Friday, June 20, 2008

Well, I ended up not going kayaking because my mouth was hurting and making me cranky. But everyone who went LOVED it, so we'll be going again which makes me happy!

Yesterday after class I laid down for a while to get over my grumpy mood and then I got up and got ready. We went out to eat with Maxie (the German girl we met here) and she showed us a cheap place to get pizza and pasta. It's run by Italians so it was very, very authentic, and very,very good! I had a Hawaiian pizza that I shared with another girl and it was scrumptious.

After that we headed to the place that the Bach concert was at and we got there early. There was a Germany soccer game last night, and so they had a HUGE screen set up for public viewing of the game. This is very common and popular here. See pictures below!

The Bach concert was really interesting. It was jazz interpretations of Bach pieces. I really liked it. I think I am like the only person who did haha. See pictures below.

I am really enjoying my time here because Germany is wonderful (duh!) but I am also loving the people I am with. I was worried that I wouldn't, and of course we all get sick of each other at different times, but overall Amy (my roomie and travel bud) and I are really getting along well and I love her to peices, and my other roomie, Amanda, and I have also hit it off so I am just thankful to actually have people here to enjoy this all with.

Today for class we went to the museum of psychiatry in Leipzig and had a lecture from a professor at the University of Leipzig who is very involved in managing psychiatry facilities across Saxonia (Saxonia is the state of Germany that Leipzig is in). The lecture was very informative about how the field of psychiatry works over here in Germany and we also heard from two patients there about their experiences after the wall came down in Berlin. There's a concept here called "the wall in the head" and it has many different facets, but what we really learned today was that people from east Germany were excited about their freedom when the wall came down, but there were also people who freaked out a bit because they didn't know what would become of the future and that weren't sure what to do w/ their new found freedom. That was something I hadn't really thought much about until today, so it was just really interesting to hear from these people. They are people who do have diagnosed mental illnesses but they are what they call "experienced" persons, and they actually work at the museum (the woman we heard from was the secretary and the man was the head grounds keeper/repair man), so they are learning how to function in society and have been helped getting jobs. It's a good system and is too much to completely explain here but it is neat how they are treating the patients here.

This afternoon I played spades for a while with some folks (whooped up on 'em! that's right!) and then some of us headed to a coffee shop and chatted about books we have all read. That was fun. After that we headed downtown and I bough a new cheapie bottle of perfume because i dropped mine here and it broke :-( and when I bought my bottle I got a free necklace haha. When amy bought bubble bath at the same place she didn't get anything. Hahaha. See picture below.

Well...That's all! I have a paper due Monday so I may not blog until after that. Love to you all!



Me and Amanda (we shared the pizza)

Elfie (she's the German woman who has been coordinating stuff for us here), me, Amy, and Amanda (look at the background, it's the public viewing of the Germany soccer game)


Some of the Jazz band at Bachfest


Me drinking a can of coke (notice the shape is different than in America)


My free gift haha

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Robyn, sounds like you are learning so much. We love the pics. Keep them coming! Loved the coke can...does it taste different? Remember at Disney World tasting the cokes from around the world and they were awful? Paris countdown is on...can't wait to read more....and kayaking?????? Really??? I love you, mom