OK…so this post is a little delayed, but because I cannot tell time, I didn’t leave for Turkey yesterday so I have time to catch you up on Berlin (The Turkey story will come later, maybe when I have fond memories of the country instead of me being retarded - As if I don’t have enough emotional issues to deal with, now we have to add a learning disability).  

So the first weekend of October I went to Berlin with a huge group from my class.  I think like 85 of us went.  You would think that getting there would be simple because countries in Europe are smaller than states on the East Coast, and Denmark and Germany border each other, but you would be wrong in that train of thought.  My trip started at 5am when I had to bike 4.5 miles to my school with my weekend luggage.  I did a surprisingly good job of packing light but any bike ride at 5am, before coffee, in the rain is going to suck.  So I actually had to bike to my friend’s dorm to begin because she left her phone at the bar the other night and I told her I would bring it to her before I left for the weekend.  Well said friend got too hammered at the bar the night before and didn’t wake up to get her phone so I biked the extra distance for no reason.  But, like a good friend I snuck into the building and left her phone on her door.  This story could stop here but it gets better because 50 feet away from her building I popped a tire on my bike. 250DKK to get it fixed.  Again, must learn to stop going out of my way for friends.

So finally I get to the bus.  A two hour ride to the ferry where the bus drove on.  Then a 1.75 hour ferry ride to Germany followed by another 3 hour bus ride to Berlin.  After getting to Berlin CBS officially won the award for most unorganized trip ever.  We spent 45 minutes waiting outside of our hostel to get room keys…again would not have been a major problem if our hostel was not above the sex museum where all of the crazy sex addicts with crazy ass fetishes went to hang out.  Seriously, it took everything I had to not jump in a cab, drive to the nearest Marriott and get a room.  I get that I need to experience what it is like to be a “poor college kid” because my past experiences have spoiled me but do I really need to experience this much????

Once I got to my room I decided that the only thing that would improve my current mood would be a stead flow of alcohol for the weekend.  No problem here, as the hostel had a lobby bar where I got a pint of German draft beer for 2.25 EUR…that is less than $4…and, like a true male friend, Mike was right there with me every sip of the way.  After I calmed my shit we proceeded to go to ‘White Trash’ for dinner.  The place is famous and I have no idea what the atmosphere was supposed to be, but I do know that I was given free tickets for beer and I ate a chili cheese burger that tasted like America!!!!!  Again, Mike and I went sip for sip and this is hen the problems started.  Sometimes, you see, I forget that I am not a 6’ 200lb man (Event though Corey will forever classify me as a “Large Girl”).

After dinner my liquid blanket kept me warm enough to walk around Berlin for like 3 hours looking at buildings that probably had great historical relevance.  I wouldn’t have known at the time.

I woke up Saturday feeling decent.  Rumor had it there was a nearby so you bet I was like a police dog looking for it.  But in true European style, Starbuks doesn’t open until 9am on the weekends…seriously!  So I had to settle for Dunkin Donuts, whish I have never been a large fan of, but I needed something from America because the homesickness was starting to sink in.  

So I was joed up and ready for the day.  We bused it over the East Berlin (After waiting on the bus for an hour because the tour guides were late!), and took a three hour walking tour of all the historical buildings.  Honestly, our tour guide was the best I have every had.  She was amazing - like I think  developed a girl crush on here.  I will post a slideshow above of my favorite pics.  I was absolutely amazed at East Berlin!!!!  You would think that West berlin (Capitalist) side would have been nicer but East Berlin was just beautiful (Probably because that is where are the government buildings and memorials are).  The fall colors were just beautiful and it was a perfect sunny day!  I defiantly recommend going to Berlin and taking a walking tour.  I wish I had another day in the city and would defiantly like to go back in the future.  My favorite memorial was the one dedicated to those that lost their lives in the Holocaust.  The memorial is actually quite controversial because it was so expensive (about 25mm EUR), and because it is so large.  

Saturday night we went to dinner at a traditional German place recommended by our tour guide.  I had sausage and sauerkraut with boiled potatoes.  IT WAS SOOOOO GOOD!  Then the pub crawling began.  The following are the bullt points from the rest of the night:

1) I went to not one, but two pub crawls in one night.

2) At 21, I had my first cigarette smoking lesson (courtesy of the French). 

3) Favorite Bar = Whichever one was an actual beach with sand and tiki tourches.

