Steph's year in Tübingen

Just in case...

2006-10-07T02:41:00.000+02:00

Just in case anyone is still looking at this blog, I thought I would post some new pictures... Summer is coming again to Sydney. I'm counting down the weeks til uni is over forever! Then I have an awesome summer planned with some trips and lots of overseas visitors before my working life begins!

Just trying to make my overseas friends jealous

2006-03-24T09:52:00.000+01:00

I'm here

2006-02-28T11:11:00.000+01:00

For all those who are concerned, we made it home alright and I am loving being back! I'm getting a bit desperate to speak some German, but other than that, my family and Luke and my friends are all here... And oh my goodness I understand everything. It's incredible. Even the little kids speak Australian. Have had a few close calls trying to hand over the wrong amount of coins (they look different!) and also forgot to buy a train ticket the other day because I thought I could buy one off the conductor. I finally got back in the car too and drove the whole way to Hornsby (about 3km) on the left hand side of the road. Oh yeah!!

Arhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

2006-02-17T03:06:00.000+01:00

I'm leaving in the morning!!!!

Things I can't wait to leave behind in Tubingen: Cigarette smoke, horrible weather, my teeny-tiny bedroom, the fact I have no freezer or microwave, people pushing and shoving in queues and on public transport, the euro which is draining my bank account, my 90cm-wide bed, having cultural or language misunderstandings at least once a day.

Things I might kinda miss about the place: All my friends - especially the ones I have caught up with especially over the last week, the history and the cobblestones (I don't wear stilettos anyway, and the ice is gone now, so they're no danger to me or my footwear!) the Neckar river flowing really fast and muddy because all the snow has melted, DC++, cheap chocolate, Germanwings flying out of Stuttgart to all European destinations, having an 8-minute bus to uni leaving from my bus stop.

Things I can't wait to get home to: Apart from of course my family, boyfriend and friends - Summer fruits, my (our) car, the sun (that's easy to say but i REALLY, REALLY miss it), Aussie meat, Sydney's bars, restaurants and RSLs, our beaches and national parks on the coast...

See y'all next week!

Our last weekend in Tübingen

2006-02-13T00:05:00.000+01:00

I get home on Sunday. We're all in absolute denial that the year has really come to an end. But I can't wait to go home... I miss home so very much!

The party

Kate and her flatmates had a party on Friday night, which was also Jo and Jeremy's last night on the Continent before heading over to start their London adventure. It was an awesome night (nothing to do with that €12 bottle of Smirnoff) and I enjoyed being able to party one last time with all my mates over here. Us girls are flying home together but I will really miss my Italian and Polish and German friends who are staying in Europe. Not to mention all my Aussie friends who are leaving the country in droves to go live in England!

Me with Susie and Cath - all flying home together

Me with Kate - also flying this weekend

Konrad (Polish) and Jo (Aussie) - both staying in Europe! :(

The Fasnet parade

Then as if to give us a real German send-off, today there was the Tübingen Fasnetsumzug (carnivale parade), traditionally an opportunity for people to indulge in vices before the start of Lent!

In this region in southern Germany (as well as lots of other regions in Germany), each town has its own unique costume - such as a witch or a pig outfit - complete with a wooden carved mask. They're really intricate and very expensive! And on Sundays during the Fasnet season (also known as "the 5th season of the year" or "the crazy season"), keen beans from each town who own these costumes travel to all the other towns to take part in whichever parade is on that weekend.

Typically the costumed people in the parade will go through the town smearing paint on peoples' faces, setting off fireworks, pulling or messing up girls' hair, drinking and singing. In the picture you can see a poor girl being carried away by an overenthusiastic witch.

This is definitely not normal behaviour for the usually very well behaved Germans! Today in the parade, one group of witches gathered in a circle around one of their witches, and used their broomsticks to lift the one in the middle about 6 metres into the air!

Ahh Germany... You never really can know what to expect! (...get me outta here!)

Berlin Oddities

2006-02-07T22:52:00.000+01:00

Palast der Republik - This asbestos-contaminated building probably won't be around much longer. Considered very ugly and communist, many want to pull it down but it's been surrounded by scaffolding for a few years now. Not sure what happened to the grand plan to replace it with a copy of the imperial palace that it replaced in the first place.

