Sunday Reflections

Some days I look out my window and find it hard to believe that I'm really here. I'm used to the way the cars look here, and the sounds of the tram passing in the distance, and to the construction outside of my window, and the Black Forest hills. Sometimes I look out my window and feel like I could be anywhere.

Today I had a lazy Sunday, slept in late like I would have if I was back at school in Ithaca, and more or less just lay in my bed and watched Netflix. I made a huge pot of lentil soup, which really made it feel like home. It also made me miss my mom, because she makes lentil soup all of the time. I haven't left my apartment or made any human contact today, but it's actually been kind of nice.

My weeks are pretty crazy ups and downs of being busy and staying in.

Thursday afternoon my environmental studies class went on a field study trip to Buchswald down on the Swiss border. It was about an hour's drive in a cute little bus, and dropped us off in this cute little German town. Up on the hills, we could see the outskirts of Basel across the River Rhine, which was pretty cool, because I haven't been to Switzerland yet (but might make a day trip this weekend!). It was pretty chilly, but it was mostly sunny except for some occasional snow showers. Buchswald is a boxwood forest, one of the only places where box trees grow in Germany. We've been learning about the history of box in Germany in classes, and it's actually pretty interesting. Boxwood is an extremely dense wood, used for thousands of years to make tool handles and was heavily exploited in the 19th century for spindle production. At one point it was worth more than gold per kilogram. Local people used to use it for Easter wreaths decorations because it is an evergreen and one of the only green plants at this time of year. The actual Buchswald was a little bit depressing, because it's fallen victim to the Buchsbauzuensler, a pest from China, so a lot of the foliage has been eaten off of the trees.

We saw how Buchs grows differently in different microclimates in the area, and worked on a little bit of dendochronology, and took our first tree core sample. Overall the trip wasn't too academic, we just hiked around the woods observing and listening to our professor's occasional lectures, which are always peppered by amusing English mistakes or strange pronunciations. (When looking at tree rings through a magnifying glass, he told us, "Make sure you put your ear right up to the glass so you can see everything!"). It was a good day. A few of us tried to work on our German homework during the busride, but it was hard to tear my eyes away from the window, because the beautiful German countryside going by was too nice to resist.

Thursday night I went out with two of my roommates, Carrie and Fidi, because it was Fidi's last night in Freiburg before she goes away to visit family for three weeks. We started at Mudom, the student bar (you can't get in without a student ID!), and when that closed we went out to LP, a little hole in the wall place that was packed and played the weirdest collection of music, from 90s German rap, to Sublime, to Foo Fighters, and some borderline heavy metal songs. A lot of Fidi's friends from the rugby team followed us there from Mudom, and they were fun to hang out with, despite the language barrier. We were out pretty late, caught a cab back to Vauban and then just hung out in the kitchen for a little bit until we all turned in for the night.

So naturally, Friday was a little rough. I came home from German class and took a nap for longer than I had slept for. As much as I wanted to go out, I decided to stay in for my own health and sanity.

Refeshed on Saturday morning, I took my relaxation a step further and visited the Keidel Thermal-Mineral Baths in Freiburg with some friends. I wasn't totally sure what to expect, but when I got there, it was a sunny paradise of indoor and outdoor pools, all filled with natural mineral water and at varying warm temperatures. There were people napping in chairs in a sunroom, people swimming, relaxing in hot tubs, and floating along on the little lazy river. We checked our stuff into lockers, changed into our swimsuits, and joined the locals in the pools. We started inside, and swam through a little door flap into the adjoining outdoor pool. I expected it to not be open or pleasant at this time of year, but I was wrong! The water was wonderfully warm, and there was lots of steam rising off the surface into the cool but sunny day. We spent a few wonderfully relaxing hours lazing around in the pools outside, enjoying the water jets and the hot tub area.

We had paid for the sauna as well, so we decided to go and check that out. I'd heard about how Europeans tend to be in the nude at these kinds of things, and well, those whisperings were right. There were nude people everywhere, being very casual about it, not embarrassed or trying to hide or anything at all. Enter my biggest cultural experience so far. We weren't quite sure how to approach this, and couldn't find any signs anywhere that said clothes were or were not required, so we attempted to go the saunas in our bathing suits. A woman who worked there came by and said something to us, to the effect of, "clothes are not allowed."

What to do? Well, we paid for the sauna portion, we reasoned, so we might as well just suck it up and stop being prude Americans and go get our money's worth. So, we stripped down, hung up our bathing suits, and walked through the place in just towels until we chose a sauna. They had probably six or so different saunas in that area of the spa, at varying temperatures and humidities. It was really weird at first and we tried hard not to be so embarrassed or giggly, but we were Americans after all, and this was our first time doing such a thing. We went into a few different saunas and ended up really enjoying ourselves.

A few people in my group went for a swim in one of the pools, while the rest us went outside and explored the saunas out there. One of them smelled like lemongrass, and one of them had these big windows looking out on the property. After some amount of time, we strolled over to the restaurant in just our towels and ordered some freshly squeezed juice, which seemed very appropriate for a spa. I then put my bathing suit back on, then lay out under some heat lamps, went for another swim. After four hours at the spa, we called it a day.

I had a great time at the mineral baths. Not only was it a great experience doing something very out of my comfort zone, it was the most relaxing day I've ever had. Just floating around in deliciously warm pools filled with healing minerals, not paying attention to the time. It was definitely worth the 17,50 we paid for entry. And I will be back.

Last night was St. Patrick's day Saturday, but the Irish pubs here had been full since before dinner, so I didn't even attempt to go. I went out with some friends to a place called Schmitz Katze instead, and since we got there freakishly early for some reason, it took awhile before it started to get crowded and interesting. The place was huge though! They had an outdoor patio (too cold), a bar area, a little upstairs dance area with a DJ booth, and then another room with a huge dance floor, another bar, and another DJ. It was pretty neat. I had a good time, and was also admittedly looking forward to spending all of the next day in bed.

I really should do some homework now.
I have to give a presentation in German on Wednesday and I have no idea what topic to make it on. It can be anything, but I want it to be interesting and relevant, because my class is all international students. My German speaking skills are also nicht so gut. I'm actually terrified. So I just haven't done anything yet.

Someday I will post shorter posts more often, but for now, long posts seem to be the way to go.
Goodnight!