after spending a week in CA satisfying my craving for quality family time,
perisan food, an animal style at in-n-out, and some time wrestling the waves at the beach. i packed my life in 4 bags and began my move Reutlingen.
i have been here a week already. so far i am really enjoying my time here. the city is incredible. life is much more laid back and natural. rolling hills of uncut grass. stores close for a couple hrs at lunch time. despite all the hills many people prefer to bike. i am looking into getting a bike for myself, then hopefully doing a weekend bike tour to another city. i really enjoy my room here, and am especially fond of my view. there is also a running path through the woods near my school. whats great about it is it has work out stops on the path, all made out of logs. u really get a great core work out. the downtown here has everything u could need all condensed into a maze of cobelstone streets, imagine the german town with the wood work houses painted in pastel colors. but there are also many modern building built into the city between the older homes, its adds a nice contrast.
the students here have been extremely nice and fun, and love to party. a couple of my NU buddies and pregamed a little in my room and continued the party in the Fishbowl outside the french students apt. i was soon to nicknamed the “schwimbadmeister”, which means poolmaster becuase i was encouraging people to go to the town pool the next day. my night ended with people chanting schwimbadmeister, its was a good time.
i have finished the 1st week of three wk intensive german language course. last night we went to a wine fest in the stadtmitte, we had three bottles throughout or sit (there were a bunch of us NU crew plus some irish and indianu U students. we got a reisling, a random dry red wine and a another white that i didnt really like. after that we hiked it to the only disco in town, the Fahrbarie. it was a small place and it seemed that everyone there was from ESB. it was ‘doubletime’ when we got there. everybody was havin a great time, and at some point i think i was in the middle doing a windmill. we were there for a while and me and an NU friend trekked back to campus. we got home about half past 3. the next morning got up around 7:45 for a trip to constance [bus leaves at 8!!] i quickly ran door to door and woke up all my buddies and we all ran to the bus making it just in time. we took a day trip to the lake of constance (bodensee). absolutely incredible. on our bus ride there we stopped first at a la Caterdral Zweifalten. we then continued towards the lake and parked the bus in a lakeside town called Meersburg. there we ate a quickly, i had apful strudel mit eis and an expresso machiatto. expresso blew my mind i was wired all day. we then walked towards the lake beach front so we could jump in for a quick swim. we ended up by walking into a resort type place. the desk attendendent wasnt at their desk so we decided to walk in…greatest idea ever. this place was an oasis by the bodensee. [[NU buddy in foto]]two pools the overflowed at the edges each with a magnificent view of the lake. a mini wave pool, a slide, topless sunbathers, a dock and a highdive into the lake. the water was pretty cold but refreshing (fresh water). we jumped of the high dive and did some swimming around then back to the meeting place to board the ship to Constance. at constsance we only had an hour so we ran around trying to make the most of it. its a was a very nice little city with lots of interesting builings and grand church that was currently being built. its was massive. we ran (literally) back to the bus and we began back Reutlingen. fantastic day.