First Visitors in Munich and Very Happy Mimi

Am I the luckiest girl in the world or what?? I up and decide to move half-way across the world, and STILL my mom and lovely step-dad find the time amidst their 6 children, 3 children-in-laws, 2 and a half grandkids, and one and a half dogs to come spend two weekends with their favorite youngest daughter. Some might say luck, others might say "stalker" but I'm going to go with luck :)
Let me tell you, we had a blast! They got to meet my kids, my family, and a lot of my friends. We went on lots of adventures, some successful, some not so much.

Our first adventure was to Schloss Neuschwanstein... Otherwise known as the Disneyland Castle. The last King of Bavaria built it over a span of seven years, and slept in it a mere 172 times. Let me tell you. No expenses were spared. Every detail was magical. There were decorations and paintings and gold accents as far as the eye can see. In those paintings, stories were told. Most important, stories of the famous PARSIVAL!!! Sadly, you aren't allowed to take photos inside the building, but we managed to sneak one :)

 Here is one from the outside.

We had a lot of fun. For the rest of the time, we just frolicked around Munich. We went to Hofbrauhaus, Dachau, the Deutsches Musesum, what we thought was the BMV museum. It was so fun to have them here. I loved being able to show them around and let them experience my life here in Munich.

Hofbrauhaus

Sunrise after Snow

Munchen specialitat: warm candy-covered nuts!!

At the Deutsch Museum

I'm so grateful I got to see my family. It just reminded me of how much I love them, and also, how much I miss this face:

I will be updating this blog more. I really have a lot of great adventures. Most of them involve language barriers in the U-Bahn. Oh boy.

The Third Anniversary of My 21st Birthday

I don't know if I've touched on the unfriendliness of Germans. Don't get me wrong. They are very nice people. They are just.. well.. I guess the best way of putting it is "busy". They don't like to bother with American things such as "small talk", and talking to strangers just to say hi.  They only ask you things if the answer is necessary. They offer information on a need to know basis. This is an absolute rule.. with one exception. Beer Halls.
 Naturally, as a non-drinker, I decided it would be a great idea to go to probably the most famous and definitely the first Beer Hall in the World to celebrate my 24th birthday. Hofbrauhaus was everything I hoped it would be and more. It is located in the center of town, down a few side streets but all together a a great location. When we entered, the first floor was completely full to the brim with ~300 people, so we ventured to the top floor which it turns out was definitely the best. The way it was set up was very wedding-esque-- we actually thought we were intruding on a private party. There was a big dance floor in the center surrounded by long dinning tables for ~100 people. There were a few long tables in the back.. maybe ten that could hold around ten people. In the front, there was a stage with an Umpapa band (which apparently is a real word. thanks mom).  Private party or not, Anna and I strode across the dance floor to a table in the back and were seated by a real wench of a woman in a dirndl who really did not want to serve us. We got out drinks and started to have a great time.

 Elise, me, and Brigitte

Anna and me
Turns out the table behind us was a table full of drunken soldiers stationed in Germany. They thought it was so great that I was having a birthday and proceeded to party with us. Our wench of a server kept coming up to us and telling us to be quite. C'mon please. We're in a beer hall lady. We talked and they sang to me too many times and it was great! However, they were at the first stop of their pub crawl. When they left, we talked to the other table next to us. This was full of Swiss Tourists. There were eight of them. They were very pretty.
 They also thought it was great that it was my birthday. In their words: "do you speak english?".. "For you, I will speak English". They taught me fun Swiss drinking games, having no idea I was in fact, not drinking. It's a good thing I didn't lose. After this, we decided to Bavarian Dance. Neither one of us knew how, so we just kind of made it up. My dance partners name was "Jan." That's right. A (kind of) German named Jan. My life is now complete. It was great fun!

After this, we went to some hostel where we just hung out and talked. It was great. I decided to go home around 230 so I wouldnt miss the last U-bahn... I had to take a connection. Halfway home.. I missed the last connecting U-bahn, and had to walk 3 miles in the snow. At 3 am. This was not so fun, but I have to say, it was very lovely and beautiful. I made it back to the bar where my friends were still drinking, and went home with Elise. All in all, it was the best birthday ever.


