Spring is here!

The signs of spring--the tentatively budding trees, the refilled fountains throughout the city--have been beginning to show themselves for awhile now, but the last few days have been the first really springlike days. Much welcome after the Scheißwetter of last week--we had a few days of sunshine alternating with hail/sleet/rain. I'm not sure if I've ever described the weather patterns of Aachen to you all, so I will today. Usually it rains. That's about it. People joke that you know it's summer because the rain is warm. I'm usually not anti-rain, but there is something about the quality of rain in Aachen that makes it miserable. I'm a fan of the American thunderstorm. When I worked in Florida for a summer, it rained every afternoon. You could feel the humidity building and building until BOOM! Downpour. Afterwards, the 100 degree heat would be bearable. In Aachen there's no downpour, no thunder, no lightning, no post-rain satisifaction. It's just mostly gray. So you can see why after all this grayness, four straight days of no rain are kind of magical.

Afternoon coffee breaks are now taken on the fire escape, the sun rises at 7 and sets at 8 and the walk home from work, which was never really unpleasant, is suddenly becoming beautiful, a delight, if you will. Perhaps best of all, Anke, one of my labmates, has a bicycle she doesn't want and is letting me use until I leave. I'm picturing riding my bike through the greenness to work, I'm picturing taking my bike on the train to Cologne and then riding along the Rhine (I'm in some ways not over living in Europe--on my way to AstraZeneca I passed a country club, now I pass a medieval city gate on my way to work. In Massachusetts I rode my bike past tobacco fields, here I can ride along the Rhine, past castles. Gate from the 1300s! The Rhein! Castles!), I'm picturing...well, that was about it, actually.

With spring also comes the realization that my time here is short, and motivation to make the most of it. I have some exciting trips ahead, including a spontaneously booked Überraschungsflug to Zürich for Easter, and a trip to Stockholm, as well as some unfirm plans that include the British Isles and Italy. I will try to be more motivated to write up my previous activities--I owe you guys Budapest (so, so long ago!), Brussels, Berlin, Copenhagen, a train ferry, and Hamburg. And Karneval! What a story that one is!

Berlin

After getting back from the States, I immediately went to Berlin for what was supposed to be the highlight of my Fulbright year, The Fulbright Berlin Seminar. If it was the highlight of my Fulbright year, it was because it was a free reunion with my Marburg friends and they put us up in a really nice hotel and fed us a lot. The Seminar itself was fairly lame.

This was the view out my hotel window.

The Bundestag. The line was too long, so we didn't go in.

The Brandenburg Gate

The Holocaust Memorial

A "gemütliche Cafe" (of the kind we don't really have in Aachen) and Marty taking a nap as we prepare for our journey to Copenhagen.

Berlin was really great, and it was so much fun to be reunited with the Berlin Fulbrighters I hadn't seen since Marburg, as well as everyone else. I'm definitely planning on another trip to Berlin before I leave.

Zurück in den USA (Back in the USA)

So I made it to America. Upon my arrival at Chicago O'hare, I boarded the Lincolnland Express to Champaign. I was warned that the LEX, as it's known in the local parlance, would be slow and late, but I was not warned about my fellow travelers. I was accompanied by a few kids who were on their way to "Unofficial," the UIUC fake St. Patrick's Day that's celebrated the weekend before. They had decided to take the bus because they wanted to pregame. They would have just pregamed while driving, but one of them had gotten a DUI in December at the tender age of 19, somehow managed to keep his license, and did not want to get caught again. Then one of them pulled something out of his pocket, and the girl next to them asked what it was, and he said weed. They also had ecstasy on them and debated the right time to take it, since it takes an hour to kick in and they wanted to arrive in Chambana in party mode. Ridiculous.

After finally getting off the idiot bus, I was reunited with Seiko!

Illinois made an excellent impression even though I missed a whole day of the visit. Basically everyone knew who I was because I had been stranded in France. I was also impressed by the NMR facilities.

Next, I made my return to New England. After hanging out with Kate in hipster JP, I visited BU. The people there were also really nice, but I'm not as interested in the research. They did put me up in a nice bed and breakfast and make me cappuccino, so it was tempting.

After finishing my BU visit, I headed off to Northampton. On the way, my luck was about to get worse. I loaded my suitcase in the bottom of the bus, expecting it to be there when I got to Springfield. However, some idiots took it in Worcester. To make matters worse, I had no tag on it, since it is usually a carryon. Two days later, I got a call from Peter Pan saying they had found my bag and would send it up to Northampton. They had dug through my suitcase and found some papers with my parents' phone number, which they called and talked to my mom, who gave them my cell. Well, they somehow messed it up and my bag made a trip around Western MA, with Springfield saying they'd sent it and Northampton saying they knew nothing about it. By the time my bag got to Northampton, I was back in Boston. I was finally reunited with my bag on Saturday morning, the day before I was going to leave to go back to Germany. My bag was missing the chocolate I brought for Lois, my lovely Northampton host, but was otherwise intact.

