Last night was New Year's Eve, and I had a delightful time at one of the largest family gatherings I've ever been to. I was told on the order of 17 families were present: mostly the middle-aged parents, some older grandparents, and a bunch of kids ranging in age from 2 to 25. Those of us in our early twenties were in this awkward position of adults but not of our parents' generation, but we certainly had a great time catching up with one another.
Now that the New Year's point has passed, I'm beginning to think a little bit more about going back to Germany, not because I want to immediately (I'm distressed at how short my break is), but rather because I'm faced with the challenge of completing a large number of tasks in a short amount of time. One of these things will be my attempt to find a new living situation. As much as I like my single room & the rest of EuropaHaus III, I've decided I would benefit greatly from living in closer contact with other people, especially Germans or maybe other international students. It seems to be extraordinarily difficult to move in Germany, but in any case I will try, and even if I can't, I feel like I will at least have gained a better understanding of the WG (wohngemeinschaft or shared-living) apartment situation.
I am of course also reminded of some of the fonder memories in the past couple of months. Over Thanksgiving break, I first spent about 3-4 days in Stockholm with my friend Omid. Visiting in winter effectively ruled out any possibility of some of the fun outdoor activities they had, although we did get a chance to go to Skansen very briefly to scout out the Christmas market they had there. I had never seen so much (or any, really) elk & reindeer meat in my life. I spent whatever few Swedish kronor I had left at that point on some reindeer pate and some honey. Stockholm is really full of things to do. It wasn't difficult at all to get around Sweden since everyone spoke amazingly perfect English. Sometimes I wondered if I was really abroad.
The rest of my time I had spent visiting museums. My favorite by far was the Royal Palace. It was absolutely beautiful and exquisitely decorated inside and out, and it was clear that the Swedish are very proud but not pretentious about their royal buildings.
Other highlights of the trip included going to a modern ballet show at the Royal Opera (there was a dance with floating daikon radishes above the dancers? that was beyond us..); roasting a chicken for Thanksgiving (but only eating half and wondering what to do with the second bird purchased); baking cookies, and drinking lots of Glögg (kind of like German Glühwein or hot mulled wine).
I then went straight from Sweden to Mainz to celebrate Thanksgiving (again) with a few Southern Germany Fulbrighters. =) I honestly have to say it was culinarily and spiritually one of the best, if not the best Thanksgiving I have ever had. It didn't matter that we were up until 3 am making pies or getting up at 6 to handle the turkey. Everything came together beautifully, and I only wish I had been more disciplined in pulling myself away from the experience of it all to get some photos. All I managed to get were these 2 pictures.
In any case, a wonderful 2008 and hopefully an equally or more wonderful 2009. Happy New Year, everyone!
1 comment:
yay! happy to hear that the holiday party went well! :) and that there were a few other folks in the inbetween stages to pass the new years with!
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