battle of the blogs

EDIT>>> Normal script is me, italics is Katie.
And I don't think I sound funny at all.

On Friday the 27th, Katie Came to Town.
And the world was changed.

Before this happened, a few other things worth noting occured.
First of all, Creepy Sunglasses Guy was on the bus. As usual. AND, he asked to borrow my pen. Which I allowed, because I don't know what he would have done otherwise. Scary scary man.
Then, Katie did not come. But her phone call came, and I answered it. And in Denglish, she told me that because of snow, her train was coming late. She says that isn't what she said, but that's what I understood. I love it.
Much waiting occured, and I bought a crazy looking bread thing for Andelyn. And some other stuff of goodness.
After much more waiting, Katie arrived! And the world was, as before stated, geändert.

after a 50€ train ticket, 2 ices, a 30 minute verspatung, a bottle of fanta, and a rogue encounter of the english variety (there was an english speaking man on the train), i finally made it to the bonn hbf.

thankfullz, meg was waiting for me.


A good chunk of my waitingness had been spent with a Ticketautomat, attempting to save katie as much money as possible. I ended up failing, but that wasn't my fault. So, prepared with infos, Katie and I boarded an U-Bahn to Anya's house.

this is sort of actually a lols story. i couldn't exactly figure out, why meg had switched host families TO LIVE WITH TWO NATIVE ENGLISH SPEAKERS. anywsays, it turns out we didn't go to her house, we went to anya's.

the general plan was to dye my hair.

the general plan sort of... dissolved. into teeny, tiny, bitsy pieces. the first thing the "professional" did was dump the conditioner into the dye, making it unusable. didn't like the color anyways, and we hop back on the u-bahn and make a flying trip to rewes.


The funny thing about that story is that Katie was not under the impression that, despite my assurances, Anya really is a professional. She is, like, trained and stuffs. In Cosmetology. Yup.
I take full blame because I was distracting Anya the whole time with my incessant chatter. I lost my voice eventually.

Anywhos, we went to ReWe. Turns out they don't carry hairdye. Not in the the hair section, or the fruit section, or the cleaning products section. We checked.

So we returned to the House of Anya, and Katie and I both got our self-done haircuts smoothed out by Anya the Amazing.

i was going to make a totes brilliant meg equals pithy squirrel reference. it's forthcoming, promises.

I have yet to understand from where this forthcoming reference is supposed to come, but it will most Definitely be brilliant.

well, have to have some incentive to keep the readers at it

Oh right. It's part of the evil plan of all bloggers. *had forgotten*

At this point it became run-to-the-bus time.

so i bought another bus ticket. hence the meg failing at saving katie money thing, that you'd remember if you just didn't skim to the dirty parts.

anywhooos, so we rode the u-bahn back to the bahnhof. when we were walking out of the hallway, i got confronted by two germans of the teenage variety. they did not seem to be drunk.

they approach me. i whip out the "es toooot meeer leeeiiid..." and look to meg for reassurance. i thought SHE SAID THAT THE BONN FOLKS WERE FRIENDLY.

LIES!

and then the guy starts speaking english.

he points at his wrist and says, i saw you on the tv yesterday, can i have your sign?"

and then they rambled some more and then meg pulled me away, so i could be harrassed by the next one in line.

which was the bus driver.

i get on the bus. i must buy another ticket (this is a reaccuring theme; i hope you're not bored by it yet.)

me: can i buy a ticket to... meg?
meg: blah this is my stop blah
me: what she said
bus driver: now you say it!
me: ??????
me: meg?

and then meg fed me the words and the guy asked me from where i'm from. no one knows where braunschweig is down here, so it's a bit odd.

i think he meant my nationality. but i whipped out the german, srs bsnss style, so all was in ordnung.


I personally found the busdriver rather friendly.

sure, meg. sure. i thought bonn was family-friendly; now i'm thinking again.

It is, except when you are here. The trade-off is that when you are here, the trains come on time. So I win.

By the way, the name of my stop is Bßhövn Abzg. Ganz simple.

that's for privacy protection

Then Samstag occured, bright and early the next day - we were awoken by the brightness of the sun at apprx. 7:40. How deceiving of it.

We made ourselves ready (as the Germans say) and went downstairs for shoes and stuffs, when we ran into Regina the hostmother.

Mama: Ack! If I knew you were leaving early we would have breakfasted earlier!! Here, smear yourself a Brötchen.
Me:...Bus in 5 minutes?
Whatever. We made it with only minimal light jogging.

