I arrived in Salzburg, and for the second time felt right at home. Walking off the train, I looked and saw my cousin Peter walking toward me, and we proceeded to catch up as we walked to the car. I could not have been any happier.

Right away, I noticed a big difference between my trip to Salzburg in November and this one… I could really communicate with my family in their language. Wir haben nur auf Deutsch geredet. Mission accomplished!

We drove out to the house where der Peter and his wife die Bozena live just outside of Salzburg in Munderfing. As I said in November, the house that was a farm before has been completely redone by Peter alone, including a beautiful garden.

Bozena made us something to eat before Peter and I went out for a Moped ride to Matsee to have some coffee. It was a beautiful day as we rode around on his Moped and by the Matsee.

Trips like these remind of how happy I am here…. Riding around beautiful Austria, speaking German, and meeting with family as if I had known them forever. These images are not only in my camera, but permanently in my head.

Saturday was perfect for the garden party for Peter’s birthday. I helped Peter to set up lights and tables in the Garden and then we went shopping for the massive amount of food needed to feed the 30 people coming to the party.

Olivia (Peter and Bozena’s daughter) and her boyfriend Christoph showed up later in the day after taking the train from Wien. Christoph asked if I was brave…. We then proceeded with Peter, Olivia, and a friend of Peter’s to a giant swing just around the corner from the house. I watched as everyone took turns being a child again, climbing up a hill and a ladder and then plunging out into the beautiful scenery in Munderfing.

It was my turn now. “Ich habe wirklich ein bisschen Angst.”

Keine Angst!

The party began at 4, but we decided to open the wine a little early… natürlich. Meine Großtante Veronika showed up shortly thereafter and we talked for a while. She enlightened me on some österreichishes Deutsch. Yes, there is a big difference. Grüß di, a very personal way of greeting someone you know very well.

I sat with Veronika for much of the evening, recognizing the many similarities between her and my Grandma Terry.

The party continued with a load of gifts for den Peter, some of them more inappropriate than others.

After presents, a massive amount of delicious food prepared by der Bozena and her friends from the theater, and naturally bottles upon bottles of wine, it was time to dance.

After Veronika left, I spent the rest of the evening with Olivia, Christoph, Peter, and this wonderful woman from Norddeutschland who was terribly excited that “I was from Lüneburg.” She proceeded to speak in English with me for some reason. This turned out to be impossible to understand, so we switched back to German. In any case, she was wonderful company as we took the party well into the wee hours of the morning.

By 2 in the morning, Peter had the hiccups and it was time for bed. It was a wonderful party with great people.

Peter had to work early the next day. After breakfast with Bozena, we began to clean up from the evening before and I took a quick dip in the freezing cold swimming pool. Quite refreshing!

Bozena also had to work at the theater and I accompanied her in the Kantine for a little lunch. It was another beautiful day, so I explored the city for a few hours while they worked.

Peter had promised me that we would go out in Salzburg at night. Even amid being extremely tired and somewhat hungover, we made our way to the Augustiner Bräustübl. This had a wonderful Biergarten where everything was self-served. You even wash the beer mug yourself…. Das Bier schmeckt ausgezeichnet!

After a few rounds there, we were off to die Lesliebar. Peter and Bozena refer to it as the Lesliebar after my Aunt Leslie visited some years ago. After a beer there, it was really time for bed.

My last day in Salzburg was a cloudy day and I was quite sad to say goodbye. Peter and I spent some time working in the garden and made some time for Badminton and a quick dip in the cold pool.

We had coffee at the top of the Stein Hotel in Salzburg right before my train left. I looked out on a beautiful city with beautiful people, knowing that I would someday come back.

The overnight train back was definitely something I would only experience in Europe. I got on the City Night Line train in Nürnberg after connecting through München and made it to compartment 197, seat 76. Across from me sat a man that was speaking on the phone in a language that I did not recognize. After he got off the phone, he asked me:

“Der Zug fährt nach Kopenhagen, oder?”

“Ja, ich glaub’ schon.”

He got out a bag of food that he had prepared, complete with chicken, vegetables, and pita bread.

An Iraqi and an American sat and shared dinner together, conversing in the only common language that they could, German.