Our curtained-off 'separet' in the Orient Lounge with Sarah. Love that Turkish food.

Apparently these fish will defrost when the lake turns to water again, and swim on their merry way...!

Jeremy, Jo and me standing on top of something we really should be swimming in. This entirely frozen lake on the outskirts of Berlin stretches for kilometres! Our toes went completely numb after a Sunday afternoon stroll across it!

Around my place

2006-02-07T22:45:00.000+01:00

Just some pics from my room, our kitchen, my friends and my flatmates. Roll the mouse over the picture to see the captions and click to see the full size version.

Jo & Jeremy told me to write this

2006-01-28T23:26:00.000+01:00

Jo and Jeremy are the best house guests ever. They are very clean and tidy, chip in for everything, and wash up very well. They are looking for accommodation on people's floors all over Europe... Any offers leave us a comment!

Let's talk about the weather

2006-01-24T14:39:00.000+01:00

This one is for all of you reading my blog from Australia.

It is SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO cold here.

The end.

The last month

2006-01-19T15:20:00.000+01:00

I'll be home in one month today.

Anyone who wants to come over to Germany with an empty suitcase, to then help me carry my stuff home, is more than welcome to visit! Malaysia Airlines rejected my very polite request to be allowed to take excess baggage home next month. Gotta pack it all up and post it then!

It's so cold here that we are storing our ice cream on the windowsill at the moment... And the buses stop running from time to time when the rain or snow freezes on the streets and it's too slippery.

Can't think of any goss, except that it seems to be wedding season at the moment and I am looking forward to quite a few of my friends' weddings this year! Never really thought that would come around, did I...

Also can't wait to hit the beach when I get back to Australia (don't care if it's already "autumn") and go bush with my tent... I am going stir crazy in these constantly heated buildings where every public space is filled with cigarette smoke!

But when my assignment is finished in 1 week I am definitely going to be making the most of my last three weeks in Germany. There will be an excursion or a party every single day, don't you worry!

Back to the grind, for 2 weeks at least ;)

2006-01-12T15:25:00.000+01:00

Yes, it has come around to that time again. My major assignment is due in two weeks, or 12 days, or something like that. It's SO hard to get motivated! I have this tiny bedroom where I sleep, eat and work too. It's too small! And the research itself involves a lot of translating... Ahh enough about that. I'm even boring myself

It snowed last night for the first time in a few weeks, so instead of dirty puddles of snow (the type commonly to be seen at Perisher in Australia) we have a white blanket over everything again. The average temps at the moment are about -6 overnight up to 2 during the day if we're lucky. The Neckar river has started to freeze over, which is most exciting!

My grandparents are now on the cruise ship (click to see the webcam!) somewhere on the Atlantic on their way to the Caribbean after a few food-filled days in Tuebingen. This is a picture of us at the Tuebingen Castle after visiting the surprisingly interesting Archaeology Museum there that belongs to my uni (free entry for the students)!

On the food front, I am still going through my Tim Tams, and this week have cooked a really tasty Pad Thai dish and a chicken lasagne. Tonight might be Schupfnudeln (translated in some German restaurants as "finger noodles") with a creamy mushroom and smoked salmon sauce.

And I also made cocktails with Absolut Vanilia, pineapple juice, and some triple sec imitation i found for under €4. We snuck ice cube moulds into our flatmate's freezer (we don't have one) so we even had ice cubes in the cocktails, albeit in limited supply: one ice cube per drink.

It is surprising what you can do with our dodgy student kitchens if you really put in the effort - this is Susie & my attempt to make gingerbread houses for Christmas!

So, only 2 weeks til Jo and Jeremy come to visit! (I hope you guys get a chance to sleep on the plane because I have so much planned for our couple of weeks together!!! I hope you like castles and thermal baths and views of the alps and....)

And then when they leave, it's only a few days til I fly home. Wow.

Chilly Christmas trip

2006-01-04T16:59:00.000+01:00

Just got back from my Christmas trip to Prague, Krakow (in Poland), Vienna and Munich. The snow storms caused one of my trains to run 160 minutes late, and the cold meant that, for example, this Viennese swan only had a tiny hole left in its pond that wasn't frozen solid!

