So, Bavaria! I arrived at Staudarerhof on Sunday evening, the 24th. Welcome to the farm!
















This is the farmhouse, which is pretty typical, although maybe fewer flowers than normal (seriously, the Bavarians love their flowers). Huge, square, with walls so thick that it’s probably the same temperature all year round, and I can’t use the telephone or wifi in my room because the signals can’t make it through the floor.




















Also typical is the fact that the cow barn is connected to the house. There’s no door between them, but there is a window, which is kind of entertaining. The upper level of the barn is just hay and grain, and piles of old tractor-bits, and the bottom is where their 40 cows live for most of the year. They’re not here in the summer, though, but all out in the mountains, grazing to their heart’s content (they only raise cows from birth to 3 years old, so they never do milking).














The main hall downstairs. It looks a lot bigger in reality. Kitchen, pantry and living room are to the left, Helmut’s father’s room, bathroom, mudroom and stairs are to the right. Maybe you can see, but there are horsey things all over the place—bridles and horseshoes etc.














The front pasture, looking over the road. I need to take more farm pictures, but I’ve been waiting for a sunny day, and there haven’t been a lot of those lately... (Seriously, though, where is my summer?! It was cold and damp when I was in VT and it was cold and damp in Heidelberg, and now it’s cold and damp in Bavaria! Damn you, global cooling!!)














On a nice evening, we had dinner outside, complete with grilling and everything. A little bit blurry, but Jenny and Helmut (the farm owners) are next to each other on the left, and on the right is Guillermo (wwoofer from Spain, who left), Damien (from France, who also left), and then Manuel. It was really nice :)















View outside my bedroom window... Although, below this pretty sight are about 40 chickens. I really hate chickens. There are more, too, and they are a pain in the butt.















Luzy, aka Luzifer. Very nice dog, though, despite the name, although she looks much too much like a wolf.












There are also 3 cats on the farm, one of which just had babies! This is them when they were only a few days old. They’re about a week and a half old, now, and ridiculously cute.

So, farm life... The general routine seems to be this: Wake up at 6:00, be in the stables by 6:15. We feed the horses, and clean the 10 stalls, 7 of which have little outdoor paddocks, which we clean as well. We’re usually done by about 7:30, and we go into the house for breakfast (fruit, yogurt, musli, coffe). After breakfast, there’s about 2 hours of chores. I usually spend a while doing dishes, and then sometimes cleaning inside (it’s a big, old house, and thus is always dirty no matter what you do), and sometimes cleaning the fields (it’s a silly task, but necessary—when there’s too much horse poo in the fields, they can get worms), sometimes rescuing baby trees from the grass that’s growing over them, and today, gathering a pile of apples from the trees... Etc. Yesterday we spent 2 hours cleaning the windows in the barn. I’m all for things being clean, but... Really? I don’t think the cows care...

Lunch is at 1:00 (Jenny cooks really well), and then we usually have time off until 3:30. Then, we bring the horses into the pastures, and we muck out stalls. There are the 10 in the main stable, but there are two other smaller stables, one for the mares, three of which have foals, and one for the four boys. It usually takes about 2 and a half hours, with the 3 of us working. Around 6:30, we take the horses in, and feed them (it’s incredible how much a horse can eat in a day... Also, just how much they poop), then we feed/water the chickens and geese, and spent 20 minutes chasing the chickens, and getting them back inside their house. Sometimes it’s entertaining, but mostly it makes me want to kill them because they all act so surprised that we’re chasing them, like it’s never happened before. “Wait, what’s going on? You want me to go somewhere? You’re going to eat me! AHHHHH!” And if you get too close, they start to freak out. Stupid animals. I like to watch them run, though, and pretend that they’re mini Velociraptors. Dinner is around 8, which is good, although consists of bread, cheese and pig-products a little too often. I think that’s just very German. Their bread is basically a meal in itself, and it’s filling, just not terribly interesting. Also, we eat off of wooden boards, which feels very Bavarian. Geese have to go into their house after dinner. Geese are awful, awful creatures. They are loud, obnoxious, and they like to hiss. They only way I can deal with them is by imagining them roasted and on the table for Christmas dinner. Om nom nom.

