe institute, and I enjoyed every second. SURPRISE!!!!!!! I learned more about the Industrial Revolution and Beethoven and Chopin and I was reminded of how much I LOVE this Schubert piece and I want to sing it so bad!

Luckily we were dismissed early to get to the Hauptbahnhof to get a seat for the Germany/Argentina game. We found a spot near a hotel with a large group of older Germans outside, and once we got there, Deutschland was already up by one. [I used the bathroom here & was so proud I made it all the way there without a single English word] I was SO freaking excited to watch this game with Germans. They were clapping, screaming, singing fight songs, and the second goal someone spilled beer on my foot. PRICELESS. This place is crazy for their team and it made me feel like I was German too! There were highfives, cheers & I made a new south African/German friend who translated all the yelling for me. We won 4-0 and WE’RE IN THE SEMI-FINALS. This whole place has gone CRAZY. There were honking cars and horns blowing non-stop and every person walking by yelled something celebratory at me and I just yelled YA DEUSTCHLAND back. I get to watch 2 more games with these people, win or loose. And I want to see us beat the Netherlands real real bad. BUT if they won while I was here… I’d consider myself their good luck charm and never leave.

Which leads me to my next sorry-this-post-is-too-long point… remember how I said this place went nuts after the win? Well that included drunk/excited fans in the streets [with flags and horns and redblackyellow mowhawks and beer beer so much beer] Where the street cars that take me to OPERAS are. As soon as the time ran out for the game, we hopped a train to get to Falstaff by Giuseppe Verdi [look it up right now it was flawless and I enjoyed every Italian second] but because of all the traffic, it skipped our stop & went right on to another that I’d never been to before. Did I mention I was on this train with 1 other girl who knew no German either? So we stayed calm, hopped the rails & managed to catch the next 8train to ‘Theatreplatz’ where the opera house is. EXCEPT NO WE DIDN’T. That train skipped our stop too. and so would every other train, we found out later. There were so many people in the streets we couldn’t get to the opera house without walking 3 blocks. It was 6:43. The Opera started at 7.

SO WE SPEED (sped?) WALKED. Through old town. I’m talking like in the Lizzie McGuire movie but I had no moped. I tripped over some cobblestones oh so gracefully & Dr. Jackson got directions in German but that didn’t help me, I was sweating and stressing and my calves were cramping… but finally we made it. We were the last people in the door. Then of course I had to use the bathroom, so I asked where it was in perfect German, only to be told in perfect German where it was so I STILL didn’t actually know. They were closing the doors. I had to wait 2 acts of an Italian opera to use the restroom but I LOVED Falstaff so it was worth it.

ALL THAT TO SAY – I loved today. I tried new food, learned about music, watched a Fußball game, RAN through cobblestone streets to see an Opera, met one of the cast members on the train home, and now I’m blogging from my balcony in 68 degrees.

Es war ein guter Tag. (i almost did that all by myself... only missed 1 word.)