I have finally danced to Rammstein at a German metal club.

The weather continues to put a grey curtain over everything we do in Germany, but that never stops us from having fun! I compared the weather forecasts of Dortmund and Iowa City, and this week they both look identical...beautiful weather for everyone! :D

This upcoming week is our final week of language class. We have a ten day break until classes start, and Wendy and I are having difficulties deciding on where to travel. We thought about backpacking around southern Germany or going to Amsterdam, but haven't made any decisions yet. Man, we need to be more decisive!

But, I have decided on some classes that I will be taking this semester! I will be taking two language courses, one for conversational German, and the other for understanding literature and culture. I will also be taking a few classes in English, one being an international crime novel class, German film, and an international journalism. OH speaking of journalism, I think I will be writing for the student newspaper, Pflichtlektüre (Essential Reading)! I got into contact with the layout editor, and he said that they would love to have an exchange student on board! Whee, I am excited!

Tuesday the exchange group all went to see the movie Die Vorleser (The Reader). It was a very good movie, even all in German!

Wednesday night I went to Bottrop (a city about 40 km away from Dortmund) to hang out with my friend Alexander. He was an exchange student at Valley in 2004, so it is really cool having a friend here to visit. His mom cooked us all dinner, and then me, Alexander, and his sister Katarina went to a shopping mall in the neighboring city of Oberhausen. Unfortunately I forgot to grab money AND my ATM card, so we all just window shopped.

I really love talking to his mom! She doesn't speak any English, but when we speak in German together she is always really patient and helpful. She is very friendly, inviting, and always wanting to give hugs, which is EXTREMELY rare for an older German person. The older generation of Germans are usually quite rude to youth, German and non-German. I have witnessed and experienced this several times. So I have been told it is best to just stick with talking to the younger people.

Friday I went to an old coal factory with my group. The place was interesting, but our tour guide was pretty worthless, so I didn't really learn anything. But afterward a small group of us went to a laid-back student bar called Platz an der Sonne. We all drank beer and cocktails, and took shots of Jägermeister. It was a wonderful way to end the otherwise dull evening.

Saturday we went to Düsseldorf. First we took a boat tour down the Rhine, which was pretty fun, and then we had a few hours to just wander the city. We then all got a glass of Düsseldorf's special beer, Altbier. It was very dark and very odd tasting. Even the Germans in our group didn't really care for it. Luckily all of the other beers I have had here are fantastic! Of course I am partial to Dortmund beer, though :)

Saturday night I went into the neighboring city of Essen with a few of the other girls in my group. There were five of us, two from the US, two from Turkey, and one from Latvia. Antra, the girl from Latvia, was really wanting to go to a hard rock/metal disko (club), and she asked me to go because she heard about my experiences with the goth bar. So after wandering around Essen for half an hour, we finally found the place, Turock. None of us fit in, but we had a great time dancing anyway! First they started out playing lots of metal music, so all of the people with long hair went out on the dancefloor to headbang. Then the normal hard rock music started playing -- Rob Zombie, AC/DC, and of course, Rammstein. Similar to the goth bar, my group didn't really fit in with the normal crowd. That didn't stop us all from dancing our butts off! I even found myself headbanging a few times.

Getting back turned out to be extremely complicated thanks to Daylight Savings Time. Because we lost an hour, we were all sorts of confused about how to read the train schedule. So finally after waiting at two different platforms we caught a train back to Dortmund around 4.30 am (or was it 3.30??). All in all, a good night.

A side note, I have discovered that my ability to speak German goes down the drain when I am drunk. You'd think that drinking German beer would enhance my language skills!

Phew, that was long! I will update more times during the week so these posts won't be so damn long! I will also post a separate photo post (sadly no Turock pictures...we all forgot our cameras!)

Aufwiedersehen!