Cleaning

Thats been today, cleaning and packing. Trying to make my room presentable once again. Pretty much just taking all the "Lived In-ness" and stuffing it in garbage bags. Kind of depressing actually. But im making progress, I woud say im abou 80% there. And i intend on finishing when i get back from some adventures tonight. AKA going to one of my favorite clubs here for the last time. More saddnessssss! However its student night, so beer is cheap. I plan on going out every night this week, to take in as much ERASMUS fun as i possiblely can. Last night was the last Brau Haus, and it was a quite a good bit of insanity. Not looking for too much insanity tonight, as im going to need to come home and finish cleaning before the Haus Meister comes round tomorrow at 9 to inspect my room. The days, they grow short.

Lessons Learned

Flirting with German girls. Yepp. Im not gonna say im an expect, i dont anyone could ever be with German women. What I have found is that German women are some of the most beautiful women around, but as beautiful as they are they are also equally as difficult to approach. Especially for us foreign speakers of German. Of course most everyone around here speaks a bit of english, and they love to speak it. So if you can break the ice somehow and get to the talking and dont feel confident with your German they'll probably start the english right away anyway. But I enjoy talking German, so when I try and make a move Im doing it in German. But once you've broken the ice with whatever special dance moves or elaborate events, they're all usually very friendly and responsive. Especially when you're a foreigner speaking pretty decent German. On a side note it really amazes people here when im talking to them in pretty good German and I tell them im from New York. The reaction is always either "Why did you want to study German?" or "New York!!!! I love it there, why did you want to come here". But yea so being a foreigner talking in German to German women is definently going to help you out. But ive seen amerikans here who speak no German, talking in stupid english to German girls and they still get somewhere. Then if you manage to make it past the first date or so and a relationship develops, it has a totally different feel than in ny. Here it seems that if you're going to be with someone, its going to be a long term sort of a thing. Sort of a one year minimum thing. Where in the states, at least in my friend group, relationships of just a few months are way more common. You see couples here who have been together for 3 or 4 years and its very common. Its pretty cool. alright now i gotta run. Try and figure out what happened to me last night that i decided to write this blog. love this video.

A music video for how i feel right now

This song is awesome, but I feel like this video properly illustrates my situation/feelings right now.

7 Days

Its freaky to think this time next week im going to be on a plane on the way back to new york. Real freaky. Honestly i have no desire to go back, to leave this amazing place ive come to call home. To leave all the magnificent scenery, the beautiful buildings, the delicious and numerous differnt types of food, the beautiful women, the history, the parties, the beer, the wine, just everything. I have no desire to go from a city where most things seem to be figured out, to a state thats drowning in its own foolishness. Its gonna be hard, and here's an apology in advance if im not so nice to you when i get back. I dont mean to be. Let's call it adjustment angst. Im gonna have to go back to all of those responsibilities. All of those illogical courses im going to have to take when i get back, just to get a piece of paper that says i know international relations.I can say without a doubt that i've probably learned more about international relations here from just being immersed in another culture for nearly a year, than im going to learn from the next 2 to 3 semesters of unterricht im gonna to have to take when i get back. Thinking that way now kind of makes me want to give it up and do something different. I dont have the faintest idea what that something different would be. But i have time to figure it out i suppose. Right now just the thought of Rockland County makes me really nervous. I have nothing against my family and friends there, im looking forward to seeing them. But just thinking of it all, i just get that yuck feeling. The feeling of crushing bordom, there being absolutley no viable public transit system to speak of, just the whole suburbia of it. I have encountered nothing even close to Rockland over here, and i love it. And no rant against Rockland would be complete without mentioning how much I loath Chris St. Lawrence. The root of many of the problems in the county. Ahh well time you are one heartless dictator of exsistance, relentless in that march forward to the end of things. This time last year, i could not imagine myself at this point. from the vantage point of Juli 2009, Juli 2010 was just some distant point, an unreachable goal for me at that point. Ja i knew it was coming, but it wouldnt be here for the longest time. But 10 Monaten of wine women song and German later here i am. In 7 days i have to return to the Amerikan Albtraum. Hurrah for me.