As usual, everything went to plan, and I met heaps of other solo travellers and we ended up having an awesome Christmas together in Prague.

Probably for the first time in a while, I was told I had a good sense of direction! Compared to these guys at least...

Hope everyone else had a lovely Christmas too, and thanks so much for all the cards that filled up my tiny little letterbox!!

The Schnee has arrived

2005-12-19T12:34:00.000+01:00

Yes - the snow is finally here. On Saturday evening, after a day of Christmas shopping, fighting for car parking spots, and Christmas biscuit-eating with Martina and her family, I came home to Tuebingen and was looking forward to dinner and an early night before hitting another Christmas market on Sunday morning.

However, on Saturday night, ALL the buses I can catch had stopped running! I live with about 2000 other students in an area at the top of a hill, and with the ice and snow, it was too steep for the buses or even most cars to get up here.

I met some randoms at the bus stop while waiting for the non-existant buses: a school kid, an apprentice from Stuttgart, and an Italian exchange student. The school kid rang his dad who came and took all 4 of us home! We crawled up the slippery hill in the dad's car, meanwhile, half of Tuebingen is slowly walking up this steep hill because they needed to get home but there was no other way! All the while a snowstorm is going on around us.

And I slipped over most spectacularly at the bus stop yesterday morning on the ice, and am feeling pretty bruised today. Joan and Frank if you're reading this... umm... Maybe the snow will have melted by the time you get here in 2 weeks!

Susie and me with the marketplace Christmas tree in Rothenburg ob der Tauber, a medieval town complete with city walls and a torture museum!

A week in the life of...

2005-12-10T21:00:00.000+01:00

Seven days in the life of me

So now you have an idea what a week in the life of an exchange student in Germany really involves... Not exactly a typical week, then again no two days are the same over here! It's 70 days til I come home and i can't wait, but then again there's so much still to do and see over here. I'd love to know who is actually reading my blog, so if you have a minute, write a quick comment at the end of this posting! :) Just don't torture me and tell me how much warmer it is wherever you are than here...

Friday - All the way to Karlsruhe for nothing

Cath and I caught a 6.07am bus to make it to Karlsruhe in time for the scholarship holders' meeting at 9am. Compared to the last scholarship meeting I attended, where we saw a band, heard speeches, a debate, got free postcards, food and alcohol, this one was a real let down! One boring speech was followed by a 1.5 hour coffee break, followed by lunch in the uni cafeteria (Yum... food loaded with MSG and other bad additives). We got to see a bit of Karlsruhe though, which is very industrial and made us very pleased to be living in Tubingen! They do have a nice baroque palace though...

Finally made it home in the evening and went to a pretty good party at the Biology faculty. It was in a non-smoking venue but of course all the Germans had to break the rule didn't they, so you still come home stinking pretty bad. Caught the 2am night bus home... very long day!

Thursday - Too late, I already opened the parcel!

MORE TIM TAMS! Yay!!! Thanks Mum!!! That's like one packet per fortnight til I come home... I can almost eat one biscuit per day! By the way, that was very quick service from the time I complained about eating my last one, to the time a new batch arrived. I'm most impressed.

What else did I do today... Well my only class was cancelled so I went and bought some train tickets for my Eastern Europe trip, went to the supermarket, cooked a curry, and rang Martina to say happy birthday! Might go visit her next weekend which would be really cool!

Wednesday - mysterious parcel arrives

Who is the parcel from???? May i open it yet???!

Went to the Stuttgart Christmas Markets today with Susie and Cath and went ice skating! I hope we didn't look quite as embarassing as the other Aussies who turned up at the outdoor skating rink - one of them was decked out head to toe in khaki, including an Akubra... No one told her that the current average amount of sunshine per day is 45 minutes.

Tuesday - Had to go to uni!

Yes I had to go to not one class today but two. To make up for the stress of it all, I ate my very last double-coated Tim Tam. Might go across the road now to the pub and see if anyone's there. Where did all my flatmates disappear to tonight?! P.S. As I was typing this message, they barged into my room and we went to the party together :)

Monday - The day of room cleaning

Today, I rearranged my room just one more time! Now it's set up for optimal television viewing, more comfortable sleeping (I put my spare mattress under my normal mattress, clever huh), and has a more spacious feeling for when I have guests and for when I feel claustrophobic in my room because of a lack of desire to go into our empty, cold kitchen!