Then Katie attempted to buy a Tagesticket (bus and train ticket for a whole day).


me: hallo, ich hätte gern eine tagesticket. region four. köln.
him: bonn?
me: köln.
him: bonn.
me: köln.
him: oh! köln (he says it the exact same)

and then he prints me a four card.

so we went and talked to him again, and he complained and gave me a day ticket.

then, on the bus, i was introduced to sunglasses man, meg's secret loooove.

the sparks were flying as he dozed romantically in the back of the bus.

clearly, it is forever.

Only because he refuses to take a different bus. Or a bath, I should say. There is nothing sexy about greasy hair and cut-up knuckles. Or bleeding eye sockets, but I suppose that was just once. Sorry, Katie.

sure, meg.

she's just in denial. THE SPARKS WERE FLYING; I TELLS YOU!

That was because the bus is reallllllly old. Honestly, the middle turny section is going to fall out some day.

We decided that, since we had put so much effort into getting a ticket that lets Katie go to Köln, we may as well go there. So we did. And, guess what?
It was raining.
Hard.

The wonderful thing about the Köln Dom is that it is like a massive wind maschine. It is like Chicago in the middle of the Köln Innercity. Ergo, umbrella = useless = we are wet.

and we blowdryed our hair and everything.

Luckily the rain was all, 'just kidding!' and we did not become soaked through. We eventually arrived at my personal favorite haven, The English Shop, which I find much amazing. Unfortunately the counter was not being manned this time by a hot British boy with one of those accents that melts the bones in your knees. Or maybe that was a fortunate thing - I was planning on doing a lot of walking this weekend.

well, i saw a llama. and that made me all melty-kneed, even though i was planning to do a lot of walking this weekend.

We then wandered a bit more until we came upon a S-Bahn. As we approached, the rain picked up. As we attempted to decide a direction, it picked up more. As it started down-ouring so hard that the rain - yes, rain, not hail - started bouncing off the ground, we ran for the side that we were closest to: and hid under the covering until the Bahn came.

We ended up on the other side of the river at a Bahnhof that I didn't know existed and took a train back to Bonn that I had never taken before and that went through stops that I had never heard of and I was very confused, but eventually we ended up on Track 3 in the Bonn Hbf so all was well again.

so then we were in bonn.

and we went a-walkin'.

we found a seriously cuties little store with odd things and went upstairs.

at the foot of another very intriguing set of stairs, there was a sign that said "private, but please come in. everything is for sale."

it turned out that it was a little overpriced thriftstore. i bought an amazing yolked blue fuzzy skirt and meg almost bought a magenta-themed pioneer dress and then bought like a 70's style shirt dress.

then i was hungry, so we went and nommed some noodles.

i learned to use chopsticks.





apparently, i am right handed.

Anya and I, through the invention of the Telephone, planned ourselves a ron-day-voo. And then it started hailing.

We found ourselves an S-Bahn and were magically (after a good 15 minutes) in Bad Godesberg. We went to the Haribo Fabrik!! (read - factory.)

me: So, where is this factory thing?
Anya: this will soon become apparent.
me: ... ?

After like 3 minutes: Large Red Arrow!



This is no cool thing like a factory tour or such. No no, it is a very large store fulllll of candy. The gummi bear kind, and other assorted varieties of amazingness. Also, a bear that talks. And gummi candy in the shape of Arnold Schwarzene... yeah. Him.

We wandered in a very interesting fashion, when suddenly I spotted a cooler! I like cool treats, so I peeked through the glass and spyed myself some FREEZE POPS!! Amazings. I bought one, and also a packet of them to take home. Calm yourself, it was only €o,65. Mmmm. Sadly, I had some difficulties with my package due to a lack of scissors. Photos forthcoming.

german precision engineering my oversized black eye-podular. i am experimenting with parental guidance non-required blogging.

Then - Kinopolis! Yays! Costing of money, of which Katie did not have im Moment. So,

me (what i heard): Gibt es in der nähe ein Geldautomat?
me (what everyone else heard): Gibt es in der nähe ein Geldmaschine?

I am officially going insane.

After ths getting of moneys, we returned to the theater, bought tickets, were confused about how to get in, and then were told that Katie's large camera of coolness was not allowed in the theater.

so i stuck it in a locker. it was not a positive experience. i experience seperation anxiety when parted from my camera.

We watched The Shopaholic. But before this occurence, we discussed glasses and their uses. And Katie's glasses, which she left at home, were described as "They're like a Bright Eye for Cutie glasses."