4) Defiantly had a 15 minute conversation with a man with no teeth. 

5) Germany is not like Denmark where people speak English…hello Lost in Translation.

6) Berlin is a HUGE city…takes like 2o minutes to get from the city center to the edge of the city on the train.

7) I wasn’t allowed into a bar after paying the cover (I think because I was an American but we will never really know why)

8) Being left alone in some random corner of Berlin at 2am is sketch…

So that was my night in Berlin.  On Sunday we visited a concentration camp, but I can’t speak about that.  There is actually little to know cultural information in this post so if you want any of that stuff ask me when i get home or go google Berlin on your own.

Vi Ses!!!! 

I leave for Istanbul/Antalya, Turkey in 3 hours.  The next week will be life-changing.  

“The best way to prepare for life is to begin to live.”

-Elbert Hubbard

The most amazing thing happened to me this weekend.  I went to Berlin and for two whole days I was supremely happy.  Not because I was making a ton of money, or spending money on lavish things for that matter, but because I was laughing and smiling.

Those two days were perfect.  None of the people with me on that trip can read this blog, but I think they know how happy I was - my face reads like a book.  To those friends - THANK YOU.

I also got a very happy piece of information not too long ago.  I am trying to not jump to conclusions and stay level headed (Dad, you want me to get better at this but it is VERY hard).  I will let you know how things turn out!  A long Berlin post will follow shortly as well.

Good Night all.  Be well and be happy.

xx -E 

Alright so you had to know that this post was coming.  I mean, Elise can attest to the fact that there are few things in this life that are more important to me than a proper bathroom break.  Are my priorities out of whack? Probably.  Do I care?  Absolutely not.  Unfortunately, nobody informed me that using the bathroom in Europe was going to traumatize me for the rest of my life.  

Let us begin with size.  Because, after all, size does matter.  Like everything else in America, the toilets are huge.  Like, if your butt can actually fill up an entire seat you either need to loose weight of you need to start making some money off it like the Kardashians.  Still, it is like cuddling up into a size-and-a-half chair and feeling so small and insignificant.  You might not need the extra room, but you want to know that it is there.  Unfortunately, there is no such luck here in Europa World where everything is made for the Roloff Family.  Sp the fact that I feel like the BFG every time I go to use the restroom is just not comforting.

Moving on.  People always say that you should not “Shit where you eat”.  Fair enough.  I also do not think that you should shit where you shower…I mean doesn’t that, in itself, sound like an oxymoron?  But in Euro Land, nothing gets in the way of saving space so you shower right where the toilet is.  Much like the set-up in the camper my parents recently bought that I will never use (There is a reason all of our past few family homes have had three floors and three tv’s - cramming us together in a camper is the worst idea ever.  However, the parentals are off the kid train so I don’t think I would be invited on a trip anyways).  I just do not understand why it was too difficult to build a 1’ divider between the shower area and the toilet?  Instead, when you shower you spray water frickin’ everywhere, and as a result have to use a squeegee and scrape all of the walls and the floor to push the water towards the drain.  Of course, with it comes dirt from the walls and floor and hair from the shower.  Again, it makes no sense to essentially have to clean right after you, yourself, got clean.  Two oxymorons do not make a right people.

Finally, God created two different forms of human (Well, this is neither the time nor the place for a LBGTQ debate, so for the sake of simplicity we will stick to 2).  Men and women are genetically and socially different.  Sure we mix well at times but there are also times when we need to be separated.  Using the restroom is one of those times.  Co-ed bathrooms are probably the worst part of this whole situation.  I mean there is nothing I hate more than walking into the bathroom and waiting in line with a bunch of guys to go to the bathroom,then hearing a bunch of guys go to the bathroom, and walking out of the bathroom with a bunch of guys.  The only time I would ever walk out of a bathroom but a bunch of guys in the states is if I were pulling a LiLo and getting my Coke on at a club.  I mean, not to mention how much I loathe when guys watch me fix my hair or make-up.  It is like they get a secret view into the magic box where women go when they look disheveled and bloated, and get to see how we fix ourselves up and get skinny instantly.  Some things are better left a mystery in my opinion.  

People have been asking me if I am homesick because I have been away from UT for so long now.  I am not homesick, but culture sick.  I miss the states, I miss being able to afford meat, I miss driving, I miss being able to communicate, I miss having stuff to do, and I miss a good home bowl.

