Wasting time and having fun....

So what has happened in Germany…?
After I came back I had so much time on my hands I didn’t really know what to do with it. And you know me…I’m soooo lazy! So I was just hanging around, not really doing much. I felt a lot of time like just going into the city to meet for a beer in a bar or in a café or whatever, but there’s one problem: THERE IS NO CITY! And everything needed to be planned with others…
Luckily one of my friends was feeling just the same (was also EVS, but she already returned in February), so we got together a lot. And because we had nothing to do we decided to throw a party for our dance group as a re-union kind if thing, since now finally all the people who went abroad are back (a total of 6 or something!). And so planed this theme party…it was really a lot of fun! I missed carnival so much last spring, so a theme party was just perfect. And it was so much fun: the theme was Hollywood and everybody was nicely dressed up or came up with another funny costume (two people cam as a red carpet!).


I also went to Berlin (LOVED IT!!!, thanks again Laura! By the way…I’m coming back in January for a performance at some “Grüne Woche” thing. No idea what that is but what do I care….it’s Berlin and I’m going!) and to Hamburg. My exchange organization “Youth for Understanding” is turning 50 this year so this was our big celebration. It was HUGE! We had the whole youth hostel just booked for us. There was a celebration event with about exactly 1000 guest in a huge beautiful hall in the “Minister of the Interior” of Germany was speaking. Actually no one really likes him, but it made us feel important that he came to speak ;-) . And then there was the big ball hich was a blast. All in all a great weekend with great people, but I hae to admit…I didn’t see a thing of the city so I hae to come back again.




I moved. For good. I got a room in a flat pretty fast, after only one day of looking at flats. And that’s pretty fast. Especially since I’ve heard so many horror stories from others. A lot of time people were looking for 4 weeks and still didn’t find anything! So I was lucky!
I have 2 flatmates: Sabine(22, spent 1 year in Bolivia as a volunteer, became a bank clerk and now starts to study again something with Latin America and economics) and Marina(21, in vocational school to become something like a social worker for disable/old/mentally ill people). Both a really nice and the good thing is…neither of them is studying anything similar or even going to my university. For me that’s very important so I have my uni things and the rest of my life (which will be a small proportion of the time but anyway) separate. And I don’t only have science dorks around me (I know I am one myself so I shouldn’t complain, but anyway).
I am now starting to feel at home here. I met some nice people and met others again by accident after 1,5 years. Really by accident! There was a car crash right in front of my house and then I met a girl from my hometown that I hadn’t seen fr ages.
There’s also a little bit of Estonia in Münster: Doro (Voru) and Katha (Tapa) are also studying here.
My studies will start next week and I’m kinda scared because I ha the feeling that I turned stupid and my brain died the past year. But tomorrow our orientation starts and that will be a blast: stupid games on the town hall square (the chain-of-clothes is an old tradition), a lo t of new people, a lot of alcohol. And the ba scene is quite good from what I know so far! And there’s also a big variety of clubs (yeah…VARIETY…I missed that!).

So….I promise to try to write more often now so that my post are not always that long!
I miss u guys! Hope you’re all doing ok.

New hometown...well almost.

Now it's final.
I know where I'll study!!!!

MÜNSTER !

what...you've never heard of it? Well...that's not so much of a surprise.
It's a rather small town in my state with about 280.000 people, BUT more than a fifth of them are students! So...a very good students life and a lot of good bars ;-)
And it's very typical to go by bike EVERYWHERE! In Münster there are more bikes than inhabitants (about half a million bikes).

So…that's where I’ll be. and I am excited about it! It's the perfect students city for me: small, green, nice OldTown but full of life. and a good university.

On Tuesday the latest I'll already go over there to find a place to live. Somehow. It will be quite difficult, because of all the new students. I already heard a lot of stories about trying to find a place, but i hope I'll manage.
I hope someone wants to live in an apartment with me.

Back in Germany.....

Tere tere!

You told me to write in this blog so here I am! I would hae posted something sooner, but in Poland there isn't wifi eerywhere and in the hotel it was broken. I didn't arrive home before this morning so now is the time....

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALICE!!! A little bit late I know...sorry. I hope you had a nice birthday!

DAY 1

Right now I am sitting in the train station of Warszawa Zdochnia and I am waiting for ages for my train. Of course I missed the one which left shortly after I arrived here (maybe the luggage was a little bit too much to carry after all). I think my train is at 12:50 (I arrive here shortly after 9), but I have no idea and I don’t really know when I’ll ever arrive in Wroclaw. I really hope I will still manage today. But hey…I’m always open for surprises.

By the way…yes I did have to pay extra for my luggage, when we changed the bus in Riga. Aaaaahh…what a mess that was. But luckily there was a Polish guy who spoke perfect German and he helped me to translate and I got my stuff in the bus after all.

And the best of it all…I forgot my toothbrush! So a perfect day this is. Gosh…I’m so glad when I arrive at this fucking station in Wroclaw. It’s quite boring to sit around this freaking station for 4 hours with nothing really to do (all my books are squeezed into a free corner of any of my suitcases, which I do not dare to open).to open.

Yeah…just as I am writing this as train to the city where I’m supposed to go to catch my train arrived….so gotta go!

Ok…that was too much of enthusiasm. I got the train. I arrived at Radom.

