Weekend and Berlin

Hello!

So I've been pretty busy since I last blogged. Thursday night after dinner my host sister told me that someone she knew had some hockey tickets for free, so she asked me if I wanted to go! Obviously I was totally excited, so we made plans to do that. I slept in on Friday and basically hung around the house most of the day and talked to my host parents, then I got ready for the game. I was so excited to get there I accidentally left an hour earlier than I was supposed to! I didn't realize it til I was halfway to the arena, so I just decided to go anyway. I went to the kiosk across the road and grabbed a beer, then I sat on the lawn in front of the arena and had a little beer picnic while I waited to meet Yvonne (my host sister). When she got there we went in and realized our seats were great! We were 10 rows off the ice on the side where they shoot twice! The game was a lot of fun, and the Koelner Haie ended up winning 4-2. Also, they played Wolfsburg, which was cool cuz that's who we played when I went to the soccer game too. After the game we went to the Capitol and had a drink and some pizza, then headed home.

Saturday I packed my bags for Berlin and Yvonne dyed my hair (it needed it bad). After dinner I went downtown to meet some friends, but no one showed up! I went to the internet cafe and got online, and Andrew said he'd come meet me. When he got there we talked to Hoss, who was at a little get together at his German friend's apartment, so we went there for a while. Luckily the persons house was right close to mine, so I could walk home instead of waiting on the Bahn.

Sunday we got up early and met at the train station to go to Berlin. It was a 5 hour train ride or so. We met Frank, the program director, in Berlin, and he took us to our hostel. Instead of staying in a hostel room, we have two huge apartments! The girls in one, and the boys upstairs. These apartments are sweeet! Ours is holding 10 girls, it has two bathrooms, and one has a gigantic tub. Both bathrooms have showers, and there hasn't been any fights over showering yet, and with 10 girls I consider that quite the accomplishment haha. We have a giant kitchen and living/dining area and really the whole place is just nice. After we got our beds made up and everything unpacked we went to eat at this Italian restaurant. We had 3 kinds of pasta and 4 kinds of pizza (I ate tuna pizza). Sunday night was pretty low key.

On Monday we took a walking tour of the city for 3 hours. We got to see a lot of cool places, but it was pouring rain the whole day, plus it was freezing! Oh, and my camera died, so I have no pictures of anything. After the tour we went and got coffee to warm up. Emily and I decided we needed boots, scarves, and gloves. We took a walk on Friedrichstrasse, but everything was too expensive, so we figured out how to get to Kurfuerstendamm. In Kurfuerstendamm we walked around for 2 hours. We couldn't find anything affordable that we liked, and we only had a little bit of time left! Finally when we were getting ready to give up, we both found the same pair of boots that we liked for 29 euro. We just decided to get the same ones. At home when we were getting ready for dinner I realized that my one boot was way too small, and I had accidentally gotten two different sized boots. I was bummed, but forgot about it when we got to dinner and I realized they had Heyl Wine there. Of course I took pictures and got a glass. After dinner we went and got beer and some jagermeister and we all had a little party together. It was a good time, we ended up singing and dancing all night.

Today we woke up and we had a 1 hour tour of the Reichstag. It was neat, but I wasn't too interested, since I don't know anything about German government. The building is pretty though, and has a great view from the roof. After the tour, we decided we wanted to go to Checkpoint Charlie. There was a giant black raincloud hovering over us, but we decided to go anyway. It poured for about 5 minutes, and by the time we were done with lunch it was gorgeous outside, but a little chilly. We met a funny guard that stamps your passport, but I sadly didn't bring my passport to Berlin. I did get to touch a piece of the wall though. I was a little exhausted and wanted to exchange my boots, so I decided to head back towards the apartment while the others went to the wall. I picked up my boots and headed back to Kurfuerstendamm. I walked around Bahnhof Zooilogischer Garten for a little, then exchanged my boots. I took the S-bahn to the Strasse des 17. Juni and walked to the Siegessaeule, then all the way down to the Brandenburg gate, and finally back to the hostel. Basically I went for a 2 hour walk in Berlin by myself, not counting all the walking I had done earlier. Now I'm exhausted. I'm getting ready to go eat with the others, and tonight we're going to see a beatbox play! Should be fun! Talk to you soon!

Jess