Being rats, daytime absinthe and other year abroad tales.

Despite some melancholic feelings towards the end of the week, all's well in Auslandsjahr world! So, my last post ended on Friday, yes? Well. I went to see Burlesque Friday evening with Svenja. It was lovely to see Svenja again and to catch up on Christmas/talk Harry Potter =) The film Burlesque however, was something else. To most normal, culture appreciating, music loving film fans, this film would be potentially the most devastating thing to have ever happened to Hollywood. However, I thought it was AMAZING. Cher's unmoveable, expressionless face, Christina's predictable moves, glitter, cheesy music and a hot hot man? BEST FILM EVER. OK, at the time of watching, I groaned OUT LOUD at how bad the storyline was, but I definitely downloaded the soundtrack (my Itunes counter says it's beenplayed 6 times....). So, I apologies if your estimations of me have gone down, but Burlesque is most certainly a guilty pleasure of mine!

OK, my confessions gone and out the way, let's swiftly move onto

my Saturday! So, I got up nice and early to set off to Hameln, or auf Englisch, Hamelin!

This, my friends, is where the Pied Piper (or Rattenfänger for you Deutsch lovers!) story comes from, and I've been wanting to visit since th

e beginning of the year. Niedersachsen/Lower Saxony is always put down for being a bit redundant o

f wonderful places to visit, but if there's one thin

g to get out of my year abroad it is to not judge a book by it's cover! I've discovered so many wonderful little places in Lower Saxony, and Hameln is high on the list of my favorites.

So after a 3 1/2 hour train journey, helped a lot

by the tales of Annwyn and Nathan's Christmas', we arrived in good old Hameln. We sauntered on into the town and wandered through what was a very pretty, yet quite samey, old town. Funny shaped buildings were scattered everywhere, all trying to sell me rats of any description. Obv not real ones. The Pied Piper sorted that out.

The winner of the "best rat themed touristy gift" goes to the Likör shop we found....that sold "Rattengift" (rat poison) and "Rattenblut" (rat blood!). So we were perusing and taking photos of these funny bottles, and we were asked if we wanted to try. Being the students we are, we hastily said yes, and tried said blood and

poison! Now here it must be noted for the slightly lesser minded readers that this was not actual blood and poison, but schnapps and absinthe. Thus, two shots of these and I was well on my way. We returned to this shop later in the afternoon, to sample some more delights and do a bit of shopping (Samuel Cosgrove, I bought an amazing present for you when I visit you from there!). I also bought myself a cheeky wee bottle of Mango and Jalapeno schnapps, that has now joined my "Zeitreise" Schnapps that

I got from the Medieval market on my shelf of things that will never get drunk. I'll have to schlepp them back home for fourth year house parties, me thinks :)

Anyway, said absinthe shot definitely turned me insane. We found a Pied Piper statue, which I then INSISTED we all be rats and Pipers by. In hindsight, I apologise prefusely to Nathan and Annwyn! Ha! We then discovered a really lovely German pub with proper German food, where we hid away for hours, chat, ate and drank, before embarking on what felt like an epic trek of a journey home!

Sunday came, and I worked on my workshop for Warsaw most of the day. My trip to see Magda and Richie next weekend is mostly for pleasure, however I am also giving workshops on "England Today" in Warsaw. I have stitched lots of old lesson plans and new ideas together into a workshop, and I'm really looking forward to giving it a go! Scared, but excited scared! Powerpoints aside, I went for a beautiful lunch at Annette's, and then we went for a small walk in the glorious sunshine! It was a perfect day for me, a nice mixture of productivity and pleasure!

And since Sunday my week has been a blur of school, lessons, Kaffee with Karolina//Kaffee with Cornell and weekend planning! Tomorrow I'm going to see Rachel in Hanover, and on Sunday people are coming to experience Diepholz for themselves! We, my friends, will see...