Last Sunday I took a seven hour train to Berlin for the Fubright Mid-Year Conference. This year the theme was "the future of transatlantic relations." Our days were full of seminars and panel discussions with topics like "Life after Fulbright," "European Dimensions," and "The Value of Networks." The keynote speaker at the opening ceremony was the former U.S. Ambassador to Germany John Kornblum (whose kids went to Vanderbilt, incidently, so I'd heard him speak on our campus before). If you're not sure who he is, he's the guy who wrote President Reagan's famous speech with the line, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" We also got to attend an incredible performance put on by the current Fulbright grantees in the area of music. Those performers were truly masters of their arts.

Wednesday night was the farewell party, held in one of the more famous and popular clubs in Berlin (Die Kulturbrauerei). The music was great, and the best part about it was that everyone actually danced! We may have been a group of 350 academic nerds, but we sure did know how to party. In fact, I think the Fulbright Commission will be revising its free beer and wine policy after this year . . . The director actually made a comment during one of the seminars that we were the "thirstiest" group of Fulbrighters in history.

Stefana and me, posing with the Berlin Bear before the farewell party:

While most meals were spent at the Humboldt Restaurant in the Park Inn, where we all enjoyed complimentary (and incredible!) breakfasts and dinners, I did have a few occasions to sample some local Berlin cuisine. One of those delicacies is "currywurst." It is basically a grilled sausage, sliced into pieces and doused in a ketchup sauce flavored with curry powder. If that description doesn't convince you, maybe this will:

On Thursday, the conference ended and most people headed back to their respective cities all over Germany and Europe. Over the course of just a few days, I had met the most interesting people--a girl studying food culture, body image, and HIV/AIDS in Sicily, for instance, or one in Norway doing climate change research during the week and hiking to fjörds every other weekend. I took lots of notes, ranging in topic from the shift in the context of the relationship between the United States and Europe over the past fifteen years to what the deputy mayor of Berlin, Ingeborg Junge-Reyer, had to say about the topic of collective German guilt. In fact, I'd like to share with you what she said about that topic, which is one that I find particularly interesting:

"Our past obligates us to openness and tolerance. It is not guilt over the past that is important, but the matter of taking responsibility for the future that should define this generation of Germans."

Amen, sister.

Thursday afternoon, my friends Dan, Gwen, and Christoph drove up to Berlin and met Lauren and me there. I hadn't had much time during the conference to do any sightseeing, but I knew I would get the chance once they arrived. Dan has spent a total of almost a year living in Berlin, so he knew the city inside and out and was an excellent tour guide. Our first order of business was to grab a few Berliner Pilsners and head to Mauerpark, which is a park that has pieces of the wall lining one side of it, and a big open market on Sundays along the other.

Against the Berlin Wall in Mauerpark:

We did a lot of typical tourist things, like visiting the Brandenburg Gate and the Holocaust Memorial, as well as the Jewish Museum . . .

But we also went to a few places that I had never been before, like Tacheles, which is a huge abandoned building filled with graffiti 'art' but that also has an actual art gallery on its top floor, and the East Side Gallery, which is a chunk of the Berlin Wall about a kilometer long that has been painted over by professional artists (and repainted over, in some cases, by less professional 'artists').

One of my favorite sections of the East Side Gallery:

Despite a bad bout of the stomach flu that hit me on Thursday night (and prevented me from having a Döner Kebap in Little Istanbul, which I am still upset about), my time in Berlin was awesome. For someone as excited about modern history as I am, it doesn't get much better than that city.

And tomorrow, I'm taking off for another one of Europe's most fascinating places: Barcelona! Adios, chilly weather and sausages . . . Hola sunshine and paella!

On Monday, my family (minus Will) came to visit me in Germany. They arrived bright and early in the morning, and after a delicious traditional German breakfast, they headed to the hotel for naptime. We went to the local brewery for dinner and then they came over to check out my apartment before calling it an early night.

