Der Besuch der jungen Dame (The Visit of the Young Lady)

The title of this post is a reference to Swiss playwright Friedrich Dürrenmatt's Der Besuch der alten Dame, which Claudia and Roger took me to see back in October (Much to Claudia's amusement, I was delighted to finally use the stock answer to "Was hast du am Wochenende gemacht?" (what did you do this weekend?)--"Ich bin ins Theater gegangen!" (I went to the theater), which I learned in high school from Frau Schanz.) References are not as fun when they are explained...

Last week I had the pleasure of being hostess to the lovely Jesse, who is now engaged (there goes another one). Since Jesse was a little scared because she can't speak German and I had nothing to do on a Monday night and a Semester Ticket in my pocket, I made the trip to the Cologne-Bonn airport to pick her up. Meeting up was easier than expected, given that she didn't have a cell phone that worked in Europe. However, the next train didn't leave for 30 minutes, so we got to hang out in the airport, where Jesse got to experience her first taste of Kölsch, which may be becoming my favorite German beer. When it was time for our train to come, instead of checking which platform it was on, I just took the escalator on the right, the one I'd taken the last time I was there. Little did I know that I was approaching the platform from a different terminal. We watched our train pull away as we were trying to run up the escalator, condemning us to another 30 minute wait. Herzlich Willkommen in Deutschland, Jesse! Deine Freundin ist doof! The next time we were on the right platform, and good thing, because we ended up catching the last train from Köln to Aachen. We arrived in Aachen at 1:30, well after the buses had stopped running and walked the 30 minutes to my house. (There has to be a shorter way, but I don't know it) We had linguistic adventures as I tried to explain that the duvet cover was clean, but forgot the english words for Bettdecke and Bezug and said "the whatever we call in it english" while pointing instead, and collapsed into bed determined to get an early start for a day of exploring Cologne.

Miraculously, we woke up in time to catch the 9:10 train. I made Jesse schwarzfahr on the bus, because I am a bad friend. Our first stop was the Kölner Dom, which has been described in previous posts, and also happens to be Germany's number one tourist attraction. As I turned on my camera, the heart-breaking message "change battery pack" appeared, so I have no photos from this day. : (
After checking out the Schatzkammer, we climbed the 509 steps up the tower of the Kölner Dom to an amazing view of Cologne and the Rhein (have you heard of it?). Afterwards, with legs shaking, we made our way towards the Rhein for lunch and the Schokolade Museum. The Chocolate Museum was pretty cool. However, the chocolate fountain, which was much-touted by my guide book, consisted of one small sample. Bummer. We had envisioned a chocolate free for all.

After Cologne, we made our way to Bonn to see the good old Hauptdorf. Bonn is a nice little city, and remarkably well-marked, I thought. Our main destination there was the Museum Koenig, a zoological museum featuring taxidermied animals posed in realistic dioramas. Very cool. We also visited Das Haus der Geschichte, a museum which showcases the history of Germany during the time Bonn was the capital (from after WWII until the fall of communism). It was very cool, but English captions were unfortunately lacking, and although I did my best to translate, it's hard to see a museum like that. And at the end of our long day of walking, we were ready for some dinner. I was reminded of why I had been a history major, and in a world where Smith history prof's sabbatical schedules had complied to let me take German history, I could easily see my life having gone in a different direction. But I digress.

On the second day, we saw the sights of Aachen (takes about 3o minutes), including one of my favorite sights--the guy in the main shopping area who sells bratwurst out of this bizarre contraption in which he is enclosed. Unfortunately, I don't have a picture. Then we bought some Berliners for the trip to Maastricht, a town in the Netherlands about an hour away from Aachen.

Some pictoral Maastricht highlights:

A magazine vending machine.

View of Maastricht along the bank of the Maas river

Weird public art.

After getting some shopping done in Maastricht, we headed back home for a dinner party hosted by my roommate. One thing Jesse's visit made me realize is that everyone speaks English. Okay, that is not true, but everywhere we went, when people realized she didn't speak German or heard us speaking English together, they switched over immediately. My roommates also speak excellent English. Why do I speak German with all these people? It is almost silly.

All in all, it was a pleasure hosting Jesse, who, after my entire family has bailed on me, will likely be the only person who visits lonely little Erin, all alone in Germany far away from her friends and family. Yes, that is a shameless attempt at guilting all you Amerikaner into finding a cheap flight and getting your butts over to Europe...do it!

Next in the series of what I've been up to the last month: Budapest!