J

Eight and a half months have gone by and already people who have left are returning to visit. I feel like I have lived here for a long time. However, September still feels like yesterday…

It’s a very in between feeling. Where do I live? As much as I look forward to reuniting with family and friends in the states, I also dread it. When I walk down the street, I often run into to people I know, all different kinds of people: German friends, Erasmus students, professors, people that I see every day and recognize but am unsure of how I know them, etc. I find these daily encounters quite gratifying and naturally homelike.

A couple weeks ago, I decided to cut off making any new friends. At this point, I don’t need any more friends. I will just have to say goodbye to them in five weeks. My boss recently asked me if I wanted to be a buddy for some of the new students. I responded firmly, “I don’t need anymore friends; I need money.”

He then offered to pay me. I graciously accepted.

I know that ten months is not an extremely long period of time, but there has been a hell of a lot of growing in those months. So to throw myself back into my old life, a life that is completely different from the one I lead in Lüneburg, is bound to be somewhat difficult for me. Two lives, like I have said before, both equally loved but undeniably different.

It is nevertheless good to leave with positive feelings towards this experience. That way, no matter what I decide to do in the future, I will always look back at this year and smile.

Beautiful park on a beautiful day in Celle, Germany

Eight months ago, I arrived in Germany with a new pair of shoes. It took over a month for those shoes to break in and for my feet to stop bleeding. Lesson learned, break in your shoes before you leave on a ten-month educational adventure.

It was not only my shoes that needed breaking in. Everything was new. I arrived in Lüneburg, dumb, frightened and completely unaware of the change that I would go through eight months later, let alone aware that I would even be staying for more than three and a half months. I cannot imagine what it would have been like if I had left when I originally planned to. I only know that it would have been a huge mistake.

Last semester was my fun, spend all the money you have and travel every weekend semester. This semester has been much different, much humbler with many more lessons learned.

I measure my progress with learning the language and adapting to the culture by my haircuts. Fluent German speakers accompanied my first two haircuts, as I was terribly frightened to attempt to explain my hairstyle preference alone, in English or in German. The thought of it nearly gave me a panic attack. Today, I went by myself and walked away with what I think is the perfect Jonathan-style haircut. These are small but important steps for me.

It was not about the haircut, but about how scared I was for at least two months to make a mistake. Today, mistakes are my best friend. I am a professional mistake-maker and very proud of it.

Honestly, I have always enjoyed the thought of running away to a place where no one knows me and starting over. In some ways, that is what I have done here. The only difference is that I will be returning to my other life soon: my other friends, my family, my dog, my university, the Ozarks, etc. However, Lüneburg feels just as much like a home. I know that it always will.

Returning to Germany is almost certain and finishing my study of the language is naturally a must. I have a long way to go.

Eight months ago, with bloody feet and no idea about anything, I walked off a plane into a whole new world. I leave Lüneburg, or will leave in a couple of months, with a broken-in pair of shoes and a completely new set of eyes.

Although this is a compliment, I have decided that it is likely a lie and that my German is probably not as good as I have been led to believe. Perhaps I am only a likeable person, so likeable that people would lie to me to make me feel better about myself. Perhaps not.

Am I that person that walks around thinking they are good at everything, but in reality not at all? I hope not.

My response is the same each time, blushing and swinging from side-to-side saying “es geht, es geht”. And yes “it goes”, but not nearly as well as I am told.

Honestly, it is my English that needs polishing up. Even now, as I am writing this article, I struggle to differentiate between very simple words like, “hear” and “here”. Luckily the grammar check saved me on this one.

I enjoy throwing myself into situations where communication is bound to be relatively difficult. With it brings angst and a face that can absolutely not hide nervousness. However, for me there is no better way to learn than to go through a situation that is uncomfortable and often embarrassing.

Such was the case this past weekend at a party where I am quite sure that the fastest German speakers in the world decided to get together and confuse der einzige Amerikaner.

I did get two or three “dein Deutsch ist aber gut” from the party guests. However, I found myself agreeing with them this time. I went with a friend and wound up staying later than him, continuing to socialize and dance with complete strangers all on my own. After some time to become less anxious and naturally after a little bit to drink, I had very few problems understanding the rapid German and my blushing face gradually disappeared.