Just to find out that the train to Wroclaw goes TWICE A DAY! I am really developing a deep hate against Polish train stations and employees of the train company now. How can you give a person a connection that you will not she will miss (the lady in Warszawa got me a train which left one minute after I had the ticket in my hand!!) and that goes fucking twice a day.

So I am looking forward to another 8 hours in the middle of nowhere in Poland with to much luggage to move around the city. And then a night in the train, until I finally arrive at 6:44 the next day (meaning Thursday).

Lovely.

Just lovely.

I need a beer.

DAY 2

There was no beer. The only shop in the train station was closed already. Nevertheless I spend the 8 hours fine and did more or less useful things. It’s amazing what you can do in 8 hours at a train station. Do your nails, do your toenails, I painted my mobile phone again (all the black dots were gone), I read again my travel guide to Estonia (apparently the Estonian youth meets in he Danish Kings Garden to play guitar in the evening, aha?) and I think I have never in my life spend so much time plucking my eyebrows.

As you can see: a very successful day. And believe it or nor…in those 8 hours not a single person actually talked to me. I guess there are people that are quieter than Estonians.

In the train I met a nice guy though…a students that was going to his girlfriend’s sister’s wedding or something.

Anyway…some of you have seen my entire luggage. I hurled it all into the train somehow and then it turned out that the train was one of those with separate compartments. In general those are quite cool but there is hardly any space for luggage. So I entered one that was not full yet. I managed to put one of my bags onto those suitcase-holder-thingies on the wall, put my big suitcase in the middle of the compartment, put my small suitcase on my seat and then I sat on it with my feet on my big suitcase and my backpack on my lap. So not a very comfortable position for sleeping. The nice guy (forgot his name already) took my backpack then and after some time someone else left so I actually had some place to sit after a while. But still not much sleep.

Finally in Wroclaw I was so fucking happy to give away my luggage to this luggage place and then after an unsuccessful search for a shower(well the bathroom of McDonalds was just as fine, I guess), I went with my things to the park, had breakfast and enjoyed the morning sun until I met my friend at 13 o clock.

That was really nice.

And I was quite happy to see my friend as well. She also made an EVS for half a year in Poland, so she knew how I was feeling and didn’t ask any stupid “so…how is Estonia” questions. It was really good to talk to her as first person from home again. It’s good to have someone who knows what it’s like. Also it was nice to enjoy the hot summer day with a couple of beer in the street bars.

After an odyssey through the town we finally managed to meet my dance group. So…much more beer now.

It's strange to meet them all again at once. Some of them have change so much and some are stuck in exactly the same place as they were more than 1 year ago. Or maybe I’m still stuck in my head in my Tallinn life. We will see how it goes. During the next days.

I’m looking forward to it. I didn’t have the chance to talk to everyone yet and I am curious to get to know some of them again in a new light.

And I also got warned that I have to catch up with the rest and learn quite a few dances by tomorrow noon so I can perform with the rest by the afternoon. Aaah….

By the way…I got sunburned…AGAIN. It was so freaking ht today, about 36 degrees, it really felt like the Bahamas or something especially since the Tallinn wind is missing.

I miss you all already and it really meant a lot to me that you came to the bus station to say goodbye!

Musi, musi,

Barbara

DAY 3 + 4

Well…let me tell you one thing about my dance group. In a way the group is a lot like me. We disorganised, we don’t care so much that we are, we are always late and we like beer. A lot. And luckily beer is cheap in Poland and also come in 0,5 l glasses. So life’s good here.

So far.

We did a tour around the city today and that was quite nice. Wroclaw is a nice city.

I enjoyed that part although I was still in my morning mood for almost the whole day.

Then we danced, then we drank some beer then we perform and guess what we did after that…we drank beer.

Basically this went the whole time. One evening we had a performance in a small village of 15 ppl or something like that and about a third of them actually cam o see us and later it was said there would be disco. We expected something really really lame but as soon as they brought the Vodka bottles we knew it would be a fun evening, and it was! They gave each table 2 bottles.

So…we were drunk. Some more some less and as I tried to help one of us out of the toilet (she locked herself in, was to drunk to open and her head was hanging over the trash bin) I pretty much bruised my whole arm. I guess those toilet bowl are not always as steady as they seem.

Anyway...I was quite drunk and I even spoke some Russian with some of the villagers. Quite funny…

Well…there’s not much more to say about what we did or so on.

It’s was nice to be on trip with my group…a good way to get used to people again step by step. And to have so many people around me. I would have died I think if I had gone straight back to my small hometown.

Now I am back in my hometown since this morning. Strange feeling. I entered my old room to go to bed and it felt like going back in time.

It was not like going home but like going into the past. Everything here seems so old now and also so juvenile. It feels like the room of a 14year old.

I pretty much emptied out my wardrobe and get rid of all the clutter that has been sitting there for so long.

Right now I’m a bit bored, since no one seems to have time for me. Most of my friends are working or busy with school stuff, with their boyfriends/girlfriends or not in town, so I hope there’s still someone that finds some time for me. I really don’t feel like spending my first evening in Germany sitting in front of the TV with my parents.

How are things in Tallinn, Greece, France Italy and wherever else you are?

I miss you all a lot!!!

Musi, musi

Barbara