Princess for a night! Or two...

Hello lads and lassies,

It's official - I have slept in a castle.

We left Dublin on Monday, after having visit the rather extraordinary zoo. They had all kinds of cool stuff, and by stuff I mean animals... like Zebras and Giraffes and Puppies. The puppies were not so fantastic, what with I live with three, but still the rest was cool. And the zoo itself is HUGE!!

But onto more important things. On monday, we got on a bus and came to Kilkenny, a rather small town about two hours away from Dublin. Before heading off to our hostel (or castle, whichever you wanna call it) we stopped by a pub for some lunch. It was fabulous! Bangers and mash, baby... and by bangers I mean sausages and mash, well, mashed potatoes. Irish food will be my undoing. So, we were just sitting around eating our meal, when this man, Joe, comes up to our table and starts talking to us. As it were, Joe was slightly inebriated (to borrow his words) and started telling us that Ray had "landed the salmon" because he was travelling with two girls. He also asked who was the queen here (I took that title, thank you very much!) and then told me I had Huskie's eyes. Right... I think he just told me I look like a dog... with light eyes. He was nuts. He finally left us alone, to go back to the bar, naturally. He tried ordering more drinks, but the bartender refused him, saying that he was too drunk. Now, the combination of drunkenness and Irish accents made it quite difficult to understand what was really going on, but after a few minutes, it became apparent that we were gonna witness a good old fashioned Irish barfight. Unfortunately, this scenario seems much too common for the bartender and he did a very good job calming everyone down and expelling the drunkards, thus avoiding a fight. Oh well, there's still time, more pubs to come...

Anyways, here in Kilkenny, we are living in a castle!!! And not only that, but the castle is haunted!!!! Oh yes, our haunted castle, which is about 8 miles outside the city centre and close to ABSOLUTELY NOTHING (except a yard which houses roosters, horsies that eat out of our hands and reindeer), is absolutely gorgeous and said to be haunted by 3 ghosts... a little girl (we'll cal her Myrtle), a guard, and a third one, which everyone seems reluctant to tell us about. Must be scary. Anywho, we hung around the castle most of the evening, and at chinese food in a dungeon (quite an experience!) then we went to bed. And thats when the weird stuff started happening. First of all, let me just say that Ray is sleeping in the ladies' dormitories, thats not weird, but funny. When we were all sleeping, Ray swears he was woken up by "a ghost" throwing rocks at the castle. Heather and I choose to believe, cuz we want ghosts! So tonight, hopefully, we will be attacked by said rock-throwing ghost and then Ill write about that!

Today, we went to another castle, this one in the city center and actually used to house royal families, or something like that. We took a guided tour of the inside and were guided by a rather snooty Irish lady, but it's ok, cuz it was an interesting tour. We've spent the rest of the day walking along the gardens of the castle (castle always have the best gardens) and the streets of the city.

Tomorrow, it's off to Cork, where Im not sure what well see, but surely it'll be good! And after that, we'll go wherever the wid blows us... and by that I mean, wherever Heather decides...

Cheers!!

Steph :)

Uh Oh! Beer Again!

Hello again!

Ok, so lots has happened since the last time we spoke... or i wrote, you read, whatever.

First off, i capped off my stay in Paris with a visit to the top of the Eiffel Tower. Actually, not the top top. It was closed because of the extremely windy day, but we went to the second platform anyway. It was amazing! The views from up there are awesome, it feels like you can see all of France. Clearly, you can't, but it feels like thats what you are seeing. i took pictures, so you can judge for yourselves.

I also went into the Louvre. Naturally, it was packed... so i took a picture of the Mona Lisa (by stealth - it says "Absolutely no pictures" - but no one saw me) and got the hell out of there. I wouldnt have appreciated any of the rest of it anyway, being cramped in there like a sardine. I did, however, run into someone i knew on my way out. It was quite odd...

Then my Torontonian friend and I went on a Seine river cruise at night. It was pretty, but it started to rain pretty hard during our ride, so we had to sit inside, which made it somewhat less pleasant. But it was cool nonetheless... i got to see the Eiffel Tower when it was sparkling, which is really what I wanted, so it's all good.

