Best Sunday

Well hello :) Welcome back. I meant to update this all yesterday, but I had bought/downloaded some episodes of Top Chef off of iTunes.. and I mean.. they had to be watched. So this past weekend was pretty fun. On Friday, I went into Bonn like I said I was going to. Unfortunately, the girl I was supposed to meet couldn't make it.. she hd to go in earlier than she thought for her work.. soo yeah, still pretty friendless, and it makes me miss home.. but I'll be fine. I spent most of the day walking around Bonn, and looking through shops. I found this AMAZING winter coat at The United Colors of Benetton and I'm definitely going to buy it next time I'm in Bonn. It's getting much colder here (I heard the weather back home is currently in the 70s or so?! Very jealous..) and you can feel that winter will be setting in soon. Kai and Lisa told me that although it gets very cold in the winter (very comparable to Columbus back home), there is very little snow due to pollution. I guess on the days it does snow, it almost never sticks. So that's depressing. I love snow--just not driving in it ;) Johanna told me that usually on Christmas, its raining. Oh awesome.. :( Saturday, I didn't do too much during the day, and I had my first bout of homesickness. Let me tell you, that part is not so much fun. But later that night was of course St. Martin's day, so I was able to go out and experience that with Johanna--which was nice :) Sunday was AWESOME. Lisa had talked to her mother earlier that week and had planned for all of us to meet her in her town of Remagen, which is a little ways south of Bonn.. maybe only 20 minutes or so. We went around noonish and meet up with her. She's a very nice woman, and drives a Honda so obviously she's cool :) After walking along the Rhein for a bit we came across these old black 2 towers which were present on either side of the river. We entered the one on the side we were on, which has been turned into a museum. These black towers are all that remains of the famous Ludendorff Bridge (read more about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludendorff_Bridge ) that was crossed by the 9th Division of the US Army during WWII. This was the first crossing of any Allied forces of the Rhein, and into the heartland of Germany, thus making defeat for them just a matter of time. (The first American soldier to cross the Rhein via this bridge was infact an Ohioan!) German commanders tried to explode the bridge themselves to try and hinder any more advances from the Allies, but it was too late. Hitler saw this as an act of high treason (he also refused to allow for his troops to retreat from the area, even though they were clearly defeated) and set up his "Kangaroo Court" system ('Kangaroo courts' are essentially where the Judge makes a ruling and there is no way in which to really oppose it. The "right" of Due Process is not present in kangaroo courts, and the person being tried really has no right to call witnesses, have a cross examination, anything of that nature. Pretty much, you're screwed in a Kangaroo Court system--especially one in which was placed in effect by Adolf Hitler in Nazi Germany). This Court found (of course) all 5 commanders that ordered the bridge to be blown up, guilty of high treason and all were sentenced to death. All died but one, who outlived the sentence due to being held as a American Prisoner of War. So there is your History Lesson for the day ladies ad gentlemen. The museum wa really cool, and I was able to see A LOT of awesome artifacts that had been found in the area. Really, really cool.

After the museum we went back to Lisa's mothers house where I also met one of Lisa's brothers--16 year old Felix. He was really nice and spoke awesome English. He had spent most of his summer in the US and was excited to talk to me about it. He said the one thing he really misses from America, is beef jerkey. Hahaha. I had to laugh at this. I think I will try to have some of you send me some from home and give it to him as a Christmas gift. After spending some time there, it was time for me to get on the road and get ready to see GOV'T MULE live in Köln!!!! The concert was held at a smaller venue called "Live Music Hall". I studied like 3 train maps before making the journey to make sure I wouldn't get lost. IT WAS SOO SICK. They played a lot of their new stuff and some of their old. Obvioiusly, its Gov't Mule so I had an amazing time no matter what. I met some kids from California there as well. They are here studying abroad and leave to go back home on the 2 week of December. They were cool though and I spent most of the concert drinking with them and pretty much getting my face melted by the always amazing Warren Haynes. Man, I love him. It was a pretty weird experience also, in the sense of thereI was, standing feet from one of my favorite band, but all at the same time knowing I was in Cologne, Germany. Kinda "Freaky" as Lisa Johnson would say (haha).

So, as you can see I had a pretty awesome weekend. Tomorrow is the start of KARNIVAL at 11:11am. I am really excited. Bertus, Lisa's other brother who is 22, is going to take me with him and his friends to Köln to see what this is really all about ;) It's basically just supposed to be a HUGE party in the streets all day, with Köln's version of it being the best--from what I hear. Think of something like Mardi Gras in New Orleans (except without all the flashing). So I am excited for that, and mostly just to get the chance to be around people my own age :) I'll obviously be back soon to update and tell you all about Karnival!! Sorry I don't have any pictures of the moment of anything.. I'll post those soon! Liebe Dich, Megan