A New Adventure Begins

Travel.  Quite remarkable how quickly one becomes accustomed to it.

It really didn't hit me that I was leaving until about Friday night at the PEF Alumni event.  Which is a little strange, because I had been packing slowly for nearly a week and by Friday everything was ready to go.  But it wasn't until afterwards when I was talking to people that I really realized that I wasn't going to see any of them again until September, and some of them perhaps never again.  I don't cry at these sorts of things, but it was a sobering thought.  Evidently no one else realized it either, because I got texts from two separate people later that evening as I was moving the last of my stuff out (a very unwise idea on the Friday night of Reunions, mind you) and getting ready for my last night in an American bed for three months to the effect of "WAIT A MINUTE!  YOU'RE LEAVING?!?!??!"  They asked when they could see me and I truthfully said that the only way I could guarantee it was if they hung around with Joe.  I knew at least he would take pains to make sure I said goodbye before I raced off to my summer exploits.  I should probably also mention that I worked 19 hours for two different jobs in the three days leading up to my departure, including the morning we left for the airport (I actually had to pass off a shift to someone else because it wouldn't have finished in time for me to make the shuttle bus ;]).  So I wasn't just moping around saying drawn-out goodbyes and waiting to leave.

The only people I ended up seeing on the morning of my departure were Joe, his roommates, and a close senior friend of his that I had also gotten to know this past semester.  I hope I see them (the seniors) again, because I had become very close to some of them during the course of the year.  Last year the seniors graduating meant very little to me, because I only knew a couple of them and didn't even have very many friends anyway.  This year it really hit home how much I will miss them, and I begin to wonder again whether studying abroad my junior year spring semester is such a good idea, since it will mean missing the class of 2012's graduation.  But I have all summer to decide that, and we haven't even started off on the adventure yet!  So let's get going.

The bus was scheduled to leave at noon on Saturday, but because of one of the group members' unfortunate unforeseen circumstances we were delayed about 30 minutes.  Not that it mattered - we got to the airport in plenty of time to check in and wait around for another couple of hours.  The theme of waiting on people would continue through the next few days, however, and without cell phones (which were mandatory to purchase in Russia but aren't obligatory here) communication can be quite frustrating at times.

As opposed to last summer, when I went home for a week before traipsing off to Serbia and Russia, this year I chose not to go home at all in May and merely pack for Germany from what I had brought to college.  This brought up the interesting question of storing what I wasn't bringing out of the country, which turned out to be quite a lot.  Mom was (understandably) unwilling to drive down and pick up my stuff if I wasn't coming home (a 1000 mile journey with just all of my stuff to keep her company?  Granted, I have plenty of stuffed animals, which make fine conversation partners but they can't share the driving ;]).  However, she and my sister were planning a college visit trip during Emily's April vacation and she (conveniently) wanted to visit some colleges in Pennsylvania, so she decided that they would come visit me on the way and bring as much of my stuff as possible back home with them.  It was unbelievably difficult to pack everything I thought I didn't need for the summer in April, and though I planned to basically live out of a suitcase for a month, I ended up having quite a bit of stuff that needed to find a home for the summer.  Thankfully the wonderfully generous PEF staff and some close friends who live in the area made it possible for me to store everything I didn't need without having to pay exorbitant prices for it all.  However, since I didn't want to burden them unnecessarily with all kinds of stuff, and I packed so hastily in April (there were a few things which I accidentally sent home which I later needed, and I kept at Princeton FAR more than I intended to), I ended up bringing much more than I needed to Germany.  Problematic, when one considers luggage weight limits on planes which are becoming ever stricter as each additional pound means extra fuel costs.  So it turned out that BOTH my checked bag and intended carry-on were above the limit, and I didn't even try to weigh my backpack which contained my laptop and sundry other items which I intended to be my "personal item."  Thankfully the woman at the check-in counter was wonderfully gracious and didn't ask about the backpack, but only made me rearrange so that the carry-on bag said 8kg (it was originally 10kg, and the checked luggage was 25.5kg, when the limit is 23kg).  When I tried to weigh my big suitcase again to see how much over it was, she waved me away and strapped the tag to it before I could protest.  I suppose if she didn't see how much over the limit it was, she couldn't charge me for an overweight bag?  In any case, my prospects for souvenirs seem dour.  I hope everybody will be content with postcards, because unless I leave a significant chunk of my luggage in Germany, that's about all I can afford to bring back, and that's only if the German luggage-counter attendants are as gracious as the one in New York, which I somewhat doubt.  While waiting for the plane in JFK I began thinking of how much I was bringing to Germany that I could spare: which clothes weren't my absolute favorite, which books wouldn't I need again, which things I had brought that I would use up over the course of a summer (painfully few, as I planned to purchase most such disposables upon arrival).  But again, I have all summer to decide that.

