arbeiten, genießen, und der Abschied: to work, to enjoy, and the farewell

Whew!! These last two weeks have been JAM PACKED with writing papers and trying to see everything that I have yet to see in Berlin! I have 2 10-ish page papers that I had to write (in German, of course) and so I spent a lot of time in these two weeks cafe-hopping (Maureen and I tagteamed using this great website we found: cafekulturberlin.blogspot.com to find fun, new, and Berlin-ish places to study). My first paper was for my history class (called American Perspectives on German History from Bizmark to Hitler). I've never written a history paper before, and the German school system has a slightly different format for papers. In the United States, if you don't make an argument and say something original, then the paper is "not that good." But in Germany, if you don't use the arguments that other people have already argued and pit them against each other, then the paper is "not that good." Perhaps it is ACTUALLY the same thing, just explained in different ways. Regardless, I had countless meetings with my tutor trying to form a thesis on something regarding Hyperinflation in the 1920s and the Dawes Plan (since I didn't take any business courses this semester, I thought I would at least get a taste of business in the context of history.) Luckily, in spite of it being so difficult for me to form a thesis around the topic, I found the topic extremely interesting. My other paper was about Augustine and Aquinas and their philosophy on lying, so the format of the paper was a little more straightforward in terms of comparing and contrasting.

view from Cara's

A few final tourist destinations in Berlin: Maureen and her dad and I went to St. Hedwig's Cathedral for Mass one Sunday. We were planning on going the week before, but luckily didn't because the Bishop sadly passed away while we were here in Berlin and his funeral was that day.

Maria and I went to Hamburger Bahnhoff, a former train station turned modern art museum. We had SO MUCH FUN. It was really cool to see all of the art there. I've finally acknowledged that in general, I'm not a huge museum person. But I DO like modern art, so it was very fun to see.

Also, Maureen, Hilary and I took a tour of the Konzerthaus. This was very cool for me because my hostmom works here, so it was great to see the inside. Not to mention, the inside was beautiful! and we had this really great tour guide who spoke very deutlich (clearly) and langsam (slowly) -- but not too slow! But we were able to understand her very, very well. Although HOPEFULLY this also has something to do with the fact that we've spent the last 6 months practicing our listening skillz : )

Other important happenings: Maureen, Hilary, Maria and I finished watching How I Met Your Mother! We started in April watching the first episode of season one, and it was always a fun study break at night to get together and hang out with each other for an hour or so. But we are now all caught up with the episodes that have been released. We're already excited to have Berlin reunions once a week to watch the show when it comes back in the fall.

Speaking of comedy, we went to go see my friend Matt do comedy at a bar in Berlin. It was great to see him, but we also got to see all of the other comedians after him. The show was all in English, and it was definitely interesting to see native and non-native English speakers doing their routines. The most fun for me (besides seeing Matt, of course) were all of the jokes about Germans/Berlin that I actually got because I understand German/Berlin. This one guy listed his "Top 10 Favorite Things About Berlin" which was extremely funny after my time here.

So I know I said I was done traveling with Oslo -- Just Kidding!! Hilary and Maureen found out that we could take a day trip to Szczecin (can YOU pronounce it?!), a city in Poland on the boarder between Poland and Germany (the town actually used to be in Germany before the redistribution after WWII. We got to use Polish money. Also exciting and hilarious -- the town has painted a red dotted line throughout the city with a corresponding map with all of the Sehenswürdikeiten (things worth seeing) to encourage tourism. The town is a port city, and it was interesting to see the similarities and differences between a smaller German town and Szczecin (or Stettin, in German).

me "planking" by the red line

One of the last things that I did after finishing my paper was see my friends Ahmed and Walid again! I met them last time I was in Germany (June 2009) at a language school (the Goethe Instutit in Bonn) and we weren't sure when we'd see each other next, but we were able to hang out in March and then again this past weekend. Hilary also knows them through me, so it was fun to hang out with them and speak German for a little while. Also, my German has improved so much since first meeting them, and so it's cool to be able to gage my process. The first time we met we spoke almost only in English (and they made fun of my accent that I had when speaking German all the time! -- although I still have an accent, it's improved so much! Actually, I've had lots of people thinking I was from northern Europe and not the United States, so apparently my American r's are getting less pronounced. Hopefully anyway.) So when we hung out in March, we spoke about 50-50 English and German. But this past time, we spoke almost entirely in German. Also, we met at Cara's, so I was able to say goodbye. (PS just for Mom -- the one on Ku'damm, not at Ernst-Reuter. I looked for travel mugs from Cara's for souvenirs for us but they didn't have travel mugs or non-travel mugs or anything but plain ol' coffee).

For my last night in Berlin, I met my friends Hilary, Hannah, Monika, Matt and Lauren at Schwarzes Cafe, a cafe that's in one of my favorite parts of Berlin. They have Hilary's favorite type of German beer (Augustiner) on tap, so we ordered German meals, drank German beer, and enjoyed seeing each other's company for one last time (except Hilary, none of them go to Notre Dame. Although they are all from the States, so we'll definitely be able to stay in contact. Especially when KU or Notre Dame plays and beats North Carolina -- then I will be calling Hannah and Matt to rub it in!)

There was one last thing that I REALLY wanted to do before leaving Berlin. This is a surprise for Pappy -- but I emailed Grandma Barb to get more information on where EXACTLY he was in Berlin. Well, she found the exact bar where HE celebrated his 21st birthday, including the phone number for the place! So I went over and found where it was and took lots of picture to see what it's like now. It's still a bar! Although there was lots of scaffolding, so I didn't get any wonderful pictures. I'm not sure that it's called the same thing as when Pappy went there, because I didn't recognize the name as any of the ones that he told me. But it was still so cool for me to see.

Very weird to think that Pappy was my exact age when he was in Berlin, especially because I never really picked Berlin; it just kind of happened. Overall, though, I'm so so glad that this is where I found myself this semester : )

AND NOW TO SEE MY FAMILY AND FRIENDS BACK IN THE STATES!!!

Liebe Grüße, Love,

Emma