We decided to spend Tuesday in Heidelberg, one of the most famous tourist cities in Germany. It has an enormous castle and a beautiful Altstadt. Unfortunately we missed the English tour of the castle, but we were able to check out the Apothecary Museum (way cooler than it sounds) and the two giant barrels of wine kept in the cellar there. My dad was impressed.

Having "the best cake ever" before heading up to the castle:

On Wednesday we took it easy, going for a bike ride in Tübingen and doing a bit of shopping. In the afternoon, I took Joseph to nearby Reutlingen to sit in on a seventh grade English class that one of my Fulbright friends, Lauren, teaches. It was a great experience for him and I think the German students enjoyed themselves as well. Wednesday night was, of course, time to show them the wonder that is the Besenwirtschaft. After an enormous meal of sauerkraut, mashed potatoes, Schweinebraten, and plenty of good wine, we sampled the homemade liqueurs. I highly recommend the cinnamon one.

Thursday we had a mini family reunion in Ulm. The weather was terrible, but the company was so good that it didn’t matter. We met up with about ten of our relatives and had a lovely German lunch, followed by a trip to the Ulmer Munster so that Joseph could say he climbed the cathedral with the tallest tower in the world. Then we had cake and coffee at Tante Irmgard’s. (She made me tiramisu! Again!) We got back to Tübingen around 9, which was bed time for the travelers and just in time for me to meet up with some friends and celebrate St. Patrick’s Day . . .

With my relatives in Ulm:

We spent their last day in Germany doing a tour of Bebenhausen, the monastery just outside of Tübingen. The English audio tour was surprisingly really fascinating--it was narrated in story form by a monk in the 1500s, who took us around all of the rooms, speaking in a hushed voice and making the whole experience come to life. We also took a tour of the hunting castle, which was not in English or German but Schwäbisch, so I had a good time working on understanding local dialect while my parents and Joseph tried to follow along in their guide books.

After saying our goodbyes on Saturday morning, my family headed to London to visit my brother, and I headed home to pack for the Fulbright conference in Berlin.

So here I am, sitting at our hostel in Berlin and enjoying the free wireless, which is allowing me to deliver this blog post to you. I’ll be back in Tübingen on Sunday, with just enough time to write a post about this past week and pack up for another trip . . . Barcelona, here I come!

Miss you guys already:

This past week, my friend Gabby from college came to visit over her spring break. I think both of us would consider her first European adventure a grand success! 

We started the trip out right with a trip to the Besenwirtschaft on Friday night. 

Some local German wine and a huge plate of sauerkraut, meat and potatoes sure hit the spot after her long flight:

On Saturday morning, we headed to the Hohenzollern fortress, about a thirty minute train ride away from Tübingen. What should have been a decent hike up to the castle (which was visible from the town when we arrived) became a rather more serious hike, as we got lost multiple times and even managed to climb the wrong mountain. In our defense, the signs and trail markers were extremely misleading. After a solid several hours of exertion, we finally did make it up to the top of the castle, where we were just in time for the only English tour of the day! 

On the hike down, Gabby and I stop to revel in our victorious castle experience:

On Tuesday we went to the Ritter Sport Chocolate Factory, which is located outside of Tübingen in Waldenbuch. When we got off of the bus, the town smelled like chocolate. I kid you not. As we walked up to the factory, we began to understand why . . . The factory is enormous! But as far as tourism goes, there wasn't as much to see. Their exhibit about the history of chocolate and its production at Ritter Sport was limited to one floor, and the fact that it was filled with screaming American children made the experience slightly less enjoyable for us. We discovered later that there was a field trip to the factory put on by a group of homeschooling US military wives. The Chocolate Workshop looked pretty cool (Make your own chocolate? Do I?!) but it was only open for kids. Lame-sauce. The Choco-Shop, on the other hand, was an enormous open space filled with all manner of delicious Ritter Sport concoctions. And unlike in the US, where tourist destinations tend to jack up prices because they know that everyone likes souvenirs, the price of chocolate in this shop was actually reduced! Twenty euros, my friends, goes a long way in that place. 

