Tour Guide-isms

On our bus tour through Berlin, we were blessed with a wonderful tour guide with a ridiculous accent and too much inflection. Although his tour was very informative, it was also rather humorous. We were laughing the entire time while we wrote down some of the best phrases.

"I must tell the truth. Yes, I cannot tell a lie."

"A teacher must not admit that he has made a mistake."

"Ah yes I have an idea! I know how to do it!"

"I just helped your bus driver out. He can do it on his own now."

- the very beginning of the tour as our bus attempted to exit the parking lot without crushing any cars

"We Germans are usually pretty strict about rules, but every now and then we make our own rules. As long as we do not harm people."

"There's the queen on the left, and the king on the right. Yes, she has a very nice... haircut."

"And if you look to the right you can see all of the rich and beautiful people."

"So I think you understand my story. Let me subsume it."

"Very wealthy."

- as we drove through a wealthy neighborhood called Charlottenburg

"The Germans should not forget that the second world war was planned here, started here.

"And the official name is the memorial for the Jews... killed... murdered Jews... in the European nation."

"And as you know, Hitler had two projects. He wanted to murder all of the Jewish population in Europe... on the right are two projects..."

- he reminds us of Germany's history as we pass through construction (the word project may have been lost in translation)

"Okay, here's the other bus to the left. You know we do the same tour."

"Okay, my dear friends, now I have a cool neighborhood for YOU. All of the heepsters are there."

"And on the left, you can see the advertisement for 'Watch.'"

"THICK walls."

"And to the left I see a black building. I think it's a hotel.

"You should see the biggest one. It's overwhelming."

"And then comes a beeeautiful building, green!"

- we become acclimated with the buildings of Berlin

"There are four pringle parties here in our government."

"This embassy belongs to the five northern EU countries... plus Finland! and Iceland!"

"And to the left you will see some flags."

"And there are even German embassies... imagine!!"

"And the four rich districts have to give money to the fffff... Twelve poor countries. Come on.  Imagine the relationship."

"We are neighboring countries. We know each other. Like a family."

- as we drove through the part of the city where important government things happen

"He emigrated to Hollywood..."

"Plllleeeaaaase. At first I thought: what a high level, this group. Like if I would go to New York and the first time I was grinning was 'oh an Audi or a Traders Joe.'

Well, actually I did. I was walking through Brooklyn and I said 'oh, a Trader's Joe!' Okay, I forgive you."

- the North Americans on the bus (so... all of us...) spotted a Domino's pizza and really showed excitement

Stadt Tour und Wien Wochenende

So October's been a pretty busy month. On the weekend of the 9th-10th, I visited Wien with my friend Anna and her mom. We had the chance to meet up with Claudia, Adrian, and Martin and we got chicken nuggets at McDonald's and wandered around Maria Hilferstraße as usual. On Saturday, Anna and Adrian and I hit up the Albertina, and also got to visit Prater, the oldest amusement park in the world.

The next weekend after that was the Rotary Wien weekend. I got to see all of my exchange student friends and spend time with them around the city. We also were accompanied by the Hungarian exchange students. On Friday night we crammed ourselves into the U-Bahn and attended an opera called "Die Lustige Witwe" and were blessed with a screen above the stage with English-subtitled summaries to help us understand what was going on as we sat in the theater for three hours. We then visited a subpar Chinese restaurant. We made Freddy drink some strange substances ("room temperature mushroom soup with about 4 spoonfulls of hot sauce") which was rather entertaining.

Saturday was the day we visited Parliament and Schönbrunn. (HA - check it out, I'm at school using a German keyboard with all of the umlauts I want!! Deutsch spellcheck is having a hayday with all of these English words though.) Parliament was pretty cool, aside from accidentally being given a tour in Spanish. We all really enjoyed walking through Schönbrunn and the palace gardens. It was beautiful, and it really gave you a taste for what life for the Hapsburgs was like.

We were given freetime later that night, during which Claudia and Connor and I wandered around in the dark streets of Vienna witnessing crime and ending up at some Russian monument.

On Sunday we were given the morning free after orientation, so some of us visited a Cat Cafe, where actual and real live cats wandered freely for customers to pet. Although the cats were indifferent to our presence it was still a lot of fun.

That week back in Völkermarkt went fast, I did go to a KAC (that's the Klagenfurt team) hockey game which I enjoyed a lot. 

