week 3

As this program progresses, I found myself more and more comfortable in Berlin. Also, I had this most memorable birthday in Berlin as well. We had lots of free time this week and I was able to get some work done. The topics were more interesting to me as well. This Friday, I went to visit two of my middle school friend and stayed there for two days. They are here for university because they believe they can get better education while there is no tuition here. On Sunday night, we were invited to join some local students to plays some cards games in bars. It was very new to me since I never had the experience with German students hanging out. Compare to many people I talked to from waitressing and cashiers, all their English was surprisingly good. Since I do not speak German, all night, they were speaking English to each other, which I thought was very considerable. We talked a lot the differences between Germany and US. Weirdly enough, I though Germany is such a great place especially berlin, that I would like to live here couple years after graduated from college. However, they seemed all have this strong interest to go to US or even stay there. They also think Aachen, their university city, is too old and crappy, which I consider as “old but sexy”. I told them to enjoy this oldness that other cities do not here, but they think I should cherish more about the modernity in US. I guess people all like the places that do not belong to them.

Although, my experience of travelling to visit my friend is fairly well, the DB train was quite an experience as well. My friends were never hurry even when the train is coming in a minute. I was super worried until when we got to the platform and saw the sign said the train was cancelled. According to my friends, there are million reasons why DB cancel or delay a train. On Sunday, because of a mild storm in our area, they canceled all the trains to berlin. On Monday, I was finally able to get a train ticket to berlin; however, I needed to wait in Düsseldorf for two hours because DB canceled two train in a row. When I was eventually on the train to berlin, the train got delayed for 2 hours during the trip. Now, I know why everybody is complaining about DB. In addition, the train ticket in Germany can be so expensive if you do not book it early. The way there was 111 and the way back was 125.