I died of laughter.


Scary talking mannequins. Otherwise good.

We then searched us a drug store to try this hair thing again.

except we got out of the kino at 6:02.

and we're in germany, so apparently people don't need hairdye or toothpaste or nailpolish after 6 o'clock.

so we went to karstadt. and bought like THE MOST obnoxiously coloured red hair dye ever. ever. ever. ever. it was like orange. i was like, okay!

so then we went back to anya's house and we had dinner with someone from the un and i got climbed over by a toddler for a while.

and then we dyed my hair.

it was suspiciously not-burny. but as we washed it out, we were sort of like... katie, your hair isn't really red.

but we almost missed our bus, so we went running with the soaking hair and then we did not miss our bus, but it turns out that on saturday evenings, the bus only runs every other hour.

so we went to meccas. and met some german gangstas, with mullets and overly tan skin and sweatpants and fanny packs. they were quite infatuated with one miss meg.

We were speaking English.
Dude #4: lol hehe Ich kann English! lol
me: Ich kann Deutsch! (said to myself/Katie)
#4: Oh, du kannst Deutsch?
Kontact had been made. So I sold them a dollar.

We discussed many topics: famous people (I'm from Iowa), drinking (he didn't until 18, when his gramma died), hamburger prices, Monster Energy Drinks, spring break, exchange year, spring break, $/€ exchange rate, so on. And then,

#4: Hey, can I buy your dollar? For a euro.
#3: Yeah! That's a 20 cent profit!
me: sure you can.
#4: Oh, I don't have a euro.
me: ....
#3: I'll buy it!

Sweetness.

Except now I don't have a dollar, and those things are great conversation starters. Obviously.

Then they randomly left. And the bus came. And Mr. Sunglasses was somehow not on board.

but meg was missing him, i could tell.

she was practically pining away.

No, that was just my throat from talking all day. *croak* *croak*

because she was talking about SUNGLASSES MAN.

i win.

anyways, so we came home and went to bed and the time sprung ahead and then it was this morning and i went to church.

meg is the first real mormon that i have ever met. but now i know a lot of them.

they are semingly very nice, but no one knows with these types and their "people jackets".

it was sillies, because they kep saying "zeugnis", which i know as report card.

which actually also means report card. and testimony. everyone also thought we were sisters, because apparently our hair and our eyes are like the same.

The retro-ness of our clothings may have also played a part in that.

sure, meg. i TOTES believe you. secretly, i am from iowa. you heard it here first.

and then one of the missionaries asked me if i wanted a book of mormon.

i was like, sure?

so they came and visited my house. well, meg's house. but whatever.

spreading the gospel and all the jazz.

with his "people jacket".

well, that's all from this end of the spectrum.

all the love (tooth and nail)
katie

I'm not much of a sign-offerin, but I am feeling the peer-pressure.
warm-fuzzy-feelings from buschhoven!
-lauren margaret

Back to Reality

Well, this has all been fine and dandy, but when you get right down to it, between not speaking German and not being allowed to write the test, well, my school skills have ... disappeared.

Enter: ACT!

Me: oh dang.

Allegra Bel: Website! Bitte schön!

So this is me, sitting in the library after asking to be let out of Deutsch (see previous post involving book) doing test prep stuff on number2.com. And I begin the algebra section, and I get this little gem:

6

Do you know what this means?

Of course you do. It's a six, as in one, two, three, four, five, SIX. So what?

Well, right back at you: six whats?

6 horses? 6 cars? 6 cookies? 6 friends?

And you say, "I dunno, just 6." And that's exactly what's so important. Believe it or not, it was a HUGE advance for peoplekind when we first realized that what 6 horses and 6 cookies had in common was their SIX-ness.

That might sound too obvious to be deep, but it is deep.

Let's move on.

I feel smarter already. This is my kinda humor/learning.

Luckily, no, I did NOT bomb the English Practice Test. In fact, I aced it.

Algebra, on the other hand....

It is called a Bat. You bat with it.

Last Saturday I went to Köln with Allegra Bel and we wanted to do something different (I was thinking museum, tour something...) so she called her friend whose name I cannot spell to show us around. We ended up just wandering a lot, which is what we always do. I was okay with that. What I wasn't okay with was how LOUD this girl was! Her voice echoed off the houses. Yes. Echoed. As we were walking Allegra Bel heard a lady lean over to her friend and say, 'Unglaublich' - unbelievable. Yes, it was.
But we did get a bunch of great pictures, which will be accessable from the right hand column once Allegra Bel gets them to me.