Anyways, so far so good. It gets a little repetitive, and 6 am comes awfully early, sometimes, but it’s alright. I wanted different, and that’s what I got! Manuel is in Prien, which is a few towns over, and we have a nice routine—he’s been coming over to stay on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, and then leaves first thing in the morning, and then I can get a day off on the weekend, and we go do something. It’s almost like dating... Crazy.

It is nice, though to have the afternoons pretty much free, and I’ve been reading like a crazy person. Finished Dracule and the Pillars of the Earth. Gotta say, the latter was interesting, and is great historical fiction, and I have to appreciate the architectural detail, but... There wasn’t really a plot, the writing was repetitive, there was nothing surprising, and the good characters were entirely good, and the bad, entirely bad. I’m not usually one to criticize a book that combines art history, historical fiction, political intrigue and some bodice-ripping, but I was not super impressed, although, granted, maybe that’s because I had been hearing rave reviews for the past few years. Hm. Wow, and I just wrote a novel. Hope it’s not too boring. I’ll try to write again soon, with more farm pictures! Tah!

On Saturday July 23^rd, we took another touristy day, because we were leaving for Bavaria the next day. We went to the town of Neckarsteinach, in which one cannot swing a dead cat without hitting a castle. Seriously, I think there are four in this little valley, and apparently they were always fighting. Ah, the middle ages...















Entrance to the town, and that's the original town wall (I believe).

Manu looking a little skeptical...

Really pretty little church...















... How many walls can a little town possibly have? Apparently a whole lot.

Castle #1, which we went into. There’s not a ton left, but it was pretty cool. When we think of castles, we usually have something more palace-ey in mind, but this was a Castle. Basically all thick walls and towers. Seriously, that thing could probably have taken a nuclear bomb. Perhaps not the comfiest place to live, though.

Town from the top of the castle, and the Neckar.

Manu on top of the wall. Told you it was intense.

We hiked down from the town and came to the Neckar (hence the town’s name, Neckarsteinach). There was a dam that we crossed over, and we watched a huge coal boat going through the loch which was pretty cool. I’d never seen that before.

Pretty!

I wish I had more to say about the excursion, but I’m not sure if I do. The pictures speak for themselves. It was a nice trip, and especially good because we managed to be touristy without being excessively so. We went out to a very German dinner, where I discovered Reislingschorle—Reisling mixed with seltzer, basically. It was actually quite good, and really didn’t taste watered down, just a bit... Lighter.

The next day, we packed up for Bavaria! Manuel had decided that he wanted to take ride-sharers, to help pay for gas, and we ended up with two girls in the back seat, one headed to Munich and the other to Rosenheim. There was going to be another boy as well, but turns out there was a misunderstanding—Manu thought it was one more person, but turns out it was two, and there’s no way we could fit 6 people in that car... Hell, four was cozy. So, they gave us gas money and company, and we gave them a ride. Does anything like this exist at home? It’s really cool. So, the whole trip worked out well, aided of course by the huge bag of food that we had brought along. There was something like 5 sandwices, juice, bananas, chocolates, gummybears... Yeah. We were well-prepared. Om nom nom.

Time for yet another boating adventure! On Saturday the 16th, Manuel, Juri and I loaded up the camping car, drove a little ways up the Rhine, and then packed up... The Catamaran. Made by Waldorf kiddies, I believe. We fit a ridiculous amount of stuff in there, and then Juri and I paddled upstream, while Manu surfed. Paddling was all kinds of uncomfortable because we had to sit on the platform and then paddle out in front of us... Anyways, we eventually got to an island. We had planned to go where we went last week, but it was under water! Guess there’s been a lot of rain.
















So much stuff! The boat was literally 2 inches out of the water with Juri and I in it.
















Because we thought it was going to rain (and dear god, did it rain...) we put up a tarp which ended up being the size of a small house! Crazy. We had a good evening, grilling, eating, and playing Dutch Blitz for about 2 hours. I think I’m going to need a new set of cards, because mine are all kinds of beat up!

That evening, after getting back and getting a little less wet, we watched the final of the Women’s World Cup, USA v. Japan. It was a really good game, and SO close! Sort of disappointed that we lost, because we really played the better game, but it was pointed out that if anyone else should win, Japan deserved it.

