A Day Full of Laundry, Noise, and Trains

Yesterday, Kori and I decided to do some laundry in Bonn (the closest laundromat). We caught the tram around noon and we were pretty proud of our timing because the tram we needed pulled up just as we approached the platform. We boarded and looked around. Our fellow passengers were numerous and between the ages of 14 and 18. They were decked out in Gothic styled clothing and they were all half drunk. There were about 25 in all. Kori and I make eye contact, "NICE!!" we communicate silently. We are both BIG fans of new euro experiences. As the tram takes off so does the noise level in the car. What appear to be the ring leaders are five or six boys standing in a circle yelling chants that the rest of the car joins in on; call and response type chants. They were passing around a keg and the whole car smelt of alcohol. When they all got off a few stops later (that's a lie...it was more than a few) they left behind beer spilled all over the floor, bottles and trash galore. It was insane.
Then we found the laundromat that was disguised as a coffee shop dropped off our laundry and went to go find some food. Because we'd slept late we hadn't eaten yet. The place we stopped at served breakfast till 3...NICE! I ordered the "American Breakfast" and got fried eggs, a muffin, bacon and sausage...as well as a random side of guacamole.
After this we went shopping, which included walking around a lot of stores and trying on a lot of clothes. We had a blast.
We came back to pick up our laundry four hours later and it had only just come out of the dryer (again with that perfect timing). We did a quick fold, stuffed it back in our bags, and headed to get a coke. Then we went to the train station and laughed. The next train to Bad Honnef arrived in 7 minutes: PERFECT TIMING. We sat down with a few other people (a nice-looking kid with a backpack, a family with several daughters, and a couple that just got done shopping) prepared to wait just a hot minute for it to show up...then it did and the sight that met our eyes was enough to put us back in our seats: The train was jammed. And I don't even mean standing room only; I mean windows fogging up because of the body heat, bodies slammed against every window and door, and security guards standing around to make no one else tried to board the train. It was bizarre. We looked at each other and made the only choice we could: we'd wait for the next one, thanks.
So we did...for 20 minutes. The kid with the back-pack kept looking at his watch. We kept laughing at that one train that was so packed. And then came another one, just like the other one. You may laugh because that rhymed...but we REALLY laughed because it was true. The second one was just as packed if not more so. This time when the doors opened to let people in, the people being pressed against them fell out and had to push to get their place back. At one point Kori told me we would just punch our way on to the train and though the kid with the back-pack didn't appear to understand us, he laughed when he saw her put her fists up. "Is this normal?" we asked. "No, it is very unusual," he replied. We had a new friend. Just then, his phone rang and we heard urgent German and saw another frantic glance at his watch. We later discerned that this was his mother wondering where he was...
Six trains and two hours later we were still sitting in the train station in Bonn with the kid with the back-pack waiting for a train. At this point we decided to skip trying to get on a Bad Honnef train and just try to catch ANY Line 66 that came by with enough room to squeeze on three people (Kori and I had decided that we weren't leaving the kid with the back-pack behind). We figured if we caught a Ramserdorf train and rode it to the end of the line and then caught a Bad Honnef from there we might have a better chance of getting home within the next month. With this new goal in mind ran to the doors of the already almost full Ramserdorf train that came and Kori and I shoved our way on. I turned around and the kid with the back-pack was backing away and shaking his head. "Come on!" I yelled, "There's room!" He grinned and jumped in just as the doors shut on his backpack. We were off.
A few stops down, the train completely emptied and we realized that there was some sort of concert/festival going on right outside of Bonn and that's why every train going that way was slammed. We got off at the last stop and ended up having to catch a train to Obercassel just a couple stops down before finding an empty Bad Honnef train. At each connecting train stop, the kid with the backpack always made sure we knew which one to catch next and stuck with us whenever we encountered sketch characters on the trains. "We're here for another month," Kori told him." Maybe we'll see you again!" He smiled and nodded. When we boarded the last one, our friend asked where we were getting off. We told him Konigswinter. "Where do you get off?" "Here," he said and waved goodbye. I may never see him again, but I'll never forget the kid with the backpack.
We finally made it back to Konigswinter around 8, grabbed some dinner and spent the rest of the night remembering our crazy day.