The people at the party and the people I meet that compliment me may or may not find me to be overly likeable or speak incredible German. I know that I’m not and I know that I don’t. However, they are pleased that I have taken an interest in their language and actively attempt to speak it in most situations.

Nonetheless, it is always a nice self-esteem boost to hear that I am doing well.

Prosting at the Saltz Contor in Lüneburg.

Mirror Article 7.4.10

I sat with my friend Anna on her balcony for almost two hours watching all the people walk by, drinking coffee, and feeling completely at ease.

The Germany that I have known for the past four months has been very cold. People didn’t smile and laugh arm-in-arm as they walked down the street, or sit outside enjoying Eis. No, it was quite the opposite. Gestern war unglaublich schön!

Honestly, I feel like I just started my stay in a new country. I went to Hamburg with a few friends, a place I go at least once a week. However this time, it was all new. Everything was fresh and everything was perfect. We sat on the Alster, ejoying Eis and laughing for no reason with the thousands of other people that were doing the same thing.

Don’t get me wrong, winter in Germany was also fun, but this is much better!

Here are some pictures from my weekend with my Dad and some Drury professors in Athens. Best food that I have ever had, beautiful historic sights, and wonderful company. Thanks to my Dad and to Panos!

National Gardens

Odeon of Herodes Atticus

From the Acropolis, looking at Mount Lycabettus

National Gardens

View from Mount Lycabettus

Das Rathaus in Osnabrück

I’ve spent the past six months in Germany, but until this past weekend I had not experienced what it’s like to be in a German family home. I traveled to my friend Michel’s home in Osnabrück with another Erasmus student from Finland, Aija. It is free to travel anywhere in Niedersachsen, so it was a billige Reise.

Osnabrück is a city about the size (in population) of Springfield.

The Maaß family were incredibly welcoming and made this trip quite a memorable one. They live a little bit outside of the city center, but it is only a 15-20 minute bike ride to get into town. The house is straight out of an Ikea catalog. I loved it. I feel like my Mom now… I took a picture of the bathroom.

On our first evening, we ate dinner with the family (Michel’s mom was kind enough to accommodate our picky food needs – kein Fleisch für mich, kein Käse für Aija) and chatted about our homelands. They got out their Atlas so that they could see exactly where we were from. I pointed to Springfield and then we looked at the Google street view to see my house. Google makes everything better.

We rode bikes into the city on the first day for a morning brunch at Lilly’s café and a city tour. It was quite a treat. For 11 EURO each, we got as many drinks as we wanted, brötchen and croissants (with jam, honey, salmon), a boiled egg, and fruit and yogurt for our Nachtisch. Perfect way to start this vacation.

Afterwards, we decided (as you can see from the picture above) that it was time for me to get a haircut. The stylist thought that Americans spoke American and not English. She was serious too. We laughed about that most of the day.

The next day, we woke up to breakfast with the family and spoke about what our plans were for the day. It just felt good to be in a home and to see how a German family home functions.

We met later with Michel’s friend Dennis at the Felix Nussbaum Haus museum. Michel had never been to an Art museum, and I was very interested in seeing some of the paintings. Definitely worth seeing… and extremely inexpensive. Only 3 EURO.

After the museum, we walked to Michel’s grandma’s house to have lunch. She had prepared some soup and load of meat. Sehr Deutsch und sehr gut! It is also more common for German families to have their hot meal at lunch instead of dinner. It was nice to meet the grandmother, who at 86, is in extremely good physical condition.

Later that evening, we went the the movies to see Avatar 3D auf Deutsch. Television and movies are proving to be better ways at picking up the language than taking German language courses. We spent the whole weekend speaking almost only in German with Michel’s family. So I feel like it was a fairly educational vacation.

The next day Dennis came over to the house and we prepared a very nice lunch – Fisch, Gemüse, Kartoffeln, Reis, und natürlich Eis zum Nachtish. I think I am starting to catch on to this cooking thing. Plus, it saves me a hell of a lot of money!

Many thanks to the Maaß family for making a billige Reise so relaxing, educational and most importantly fun.

J