Finally the call came to board and we eagerly crowded onto the plane (the second-longest in the world - the bathrooms are actually downstairs from the main cabin!!) only to wait another 60 minutes or so on the tarmac before being cleared for takeoff.  I didn't mind particularly - I was excited for Germany but not so-excited-I-can-hardly-stand-it.  While we waited I watched The Green Hornet which seemed to be about the only interesting movie option - I'm glad I had nothing else to do with that time, because watching that movie would certainly have been a waste of it.  And I usually like superhero movies... I do, however, tend to despise movies where the main character is a jerk - though Dan H may kill me for saying it, I really didn't like Rushmore either.  Finally we took off, which is always one of my favorite parts of a plane ride, and soon we were cruising up the New England coast (which I knew not because of my stellar sense of direction or knowledge of aerial geography, but because the plane had one of those nifty GPS-maps that shows the route and position of the plane, as well as sundry other information about the flight - if you are curious, go read my blog entry about my trans-Atlantic flight to Zurich last year, where I first encountered this useful bit of technology.  I probably spend a paragraph and a half describing it :P).  In true German style the plane was clean, all was orderly, the flight attendants were crisp and businesslike, and the food was stellar (well - for airplane food, anyway).  I had "asian chicken" for supper and breakfast of a roll, granola bar, and fruit salad (if you can call two slices of pineapple, one of watermelon, one of cantaloupe and one blueberry a fruit salad).  I slept around 3 hours in between, not bad on a 7-hour flight (I don't usually do well trying to sleep sitting up).  Because of the northernly arc of the flight trajectory (presumably to stay over land as much as possible in case anything should go awry and demand an emergency landing) I got to see both sunset and sunrise on the same flight from my window seat on the left side of the plane.  This is probably my favorite part of flying, even more than takeoff/landing.  We landed at about 8:30am Munich time, which is 2:30 EST due to the 6-hour time difference.  Upon deplaning I promptly took a wrong turn in baggage claim and almost got lost in the airport - not a fortuitous start to the summer, I must say.  In addition I discovered that whether in the airport in New York or on the plane, I had somehow misplaced my better pair of sunglasses and was now constrained to my big bug-glasses for the summer - at least I brought two pairs!

As soon as we deplaned, the Princeton in Munich program unofficially began - we were from that point on constrained to speak only German from 9am-9pm.  (I don't count blogging because I'm not technically *speaking* English, and I hope my professors and classmates will forgive me the exception in the interest of preserving my memories).  To my great surprise, I could do it!  In stark contrast to the rocky start of the Princeton in St. Petersburg program in which I participated the summer prior, when I was unceremoniously dumped off at my host mother's apartment to find that she spoke not a word of English and my Russian was lacking to the point that I could barely understand what she was trying to communicate, much less respond (again, for more on that traumatic experience, go read the post titled "First Impressions"), I found that most of the vocabulary I wanted to communicate with my classmates was easily within my grasp!  Not that my grammar is perfect or that I don't pause and stumble (and make up German words or use English substitutes quite frequently), but I can understand and be understood, and that is a huge relief and confidence booster.  Granted, I am speaking with my classmates and professor who are intimately acquainted with both my accent and vocabulary level, and I have found that speaking with native speakers is significantly more difficult, but not impossible.  There may be hope after all for me being at least conversationally fluent by the end of the summer, if I work hard these next 12 weeks.