On Tuesday, the first properly sunny and warm day since I’ve been here, I decided to have a ridiculously touristy day around Heidelberg.















The city from the castle.















Castle! You can't really see it here, but it's this funny pink color, because that's just the color of the local stone. Makes it look just a bit less intimidating, though.















Yay! I took a picture of myself and it doesn’t look awful! By the way, I’m on the castle, and that’s the Neckar.















Outer side of the castle, and I think the green part used to be the moat. Apparently, during WWII, the Americans refused to bomb Heidelberg, because so many of them had traveled or studeied there, and they thought it was too beautiful to destroy. The French, however, did not have the same reservations, and that’s why the castle is looking a little worse for wear. (I’ll admit, I don’t actually know if the second part is true, but I know the first is).















This is apparently the German concept of a royal garden.















Just kidding, it used to look like this!















Ich bin dein Gummibär....















So, apparently, Heidelberg has the largest number of Americans outside of America. Or, something like that, because there are a TON of army bases! This one is right around the corner from his mom’s house. Craziness.

Hehehehe. There's something so satisfying about taking pictures of things that say not to...

This is really random, but I’m really excited, because whenever I go somewhere, I always think “man, I wish I had the habit or buying a patch or pin in every country I went to, because then I’d have this awesome collection of memoribilia.” But then I always think “Well, I’ve already been to so many places, that it’s stupid to start now.” But then I always go to more places... So, I finally made up my mind. In Heidelberg, I bought two little lapel pins, one with the German colors and an eagle, the other saying Heidelberg. Finally, I have my tradition! And here’s the clever part—I found a website (zazzle.com or something) that sells many things, including pins. So, I went and bought a pin for everywhere I’ve been (flag and/or national symbol pins). I’m going to have such an awesome collection :) I don’t know why, but it’s really exciting, although I won’t get them until I’m home. Too bad

Other things during the week involved: painting Manu’s mother’s kitchen (he then replaced all the cabinets), going to see a really impressive youth circus from... Costa Rica, I think, which was organized by a few of his friends, and finally seeing Harry Potter! Very exciting. I might have changed a few things, but overall it was fun. Hell, even Manu liked it.

On Sunday the 10th, I moved into my dorm room from the language school (the language school which goes by the name... F+U. No, seriously. I don’t know how they thought that was a good idea). Not a bad room, although the lighting was a little iffy. The cool thing is that Manu’s father let me borrow a bike of his, so I can bike to and from school, which is about 20 minutes or so. It makes me totally feel like a resident, which is really nice.

My room. Nothing special, but pretty roomy. Tiny little bed, though. For the first week there were 2 boys living ext to me, maybe 14 years old. And... Let’s just say that I fantasized about killing them. Ok, maybe not, but they made an incredible amount of noise. Seriously, it was impressive. They moved out after a week, though, so that was good.

Death by German grammar. UGH. I copied out all 200-something irregular vrebs in present, präteritum and perfekt, which took roughly forever.

Anyways, classes were alright. The first few days were hard. I had trouble understanding the professor (turns out, she’s Hungarian, and had an accent that threw me off at first), and was definitely behind the rest of the class. It was weird, though, because the grammar was nothing new, I mostly just had trouble following the directions. After the first few days, though, we split into two groups, and that was a lot better. It was only 9 of us, and we went a little slower. By the second week, I had a good grasp of it all, which was nice. Not the best classes I’ve ever taken, but if nothing else, it was really good to have German spoken at me for 3 hours every day.
Also, it was really cool who was in the class—an American, 2 Turkish, 1 Spanish, 1 Chinese, 1 Italian, 1 Ukranian, 1 Czech, 1 French. It was just so neat to be in a tiny little classroom with 9 countries represented (plus the Prof), with all of us trying to learn a language, and all working together. I guess that shouldn’t be so cool after MHC, but I think it was just so much more obvious here.

The view from my window, Viktoriastraße. It was about 6 minutes by 6 from Manuel’s mom’s house which was great, and I went over there quite a bit.

We decided to cook a German dinner one night (ironically, I did most of the cooking)—Saurkraut, Kartoffeln, Wurst (it was beef, promise!), and of course Bier. It’s Radler, though, which is half beer and half limonade... Which is like Sprite, I think? Anyways, it’s yummy, and sweet enough that even I can drink it.