Oh yeah. This is Louis. Remember this face. I could dedicate an entire blog to him. He is awesome. He bought me alcoholfree chocolate. He likes to walk through dark parks.

Enjoying Bavarian Holidays: Fröhliches neues Jahr!!

Happy New Year to my friends and family around the world.
2012 is going to be a good one. I can just feel it.

On the eve of our new year, I went to my friend Elise's house for a traditional German dinner of raclette. I wish I had pictures of it. Basically, everyone gets a small tray, about half the size of a business envelope. You fill the tray up with different treats, like onion, mango, mushroom, etc. Then you cover it with cheese. You place the tray into this heating element, that melts the cheese until it sizzles. On the top of the heating element, you grill various types of meat. Then you take the tray out and place the mixture over cooked potatoes, and finish with freshly grilled meat. IT IS AMAZING. After stuffing our faces with raclette, we finished with a traditional New Zealand desert of pavlova, or like a meriangue covered with kiwi and creme. 

oh boy. were we finished. Elise and I almost decided not to go out, but thinking about what my dad said, "you are in germany. go. experience it" we decided to do the traditional Bavarian thing and go into the center of Munich and watch the fireworks. New Year is the one day a year when they are allowed to light fireworks and boy, do they light fireworks. It was like a war-zone!! They are lighting off fireworks everywhere you look. The whole streets are filled with people and you can hardly see in front of you because of all the smoke. They have no discretion: young, old, weak, strong, they let those things off in every direction.We were running and screaming as we dodged all of them going off. It was a blast. (literally)

The really cool part was how historic the buildings were. We were basically in the middle of one of the oldest parts of Germany, some things dating back to the 1500's, and they were being lit up like Fourth of July. It was pitch black outside but you could see everything in the sky. It was gorgeous. We had such a fun time. Oh, did I mention it was pouring rain??

Elise's host-brother lives in Missouri and is visiting for Christmas. We met up with him and his american friend and went to a proper German New Year's Party. That was interesting... a nice cultural experience. They just..well... drink. A lot. And eat sausage. Pretty much what you'd expect! We kind of spent most of the time entertaining ourselves and then about an hour trying to hail a cab, but I'm glad I went.

When we returned home, Elise, Bret and I sat together and finished off the rest of the pavlova. and by that, I mean I finished the rest of the pavlova. It was so delicious. All in all, New Year's was a smashing hit.

Enjoying Bavarian Holidays: Exploring Munich

Well, here in Germany, Boxing Day is a national holiday. Everyone gets it off work, and all German businesses are closed. Good news for me: I get the day off. Bad news for me: Everything is closed...

I called my friend Khaliq (who is Muslim, and doesn't celebrate Christmas) and we decided to explore the city.

We had a grand old time! We walked by buildings that looked historic and took tons pictures. There are many very old and beautiful churches in Munich. Most of them were closed except for the main sanctuaries, but it was still very neat. They were beautifully painted and used lots of gold accents. It was very fun.

We walked around for several hours before we realized how hungry we were!! We started looking for something to eat but EVERYTHING was closed!! About an hour before we had seen a McDonalds that was open, so decided to head that way. Luckily on the way, Khaliq spotted a little Kebap shop that was opened. Kebaps have never tasted so good!! For those of you who don't know what  a kebap is... basically, they slow roast chicken all day so it's extra juicy. When you order it, they shave off enough in thin slices to make a sandwich. Then they add this yogurt sauce, spicy sauce, and whatever veggies they can find. Then they toast the bread (or tortilla) and you eat it. It is SO GOOD.

After lunch, we walked around the city more and kept running into statues of lions. So we decided to make a montage of lion shots.

At the end of the day, we found this Irish Pub.. called "the irish pub" and had end of the day drinks. I had BIONADE. It's this weird hippie soda that's all natural.. but pretty tasty. It was a very lovely day off!

Change can be very good.

