Home. Augsburg. Konstanz. And a cheeky bit of Switzerland, thrown in for good measure.

"Don't it always seem to go, that you don't know what you've got 'till it's gone?"

So, I did quite a lot with my Herbstferien, or Autumn Holidays, to say they were just two weeks long! I flew into Edinburgh, which was so great, but I definitely cannot stand the studenty pace anymore! Having said that, I managed two very substantial nights out, and saw lots of people I wanted to see, so all in all, a good time was had =)

Then I went home. Which was perfect! Lots of sleeping, eating good food, seeing old friends and chilling.

Back to the mainland Europe stuff...

I flew back to Germany, into Munich Airport on the 19th October. I didn't get to catch a glimpse of much more than Munich airport, as I skidaddled off to the city of Augsburg!

Augsburg is lovely. It's this quaint little city, a fourty minute train ride outside of Munich. It has everything and more, and is such a nice University town! Ailsa and I did a lot of catching up, as well as wandering around Augsburg, seeing all there is to see. Brechthaus (we didn't go in, a picture outside was sufficient!), a lovely grand Cathedral, and lots of lovely little rickety streets. We found a pub called Dudelsack, which is the German word for bagpipes...never have I been so keen to enter a pub, however it looked ever so slightly elite, so we decided against trying it out...

We went to the Botanical Gardens one day too! Which was super, really really pretty, but definitely the wrong time of the year to go...far too cold, and things were starting to die....all the same, we managed to find a play park to play in, and a cool greenhouse (although it did nearly suffocate us...) with lots of big tropical plants.

Oh my, I am typing more like a five year old than usual. Apologies.

So, I left Augsburg on Friday morning, and embarked on my trip to Konstanz. The quickest way for me to get there was by boat over Bodensee, which was a beautiful, and exciting experience. The views were so picturesque, and I felt like such a tourist as I snapped away at the sights on my phone. I think I was potentially the only person on that boat that wasn't travelling home, or to work...

Once Janni met me on the harbour, we spoke at each other, and quite often over each other, for the majority of the day...I sometimes wonder how we are friends, as we both have equal sized gobs, and blabber far too much! We had lunch at a good old German Brauhaus, (I had my new favorite thing, Flammekuchen..like pizza, but better/German!), drank some German beer, and then went on a walk with one of the teachers from Janni's school, to this really quirky little fish shop, which was inside someone's house! It sold all sorts of everything. It was brill! Jans and I then trecked back to his, had dinner, then went out....a quiet night out, resulted in us singing the Sound of Music and Moulin Rouge Soundtrack on our walk home. You can take us out of Northern England/Scotland....

Our hangovers were very substantial the next day, however, we managed to battle our way (by train, not by actual battle) to Basel, in Switzerland. Basel was fantastic, and just how I expected Switzerland to be. Everything was ridiculously overpriced, but everything was perfect. Tourist shops were organised and perfect, the people were not arrogant and lairy, and best of all, the trams had witty slogans like "Ich komme dreimals pro Nacht" (I come three times a night....advertising trains, obv).

Sleazy slogans aside, the place was total schoen! We wandered up and down and embarked on an architectural tour...sadly, my mind falters and I cannot remember names of any of the marvellous buildings we saw, but we took many many photos, so if you're curious, check my facebook when I have got around to uploading :P

We finished off Basel with a typical Swiss delicacy, Cheese fondue...we ate far too much, and slept all the train journey home.....

That was the end of my Herbstferien! I jumped on a train and headed back to Diepholz the next morning. I am struggling so much to write today, which I am hoping is a sign of my brain switching back into German again. Failing that, I am just losing both languages!

Tag der Deutschen Einheit, Berlin, and very little sleep.

My life took a U-turn this weekend! As I have mentioned more than once, my life in Germany is normally quite sleepy, definitely un-studenty and to be honest, all quite grown up! This weekend, however, I most definitely reverted to being a typical 20 year old...

A group of us from Edinburgh, and also a few from Altenberg training weekend, all decided to meet up this weekend to celebrate one of the girl's birthdays in Berlin. This quite nicely coincided with the 20th anniversary of the day of German unity, which meant that the city was jam-packed with people wanting to celebrate! My main sightseeing day was Saturday, and Sam, Bronagh and I went exploring the typical Sehenswürdigkeiten of Berlin. We visited a remaining bit of the Berlin Wall, Reichstag, Brandenberg Tör...all the things that make up Germany's history. I love Berlin. As you walk round, you can feel all the events that have happened, the things you learn in the classroom more or less come to life around you. To think I am older than unified Germany is quite strange...

One of my favorite things about Berlin is are the Ampelmänner, and the endless memorabilia you can my in relation to them. Earrings, keyrings, tea towels, pasta-you name it, they sell it. To those non-Germans in my life, the Ampelmänner are the traffic light men, or figures, that you see when your crossing the road...only, when you are in former East Germany, they look like this...
There a bit of Ostalgie, or Eastern nostalgia, being one of the few things to have survived the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the transformation of Eastern Germany into Western culture. Berlin's souvenir shops thrive off these Ampelmänner, but I love that the traffic lights have stayed despite Westernisation. It reminds me that divided Germany wasn't just a story, and that the signs of this split are still present as you walk around. It has only been 21 years since the fall of the Wall, and although the country is all very much Westernised, it is interesting to see that there are still some differences. My friend Sam, for instance, lives about as East as you can get before falling into the Czech Republic, and his town "Chemnitz" still has an air of Communism, it's focal point being a statue of Karl Marx. In fact, up until 1990, the town was called 'Karl-Marx Stadt'. To me, it is so interesting to see that although Germany is entirely unified, the two former 'countries' can at times be entirely different, and to visit places where communism isn't entirely forgotten is all quite strange.

Moving on from traffic light men, where our daytimes were filled with sightseeing, our two evenings spent in Berlin were both quite crazy. On Saturday evening, we had dinner by Brandenberg Gate, which was suprisingly cheap despite the brilliant location. We followed this with plenty of Glühwein whilst partially watching the bands that were playing to celebrate this anniversary of German Unity. We then went to a bar, which later on also became almost like a club, and drank, talked and danced until 7am...me and Sam had to check out of our youth hostel at 10am, which meant the 9am rise was not at all pretty, whatsoever. We somehow survived the morning, somewhat inebriated, and I managed to catch my very lengthy train home.

Our Youth Hostel was brilliant, and in fact, if you are planning to visit Berlin in the near future, I cannot recommend 'Wombats' nearly enough. It is all very clean, breakfast is cheap, and it has a small cheap bar on the top floor. To add to this, there is a patio on the top floor, attatched to the bar, which over looks Berlin. The view is astounding, as you can see in the picture to the right, and it was a perfect place for a glass of red wine before heading out into Berlin for the evening. I've stayed in a Wombats Hostel in Munich before as well, and although it was entirely lacking in a bar with such a great view, it was equally clean, and its' services of a high standard. The best thing about this hostel was that it was so central, very close to Alexanderplatz, which meant that our time and money wasn't consumed by travel.

So there we are! My first trip away at a weekend since being in Germany. I fly to Scotland, and then home, this weekend for Autumn Holidays, and then I have my trip down to see Ailsa and Janni in the South of Germany. I truly cannot wait to be home, I'm not homesick, but I do miss everyone, and I am very much excited for a proper Sunday Roast with my family =) Sometimes, British food is just the best!