A Long Post, for a Short Time

So I meant to write a post over the weekend before I left for our trip, but I unfortunately didn't have any internet for 2 days. So I'll just write it now!

The Weekend

So it's now March, and it's hard to believe that I've been in Germany for a month and a half. We spent the entire month of February around Freiburg, which is amazing. It's also crazy that we've been in classes for as long as we have, we're already approaching mid-terms.

We've gotten to know Freiburg a lot better and have had some really interesting experiences getting to know the town. Last Friday a group of us decided that we wanted to play a little soccer game. So we headed over to a local field and started kicking the ball around. After awhile we found some Germans playing and set up a little game. We played a nice friendly competitive game and had a nice cultural experience while we were at it. That evening some of us got together to play some charades and other games.

On Saturday morning I got up and headed out to enjoy the beautiful weather and headed into the Black Forest. I headed up the Schönberg, a nice "mountain" near my dorm. The weather was completely beautiful and the forest was amazing. I took some wonderful pictures of the German countryside, the open fields, and of Freiburg from above!

The unfortunate part of playing Soccer and Hiking is that my legs were then very very sore. I'm still recovering from a few minor aches and pains almost a week later!

On Saturday evening I played in the "First Annual Freiburg Beer Pong Tournament" in the true Olympic spirit. I played as Russia and won several games before losing to the USA (naturally). It was a good time hanging out and enjoying other's company. Oddly the German's are not big on any drinking games like American college students are.

On Sunday my friend Chris and I headed to Stuttgart to see what it had to offer. Stuttgart is the headquarters for both Porsche and Mercedes-Benz and they both have excellent museums. We headed over to the Mercedes museum and enjoyed it a bunch. They have 8 floors of cars starting with the first motorcars and proceeding all the way to the future of their vehicles. The museum was humongous and contained hundreds of cars of all types. There are some vehicles of famous people as well. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Mercedes is displayed, along with the truck from "Jurassic Park: The Lost World" and Princess Diana's car. They even have the "Pope-mobile." We had a great time, and spent almost 5 hours in the museum starting at the oldest automobiles and going all the way to R&D for future models. The sheer amount of innovation and engineering that has gone into the vehicles over the last 120 years is really amazing and it's hard to believe that one company has existed since the beginning.

We didn't have time to enjoy the Porche Museum, but did spend a bit of time walking around downtown Stuttgart before starting to head home, which actually turned into quite an adventure.

There is an excellent deal with Deutsche Bahn that allows 5 people to go anywhere in one state for only 28 Euros. This is a really good deal and is much cheaper than buying individual tickets. There are a number of other deals too that make travelling an easy and affordable thing to do on the weekends. Unfortunately we missed the last train home on our ticket, so I ended up paying more for an express train home. Just the lessons you learn by traveling though. I now know to always check when the last train home departs!

On Monday morning we headed out on our next great adventure to the EU Institutions on Luxembourg, Brussels, and Paris! Here are the collected stories so far.

Luxembourg

After an early departure we arrived in Luxembourg around lunch time. We headed out into the downtown area and immediately started taking pictures. Luxembourg is a picturesque and quaint city. There are a number of old fortifications around the city that have been either restored or maintained. The city was founded in 963 so it has a lot of history and is wonderful to see. Unfortunately the city is not very large and you can see the whole thing in just a few hours. We also stopped by the EU Info Center and picked up some good information on the EU and got a few posters.

After lunch we headed over to the European Court of Justice and had a presentation from one of the legal staff there. the ECJ is housed in a beautiful building that is currently under renovation/expansion. We learned how the legal system of the EU is quite different than any other system and that they are in the unique position of checking large amounts of legislation and hearing vast numbers of cases.

Brussels
That evening we arrived in Brussels. A couple of us went out to a restaurant and wandered around the city for a little while. We didn’t arrive until rather late, so we simply turned in early and got some sleep for our big day on Tuesday.

On Tuesday we started off the day by visiting the Council of Ministers and the European Council. The two instutions meet in the same building and both work to build the EU. The European Council is all the Heads of State for the EU members, so they are a pretty big deal. We talked to a translator who works there, and with the 23 official EU languages.

After the meeting we had the opportunity to tour Brussels, which we took full advantage of by walking around in the nice weather, seeing the sights and taking plenty of pictures. We saw The Gran Platz, Manneken Pis (a statue of a boy peeing), The Royal Palace, various government buildings, squares and churches. We looked at the St. Michaels Cathedral, which was a beautiful cathedral of white stone with amazing stain glass windows.  It was a great afternoon and we were pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to walk between the sights.

That afternoon we headed to the Turkish Mission (similar to an Embassy) to the European Union. We talked about the possibilities, and challenges of Turkish ascension to the European Union. Let me know if you want the full story and debate, it’s a rather lengthy issue!

After a day of meetings it was time for some Belgian Beer. There was a famous bar just down the street from our hotel. The Delirium Bar has over 100 bars on tap, and some of them are very interesting. Though I didn’t get a chance to try them all I did have a few really great beers. They have beer from all over the world, including a few from Colorado (Left Hand and Flying Dog). We enjoyed the company of some other student groups who happened to be visiting Brussels from a study abroad program in Copenhagen and a group of British students. Quite a nice evening.

Another early morning on Wednesday took us to a meeting with the Flemish representation in Brussels. Flanders is a region within Belgium which, like the other regions, has quite a lot of power over its own policies without the oversight of the Belgian government. Afterwards we headed to the Chocolate Museum in Brussels and did some souvenir/chocolate shopping. The Chocolate museum was a bit of a letdown as it wasn’t very large, interpretative, or educational. We then headed over to the EU Commission and talked with several representatives from different committees about EU Energy policy, with special respect to Russian natural gas and oil pipelines. The other speaker talked about the Turkish ascension question from the EU perspective as well as the general idea of expanding the EU to other countries within Europe.

Yesterday we departed early to head to NATO and learn about the future of NATO efforts and roles in the world, as well as the US position within the EU. It was an educational experience as we received various opinions on what the future of NATO was, and should be after the fall of the Soviet Union, and what role Europe vs. the US should play. After that we headed South and stopped at Waterloo for lunch. Waterloo is the site of the most historic European battle of the 19^th century and the final stand of the Allied nations against Napoleon Bonaparte’s rule in France. After the battle Napoleon was exiled and spent the rest of his days writing his memoirs. The battle site didn’t have much to offer in the way of interpretation or information, which made it hard to understand what happened. We continued south, making it to Paris yesterday evening.

I’ll write about Paris once I return to Freiburg, as to not spoil the fun!

As always, thank you for reading, I love hearing from anyone or talking about things I’ve done if you have any questions.