In an attempt to be a good little class participater, I blew 8€25 on the book we are going to read in Deutsch. Everyone had to buy it, they don't have cool things like 'lending' in the schools here I guess. The book is called 'Der Vorleser', or 'The Reader' and, I am not going to read it. Take a look at the summary to help you understand why. I was, however, proud of how quickly and effortlessly (in a literary sense) I was able to read the first 26 pages - which is where I stopped.

On Wednesday I got to watch Germans hit the ball with 'Das Ding' - the thing - in Sportlesson. After hitting the ball with the thing (amazingly) they ran around 4 mats and then dove into a big mat at the end for points.
Yes, The Thing is a bat. And everyone had the most awful form. I mean, yelling 'Choke Up!' wouldn't even begin to help these kids.
Also, at some point a kid ran all the way around without having to stop. After his rather impressive dive into the mat, another boy yelled, 'Touchdown!' and I burst out laughing. He looked at me sideways, so I yelled, 'Home Run!' And that didn't seem to help him (or anyone else, for that matter) so I said, 'Wrong sport.' And he glared.
Sorry, dude. Don't mess with the national pasttime.
Another boy kept doing the hand motion for 'safe' when people got out. I didn't even try on that one.
Later, Elder Weng (the only German missionary) said that he knew what all those things should have been called and that the kids in my school must be dumb. But then, he has been rooming with American boys for a year or so, so I don't take his word on it.

This week I wrote a test in Informations 2, Math, and English. Pretty sure I bombed them all.

And lastly, I would like to quote Katie in saying that this is terrifying. When we discussed it in my Politics class today, some of the topics were that
'This is happening too often since it started in America,'
'Kids in America like school and enjoy being there more since they have activities there,'
'But they have metal detectors at schools in America too, and weapons still get in,' (which was followed by 'You can kill someone with a butterknife')
'They need to tighten up on gun laws in Europe, and Americans set a bad example. They all have guns in their homes.'

And not once did anyone ask my opinion. Do I need to wear a FLAG on my head?

Having Nothing to do With Anything Except Everything...

Some Rather German Occurences

This weekend was gorgeous weather - 12°C! That is.... roundabouts 55°F. Holy smokes. I went to the store and didn't wear a jacket! I did, however, wear a scarf - thanks Jacinda. Regina planted some flowers in the backyard. One kind was a snow-something and she told me a story:

The snow needed a color. It went to all of the flowers: the tulips, the roses. It asked again and again if it could have some color from the flowers, but all said no. Finally the snow asked the snowflower, who gladly shared its color - white - with the snow. In return, the snow promised to never fall after the snowflower had bloomed, so that it could live.

Aw, how cute.

Yesterday I helped Ingo put together a ..schrank... wardrobe thing for Anna Lena's room

INSTANT UPDATE: Johannes said: 'Das ist keine Gründe auszuflippen!' That is no reason to flip out. *unstoppable giggle*

anyway, I was helping Ingo build the wardrobe and I remembered the basic rules of Helping:

1. Do hand things instantaneously.
2. Do not block the light.
3. Do not make unnecessary movements.
4. Do give helpful suggestions.
5. Do not get in the way.
   
6. Do NOT lose that screw I just handed you.

I think we did a pretty slick job, if I do say so myself!

As Regina and Ingo were getting out of the car on the way home from church (I had come home in the first cycle), a neighbor stopped them and asked after their American - 'Is she well? She is always running out of the houses wearing the lightest of clothing - why, once I saw her going for the bus with a skirt and no tights!'
I promise you - I wear them! I do! Sometimes they are skin-colored. So shoot me. Anyway, I am going to be more careful about what I do in the frontyard....

Something I have noticed recently is that all windows in Germany open. The weather has been, as I have mentioned, wonderful and I have begun to notice the mirror surfaces of skyscrapers being broken by little holes - open windows. I am starting to really like that all of the windows open - no air is better than fresh air.

And FINALLY: German organists.

All of those here who have ever used a Mormon hymnbook (i dunno about the other kinds) will know that there are little brackets above the bars marking what is the suggested introduction before the song. Therefore, the songleader watches these little sections, the organist play them, the hand goes up, the song begins. Smooth as pie.
Wrong! I have conducted for my hostsister for 2 weeks now, and not once have they played the suggested brackets! What are they playing then? No clue. Keine Ahnung.
On the closing hymn today I was confused and so I waited a second and the lady just took off without me - I had to catch up to her. Honestly.