My lovely bike which is about a century old :)

One of the great things about Heidelberg (and probably most German cities) is that they have bike lanes throughout the city. What’s not so awesome is that some of the streets have cobblestones which make for seriously awkward bike riding. I think it must really suck to drive a car in the city, though—Not only are there bikes everywhere and astronomical gas prices, but the trams (you can see the tracks in the photo) run right in the street, so cars have to stop all the time. Oof. Glad I have a bike!

Also, random fun fact—the name Heidelberg comes from “Heidelbeeren” which means blueberries. Apparently they used to grow on the hillside.

So, this might be a few weeks behind schedule, but it’s once more blogging time! “American in Montpellier” doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense right now, but... Deal with it. I’m not feeling clever enough to come up with another blog title right now.

Anyways, so, summer trip to Germany to improve my German and see Manuel! AKA, Emily wants to avoid the real world for a while longer... Either version works pretty well :)
So, I left for Germany on July 5th. Gotta say, Aer Lingus is wonderfully cheap, but not really the best airline ever. But, I got to Ireland without incident (Finally! Ireland!), and then off to Frankfurt. It totally felt like cheating to break the trip into 5 and 3-hour flights, instead of 9 hours straight. Much easier that way. Manuel met me at the airport which was exciting and a little terrifying, and we headed home to Heidelberg.

Our first few days were very lazy, with some walking around the city and spending time with his family. On Friday the 8th, we went to Mannheim to borrow a boat from his father (which he had made), and went boating on the Rhine!

But first I had to play on the trampoline with Juri. God, I love those things.

The Rhine goes right by Mannheim, so all we had to do was put the boat on a little cart-thing, and walk it down to the river! We definitely got some weird looks, though.

Heading up river with a motor! He taught me how to control the boat which was cool, although kinda scary. Although it makes your hand go numb rather soon. Also, what’s with the coal plant? I thought Germany was all for clean energy? Or, does that only count for nuclear

Manu driving :)

It was apparently all too easy, so the boat decided to start leaking. A lot. So, we had to try and sop some of it up with a towel and wring it out. But, we didn’t sink so it worked out all right.

Pretty..... We went to an island, and camped for the night :)

We got back on Saturday afternoon, went to dinner with his Aunt, Uncle and brother that evening. It was cool, because, although I couldn’t really participate in their conversation, I could follow it (mostly) which was a nice improvement :)

p.s. My apologies if the photos aren't great - I don't have a fast connection, so I had to reduce the size of the pictures so it wouldn't take all day to load

Like any good art geek, I felt it necessary to go render homage to arguably one of the world's greatest architectural achievements; the cathedral which marked the absolute beginning of the Gothic style, born in France in the 12th century, thanks to Abbot Suger and his abbey which was massively in need of repair. Welcome to the Saint Denis Basilica, located in the outskirts of Paris and is the burial place for nearly every French king and queen over the last thousand years:

So, after about 45 minutes of wandering around the Saint Denis, hopelessly lost... I stumbled across it! Big, intimidating, tall, kinda fortress-like (I mean, it was the middles ages...), three decorated portals, rose window... :)








Note the one bell tower. The other was taller and pointier (kinda New England church style), but was taken down in the 19th century because of some structural problem.










Rose window from the inside.













Upper left side of the choir. Love the stained glass!

















Nave, facing west, right at the transept. Note the organ and the fantastic vaulted ceilings.
















North side of the nave... Like the smoke? There was a group from a German tv station there to get some footage, and they wanted smoke to help catch the rays of sun. How cool!










Nothing better than finding a star of David in a Basilica :)












So, while Reims is where pretty much ever French king was crowned, Saint Denis is where they were all buried. Seriously, ALL of them, from the Merovingian kings to Louis XVIII.










Ceiling of the ambulatory. I LOVE these ceilings. Seriously, they're probably my favorite part.












Central window of the choir, with Saint Denis who is walking around, carrying his head after it was chopped off with an axe. Ah, zombies...















Have I mentioned how much I love these ceilings? They look like dragon scales or something...










Okay, done with the art geekiness...

... NEVER!