I am back and I wish I'm not! Germany was so much fun! I'd stay there for a few more weeks if I could. It's wayyyyy better than the China trip last year. The weather was pleasant although sometimes a bit too hot for me, the cities are nice but the countryside is nicer. It's so beautiful! There were flowers growing all over the place and we could see fields of red, blue and yellow dotted all over. On top of that, there were also lots of cows and horses. So cute. We were taking photos of them were crazy hahaha everyone was like "OMG! COWS! *snap, snap, snap*".
On the first day, we drove out of Munich and visited the magical fairytale castle Neauchwanstein and the beautiful Lake Titisee. It's really nice. The castle is situated high up in the mountains and you can see snow at the peak which is quite near to the castle...in Summer! Lake Titisee was very serene and very pretty. Before that, we were driving through the Black Forest and the Romantic Road and the views that accompanied the travelling were so pretty. We passed through small towns, rolling hills, thick forest and even Lake Constance! We could see Switzerland and Austria from there. There's so much to see. And the hotel we stayed for the night was very quiant. It's like a typical German hotel in the countryside. Made up of wood with comfortable furnishings. It comes with a balcony too and you could sit outside and enjoy the peace and quiet with the view of the town and the Black Forest. In the morning, you could birds chirping loudy.
On the second day, we started our day in Freiburg. It's a big town with a typical German town square. There's a huge Gothic cathedral in the middle accompanied by an old town hall and a market surrounding the area. Once after, we drove our way up into the mountains to my favourite place, Altensteig! It's this little town located in the Black Forest. The journey to the town was the most spectacular journey I've ever been on. We were climbing up and down heavily forested mountains with awesome views of ranges and whatnot.
This time, we passed through many picturesque medieval villages and Altenstieg is one of them. The town's a very old one. If I remembered correctly, it dates back to the 12th century. Anyway we were there beacuse we had an exchange with the school called Christophorous Gymnasium over there. I want to go that school. They have a very nice campus and they have great views of rolling hills and of the town from their classroom window too! They don't need air conditioning beacuse there are located at the very top of the hill so it's very cooling. The school specialises in biology due to the natural surroundings of the school which is very diverse as well as singing and music. The school's chior is one of the best in Germany and they regulary go around the world to sing. And the can sing very well! They gave us like 2 impromptu singing sessions without any preparation at all! And the best part is that the students walk around school barefooted! Not surprising considering how clean the campus is and ry the toilet floors are. We spent the afternoon touring around the school. After that, we headed to Stuttgart for dinner and spent the night there.
The following day, we went back to the school and attended lessons. Me and Parmes decided to go for European History which was the topic for the English lesson since it sounded interesting. The lesson was quite an eye opener. The German students are very nice people and they are not naughty or loud as what I thought they would be. Maybe that only applies to American students which we saw a lot all over the trip. Very irritating people. The German students on the other hand kept quiet when the teacher was speaking and they're quite smart too! We were discussing about the European Union and the teacher was very fluent in English. She has a British accent in fact, very nice. And she interacted with us a lot. Asking us questions about Singapore and how we feel about Germany and such. The most interesting part was when they asked us how we felt about the Birtish. During the entire lesson, Parmes and I answered most of the questions so we said that we love them, we are veyr much like them blah, blah, blah. And the class opinions seem to point to the Germans disliking the Brits, super amusing hahaha. Finally we were asked what subject we took and Parmes said that she took History, Maths, Tamil Lit. and English Lit. and the teacher asked "wait, what was the 2nd last one?" and Parmes said "Tamil Literature" and the class including the teacher stared at her. So she went on and said "errr....I'm Indian?" and we burst into laughter. It was so funny. The bell rang and we gave a presentation to the shool about YJ and Singapore. They're coming over next year in August and many are interested. So we had lunch in their big cafeteria and they gave us lasagna! The teacher then gave us a tour of Altensteig. It so omg pretty. We visited the town's castle (a very small one), and walked downhill through the little alleyways and so on. Unfortunately, it was raning so were a little drench but couldn't be bothered. We continued walking in the light rain cos we really wanted to see more!So much so that we even drove up to a neaby hill to get an aerial view of the entire town and take pictures. It's very picturesque. If I were to come back to Germnay, I'd definitely head back to Altensteig! It's now my favourite place in the Germany!