The next day, i headed off to Annecy, where Natalie from work is staying on her school exchange, or whatever it is shes doing. It's a really pretty little town, bordered by lakes and mountains. We didn't actyally get much done... walked some, shopped some, ate the best ice cream of all time... but then again, there isnt much to do in Annecy, so I suppose we did well.

After all that French stuff, I took an underwater train to London, where I refused to eat of drink or anything like that, because I hate British Pounds... so expensive. But it's ok, because I was only there for one night... The next morning, I flew out to Dublin, where, after a few delays, I met up woth Heather, Ray and Alexis. Alexis is only hanging out with us in Dublin, but Heather and Ray will be part of the "we" I will use from now on.

Yesterday, we went to the Guinness breweries, where we saw how they make beer, what ingredients they use and so forth and so on. At the end of the tour, they give you a free pint. But of course, as i had only had a bowl of cornflakes, I was slightly tipsy by the end of it. Tipsy and it was only two o'clock in the afternoon. Not my finest hour. We capped off the evening with a nice irish meal... mmmm potatoes.

Today, we saw some sights... cathedrals, parks and such, but also Dublinia. It's an interactive medieval historical museum type dealie. It was pretty cool, but most of all, a hell of a good excuse to take some stupid ass pictures. Funny. And there was a whole big section on Vikings, so I felt at home... and took pictures of Viking stuff to teach JL how to properly act like a Viking. We also went to the Natural History Museum, which displays all sorts of animals and their skeletons from all over the world. SO COOL! I now absolutely need to go to Africa to see some cool ass animals.

I suppose thats about it, in a nutshell. We are also acting like fools a lot, but thats to be expected when me and Heather and Ray get together.

Let's hope we dont get too drunk in the afternoons anymore...

See you soon!

Steph :)

I need a boyfriend for this city...

Will you be my boyfriend? Ok, so most of you will know where thats from... those of you who don't, too bad. So, two posts in two days - how's that for not falling off the face of the earth - but if I dont write about today now, then I'll probably not have as good a post for you guys.

First of all, and most importantly, I got up this morning and did laundry. I had no clean socks and no clean underwear left and all my stuff (literally ALL of it) smelled like crap, so it was really time. Now I smell nice.

Afterwards, my new buddy Jody and I went on a walk around Paris. And I mean ALL around Paris. We started by walking from our hostel to the Louvre. We did not go in, because she has already seen it (I'll go another day), but we got some pretty cool shot of the outside and, naturally, the glass pyramid in front. It's such a bloddy big museum. I was in shock. I knew it was big, but this is unreal. I feel that if anyone was really into art and wanted to see the whole thing, it would take them at least three full days. Thankfully, I am not really into art and only plan to go in, take a picture of the Mona Lisa, and leave. Thank goodness.

Next, we moseyed on over to the Arc de Triomphe via the Champs Elysees. It was cool, because our weather was sorta moody, so I got to see the Champs Elysees "au soleil" and "sous la pluie". Not too shabby. Naturally I sang all the way down (or hummed, whatever). We finally got to the Arc de Triomphe, which is a pretty damn long walk from the Louvre, but it was well worth the effort. The thing is friggin huge! You can climb to the top of it, but as neither of us is that fond of heights, and we agreed we would do the eiffel tower, we skipped it.

From there, we crossed over to the Trocadero, which, aside from being a fantastic place to view the Eiffel Tower from, I'm not too sure what it is. It's a building, and its pretty. So there. Then it was off to the Tower itself. Pretty hot. Actually, it's kind of ugly, but it's impressive nonetheless. It's sooooooooo big. Like, so big. I can't even explain how big it is. I tried to get some pictures which could possibly convey it's size, but I'm not too sure I succeeded. We'll see. Jody and I didnt actually go up the Eiffel Tower today, because the line-ups were so long and we decided we should do it at night, to make it that much more impressive. So, I'll have to get back to you on that one.

