weekend update.

on saturday morning, we rode on the bus (super fun!) to the medical facilities at the university where johannes used to study. he gave me a tour of the campus and showed me where he used to have classes, as well as the old dormitory where he lived for a few years. then we continued our walk to a giant park with trails and a lake and even an enclosed area with all sorts of animals (goats, deer, sheep, et cetera). it was quite nice and i enjoyed spending time in serene surroundings, since - aside from the "greenbelt" - köln is very much trains and cars and bicycles and such.

back at the house that afternoon, i was able to get some reading done (finished a book by marquez and another by hornby) thus allowing me to delve further into my book about germany, from which i am learning quite a bit. for example, nutcrackers and garden gnomes are both german inventions. additionally, germany stole the melody for its national anthem (a song written by haydn) from austria, and the first two verses of it are too nationalistic, so singing anything but the third verse is illegal in the country. also of particular interest and relevance to me: köln is considered a party city, and it also houses the largest brothel in the country. fancy that!

saturday afternoon was spent trading movies between the two of us, until we caught a train out to the surburbs for a date with johannes' friend and i got my first experience of a german house (multi-level). we met up with nico (who is an archeologist and apparantely superhuman) and another friend whose name i don't quite remember (who is a landscape contracter and has been to santa rosa before!) and drank beer and watched the eurovision song contest, which is the most awful piece of entertainment i have ever experienced. but it was quite funny, even if germany did rank 20 out of 25 (not so impressive). after the competition ended, we watched some soccer highlights and other such things on youtube, before heading out to catch our train.

it was relatively late (and i was relatively drunk) when we returned, so i immediately crashed, only to wake up sunday morning with my first german hangover! but it wasn't so bad, all in all, as it was just a slight annoying headache for part of the day.

i spent most of the afternoon reading my book, with the exception of a few hours during which we poured over and traded music. around 6, johannes woke me from a short nap i had taken and we headed back to the suburbs (this time a couple stops further) to go to his parents' house. more specifically, we found ourselves in köln-sürth. from the train station to the house is a pretty and quiet walk, and the house itself is very modern in design and impressive in its interior.

johannes' mother, doris, cooked us a dinner of potatoes, german asparagus with a cream sauce (delicious!), chicken (which of course i didn't have) and salad (something which is served after the rest of the meal, as per minkus family tradition). it was delicious, and complimented quite nicely by french and italian red wine (and some austrian white wine, which i didn't get around to trying). dessert was a strawberry tart of sorts along with coffee, as well as some pineapple and orange. johannes' sister, marie, also joined us for dinner, and she is absolutely adorable; i am quite fond of her.

after some time, we left to catch our train, and ended up missing it by maybe 30 seconds, but another one was on its way soon after, so we had to bide our time at the station for a short while until it came through. but the wait wasn't too terrible and before long we were back home. i stayed up a bit and read, and awoke fairly early this morning - something about the sun coming in the window in the morning has set me on a fairly regular sleep schedule.

not sure what adventures today holds, so i had best go find out...

p.s. i've got j. saying "fail" all the time. FTW.