HAVE A GOOD WEEK ALL.  -E   

Book a ski trip.  I refuse to come all the way to Europe and not go skiing.  Let’s hope for early snow…Where should I go?

Strike that…new weekend goal is to find a place to live since my roommate is moving out and I can’t afford to stay here by myself.  Seriously life? like not even two months of reduced anxiety?  

Last Night Jules and I set out to explore Nørrebro.  One of the neighborhoods in Copenhagen meaning “North End”.  I have biked through the neighborhood many times while going from school in Fredericksburg to downtown Copenhagen, but have never stopped to walk around the narrow streets filled with corner cafes and small shops.  We met at the Forum Train station at 9pm and when I was riding up Jules was already there yelling to me to ride faster.  Apparently she wanted me to get out of the way because the ‘Ally Cats’ underground bikers were having street races and she had just watched two guys crash into eachother.  I was biking right in the middle of their path!!!  So, I crossed the street to meet up with Jules and we watched the Ally Cats organize and get ready to leave to where ever the next race was going to be.  Right before leaving one of the guys set off a HUGE firework in the middle of a crowded street…that is when Jules and I decided to leave also.  

From there, we started to walk around Nørrebro.  I wanted to park my bike and walk around but as we started to lock our bikes up we saw four guys shining a flashlight into a car and trying to Jimmy the lock.  Maybe they locked their keys inside, but we still didn’t want to take any chances so we continued walking before actually parking our bikes. When we finally did get our bikes parked, we happened to be outside of a brilliant candy shop!  Since I had not been to one in years we decided to go in a but some sweets to energize us for the night.  My prized chocolate was a chocolate covered marshmallow shaped dolphin.  

So…let’s see, now we had our bikes parked, bags of sweets, oh yes and beer that I brought with me so we were ready to explore the neighborhood.  We walked around for a bit, had guys yell things at us in Danish, and eventually made it to the lakes.  The lakes, as everybody refers to them here, are the five man-made rectangular-shapped lakes that separate the inner city from the outter city of Copenhagen.  They are only four feet deep and when it gets colder we will be able to ice skate on them!!!!  We ended up sitting on a bench on the lake for a while talking about NYC (Jules wants to visit there so badly and sometimes I forget how lucky I am to have lived there for so long.  So she was grilling me about places to go and things to see).  

We finally started to get cold so we went back to our bikes and rode them to the party we originally wanted to go to.  The party was at this massive white mansion on the edge of one of the lakes.  Jules, pulling the “Loast American Card” even though she is Canadian, chatted up the bouncer to make sure we could get in when the doors opened later in the night.  Clubs here do not even open until midnight or 1am…the Euros rage so hard!!!!  We had some time to kill so I convinced Jules to bike with me over to a Hookah bar I saw a few days ago.  

Copenhagen Cafe is the name o the bar/lounge and it turns out it has only been open for two weeks.  When we walked in the whole lounge was filled with Hookah smoke and I just looked at Jules and said “Sit down, this is going to be good”.  Thats right, up-tight Erin frickin’ loves the Hookah.  Jennina and Jason got me addicted to it earlier this year and I must say it was a major reason why I agreed to go to Turkey with my friends.  So Jules and I sat for the next hour and a half and smoked from a 30” hookah.  We had apple flavor which was good, but dangerously verged too much towards black licorice flavor so we will not be having it again.  On a side note, who really likes black licorice?  We were the only girls in the entire place and not to mention the only white people (I felt so at home being that I was the token white person all Summer).  

The lounge ended up closing but our waiter liked us so much that he let us stay and finish our pipe while he cleaned up.  THEN…(here’s the kicker), he asked if Jules and I wanted to go to Christiana with him to a club that his friend worked at.  Now, I think the fact that I have opened my lungs to shisha is one thing, the hash is quite a large jump up.  So we decided not to go, but told him that we will defiantly will take him up on his offer another night (probably when our friend Emilie can come).  Anyway our waiter ended u giving us a huge discount on our drinks and I’m pretty sure the discounts will continue as the place is a major sausage fest and our presence is greatly appreciated.         

By the time the pipe died, I was WAY to long gone to make it back to the party so I saddled up my trashy bike and enjoyed the most amazing bike ride home along the lakes.  Touche, Jules…amazing night.