After waiting around a bit more in the airport (another student's bag had been lost and Prof. Rankin had to buy the tickets for us to travel on the train to our apartment), we were finally ready to set off, all 38 of us.  Now, anytime you have a group of this size you run the risk of losing track of everyone, and sure enough, that is what happened.  Prof. Rankin had bought group tickets (for up to 5 people) which were good for three days, which was exactly the time needed to last us until June, when we would receive individual month-long passes for all public transportation systems (local trains, subway, buses, trams...).  Amazingly this, like so many other aspects of the program, is covered in the program fee.  Now I can't believe that PIM costs only $2500!  PIP was also $2500, but we were individually responsible for our plane tickets, transportation around the city, and so on.  However, with PIM we have to pay for all our own food, and the program is only half as long, so perhaps the advantage isn't so much as I make it out to be.  In all honesty, it probably isn't fair to continuously make these comparisons between PiP and PiM, but I can't help it, and so far PiM is coming out ahead by a long shot.  Anyway, back to the airport.  As was bound to happen, 13 of us didn't make it onto the train in time and it zoomed away, carrying Professor Rankin and all of the tickets with it.  Evidently he thought that we were all on the train together because he had handed out all of his tickets, but obviously not everyone had had a group of five and in the chaos, quite a few of us had been overlooked.  All was not lost, however.  I was one of the thirteen left behind, but I was in a group of five with a ticket.  Our group had gotten off the train to seek a less crowded car just as the doors closed and locked (train doors in Germany don't automatically open and close - you must push a button to open them that deactivates when the train is about to leave).  The other eight, however, were stranded.  We finally decided that the five of us should follow the group and inform Professor Rankin of the predicament of the others, since we didn't know whether or not he was aware of so many missing, no one had a way to contact anyone in the other group (since none of our American phones worked in Germany) and having one ticket between thirteen people wouldn't do anyone any good.  We caught the next train into the city and dutifully got off at our stop, but then paused, confused.  We started off in one direction, but when we didn't find the correct street as "the first street on the right", as described, we turned around only to be met by Nathan, one of the most energetic participants in PiM, who had been sent back to train station to meet and guide us back to the dorm building.  Finally we arrived and told Professor Rankin of the other eight (and confirmed that he had no idea that they had been left behind).  While he dashed off to return to the airport and retrieve them, we received our room keys and set off to unpack a bit before an informational meeting.  My room for the summer is number 309, which is on the fourth floor by American accounting (since Europeans count the ground floor as separate from the first floor).  We all have very similar singles furnished with a bed, a desk, two bookshelves, a large shkaf (a Russian word for a free-standing wardrobe for which there is no good English equivalent), a refrigerator, a nightstand, and a private bathroom with toilet, sink, and shower.  Ironically it is larger, newer, and nicer than my academic room in Princeton from last year.  Every Wednesday we have the opportunity to change out our pillowcase/sheets and towels, and the rooms are cleaned weekly.  There is a kitchen on every floor where we can cook our meals if we prefer that to eating out (which I certainly do, to save money - this summer is going to be expensive enough!) and the basement has a game room, music room, TV room, and laundry room.  The internet, laundry, game room, kitchen use, and just about everything else here is free - it doesn't get much better than that. :)  The doors, windows, and light switches are as I saw in Serbia and Russia (the windows open either out or tilt down, with no screens, the doors have a strange lip, and the light switches are large and flat) but that's all old hat to me now (such a worldly-wise traveler have I become ;P).  Bedding in Germany is done a little differently - they have a big pillow with a pillowcase, but there is no such thing as a "fitted" sheet - a flat sheet tucks around the mattress and additional bedding is provided by a comforter with a washable cover instead of additional sheets.  Pretty intelligent, if you ask me, though it takes a bit of getting used to when one is accustomed to several layers over oneself.