After that part, our tour of South Germany ended and we headed for Berlin. Along the way, we stopped in Nuremberg for a short city tour and lunch. It's a nice city with a huge city square. Again, it's like your typical German town square with a big church and a market. We then headed for Berlin which I personally didnt like. The city is quite rundown with grafitti all over the place. Maybe I was too used to the greenery before. The only nice place was the Museum Island where all the majestic building are located. It kind of remineded me of London. We saw the Reichstag (The German Parliament) and many other bid buildings. We had a tour guide with us that gave us a lot of insightful information on the history of Berlin which is actually centred around the Cold War. We visited the Berlin wall, moved between East and West Berlin like crazy and visited 3 museums. The Jewish Museum, the Topography of Terror Exhibition and the Berlin Wall Museum which is beside Checkpoint Charlie. We took pics like crazy as usual. They gave us an hour to shop around at the last but it was so irritating. All the shops were closed because it was a Sunday and all Germans rest on Sunday. No wonder the roads were so empty. Lazy people. Even the supermarkets are closed on Sunday! We weren't able to stock up on water and chocs! So Parmes and I were walking around again and we were crossing the road at Checkpoint Charlie and one of the characters dressed in uniform asked if we'd like to get our passport stamped for crossing the border for 2 Euros. We said no and then he suddenly began to guess where we are from hahaha. So he started with Parmes and said "India!". She said no and he tried "Pakistan!" and no again. Then he tried me and said "China!". I was like "WHAT! I'M NOT FROM CHINAAAAAAA!" And was thinking to myself, I don't even look Chinese! So he asked us what colour our passport was and we said red and gussed finally Singapore correctly hahaha. The hotel was VERYYYYY NICE! I got a very big room that came with a calcony and a study corner! How cool is that?! And in the mornings, we'd have our breakfast outside in the cool air.
We spent like 3 days in Berlin and thereafter, it was a 6 hour bus drive down to Munich again for our final stop. Along the way, we stopped at Leipzig this time for a short city tour again. Nothing much to say for this city, it's like any other German city. Pretty, ancient and nice. Before we knew it, we were back in our final destination in the South again, Munich. Our day in Munich started not in the city but in the outskirts in the town of Dachau which had a concentration camp called the Dachau Concentration Camp. It was not what I expected. Living conditions were marginally better but the torture, humen experimentation and gassing were not a surprise. But this concentation camp is special because it was one of the first and was a model for all over camps. It had everything so we could see a bit of everything other concentration camps have. Because of this, gassing wasnt done here. Only one or two victims were gassed at a time and no one knows why they dont gas hundreds at a time in this camp. Anyway it was a sad place and Parmes felt depressed after that but she felt better after we visited the church while walking around Dachau which is very pretty. Small town with beautiful architecture and perched on top of the hill was the castle and we visited the garden which very pretty. After that, we visited the BMW showroom and went gila there! hahaha then we went t the Nyphemberg Palace which was omg so big and beautiful. we spent an hour fooling around the palace gardens and camwhored. Had an afternoon long city tour of Munich thereafter and visited Marienplatz, the cool city centre with great shopping that had a HUGE town hall in the middle. Oxymorically, the new town hall looks much nicer and much older than the old town hall which was just beside the new town hall. That's because the old one was rebuilt quite recently I think. Munich is the nicest of the German cities. On the last day, we had time to ourselves so all of us decided to take the U-Bahn train down to Marienplatz to do shopping and we shopped like crazy! We had 5 hours to ourselves so me, Haifa and Parmes went exploring whilst shopping! We went to many squares and took photos of places the guide didnt bring us to and shopped of course. I didnt buy much stuff cos nothing interest me lol. When we all met again, everyone had shopping bags except me! Grrrr now I regret not spening my money! So that was Germany for you! It's a nice country. I'd definitely be back! Pics coming soon!
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