Well bloggers. A lot has happened. I left my Cinderella position in Glashutten, Germany and have moved into a wonderful German/Italian family in the center of Munich. Let me tell you. Life is bliss. The family is wonderful.
She is Italian, and oh so elegant. She works at an italian bank during the day and spends time with her children at night.
He is German. Probably one of the nicest men I have ever met. He is very funny. He works for an American company. Doing... things.
Their kids: Sofia is two and half. She is very serious and does not like snow being thrown at her. She likes things neat and organized, and has been known to clean her plate with her napkin if the noodle sauce gets on the edge. Fillipo is six. He is very independent and lets me know he does not need an Au Pair...He likes to tell me this as he hands me his garbage, his backpack, and while I'm lacing up his shoes. He is a very good ice-skater.
Both children are very well-behaved and quite sweet. I have never been happier.

The German here has a very strong dialect. It is closer to Swiss German than in the North where Frankfurt was. It is called a Bavarian Dialect. I like it. My German is coming along quite nice.

I have experienced so much in the last week. St. Nikolaus, who is their version of Santa but he looks like the pope, came to a party and I got to see him. Christmas markets in Munich (so wonderful) and today I got to go to German farmers market. My host dad bought me a pretty apple that had the farmers logo carved into it:

We had a really fun time. Sofia is so adorable!

Love it here. Love the family. Love the kids. I'm a very happy girl.

Whats the opposite of "time is flying"?

Oh man. I cannot believe I have only been here a little over a week. I feel as if I have been part of this family forever. There is so much to write about.

The boys: They are 9 months, 3 and 4. They have an insane amount of energy. The oldest speaks to me in German and the middle in French. These are the phrases I hear all day "Das ist kaputt!" (This is broken) "ca fini!" (I have finished) Things the boys do could be a blog of its own.

The parents: The mother is french and she is very sweet. The father is German, and oh boy. Is he German. He likes to tell me about how great Germany is all the time. For example, I asked him how to work the washing machine. He tells me, "ah yes. This washing machine. It is German. It is the 'Mercedes Benz' of washing machines." He tells me about his dishwasher, shoes, dryer... etc. Everything is so great! We now have a joke... "now thats the power of german engineering".
He likes to say really funny things. For example. His wife was telling me about how a woman slipped on the ice and crashed into their parked car. He told me, "in germany, we still have the problem of women drivers". The wife scoffed and went on talking about the crash. Later he said, "in saudi arabi, they dont have this problem." "because of the ice," she said firmly. I looked at him apprehensively, "I think he means because they dont allow women to drive." She and I laughed.. but he never does!! Just looks so serious.

I have too much to say about this family. Not all of it is nice. I better keep it to myself.

Arrival in Europe

well all zero of my blog followers. I feel as if I have been living this life forever. and it has only been a few days. heres what has happened:

I arrived in Zurich and was greeted by two of my favorite swiss boys, Samuel and Adi. I was very excited to be in europe and even though i was coming from a 10 hour flight next to a huge, fat, croatian paparazi, the joy of being there was enough to keep me going. We met up with Phillip and they took me to a wintermarket, and there we had some lessons in each others languages. For instance. They explained to me the different between "kaufen" which means "I am buying" and "einkaufen", which means "I am buying". You see, the first one means " I am buying" and the second means " I am buying". German? ja. Its going to be a breeze. After this, I taught them an important english lessons, like how not to mispronounce the names of countries in africa, like Niger for an instance. Learning about other peoples cultures is fun.

Wonderful Sam hosted me at his house, and woke up at 5 to see me off... with my 100 lbs of luggage. I wish I was joking. I arrived the next day in Frankfurt. My lovely boss (for lack of a better word) Isabelle picked me up with the boys. Boy are they cute. We got to schlossborn at 10 am. This was my first day of work. I almost fell asleep while watching the boys. No rest in Germany. You can sleep when you are dead. I survived. But was so tired I couldn't keep my eyes open at the dinner table. Oh, did I  mention they had a dinner party for my welcoming? A classic french 5 course meal. Each one lasting 30 minutes. After the second course, I started to fall asleep. They kindly excused me from the table.


I need to take German classes. ASAP.