As of late, everyone has friends visiting them. I am not jealous, nor do I resent this. So, today, a few of us on the program and visiting friends headed out to Schloss Nymphenburg to see it all covered in snow. Over the past few days we've gotten something close to a foot (maybe? I don't have a ruler..) It's beautiful. And unlike New York, Munich maintains the clean snow (I guess there's just less traffic here.), instead of turning into oily snow-goop after a few hours.. So, I imagine it'll be like this for a while!

Upon arrival, we were met by a crowd of the local pond birds, who were swarming the crazy lady pictured above. She was feeding the swans from her hand, which was cool but also bizarre and a little bit disconcerting, and I learned that I may be frightened of swans. From a distance, beautiful. Up close, a little too demanding.. Still, a good photo-op!

The castle grounds are shut down for the winter, so you don't have to buy a ticket because there isn't thattt much to see (all of the smaller buildings on the grounds which are normally open are shut down.) All of those weird obelisk-looking things in the distance are sculptures wrapped up for protection from the elements.

To continue on the bird weirdness theme, we encountered ducks sleeping (?) in the brook with their heads tucked onto their bodies. How cute.

Amalienburg, my favorite building on the grounds. 

Bamboo, surrendering to the snow.

Next to the castle grounds is the Botanical Garden, which you may recognize from this post from a few months ago. 

Ivy covered in snow! heeeheheeehaaaahaaaaa

Munich in the snow is stunning, but if it's only December 11th - I might be rethinking my winter garb.

snow

snow a video by buddenhagen on Flickr.

As of Monday, the Christkindlmarkt is open! I imagine you can gather this much, but it is a Christmas Market in the center on town. I headed down with some friends on opening night to have some snacks and a glass of Glühwein.

The Neue Rathaus accompanied by the huggggge Christmas tree and the Frauenkirche in the background.

A Glühwein stand.

Glühwein is essentially mulled wine: red wine, cinnamon, star anise, cloves, and lots of sugar. I had high hopes for it, but didn't consider one thing: I really hate red wine. So I got a mug, but I really can't say that I enjoyed it..Though, I promise that I love Lebkuchen and everything else Christmas related!

Michael with his red bratwurst sandwich. Red bratwurst is the best.

 In addition to food stands, the market also has tons of souvenir-type stuff, and toys! The people that work at these stands appear to love it (could be because it was the first day, and not freezing outside..) and it's just so lovely and cheery to walk through. I can't wait until it snows (tomorrow!).

Our first, and probably my last, glass of Glühwein.

This stand is one of my favorites. It's a mini Frauenkirche!!

Ilana, providing some scale. This tree is huge (perhaps not Lincoln Center huge, but still.)

By the way, isn't this so cool? Justin and I found it while wandering around on Sunday.

Happy belated Thanksgiving! On Thursday, we celebrated as a group, with the addition of our "mentors" (German students that are our age and interested in spending time with Americans), as well as our teachers. So, in total we were about 40 people. Us Americans were assigned the task of cooking, being that it's our tradition. So we each cooked a dish or two to serve 40 people.

I chose to make the stuffing because I loooove to make stuffing. Making stuffing for 40 people, though...Exhausting.

They don't do stuffing here like we do in the states, so I bought 5 loaves of bread and cubed them myself!

Ultimately, I think it turned out well. I forgot to photograph the finished product though..whoops. Also forgot to bring my camera to dinner...

Justin made roasted carrots, they were awesome!

This was my second Thanksgiving away from home, and despite missing my usual celebration, I had a really great time.

   

Sorry that I haven't said much in a while, but honestly there hasn't been much going on in my life worthy of writing about. Not that things are going poorly! ; just business as usual with classes and the like. But today! Today I got mail! Halloween/Autumnal mail! And I am so happy. So, I am taking this opportunity to offer you mail! Be my pen pal, pal. Send me your addess, and I'll give you mine. But, just to give you fair warning, Deutsche Post is (as far as I've experienced) incredibly slow. 

 

This morning I made pancakes in my bedroom using the hotplate Justin gifted me. So lovely. (This is just an excuse to show off syrup pictures.) More luscious food photos to come, as we too will be celebrating Thanksgiving on Thursday. Mmm.

Sorry for being so absent, but I haven't had much to photograph/write about since the semester began! Anyway, it snowed yesterday! As much as I love Portland, the lack of snow does get to me. And, as much as I love Munich, snow before Halloween? It's absolutely beautiful though. Four inches or so accumulated last night. Today I went for a walk in the Englischer Garten and it was completely picturesque. Snowmen, kids playing, and a dogsled(!?) - a perfect Sunday.

The view from my window

Ilana's snack

A bunch of confused looking trees.

The dogsled woman!

A Krampus snowman? Or a Halloween snowman? Who knows...

This week off was spent relaxing and going on a few adventures. On Tuesday I went to Ikea, and felt like I was back in America/Sweden. On Thursday, I travelled out to Kloster Andechs - a cloister/brewery out in the countryside. It took forever to get there, but our determination served us well with excellent beer.

Tiemo, Ben & Daniel

Ilana - Wie süß!

On Saturday, I hiked a portion of the Risserkogel in the Alps. Autumn is beginning to make everything look, feel and smell wonderful here.

Justin looking very Mysterious.

At the foot of the mountain is the Tegernsee, and a beautiful (but expensive!) vacation type town

Some quaint castle nestled into the side of another mountain

Then I skyped with my sleepy dog. 

Classes have begun this week and so far everything seems awesome. I'm taking three classes with L&C, and 4 at the University here - though I'll drop three once I've figured out which ones are the best. This coming saturday is "Die Lange Nacht der Münchner Museen" (The Long Night of the Munich Museums - for 15 Euros you have access to all of the participating Museums from 7 until 2 in the morning) which I plan on attending - so I'll post again soon!

Last Saturday began our 5-day stay in Berlin. Mostly, we did rather touristy stuff and to be honest I hardy feel like I got to know the city at all - but I'd like to return to explore some more. Berlin is much bigger than Munich - the population there is almost triple what it is here. Additionally, Berlin seems to be much more spread out. Nonetheless, I had a great stay, and excellent Döner. Miss you already Mustafa's. 

Bored train ride "art"

Graffiti was a breath of fresh air - in Munich it hardly exists at all

Atop the Bundestag/Reichstag building

A beautiful old Zionist church we found in Prenzlauer Berg 

For 1 euro we were allowed to climb up the tower

to find this incredible view of the city

There was also a running theme of "mini books" while in Berlin, I have no idea what was up with that..

The Western side of a portion of the wall

 Inside the Pergamon Museum:

There were amazing rugs and tapestries in the Islamic portion of the Museum too

Nebuchadnezzar II's Ishtar Gate

 I've been sick since I've been back - but this coming week I'm off from school, so I plan to explore the nooks and crannies of Munich more extensively.