Weekend

Saturday, after realizing it was noon and there were only 4 more hours of daylight to make use of, I did something I've always wanted to do: walk out the door and keep walking into the unknown, sans-map, until you end up somewhere!  It turned out to be a great adventure.

I walked straight out the front door, eventually crossed the Spree, passed the Egyptian and other embassies, the Philharmonic's building, and the road ended at the Tiergarten (Berlin's Central Park).  I walked along the park for a bit, and ended up near Potsdamer Platz!  It's amazing how close the apartment is to everything! I then did some quality shopping in the mall in Potsdamer.

Yep, I spent my hard earned money on the German versions of Mamma Mia and Madagascar 2 :) to my defense, they were only €5!

I then met up with Devon, Elizabeth and Michelle at Freidrichstraße where I witnessed my first German protest. That's because they don't protest as much as the French! They were, from what I deduced, protesting the closing of Tegel airport because now the planes will fly closer to the city.  Anyway, I ate my first Currywurst.... it was DELICIOUS.  I'm trying to get my vegetarian friend here to eat one with me, but he's not as adventurous as I am.  This looks gross because they put about 9000 grams of German ketchup on it, but don't judge it! Also, it's one of the few gluten-free options you can get on the go in Berlin.

At night, we went to an IES gathering at our classmate Ben's house (his host parents told him that he should have us all over, which was so nice of them, as that means they invited 26 20-somethings to their flat!).  It wasn't that fun.  One of the hardest things to get used to here is the abundance of cigarette smokers/smoke, anywhere and everywhere.  His host parents smoke inside, so many people were last night too, and it's just hard to get used to inhaling so much second hand smoke.   After, I had my first "oh CRAP, the U-Bahn is closed!!!! How am I going to get home?!" experience.  Some nice German girls explained to us how to get home, but we understood none of what they said because we didn't know that part of town, so we took cabs home.  I need to learn to navigate the night map better (the train map totally changes at night, makes things more confusing).

Today did typical Sunday-in-Germany things like sleep in, stay inside most of the day, clean, and cook.  I finally left the house to go to church with Devon which was great.  Everyone there is just so friendly!! Today they live-streamed Brian Houston (he started Hillsong in Australia) who was speaking at the London service.  Devon and I quite enjoyed it, and then went to Starbucks for some tea and to chat.  I'm so glad we found eachother here, we're so similar and have many of the same goals for our time abroad, and just generally enjoy each other's company! Plus, it really confuses people when we introduce ourselves to them as Devan/Devon :)  We both decided that we'd like to spend less time with IES people and start getting involved with the community at church, which we're really excited about.  We did some planning for our exciting next weekend and spring break trip.

I then made for dinner a delicious gluten-free meal of g-f pasta and tofu with fresh sautéed veggies, topped off by a piece of cake my host mom gave me :) Another great weekend!