Peace!
~cg

Germany, Germany, Germany

As some of you may know and some of you will find out (in about as long as it takes to you finish this sentence): I am in GERMANY!! I'm on a Study Abroad Program for five weeks this summer in a little town called Konigswinter (a suburb of the bigger city called Bonn--the birthplace of Beethoven). I so super love it here. The air is humidity-less and the birds sing sweeter in another language.
I've already been here a week...may not seem that long, but there's already too many stories to try to catch up on (I'll do a Day 1, 2, 3 thing later) so I'll just skip to today. Nope, changed my mind. I'm rewinding to yesterday because I have the experience of a lifetime and I need to tell you about that first.
Thursday we (the CSU Jackson 5 as we call ourselves: Kori, Shane, Robin, Caleb and myself) struck out on our own for the city of Amsterdam. Left to catch the train after breakfast and it turned out we had our own compartment..whoa. We arrived and walked for a while in the wrong direction, backtracked, found our hotel (the Best Western Apollo Museumhotel--yes, it's all one word), checked in and went to find some dinner. We ended up eating at the Hard Rock Cafe: Amsterdam. It was wicked cool. Then we strolled through the streets dodging bikers, cars, and dogs as we went only to find ourselves in the middle of this huge lawn full of picnickers. It was wonderful. We stretched out on the grass and soaked up some culture all the while taking pictures of the ducks, people and mermaid in the little pond (dubbed a mermaid because all we could see were bubbles and obviously that means it was a mermaid...and we're theatre people).
The next morning we woke up at 6:30 so we could get in line at Anne Frank's house which opened at nine. We had heard that the line was REDIC so we figured if we were there about an hour early we might be fifth or sixth in line...right? Well apparently we were the ONLY people in all of Amsterdam who thought of that: We were first...for a WHILE. Then we were joined by a guy who we found out was from Israel. He had flown in at five so he could see Anne's house and some other high points of Amsterdam and he was flying out at 9 that night. Dedication.
Anne Frank's house was incredible. For those of you who don't know, I've played Anne twice in productions at Family Theatre and at the Springer so I have an oddly tangible connection with her and her story. It was touching and awe inspiring to walk through her room; see the pictures of movie stars glued to the wall; walk through the bookcase door; see the chestnut tree out Peter's window from which she drew so much strength. I don't posses the words necessary to describe it to you or even to think about it in anything other than emotions so I won't even try. I will say though, if in your life you EVER have a chance to go...GO.
We then went to the Rijktsmuseum where we saw original Renoir and Rembrandt paintings. Super cool. Grabbed some lunch at an Italian place and headed to catch our train back home. Funny (and by funny I mean mildly humorous and moderately entertaining unless you were on the train...if that's the case it was a HILARIOUS) story: We were riding along hyped up on the coke we got before we left; I was being riotously funny quoting movies and vividly describing the scene in Bambi where he gets shot in the neck and lives ("Bambi's a real man: he got shot in the neck and moved on"); and we hear some Dutch over the PA. We look at each other with the same blank stare that we always use when listening to the languages in this part of the world; we wait for the familiar "Ladies and Gentlemen," but it doesn't come. People are starting to look angry and the train is groaning to a stop. Now our blank stares are replaced with wild confusion. Why are all the people so angry? Then we hear it: "Ladies and gentlemen, we are stopped. (really?) Due to electrical problems we will remain this way for a while. Please feel free to move about outside the train." "Great!" I say. As I look out the windows at the German equivalent of a general store on one side and the pasture of cows on the other I continue with, "Please feel free to exit the train, kill a cow, make a hamburger, eat it, and be back on the train all before we've even THOUGHT about moving again." After about 20 mins of motionless anxiety (except for me because I found the whole ordeal amusing) they announced that instead of taking us back to Koln, they were stopping at Dusseldorf (about 45 mins away). So we had to catch a connector, get to Koln, and catch our train back to Konigswinter. All around an adventurous day.
More later!

~cg