The weather here shouldn't be as terrible as Russia - more like a Maine summer with many rainy days around 50˚F as well as a few hot ones closer to 80˚F.  After the trauma of last year's persistent 90˚ heat without any air conditioning, I welcome rain and cool.  I've also changed my philosophy on clothing and brought a fair sampling of my American wardrobe, everything from hoodies and jeans to tank tops and shorts - though the proportion of sundresses in my closet is certainly higher here than back in the States.  According to my classmates I look fairly German already (well I am about as white as they get), but to me the more important thing is being able to SPEAK the language rather than LOOK like I fit in.

After having a bit of time to unpack and get our bearings, and having been well-oriented to the Wohnung (apartment) - in German, nonetheless - we set off back for the city to meet one of the graduate students who was coming from Princeton.  Unfortunately her train was late - more waiting.  When she finally arrived, we wandered the city center for a bit, but most of the fun was taken out of the excursion by our over-tired and jet-lagged state.  I understand the sentiment of wanting to give us something to do so that we don't all go to bed at 2pm and wake up at 3am, but it wasn't very enjoyable.  We split up a couple of times and though we gave clear instructions for when and where to meet again, we inevitably ended up waiting for people again - and tempers were short.  We found a Deutsche Bank ATM (Bank of America has an agreement with them whereby fees are waived, which could potentially save me quite a bit of money over the summer) and I withdrew 200€ before I realized how much that was in dollars - being abroad had put me back in Russian mode, where the exchange rate is 30 roubles to the dollar.  I had to remember that here it was the other way around, with 1.4 dollars equalling one Euro as of a few days ago - I'll have to be even more careful with my spending this summer.  Anyway, I shouldn't have to visit an ATM again for awhile (although there are always many more expenses up front, so I shouldn't expect that any spending trends this week will continue), and there is a small safe in the room at the apartment so any extra money as well as my passport, debit card, camera, iPod, etc. should be much safer.  Unfortunately my laptop won't fit in the safe or I would keep it there too, but the rooms lock automatically and I'm not too worried.  That's one big difference between Russia and Germany - I brought my laptop Alek this year, which means many things.  Perhaps most importantly, I won't *have* to wait an entire week between blog posts, which means that each one may not be a novel.  I'll also be more connected to America and the world in general, more reachable by email, on Skype more often, etc.  Friends from home can even text me on my Google voice number and I can check it from either Alek or Sebastian (my iPod which is also here with me and connected to the internet), though from this distance I can't imagine that there is anything that you would want to text me that couldn't be better said in an email.  On that note, please know that I'd love to hear how you are doing - I can't be the only person having an exciting summer! :)

So, back to Sunday.  Since it was Sunday, many stores were closed, including nearly every Apotheke we ran across (most of us hadn't brought liquids such as shampoo/conditioner/soap, etc. and we were in desperate need of showers).  But, we wandered around and got a feel for the city center, ending at Marienplatz in time to see the famous cuckoo clock which plays every day at 11am, noon, and 5pm.  Then we finally returned to the dorm for the night, where I organized my few belongings to my heart's content (I'm not happy unless my room is clean and organized), calculated my budget for the month, and made lists: to do, to buy, lists to make, etc. ;)  Finally at 8:00 I was too exhausted to do more and fell gratefully into bed before even the sun had gone down.  My room has east-facing windows, and I look forward to being woken up by the sun every morning - that is one of the main reasons that I picked my room at Princeton for next year.  And so I slept the sleep of the weary traveler, happy to be in a made-up bed once more (my bedding had needed to be packed a couple of days before I left so I spent my last two nights in America huddled on a bare mattress with a sweatshirt for a pillow - miserable even when it is too hot for blankets).  And here my saga ends until another day.