After that, we strolled along the Champ de Mars. It's quite amazing how many parks and fields and all that kind of stuff you can actually find in downtown Paris. Not at all like Montreal, where the only park is about 5 metres wide and smells a whole lot like weed. Oh well...

We also saw the Hotel des Invalides. I can't exactly remember the history behind it (something about invalids, no doubt) but it has a nice golden roof top. So thats cool.

After that exhausting day, we started the journey home. We didnt realize how far we had actually walked until we headed out. Oh my! It took us a good 2 hours to get back to the hostel at which point we thought we would pass out from fatigue. We didn't, but we thought we would. All in all, our walk around Paris took us about 5-6 hours. Not bad at all... though I really think I need a nap now...

And so I leave you, friends. Next time you hear from me, I will have been flea market shopping, seen some catacombs, been to visit LSG Natalie at Annec and will probably be in Dublin. So don't expect a new post too too soon!

Ciao!

Steph :)

Calm the hell down...

Bonjour tout le monde!

Ok, so I have on good authority that some of you (who shall, for now, remain nameless) think that I am dead because I have not written a new blog in a couple of days. And so I say to all of you - CALM THE HELL DOWN! I am, in fact, still alive, but I have been busy and have had quite a hard time finding a place to use the internet for less than 7 euro/hour, which, for those of you who dont want to do the math, is about 12 dollars/hour. In other words, it's a bit, or a lot, excessive.

So, since I left Cologne and the chocolate museum, I have moved to France, where I started my travels in Bayeux, a very small town very close to the D-Day Landing Beaches. The town itself is pretty crap... I went to the Tapestry Museum, which boasts the only record of William the Conqueror's conquest, but it was pretty boring. The thing is, you walk in and right at the entrance is a very long written history of the tapestry. Then you get to watch a movie - 14 of the most boring minutes of my life - telling you story again. Then you actually get to see the tapestry, which is pretty amazing if you stop to consider the work that went into it, but you dont really do that, cuz you are listening to an audio-guide telling you the story AGAIN! By the time I got to step three, I was really just looking for the exit of the museum... I was pretty over it.

Anywho, the next day I went down to the beaches. In the morning, I joined a guided tour of the Canadian sector - Juno beach, the Canadian war cemetary and the Canadian war memorial museum. It was all pretty cool. The cemetary was especially cool, cuz they had maple trees, which made me feel like I was standing in my own front yard. It was shocking to see how many graves were there, though... I knew lots of people lost their lives here, but oh dear! Then in the afternoon, I wandered over to the american sector with Ange and Dan, a Canadian couple I met at the hostel. It was cool, too. The beach was very similar to Juno (sand and water - shocking!) but the American cemetary is soooo much bigger. It's not quite as nice though... more crosses, but not so many trees and flowers and stuff. But impressive nonetheless.

After that, it was off to Paris, and let me tell you, Paris at night is EVERYTHING it's cracked up to be! It's soooooo pretty... and I havent even seen it all yet! On my first day here, I couldnt get into my room till 5 so I wandered pretty aimlessly... I stumbled upon the Moulin Rouge, but it was day time, so I will have to go back and get a proper look at it. I met a Canadian girl at the hostel (bloody Canadians, they're everywhere!) and we've been hanging out for the past couple of days. Last night, we were looking for food, and we just happened to find the Notre-Dame Cathedral, the Louvre and the Arc de Triomphe. Pretty hot.

Today, I went to the Versailles Castle with another Canadian... oh my!... It was HUGE! I thought my first castle was big, but it was nothing compared to this one. The Castle itself is enormous (Louis XIV lived here as well as his entire court of 6000 people), and then the gardens! Holy! They just go on and on and on... We walked through them for about an hour, and we still didnt get to the end... There was more. But here, we found "The Queens Appartments" (and by appartment, she means mini-castle). She actually had these appartments built because when she walked through the gardens during the day, she was too tired to come back at night, so she would sleep there and come back the next day. It's nice to be rich.