Sunday - The day of rest

In Germany it's known as Ruhetag, the day where everything is shut, there are only bad movies on the telly, and flatmates disappear off the face of the planet coz we all sleep til midday and only emerge at irregular times for meals!

Saturday - Nürnberg, Christmas markets

The day involved my alarm going off at 5.45am, Cath and I sleeping on a bus for three hours to Nürnberg, and then consuming good Mexican food, Glühwein (mulled hot red wine) and Lebkuchen (gingerbread) til it was time to catch the bus home again.

It's Germany's most famous Christmas market and yesterday it seemed like most of the German population plus a great chunk of America was there!

The very best part was that the Glühwein came in a mug in the shape of a boot, which you get to keep for just EUR 2.50.

Happy 1st Birthday

2005-12-03T23:15:00.000+01:00

Wow who would have ever thought I could be such a nerd as to keep a blog website for a whole year. Alas, we have turned one! Here are some party photos to celebrate.

Stockholm

2005-11-28T21:15:00.000+01:00

Susie and I just returned from a long weekend in Stockholm, staying with friends from the Swedish Jamboree (back in August). It was my third time to Sweden - and i know Rob is really jealous!

3:00pm on the main shopping strip - sunset already in full swing.

Susan, me and Johanna trying to keep warm waiting for the night bus. See - they have efficient public transport everywhere in the world except Australia!

Poodle Hairstyle Alert! Susie sneakily photographed the poodle lady hiding in the background between Mattias and me. I guess that's how you keep warm when you wear an outfit like that out clubbing in Sweden!

MOOOOOOOOOSE!

The 13-hour door to door journey in each direction wasn't exactly made easy by the snowstorms that seemed to follow us from one country to the next! At least we had our hoard of Swedish snacks to keep us going!

Around Tübingen

2005-11-14T00:53:00.000+01:00

Come for a stroll around Tübingen. Click on the little pictures to see the full-size version.

Even H&M, the European chain department store, gets a touch of Tübingen with its wooden facade.

This is where the law students get to go to lectures. Always the law students in the pretty buildings. Don't worry, we history students have a lecture there this week too!

This my super-cheap supermarket, Kaufland. Their home brand, Kaufland Classic, can be found in illegal quantities in student kitchens all over Tübingen (and Germany).

And who can walk past the €2 Döner Kebab place at midnight after a few Strawberry Margaritas down the alley at Stern.... Not me!

Still dreaming about summer

2005-11-04T20:10:00.000+01:00

It's time to catch you all up on the highlights of my travels! Here are some pics from the "overnight ferry" from Stockholm to Helsinki. Ferry? Luxury cruise liner!!! Ok, so we slept on the deck two levels BELOW where our coach and the other vehicles were parked... But it had a duty-free shop on board! You need one of those after being in pricey Scandinavia for two weeks...

The all-you-can-eat dinner buffet cost a fortune in Swedish Crowns but the unlimited seafood, drinkies and dessert ensured we got our money's worth. The next day's lunch was also the tastiest of the whole trip as it was made up entirely from the all-you-can-fit-in-your-pockets breakfast buffet!

We slept so well in our luxury cabins, we were even able to enjoy our 24-hour stay in Finland after partying all night in the ship's disco and ... well... promenading on the Moonlight Promenade!

Second Semester

2005-10-28T18:40:00.000+02:00

Last night was a crazy farewell party for Luke, that AMAZINGLY turned into a friendly, sociable party in my kitchen where all the new flatmates not only emerged from their bedrooms to meet each other and have fun, but ended up getting the night bus home together at 2.30 this morning. I think it was the chickens and the pumpkin soup that brought everyone together! What am I going to do without my super chef now? (Click on the photos to enlarge.)

But sadly, Luke has now gone home, semester has started and my first assignment is due in a couple of weeks. But for some funny reason, the weather has stayed up around 20 degrees every day lately, and all of my classes have been cancelled for next week due to a random public holiday on Tuesday (Something to do with it being the day after Halloween, still trying to figure it out) and something that's on at the uni on Thursday. So there's another 11 days of holidays for me. This really is ridiculous!!!