Proof:

On Wednesday we headed to Lake Constance to visit my aunt and uncle. I wanted Gabby to see something other than Tübingen, and after we determined that Paris for three days would too expensive and too short, we decided that Central Europe's third largest lake would be a good alternative. Plus, Gabby got to experience warm German hospitality, and no one does it better than my family!

While there, we walked to an outdoor market, went swimming at a thermal bath, and visited the Birnau Basilica, a baroque church built in the 1700s. We also got to enjoy some of the most delicious German cooking I have ever had, including Käsespätzle made by my Uncle Dieter, and several varieties of cake made by Bea. Yum! 

By the lake:

In front of the cathedral:

We spent Gabby's last few days in Tübingen hanging out with friends, checking out the castle and cathedral here, and doing a little shopping at H&M. Saturday night we made a great Mexican dinner for everyone complete with Lemon-Lime Cake. 

It is now Sunday, my day of rest. Or more like my day of clean ALL the things! and work on my project before my parents get here tomorrow morning at 8 am. 

If you know me, you know that there's no way I could be talking about basketball. (That is the right sport for March Madness, right?) But the month of March starts today, which marks the beginning of a crazy, fun-filled, slightly overwhelming six weeks of visitors and traveling for me. In other words, I am precisely in my element!

This coming Friday, one of my best friends from college is coming to visit for nine days. She's never been out of the United States, so I cannot wait to show her what Germany has to offer! The day after she heads back to business school at Wake Forest, my parents and little brother Joseph arrive in Tübingen. Joseph started learning German this year, so I'm excited for him to practice his skills at ordering some Käsespätzle or a bratwurst! The day after my family heads to London to visit my other brother, Will, I leave for a five day Fulbright conference in Berlin. My Tübingen friends are planning on coming to visit me in Berlin after that for the weekend, which brings us to the 27th of March. Things should be winding down, right? Wrong. There's more! The following Wednesday, Gwen and I will jet off to Barcelona for an eight day adventure in Spain. The Monday after we return from the beach, school starts again! And the day after school starts, my brother Will is coming to visit from London. 

When he leaves on the 16th of April to meet up with his girlfriend in Amsterdam, I will probably need a little extra sleep. And some time to breathe, and read a book or something. Or, wait, I seem to recall something about some letters . . . ?

Just kidding. I've been keeping up with my research, and working a little bit harder even to try and get ahead before the madness begins on Friday. Yesterday, I actually finished reading the letters from my great-grandfather, which means that to date, I have transcribed well over two hundred letters from 1942-1943. Success! Now it's time to revise those transcriptions and lay the groundwork for the annotations and translations I'll be working on this spring. Oh, and the second collection of letters, from the 1970s-1990s, written by my grandmother about her experiences after her move to the United States. And I'm only here until July?!

A few weekends ago, I visited my relatives in Ulm for a day. Tante Irmgard found some more letters for me, as well as two incredible pictures taken in 1994 of four generations of women:

Of course, knowing me, it hasn't been all work and no play for the last couple of weeks. I went on a fantastic day trip to Zurich and found myself surrounded by some of the most beautiful mountains I have ever seen . . . 

My friend Kaelan from high school came to visit and we hiked up to Castle Hohenneuffen, located just an hour outside of Tübingen . . . 

The German version of the Mardi Gras parade came to town and I tried not to run away in fear. Instead of scantily clad women, there were monsters running around the cobblestoned streets, chasing unsuspecting people and hitting them with brooms . . .

And this past weekend, my friends Johannes and Julia from Regensburg came to visit. It was so good to see them again, and the time passed far too quickly . . . 

Unfortunately, those two weren't the only ones I had to say good bye to last weekend. My friend Sabine from Belgium ended her semester abroad here and headed back home. Sabine, you will be missed!