Anyways, so those are the basics of my adventures for the past couple of days... tomorrow, I am doing the really touristy stuff with my new Canadian buddy, ie. the Champs Elysees, Champ de Mars, Arc de Triomphe and that large metal phallic shaped tower that goes by the name of Eiffel. Should be a good day!!

See you later!

Steph :)

Mmmmmuseums

Guten Mutter Tag! (to all the mothers...so probably just mine, therest of you, hello)

So, I havent really being doing much these past couple of days as Ive been in pretty lame cities. I went to the Zoo in Frankfurt, though and there were giraffes, so Heather's jealous.

Anyway, today I went to the absolute best museum of all time. The Schokoladen Museum here in Köln is FABULOUS. For those of you who have not deduced this, Schokoladen = Chocolate. And it's brilliant from the very beginning... as you pay your 6 euro entrance fee, they give you a chocolate. What a good start! Then you walk through a gallery taking you through a brief history of chocolate and an equally brief description of how it is made. Then... oh, then you enter the best smelling room I have ever had the joy of setting foot in. This room is a recreated, miniature (and by miniature I mean its only one room, as opposed to a whole building) version of the Lindt Chocolate factory. All the machinery is here and they produce the chocolates for the entrance as well as for the gift shop on the spot. And not only that! The Lindt Chocolatiers are here! In their white uniforms with hats and all, just like in the commercials. Superb! It was thrilling... there's also a chocolate fountain in that room, where you are allowed to taste the chocolate. Mmmm... Then you are off to an exhibition upstairs which begins with displays of old shops with chocolate tins and other cool vintage stuff and ends in a more typical museume fashion... pictures, displays, explanatory cards. But not explaning just anything... no, this section of the museum is dedicated to chocolate as an aphrodisiac. Very nice.

So that was pleasant... and then I went to the Deutsches Sport and Olympia Museum. Not as cool as the chocolate museum (obviously) but cool enough. They had a special exhibit on - gasp! - soccer... German coaches and players around the world. And then they had their regular exhibit which takes you through the history of the Olympic Games and training in ancient times. The really cool part, though, are the interactive displays allowing you to experience a bike race, a bobsled ride and lifting some pretty serious weights. Of course, you werent allowed pictures here, so I have no proof... but trust me, it was hot.

Other than that, not toomuch happening. Its my last day in Germany today... tomorrow, I get to speak French, something I actually understand, so I'm excited about that!!

Ok, bye for now!

Steph :)

Oh Beer!

Guten Tag!

So, last time on My European Log, I was off to a bier garten with four Canadian roommates. So let's start there, shall we?

Around 9ish (cuy it closes at 12) my four fellow canucks and I headed down not just to a bier garten, but to the most famous bier garten in Munich, the Hotbraühaus. Oh yes... I thought they were saying Opera House at first, but then I caught on. So, in this Hotbraühaus, one can only order beer in one format... the one litre giant mug format. So that is what we did. In other words, by ordering eine bier, we got a HUGE glass, which could hold three regular bottles. Needless to say, after one glass of beer at thjis place, you're pretty tipsy... and if you're me, you're drunk. It was all pretty funny... we even got giant pretzels to go with our giant beer. Good times.

The next morning, I took a train to Heidelberg. Heidelberg is a very small city built on a river bank. It's really pretty... all I keep doing is taking pictures of the town and the river. I'm so lame. When I got here, I was pretty hungover and tired, so I didn't do much, but today I went to jail and to a castle.

First, I went ot visit the student jail. It's right by the University and it the place in which they used to lock up students (in the 1700s) when they were convicted of misdemeanors such as womanising, disturbing the peace in a drunken state, teasing security officers... and other such offences. The walls inside the jail are amazing. They are covered, from the florr to the ceiling... on the ceiling, even, with drawings, grafittis and names. It's so cool. Usually, when you see grafitti on a wall, it's spaced out and (sometimes) ugly and it says random crap like "Steph wuz here". But not this. This stuff was more like art. "Prisoners" were kept in the jail for a minimum of three days (and sometimes up to four weeks) and were fed only water and bread so they occupied their time, and I suppose tried to forget about their hunger, by drawing silhouettes of their fellow jailmates. It's cool... you'll have to see the pictures, I can't describe it.