In Two Weeks

In just two weeks time I will be getting on a plane to head back to boring old Rockland County, but of course I will first have to arrive in smelly, crime invested, Mafia controlled, New Jersey. Ughhhhhhhhh. I just have way too many things to do here before I go. I've got a respectable To Do list written out and with me at all times. Just burning a hole in my pocket. Its too soon to go back. I'm a part of life here, everything is easy here now. Pretty much feels just like home at this point. Gotta say I am not looking forward to the massive Kulture shock im bound to catch on the flight back. Don't think im gonna be much fun to be around when im back in NY at least for a while. Im gonna predict extreme bitterness with large helpings of discontent with everybody and everything. But I'm like that most of the time so people probably wont notice the difference.

But time for an actual update

So political rants aside things are starting to wind down over here. Its really scary. It feel like just the other day I was getting on that plane to Frankfurt, and now I have to come back. I honestly dont want to. I can say with complete certainity that this has been the best year of my life so far. I have made tons of great friends from all over the world, I've learned a new language better than i know my own, I've lived and thrived in a new country. Its completely amazing to me. I read on an inspirational calendar a quote that's stuck with me. I cant remember it completely but it was something along the lines of "The best advice you can give to a young person, is do what you are afraid to do" In all honesty I would say that quote sums up my year here. Getting on that first plane was one of the scariest things i'd ever done. Those 6 hours over the ocean thinking, worrying, practiceing what i was gonna say when i got there, totally scared shitless. Absolutley one of the most difficult things. But you hit the ground and you cant help but do it running. Right out of the gate you start learning new stuff, and meeting new people. It was nerve wracking voluntarily throwing myself into a completely different situation, one I had never imagined I would do even. But back to the quote, it was something i was scared to do, and i did it anyway. And now im all the better for it. I dont want to leave, but i know that the sooner i leave the sooner i can come back. Its a sad thought, but i have things left unfinished back home that i need to do and see before i can come back here. But make no mistake Germany, i'll be back. And that was not an AAaahold reference, because he's austrian actually. I'll be posting many more of my last thoughts here, because there is more than i could ever possiblely put down here. But imma give it a shot. alright time to get back to work. still love that movie.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!HHAHHUIDIUBIUBSIUBISUBIUIU!!!!!!!!!!

Yea i dunno, dont have much to say. Just organzing my thoughts on the recent Bundespräsident election. Have to discuss it today in class. Gonna be interesting. I find it almost hilarious that people here get excited about electing a new President, even though the position has no real power. But I still find politics here way way way way way way way way more stimulating that politics back home. Back home politics is just goddamn stupid. You only have two parties that are pretty much exactly the same, and all they do all day everyday and argue and fight and try and think of new ways to undermine each other. Nothing gets done, and the public is polarized along party lines. All the while you have a country that is falling apart, literally. Its disgusting. Here they argue and stuff too, but at least at the end of the day everyone knows that its their job to do right by the voters. Not in the states though. They'll argue all day in Congress and then at the end of the day they're going to do what's right for their wallets. The only time politicians in the states are accountable to the people is around re-election time. Its true, im telling you. Pay attention next time your local corrupt official (that means all of them) is up for election. You'll see they'll suddenly get all compassionate about your local issues and say they'll fix it if you just give them 2 or 4 more years. But at the end of those years, they still have repaved your goddamn street or whatever it is that you wanted them to do. Instead they wasted your vote by going out and doing what their biggest campaign contributers told them to do. They gave away oil concession, they gave out building contracts to their buddies, they denied global warming, they were pretty much just a waste of time and life. Now you may sit there and tell me, "Mike stop being dumb, politics is corrupt everywhere, so stop singling out the states" Well I would agree with you there, but the states has got to be where is the worst. Corporations have their hands deep deep in every level of politics in the states, and use their new found freedom of speech (see recent supreme court case) to contribute unlimited and undisclosed amounts of money to the candidates they want to see in office. Its a scary model of government. Politics is never the most innocent of subjects, but US politics is one of the worst. and in other news i booked my flight back home and am kinda sad to leave.

AHHH!!! ITS A NEW BLOG!!

ENDLICH!!!!!!!!!

Its still a new blog

FINALLY!

New Blog mutha mutha

Yea, its a new blog finally.