Maerchen Deutschland, Fairytale Germany

As I promised, I will now update everyone on what i've been up to lately!

A few weeks ago (In the beginning of October), my family took me to Bavaria for my host uncle's birthday and since we were already so far, we visited the Czech Republic, and Austria. It was simply an amazing weekend! On Friday after school, my friend Emily (from Indiana) came over because she would be coming with my family and I on our trip this weekend. I took her downtown to show her my city and we got to see Oktoberfest Wolfsburg a little (it's not very big but still pretty cool with German music, stands and beer tents) and we bought some Gebrannte Mandeln (really good German roasted almonds) and then went and got some ice cream at a little place my friends and I go to sometimes during free hours. I then showed her our train station and the canal where Autostadt is. It's really pretty there and also quite peaceful. We then took the bus home and had dinner with the whole family (Rike and Norman came over :)) and then Emily and I watched Spongebob and Family Guy in German and also watched the movie from Calvin. It was really nice seeing my friends (: and then, when we were watching the talent show, a boy I met at the conference named Daniel was playing the violin. Emily said, "wait, I know him!" so I was like, "yeah, he was at the conference his name is Daniel." She told me, "No! He's in Helmstedt!" (Helmstedt is her host city)! What a small, small world. So cool.

We went to bed around 1 am and woke up again at 2:30 because we needed to leave for Bavaria at 3 (it's about 6 and 1/2 hour drive there) But it was alright, we got to sleep in the car the whole way there :). We had breakfast when we got to Bavaria, as the sun was rising (it was so amazing, the sky was the colors of the rainbow!) I noticed the accent right away when the waitress started talking to us. It was hard to understand because the accents in Bavaria are quite strong and quite different (It's very similar to an Austrian accent) but I got used to it after a while of being there. We then drove to my uncle's house where we all celebrated his birthday together. I got to see Alena and Lotti again which is always nice. And also all my other little cousins who I love so much :) I love my family! I'm glad Emily got to meet them too! For lunch, we had some "typical Bayerisch food" which was very good! Some of the typical Bayerisch food includes white sausage, pretzels and leberkaese which is the funniest thing because leberkaese means liver cheese and there's no liver or cheese in it! :) After the party, we drove to Burgenhausen where we stayed that night. Burgenhausen is the longest castle in Europe and it's just simply amazing and beautiful! There were a lot of stairs to the top but it was completely worth it or as the Germans say "lohnt sich". The view was simply amazing and the sunset over the horizon and the mountains in the distance was breathtaking, we had the perfect timing and weather!

This day, we also crossed the bridge to...AUSTRIA! It was so cool and I can now also say i've been in 2 places at once. We didn't go into Austria that day, we just went over the border because we thought it was so cool (Emily and I) that over this 1 little bridge was a whole other country! It was really cool.

The next day, Caro and Pascal drove home and Em , Ruedi, Corinna and I drove once again across the bridge into Austria and visited a little town called Braunau. Have you ever heard of this town before? I hadn't. But maybe the reason for that is because Adolf Hitler was born here, which the people are not proud of. It was so strange walking the streets of that town and thinking that a little boy ran up and down the same streets, a little boy who grew up to become one of the biggest mass murderers of all time. It was crazy to think about. Did you know that Hitler was not born with the last name Hitler? He changed it because his real name was too embaressing!

Another thing I found amazing about this adventure to Austria was the fact that we could simply cross the border without any problems. It was as if Austria and Germany were one country, the same as when we traveled to Czech Republic (which I will write about in a second) it made me really think about how the world would be if we could all just live together as one in peace. The world should belong to all of us, together as brothers and sisters. I find the problems that Mexico and the U.S have to be quite sad because I have so many friends, so much family in Mexico but our countries can't live together in peace. There is such heavy border control and so many problems with people crossing the border and I find it quite sad. I really hope that someday all of the problems will go away and the world will be able to live together as one, as brothers and sisters as it should be. I hope that through my exchange I will be able to help in someway towards this goal as well! :)

After our visit to Austria, we headed back into Germany and started on our way in the direction of Czech Republic. We stopped on the way in Passau where we would stay the night. Passau is an absolutely amazing city. It's so beautiful! This is also the city where the 3 rivers, Danube, Inn and IIz meet! We stayed overnight there in a very cool hotel. The next day, we left Passau in the morning and headed on our way to Czech Republic! We went over the border and instantly everything turned from German into Czechisch! It was so crazy! I also got to experience what it's like to go to a country not knowing any of the language or what people are saying! But we weren't completely hopeless, everyone spoke English, German and Czechisch so we could still communicate :). We visited a few couple of really interesting and cool cities and drove for a while through the country, mostly along the parallel of Germany's border heading north. For lunch, we went to a market and bought some verschiedene (I'm losing my English xD) things for a picnic and drove to a really peaceful field where we could see the mountains in the difference and sit in the grass, eating lunch together. It was really awesome! After lunch, we headed back into Germany and on our way back home to Wolfsburg, Niedersachsen, Deutschland! It was such an amazing weekend, one that I will never forget!