My visit to BC was a little impersonal. Maybe it was just impersonal compared with my infamy as the stuck in France girl at Illinois and the girl getting a personal visit day at BU, but I felt like the folks at BC didn't even really want me to go there. At Illinois and BU, I got the feeling that people actually wanted me in their program and in their labs. I did get winked at by Amir Hoveyda because I knew what olefin metathesis was (how can you be applying for orgo grad school and not know? Apparently that was the case for some people...), and that was about the most exciting moment of my weekend, other than hanging out with Jennie. BC did not pay for beers and beer is wicked expensive in Boston...I guess I never realized that since I spent my time there in Starbucks using the internet away from my sketchy roommate and in my room watching Netflix. What a great summer!

Anyways, Sunday I made the trek back to the Schland. An epic journey: Boston--Chicago--Atlanta--Düsseldorf--Aachen (to see if my ATM card was there. it wasn't.)--Düsseldorf--Berlin for the Fulbright Seminar. After about 30 hours of traveling, I found my way to Das Haus der Kulturen der Welt, just in time for a boring speech and a free dinner with open bar. Open bar, the most beautiful two words in the English language...more to come.

je déteste Air France (Ich hasse Air France/I hate Air France)

Hello loyal blog readers (or mom, as you're also known)! I am currently stuck in France on the way to graduate school visits. I was SUPER excited to be on my way to Illinois and my reunion with the Seikosaur, and perhaps even some chicken fingers or a bacon cheeseburger or something incredibly American to eat. Everything was going according to plan until my flight from Düsseldorf to Paris was delayed due to...oh, I don't know, they didn't tell us. I like it when they at least make some excuse (unless it's Verzögerungen in Betrieb--delays in operation--like the Deutsche Bahn says. That's the worst excuse ever.)

Upon arriving at Charles de Gaulle (considered by many to be the worst airport in the world), they announced that we would be docking at 12:35. My flight to Chicago left at 1:05. I knew it would be knapp, but I thought maybe I could schaff it if the gates were close enough. And the gates were close enough, but apparently that's not how it works. We (me and the many other people who ended up missing flights to the states) had to take a shuttle bus to a different terminal, just to flash our boarding passes and passport to some guard, and then get on another bus for a 15 minute shuttle ride back to the terminal we just came from. Upon arrival, we had to go through the whole 9 yards at security, although we'd never left the airport. Come on France, trust the Germans to do security. I got patted down in Düsseldorf--the verdammte Froschfresser were considerably less thorough. I then ran to my gate to find that although the plane was still there, I could not board. I dropped the f-bomb in front of a bunch of people, and then walked to ticketing. There, I was informed that there were no further flights to Chicago. I knew there were flights to New York that day and I asked to be rerouted, but they said it wouldn't work out. I still don't believe them. They gave me a coupon for a sandwich and soda and a hotel voucher. They told me I could use the sandwich coupon anywhere, but that wasn't true. And the French were not friendly about it.

After redeeming my sandwich coupon, my next task was to get to my hotel (note here: on other occasions I may have been happy for the chance to spend an evening in Paris...however, due to getting pickpocketed (see as-yet-unwritten Karneval blog entry), my cash availability situation is interesting). However getting out of the airport would be harder than I thought. I started looking around for an exit or some signs to baggage claim, anything! But there was nothing, only the incoming security lines. After more thoroughly exploring, I came to the conclusion that I was going to have to go through an employee only line. I had to show my hotel voucher and passport to a woman who waved me through. Every time I stopped to ask someone where to go, they would want to see my documents and then they would tell me that Galerie 4 (where the shuttle to the hotel was) was very close. This happened about 4 times. I did get my passport stamped, so that was amazing. Finally I made it through the labyrinthine airport and to Galerie 4, where I waited for about 30 minutes for a shuttle that's supposed to come every 15. But alas, I did not know that there were two Hotel Campaniles (there was only one on the sign at Galerie 4), and I went to the wrong one. I found this out after a 30 minute shuttle ride and waiting for about 15 minutes. Then, I had to take the shuttle back to the airport, and wait for another Hotel Campanile shuttle. Oy vey! I was trying to think of how to describe this series of events. Comedy of errors doesn't fit, because it was in no way funny.

So now, at the time I should have been making my descent into Chicago, I am sitting in a hotel room far far away. At least they have free wireless. Another highlight was that reruns of Friends were on TV--not dubbed into French. But I would much rather be in America. Or Germany. Such things don't happen there. And I would like to note that Germans are friendlier than the French...or at least the French who work in Charles de Gaulle.