After that, I went to play princess in the castle. It's awesome, too! I rode up to the schloß in a weird uphill train thing and got to walk around the whole thing. I went looking for the fire-breathing dragons, but I think they may have been asleep today. Oh well... next time. Anyway, even without dragons, the views of the city from the castle courtyard are amazing. The castle is on a hill looming over the city... so basically, you can see it all from up there. The castle was somewhat destroyed during the second world war, but for some reason the gaping holes in the red brick walls adds to the romanticism of the thing.

While I was walking around inside the castle, I got to see the Groß Faß, which is essentially a giant keg. And when I say giant, I mean it has a 221 00 litre capacity... let's pause for a second and imagine the parties which would ensue from so much beer... good times... and much puking, undoubtedly.

So, I wandered round the castle grounds for a while and I could not help but think what it must have been like living there. It must be pretty cool to call a castle your home, but at the same time, I dont know that I would ever get used to getting lost inside my home. Or on the grounds, for that matter. The place is bloody huge and the courtyard is like the size of Saskatchewan... shocking. But I guess you get to know the place after a few years... ten or fifteen probably. Then again, I think the fabulous parties you would have with all that beer would probably make up for your getting lost. But, seeing as I dont live there, I guess there's really nothing to worry abbout.

Oh yeah, and I had beer at McDonalds, like I promised I would. It makes the whole McDonalds experience that much more disgusting...

Anywho, so those are my latest activities, tomorrow, I'm moving again, and it's off to Frankfurt for me. I heard it sucks there, so this should be interesting...

Ciao!

Steph :)
xxx

P.S. I went shopping today, too... but I have decided that I'm not bringing home CRAP fro anyone, like I usually do... and like mopst people usually do, so nobody gets to be offended if I havent got anything for you but pictures. Hope thats ok, cuy otherwise I'll feel bad.

More than I bargained for...

Hello Everybody!

Ok, so after all that sex in Hamburg, I moved to Munich (or München, here). Here in Munich, I havent had all too much to do, though the things I did do eneded up giving me way more than I bargained for.

Firts off, I went on a guided tour of the Dachau (pronounced Da-weird throaty/spitty noise-ow)Concentration Camp Memorial Site. Dachau was the first Concentration Camp ever started in 1933. It was not an extermination camp, though over 30 000 people lost their lives there. The memorial site on the actual site where the Dachau Concentration Camp used to be and many of the buildings that are there are still the original ones. We started out tour outisde, facing the buildings hwich were once used as training grounds for the SS (secret police)... they are big white buildings that don't really look like much, but when you consider that they were once used to train 16 to 24 year old men to torture people, they become somewhat scarier. When we entered the camp, we were taken to the registration area, as the prisoners were. It's a tiny little room, but it is the room in which prisoners had to surrender their personal belonging, identity and any sense of human dignigty. Not pleasant.

After that, we saw the special prisoners' cells... Speacial prisoners were political prisoners, priests and others that they wanted to keep a close eye on. Actually, each cell was divided into six cells, so that the prisoners did not have room to sit, lie down or move around, really. Scary stuff. We were then shown a short movie documented the rise and fall of the Nazi regime. It included some extremely gruesome footage of victims of the camps and torture and things like that. Again, not so pleasant. After that, it was off to the crematorium and the gas chambers. Though the gas chambers at Dachau were never used, it is the absloute creepiest feeling in the world walking through them, just knowing what they were built for. I cannot possibly imagine walking into a room, being told I'm about to take a nice, hot shower (a rather pleasant feeling, no?) and then being gassed 10 to 15 minutes later. All I can say is that walking through that shower room really sent chills up my spine. The crematorium was also quite scary, cuz there are pictures all over the walls of it when it was overloaded with bodies. At certain points, they had too many bodies to keep up the pace of burning them, so they just piled up on the floor. Not cool.

