Day 2

So last night Janine made Shepard's pie for dinner. Delicious!! :) I forgot to say that yesterday so I had to say it first today!

Anyways....
Today was an awesome day. It kinda feels like we have been here longer than 36 hours, but we haven't! It's just been a long two days :)
So I got up this morning and had breakfast, a piece of bread with nutella and a banana. Janine and Anja bought me my own jar of nutella after seeing the picture of me and little brother John holding one from our trip here for Christmas 2011. Then once we were all ready, we walked to PH. It is a short walk, no more than 10 minutes when you walk slow. It feels like the same distance as it was from Niemeyer to Mackinac hall for all you GVSU readers. Once at PH I met up with the group and we headed to a classroom. There we met Frau Becker who gave a quick presentation on the school and such. They have an early childhood education degree. Might be something to look into :) From there we filled out some paperwork with Sabrina (a PH student and our tour guide for the day), got our bus passes, and took a campus tour. The campus is small, 2 buildings plus a cafeteria (Mensa), a sporthaal (a small athletic building), tennis/soccer court, sand volleyball court, and a track, yet it is still gorgeous in its own way.

Why that is the only picture I took during the tour, I really don't know. Hopefully more are soon to come!
From there we went to the Mensa for lunch. Oh man oh man oh man was it delicious! There were so many options, and they were probably all way better for you than anything on campus back home. There were sandwiches up the wazoo, salads, soup, pasta, meat, potatoes, sweets, yogurts, drinks. It was sooooooo good! Angela and I were astonished. And it was super cheap! Even better! Not the ridiculous prices we pay at GV!

 One thing that is hard to get past is the staring. Everyone stares at us like aliens, even when we don't say anything! It's like we have an american flag stamped on our heads hahaha.
After lunch we went into the city. We totally got separated on the buses and half the group got lost found our way to Marktplatz just fine and were given this long and boring in depth scavenger hunt to do. The plus side of it was it forced us to go explore and look around the city, not just see the shops and bars and such.

In the assignment we were asked to go to this beautiful church. I love old churches. They just make me smile, hence all the pictures!

The outside was gorgeous, it reminded me a lot of the cathedral in Köln which is breathtaking. The inside was just as beautiful. 

The alter was what caught my eye though. The cross cut out is what made it for me. I love it :)

The whole place is simple yet intricate. It is great. The best part for me was being able to light candles. I lit one for my Aunt Joyce who passed away last spring. She had a long and hard fight with cancer, which eventually consumed her body. The other was for Cole Deacon who passed away yesterday. He was hit by a car at the beginning of the week and was in critical condition. His body could no longer keep up the fight. I said some prayers and left their light burning bright :)

 
After half-assing finishing our activity we had a little time left over, so I got a banana nutella crepe. OH MY GOODNESS. Can you say lecker?

Sadly we didn't have enough time for me to explore the market more and buy some sweet scarves. I can save that for another day though!
Once the group came back together, we were able to go off on our own and explore. We stayed together as a group and decided to go get drinks to celebrate Kyle's birthday, our arrival in Germany and to just have some good beer!

I tried 4 different beers, no worries though I only drank 2 of them. The others were sips from friends :) After we had finished our beers a few of us went to get some food. Bratwurst/currywurst for Angela, Becky and me and Döner for Jason. We walked back to the city center (it is similar to a mall) where we found a photo booth which is acutally meant for passport sized pictures. All 5 of us squeezed in to take a picture for a card for Kyle (who was with us)! It was more a picture of all of our foreheads but it was all of us none the less :) At one point Angela yelled at Jason because he smelled like Döner, oh and a drunk guy scolded us for trying to fit more than one person in the booth. But we took it as a challenge! In the end, I'm pretty sure Kyle loved the card!
Eventually we all went home to our guest families. Janine, Anja and I went grocery shopping. We got some fruit, vegetables, Apfelschörle (my favorite!!) and other things. Janine showed me this children's yogurt that you can put a stick in a freeze to make popsicles. Anja rolled her eyes asking how old we were. I responded with 2 and Janine with 5 :) We bought a sim card so hopefully I can use Janine's old pink razor soon.
When we got home I got to skype with my parents, and Ali and Hannah. A perfect end to a great day!

Good night Germany! Good night America!

Lots of love from Schwäbisch Gmünd!

Katy Jo