Moskau! Moskau!

Hey, I guess it's time to check in again. Every time I hear a siren around here, I'm convinced it's the police, at my parents' request, coming to kick down my door and make sure I'm still alive. Hopefully they just don't break too many things in the process. It's not my house.

So, what exciting things have I been up to in this past week plus? Well, first of all, I tried and failed to get some pictures of my room and other tidbits to show up on this blog. I don't know what's wrong with it, but I'll probably have to find some alternative way of sharing pictures. (Such as they are. I'm not the best at remembering to take pictures, so there isn't even that much to share.) I'm open to suggestions.

Class is still going well, though there was a little bit of drama concerning the Macalester students in regards to their placement. It seems a certain number of people got placed in a level that was too easy for them, and since the Goethe Institute considers Macalester one of it's most important clients, they bent over backwards trying to help us out. The other day, they had a meeting with all of us, fed us free food, and talked it out. Personally I wasn't having any problems with my class. Sure, it goes a little slowly, and might be a little below my level when it comes to reading and writing, but in terms of speaking (which is the area I most want and need to improve), it's just the right amount of challenge. Besides, the proposed solution was to put a greater number of us Macalester student in one course, so that the plateau could be universally raised. That was just out of the question for me, since I consider the multi-nationalism of my course its greatest advantage. I mean, if I wanted to take a class with mostly American kids, I would have stayed at Macalester this semester, you know? So some people did make a switch, but I'm staying put.

Wednesday after class I went with Erin, Natasha, and Lauren (people from the program) to the Jewish Museum in Berlin. It was incredibly interesting, an overview of the whole of Jewish history from the middle ages to modern Germany. It really helps you get a hold of the place Judaism and anti-semetism occupy in the world, and in this country especially. The place was chock full of information, and I really needed more than the four hours I had to spend there. Of course, it probably would have helped if I'd gone through the museum the actual right way. That's right. I accidentally went in through the exit, and just kept walking through, looking at all the cool stuff, and I didn't realize until it was too late, "Hey, I'm going backwards in time." I'm so smart. It was kind of an adventure, going into a room and not knowing what the theme was until I got to the other side. It was almost mysterious. But still, curator of the Jewish Museum, if you're reading this, I'm sorry I screwed up all your hard work!

Last night I had my first encounter with the club scene in Berlin. It was awesome. I met Hannah and Alice at the Alexanderplatz subway station, and together we made our way to this totally tucked-away club called Knaack. It came with good recommendations, and entrance was free between 10-12 for students. It took about a half hour of walking in the rain, but we finally managed to find it at around 11. Entrance was surprisingly smooth, despite me not having any photo ID on me. (I'm not about to lose my passport in a club. I'm not that stupid.) I showed the guy my Goethe ID, which has no photo on it, and he asked whether I had any other ID. I told him no, and he let me in. Easy peasy. We met up with some more Macalester and Goethe people inside. The music in this club was incredible. We only made it to the first floor (there were something like 4 floors, each with its own theme, we think), but we were happy there, so we stayed. I've never really been to a club back home, mostly because I hate the type of music they play: bad hip-hop and recycled top 20 hits of the moment. Here there was a pretty good mixture of American music from a number of eras and styles. It wasn't the most danceable music, but it was fun. Also, I can't dance, anyway, so I don't really care which music I'm embarrassing myself to, as long as I like listening to it. And then they played some German punk music for an hour or so at around 1:30, and everyone in the club except us knew the lyrics and was screaming them out. We tried to pretend, but I'm pretty sure they could tell we weren't German. Oops! The highlights of the night included when they played "Take on Me," which reminded me of Andi and Katherine, "Sweet Dreams," which made me think of David, and "Eye of the Tiger," which brought me right back to Nichols Varsity Soccer. But far and away the best moment of the night, the crowning jewel of dances, was when they played "Moskau" by Dschinghis Khan. This song has been legend with me and my friends since Freshman year, and I almost couldn't believe my ears when I heard it start playing. The Germans' method of dancing to it, by the way, involves huddling up into a huge circle with your arms over your neighbor's shoulders, jumping to the beat and kicking out your feet. It was exhausting and hot, but fun and totally worth it. Ladies and gentlemen, may I present "Moskau" by Dschinghis Khan:



Add to that the Sabres 10-1 victory over the Thrashers, which I found out about when I got home, and it was a pretty awesome, giddy night. Yay!