Back.

Germany & Austria are two REALLY cool places that I think everyone should visit.

With that said, let me tell you a little about my trip.

A couple of Saturdays ago, Cecilia and I stayed the night in Paris because we had an early flight the next day. At our hostel, we met a mom and a daughter from Mongolia who hadn't seen each other in 4 years who were touring the city together. They were adorable.
The next day we went to the airport. Super excited because although it was snowing, the internet said the flight was still on. Well, it was delayed two hours and right after I asked the nice man when we were leaving and he responded by saying "5 minutes" -- it was cancelled. We were told there were no flights to Berlin until the day before Christmas, so we freaked out and bought absurdly expensive train tickets to get there. Well, luckily we met this wonderful blonde lady who got us on standby for a night flight. Cecilia and I were cranky at the airport all day but it wasn't so bad because we met Chao and Viorela. Chao is from China and Viorela is from Romania and they are a couple who live in Paris and also were dealing with plane probs. They are awesome and us 4 are going to hang out soon! Yay!

SO, Berlin. berlin berlin berlin. I loved Berlin. We had 4 days there. We went to the incredible German History Museum and learned a TON, frequented several Christmas Markets (REAL snow on top of little wooden cottages selling handmade crafts and delicious snacks), went to an awesome Beer Hall called PraterGarten, visited the huge Jewish Memorial, discovered some cozy bars, saw the berlin wall & old Gestapo headquarters & shopped. Two things about Berlin. First-- we did an alternative art tour with a guy from New Zealand named Ben. It was the best thing. We saw a bunch of amazing street art and a few really eccentric artist studio buildings like Tacheles, which used to be a department store.

This was a building that was used to hide Jewish People during World War Two that was turned into a piece of art and a historical site. Awesome, right?

Second-- one night, we found a bar in the Christmas Market called "Partyhaus vom Nikolas" , meaning St. Nicholas. It was me, Cecilia, big mugs of beer, German songs, and plenty of singing Germans. It was a ball.

Sidenote: We had a hilarious Russian roommate named something crazy who smelt kind of bad. He had a good heart but he was weird. He told Cecilia he wanted to ask me out and he didn't know I was in the room. I was just behind the door and when I came out into the open he did it. I said no.

Then we headed to Munich. Munich was beautiful. Lauren met me and Cecilia there. We had a pretty chill time because we got there on December 23rd and left on December 27th- so a lot was closed. BUT, we were in a super fun hostel and we met a bunch of Americans. In Munich, we ate (twice!) at the famous beer hall called Hofbräuhaus, shopped at Viktualien Market, hung out in coffee shops, learned at the Munich City Museum, & checked out the Neue Pinakothek and Pinakothek der Moderne- 2 decent art museums.

As big as our heads!


We celebrated Christmas together and exchanged gifts which was fun. We also went to the Dachau concentration camp, which was shocking. We spent a few hours walking around the grounds and in the museum- which BLEW my mind.

On December 27th, Cecilia and I hopped a train to Salzburg, Austria- which is a stunning city! There we did tons of exploring and walking around, saw where Mozart lived and his first piano (which I thought was SUPER cool), & shopped. I bought a fantastic, enormous pomegranate at a pretty market. Also, we ended up meeting two cool Austrian guys because the first night, we wanted to watch the Sound of Music at our hostel. Well, it wasn't working in English. So, Herwig gave us a free drink at the bar. Then his friend Klemens was there and we all chatted. They asked us what we were doing the next night and we said nothing so we made plans to go to a big beer hall called Augustiner Bräu. It was a fun time and periodically we would ask them to say a word in German and we were just like, WHHHHHATT- because the language is pretty crazy to hear.
P.S.- in Salzburg, we got our pictures taken in period clothes like they do at Disney World. It was hilarious. The picture is on my wall in my room.
I repeat- it was hilarious.

The last stop was Vienna.
Vienna was quite cool.
It consisted of Sacher Torte (the chocolate cake that is famous), Tram rides around the old city, good coffee, a BALLET at the opera house (which was superb), Naschmarkt, and the Belvedere Museum. This museum is one of my favorites now! They have a good amount of Gustav Klimt art- including THE KISS, which is one of my personal favorites because I find it to be beautiful & romantic.

I really loved my life when I was at this museum.

On New Years Eve, we got a good sushi dinner together. After hanging around in the hostel to see if there was anyone cool who wanted to join us- we went to this club "Flex". We got there around 11:30 and it was kind of empty. I don't think I even noticed when it turned 12. It was bizarre. Well, two guys walked in and I went up to them and I said... "Hi, happy new year! We're american and alone and... do you want to be friends with us?" It was pretty absurd but it worked and we had a great night with our new friends! One of whom has a vineyard and casually makes Austrian wine.


So, there you have it people! Now, I'm back in Beauvais doing my English Teacher thing. I actually just made a pretty delicious chicken rice curry dish for dinner.