All in all, the tour of the site was quite good. Not pleasant, but good. I knew I would leave there feeling rather low, but it was much more depressing than I had thought. I suppose concentration camps are one of those things that everyone knows exists, but you cant fully understand them till youve seen one. And once you have, you dont really want to go back. Thats why I really liked that sign inside that says, in 5 different languages "Never Again".

So now that I've thoroughly depressed everyone, on to something a little more pleasant. Well, I guess... funny anyways. So, here in Munich, there isn't all that much to do, as I have already said. I did, however, take a walk through the Englischer Garten (I'll let you guess what that means in English!)... now, my Lonely Planet had told me that these gardens were often home to nude sunbathers in warm weather. It did not mention, however, that most of said sunbathers are OLD MEN! So imagine me, taking a nice leisurely walk throúgh a beautiful garden where there are swans and duckies in the pond and then I come across a little old man lying in the grass and waving at me. So I look over, trying to be polite you know, and he is NAKED! Oh Dear! Not just naked, oh no! Naked and with a sunburnt penis. Now what am I to do? Point and say, "Sir, I don't think your knob is supposed to be that colour?" Or go bold and say "Dude, have you ever heard of sunscreen?" Well, heres what I did. I gaped, got over it, and turned the other way. Needless to say, I was in shock. Then there was the man walking around naked with an all out boner, but thats a whole other story, so well leave it for now, shall we?

Anywho, so tonight I'm off to a bier garten with the room full of Canadians that just enetered my room at the hostel and tomorrow, off to Heidelberg, where I will visit a statue of a monkey (a brass monkey, at that) and a castle with a beer vat capable of fitting 220 000 litres of beer. Ineteresting...

Tchuss!

Steph :)
xxx

Hamburgers?

Hello again!

Ok, so I suppose you are wondering what I have been up to since the riots and Nazis and all... well, let's start with the important stuff, shall we? When I left the hostel in Berlin, I was walking through the forest and guess what I saw!!! The Wild Boar! I was VERY excited. And, in case you are wondering, it has babies... at least four of them. they ran away before I had a chance to take pictures, but alas, they were there.

Anywho, so I took a train to Hamburg and arrived at my hostel in one piece and not lost around 2 o'clock. I couldnt check in till 3ish, so I went on a tiny adventure... and by that I mean I went to the Port of Hamburg. It's pretty awesome. The Port itself accounts for something like 12 percent of the surface of Hamburg, pretty impressive stuff. As it was a really nice day, I wandered around aimlessly for a while taking pictures and hoping against hope that I wouldnt tan with my glasses on (cuz then I'd look like quite the fool...) When I was just about ready to get going, I was checking something in my trusty Lonely Planet and a random man standing next to me looked over and said "Tourist?" I supposed that tourist in German is Tourist cuz when I said yes he started speaking to me really quickly in German. When he saw the confused look on my face, he switched to English. Turns out he is a police man here in Hamburg and he knows EVERYTHING about anything around here. He kind of turned into a tour guide for me and showed me around to a bunch of places in the Port that I would not have known existed had he not told me. By the end of his three hour-long improvised tour, I didnt remember any of what he said, but he seemed pleased with himself, so it's all good. I do love it when locals become tour guides out of the blue. Seems funny to me, cuy there's no way in hell I could show a tourist that much about Montreal just off the top of my head.

Having already seen Hamburg's number one attraction upon arrival, I followed up with Hamburg's number two tourist attraction - the red light district. The Reeperbahn is a long street which just looks like one giant sex shop, with a random seedy-looking hotel thrown in here and there for good mesure. I don't think I have ever seen so much leather in one place at one time. Scary really, cuz there were a whole heck of a lot of famillies with small children around. Not good. Anyway, after wandering through sex shops for a while, I finally found what I was looking for... a prostitute. No seriously, the Erotic Art Museum - my book told me it was cool. Well, for once, it was wrong. I was scared. A lot of the displays in that museum involved reproductive organs, which is what one would expect from an Erotic Art Museum, but the thing of it is, a lot of these parts seemed to be bleeding. Not so cool... and not so erotic. Then there were the paitings and pictures of women doing things with dogs that I could not possibly imagine putting Gadget through... and also, if anyone ever catches me recreating the "art" involving a lit candle and someone's backside, please shoot me. So, as you can see, the Erotic Art Museum was... an experience... to say the least.