Before I knew it, it was the Friday to leave to Linz for our Prague/Dresden/Berlin tour! I was looking forward to it for so long, and I wasn't disappointed. Friday we all met in Linz to explore the city on our own and get the information for the weekend. Early Saturday morning we left for Prague. Our first stop in the Czech Republic was McDonald's for a lunch break. The Czech Republic uses Euros as well, but their primary currency is the Czech Crown which made paying for anything a hell of a lot harder. Imagine a giant group of kids that literally know zero Czech or the exchange rate of Czech Crowns to Euros (like, 400 crowns bought you some chicken nuggets) trying to order from an employee who can't speak German OR English very well as she attempts to give you change for what you paid for in Euros back in Crowns. It was a mess, and Claudia got a caramel sundae instead of chocolate and that was the end of our tolerance for Czech McDonald's.

We got into Prague that morning. If you've ever talked to me about travel, you know that Prague is the one city that I wanted to go to more than anything. We got maybe half a day there, but I got to see everything I'd been dreaming of. Although it was short and I didn't get explore the city for very long, I'm grateful I got to experience what I did.

view from the Charles Bridge

We had a tour guide take us from the palace across the Charles Bridge to Old Town Square. Anyone around me during this time probably tired of hearing me proclaim my excitement to see the astronomical clock - (shoutout to Claudia, she had to endure this the most and only insulted me like twice and countered with a never ending slew of Czech related puns). After he left us right by the astronomical clock(!!!!!!!) we had freetime for a few hours. Claudia and I took some super cute pictures, and ventured off to find the most authentic Czech cuisine we could. After a stop in some tourist shops, we were ushered inside a traditional restaurant by a man who was very pleased to know we were American. (Claud and I have decided that being two young, beautiful, American girls in European cities is ideal mostly in daylight.) 

don't ask me what this was it was all in Czech I just know there was a quail egg involved

After Prague, we set off to Dresden. It was another long bus ride, and when we got to the hostel that night we were given freetime to explore the city. It was pretty cool to wander around and see all of the city with the lights.

The next day we were given a really excellent tour and learned more about the history of Dresden. It was completely destroyed in WWII and was entirely rebuilt. We visited the Zwinger, which was built for defense but evolved to be the hottest party scene in town thanks to my new role model August the Strong. 

After our tour around the city we were given more freetime to explore on our own. Claudia and I went out again in search of an authentic experience, and were not disappointed by the Bratwurst or Dresdner Eierschecke cake we had. We also bought toothpick holders carved to look like animals from a deaf guy. 

That night we regrouped on the bus to head off to Berlin. For our freetime after arriving into the city, we went through the city at night again, finding the Brandenburg Gate and even some of the Berlin Wall. 

The next day we had another tour, and we all found our tour guide incredibly humorous. I think I'll make a post of tour guide-isms, they're great. We stopped at the Berlin wall for some classic tourist photos:

(Claudia's got more on her camera that she hasn't gotten the chance to share yet, if you want to see them as much as I do maybe you can help me yell/bribe/blackmail her)

We were given a chance to see the Brandenburg Gate in the daylight, and then were given freetime for the rest of the day. Claudia and I set off yet again in thirst of an authentic experience. We ate some kebaps and currywurst, checked out Checkpoint Charlie - (and were checked out... the "American" soldiers placed there for photo ops are not the best people to take pictures with, especially in front of a crowd), and visited a cafè for Matcha and then we ended up at Starbucks for the Wifi and chai. The sunset on the walk back was absolutely beautiful, it may be my favorite part of the  trip. 

"Hey girls... how are you so beautiful?" "Genetics." "They're not into you, bro".

And then on Tuesday, we returned to Linz  after a ten hour bus ride, and I got home to Kärnten after another 5 hours on a train :-) 

After three days of school was the weekend, and Anna and I were graced with a visit from Martin, an exchange friend from Australia. Anna got to show him some of Klagenfurt, and I spent some time with them in Völkermarkt. Saturday night I helped my host dad's Round Table club at their annual dinner party, (which proved to be challenging, seeing as I was assigned serving and I can't exactly communicate with strangers effectively on a whim). Everything will be low-key until the end of November when I 'm attending an alt-j concert(!!!!!) and meeting up with some friends for that weekend.

So that's all for now, maybe stay tuned for Tour Guide-isms sometime in the near future.

Bis später!