Luke's visit

2005-10-18T22:36:00.000+02:00

Munich, London and Paris in two weeks. Who knows what the next two weeks could have in store! For one, we're getting a hire car tomorrow and heading down to Lake Constance, Neuschwanstein Castle and the ski/hiking resort of Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Then we may well hit the Black Forest before we give the car back. Then this weekend it's Luke's birthday - watch out Tubingen!!

Last days of summer

2005-09-25T17:46:00.000+02:00

Susie and I are currently in Granada in southern Spain. Highlights and lowlights of the last week have included:

- A successful day trip out of Rome down to the 2300 year old archeological site at Pompeii and to the top of Mt. Vesuvius!
- Susie's wallet being pickpocketed on the Rome Metro... We didn't notice a thing. Don't know how it happened... What an absolute pain for her, but we just cancelled all the cards and got on with things.
- A 4am wake up for our flight to Spain
- A trip to the BEACH in Valencia!
- Spanish food and culture including La Alhambra, the really old Arabic palace in Granada, going to a flamenco fiesta, and eating paella and tapas
- A hostel with FREE internet! So send me an email!!!

I'm back in Germany again on Wednesday night... Luke arrives on Thursday, Oktoberfest on Saturday, then England on Monday. No time for sleeping!!!!!!

My youth hostel

2005-09-14T21:28:00.000+02:00

I've been collecting ideas along the way about what I would have at my youth hostel, if I ever got around to opening one up. It would NOT have seedy old men on reception who wear board shorts and thongs and dirty white blazer jackets. It would have flushing toilets and a hot shower, and it would NOT have bed bugs. Oh, and the bedroom doors would close, if not also lock, and I would have some sort of security system in place so that only paying guests may actually enter the premises and have access to all the facilities and everyone's luggage.

Guess what our hostel in Florence was like!!! Yes, all of the above and more. I forgot to mention the 'kitchen' had only one teaspoon. I ate my muesli with a fork.

Don't worry, Susie and I checked out of there and found ourselves a nice little one-star hotel with all the mod cons like unblocked toilets and a key to our door. At least we were still able to do all our little planned trips, such as to see Michelangelo's David (we were not disappointed) and to see the Leaning Tower of Pisa, visit Siena, and go on an afternoon wine tasting tour of the Chianti region.

Now we're in Rome and ready for 6 days of serious sightseeing action before hitting the beach and waterslides in Spain!!!

Russian contrasts

2005-09-04T23:49:00.000+02:00

Welcome to St Petersburg... Here is your hotel, a concrete monstrosity complete with a bowling alley, go-karting, and a pool hall...

Meanwhile, just down the road you will find a beautiful orthodox church that looks about as different from your hotel as any building possibly could be. This is definitely my favourite building in Russia - it's called the Church of the Spilled Blood and was built in the 1880s on the site where Tsar Alexander II was killed by a conspirator. How this church survived both the war (St Petersburg was under siege from the Nazis for 3 years) and then the atheist years when religion was banned under communism, I just don't know.

By the way, you can click on the photos to enlarge them.

Off to Italy tomorrow with Susie so I'll be in touch again when we take a rest from eating, sightseeing and relaxing in Venice and on the Mediterranean coast...!

Absolut Ice Bar

2005-09-03T00:27:00.000+02:00

In Stockholm, we visited the Absolut Ice Bar... Fifteen euros covers 45 minutes entry to the bar - which is made entirely of ice, a big fluffy silver thermal coat to wear, and one Absolut vodka cocktail served in a block of ice shaped like a glass!

Russia

2005-08-28T19:32:00.000+02:00

We made it back into the European Union today after our 9 day Russia and Belarus adventure!

What a crazy place. I have so many stories about the Baltic Sea ferry, the grand palaces of St Petersburg, and the mafia and black market in Russia. Oh, and I can also tell you all about cucumber and tomato salad, and greasy meat with potatoes. Our meal every single night for the whole trip. "All a part of the Russian experience"...

I'm back in Berlin in 2 days so feel free to SMS or even call my mobile again! I'm going to visit my high school exchange family, the Webers, then Sarah's coming back to see Tubingen for a couple of days. A professor from UTS is visiting next weekend too! I'm not exhausted yet though!!!!