After the Museum, I went and found everyone's favourite thing... the Condomerie, with the gargantuan condom in the window. The window is quite cluttered with a wide assortment of sex props, but when I located this condom, I was impressed. It was no longer than a regular condom, but it must have been at least ten centimeters in diameter... if I met anyone who could properly fit that thing, we would have a serious case "don't-come-anywhere-near-me-with-that-thing". It would make sex like giving birth, wouldn't it? And everyone knows that's unpleasant...

Alrighty, so after that, I went into the Panoptikum (the wax museum). It was pretty damn cheesy, but I've never been to a wax museum before, so I couldn't resist. Inside they had figures of Marilyn Monroe, The Beatles, Madonna, Micheal Jackson and, among all these pleasant people, Hitler. Not too sure what to make of that, but, seeing as I dont speak German, I couldnt ask.

So that about sums up my adventures for the past couple of days... today is the Port birthday, so there's supposedly some big party down there... I might go check it out. I'm also heading down to the Speicherstad (I think thats how it's spelled...) where I will learn what it's like to be blind...

I hope Carolina's losing...

Steph :)
xxx

P.S. Heather - why does your dad think I'm a neo-nazi??? I thought we were buddies...

Mourning

We lost. I'm upset.

And I think someone needs to get rid of Cory Stillman. What a loser.

In other news, HAPPY BIRTHDAY VAL!!! Je t'aime fort fort fort!

Ok, bye,

Steph :)
xxx

Riots and Terror and all things Scary...

Hello everyone!

Ok, so clearly, you wanna hear about the riots. Where to start?? Well, I met Marty (the psycho hostel guy)downtown around three and we went from there to Kruezberg where the whole riot was supposedly happening. When we got there, a few people were waiting to meet us. Notably Andrew (the Englishman who, by the way Heather and Ray, looks like Chris), Mark (an Irish boy... not a red head) a Canadian girl, an Aussie boy and two Italian girls. On first glance, this whole anti-capitalist riot looks like one big excuse to drink in the streets. People were selling beer off the side of the road (anti-capitalist, my ass)and everyone was getting pretty damn drunk. So, until about 9, it was just one giant street party. At that point, my group and I wandered into a bier garten and sat down for a while by a heat lamp (very cool). After about an hour or so, the owner of the place came to tell us to move, cuy it was getting pretty rwody outside and soon they'd be throwing things over the headge right onto us. So we moved. When we fuinally left the bier garten, we went back into the street, where the full-fledged riot had broken out. People were throwing bottles around, fighting in the streets and police were EVERYWHERE trying to subdue them. I am not too sure whether it worked, cuy we got the hell out of there. Marty wanted to stay "I have itchy palms, I need to see some action" What? Clearly, he's out of his mind. Anyway... the only other big adventure of that night was that I took the U-Bahn all alone and didn't get lost. Whoot Whoot!

Today, I went to see the Topography of Terror. Very cool. It's a display right behind the remains of the Berlin Wall in the basements of old Gestapo and SS headquarter buildings. It recounts the story of the whole Nazi regime, how the war started and the horrors inflicted on people in concentration camps. I got an English audio-guide to explain it to me (it was all German) but i actually couldn't listen to it all. It was sooo gruesome and disturbing that I sometimes had to skip sections.

After that, I went on a walking tour around Berlin. It was 5 hour walking tour that pretty much took me ALL OVER the city. Among a whole heck of a lot of other things, I saw Checkpoint Charlie, the Brandenburg gate and the memorial to holocaust victims. All very cool things, but they really need pictures to explain, so you'll just have to wait till i get home.

Tomorrow I'm off to Hamburg, where giant condoms await. My only regret about Berlin is that I have still not been attacked by a wild boar like Patrick promised. Oh well, I'll have to come back!!

See you later!!

Steph :)
xxx