Welcome to Bavaria with ACS

Since arriving in Germany a little over a month ago, I've been interested in learning more about the German culture. As much as I like living in Germany, I still feel uncomfortable at times because I'm not familiar with the culture or language. Army Community Service, better known as ACS, puts on a Welcome To Bavaria class each month to newcomers here in Vilseck and Grafenwoehr. Since I'm not working at the moment and it can be quite lonely during the day, it was the perfect chance to take the class.

The class was taught by a local German woman who was quite entertaining. She explained to us how many Germans can be very direct, yet American's find it rude. In the German culture they tell you how they feel and aren't afraid to tell you the truth, no matter how it might make the other person feel. But in the United States, many people will avoid being completely honest at times because they don't want to hurt a person's feelings. Although, I'm sure we all know people in the U.S. who don't have any problems "telling it like it is". She covered topics such as tipping, popular local dishes, metric system, and popular phrases. She also explained that Germans like to keep to themselves most of the time. They don't enjoy small talk, especially with strangers. So basically, I shouldn't expect my German neighbors to strike up a conversation with me. If you know me personally, you probably know how chatty I can be. I like meeting new people and sometimes I have a hard time being quiet so this may be a challenge for me in the future. HA!

Our instructor also briefly explained to us how the train systems works in Germany, specifically Bavaria, which was beneficial because we definitely plan on taking the train when we travel to farther cities. We also learned about popular festivals and events in our region and I'm definitely excited to go to some popular Christmas markets in December.

One of the other events that ACS puts on is a day trip to a neighboring town. This month they went to Weiden, which is about 25 minutes from Vilseck, and I chose to go along on the trip. The same woman who taught the Welcome to Bavaria class also led the day trip. We took a small bus to Weiden and explored local furniture stores, recreation areas and the charming downtown area. I just can't get over the cobble stone streets. I love them so much. Although, you definitely need to wear appropriate shoes because one wrong step and you could have a sprained ankle! I picked up a ton of brochures from the town hall so I could gain more knowledge about the town and other popular attractions nearby. Overall, it was a fun day, although I felt uncomfortable communicating with some of the Germans. My German is so rusty but hopefully that will change soon because I start German classes next week! I'll leave you with a few pictures of downtown Weiden. Have a great weekend!

P.S. What tips do you have for living in Germany? I'd love to know!

The Latest Lowdown on Life Overseas

Hey everyone. Things are starting to pick up here in Germany. A few things have happened that I thought I would update you all on.

• I signed up for German classes! It's an 8 week course on base that teaches you the basics of German. I've learned a little German through some mobile apps I have but I want to communicate better with the locals so I figured it would be a good idea to take some classes. I start the first week of September!
• I also signed up for a "Welcome to Bavaria" class next week on base. The class is designed to teach newcomers about Bavarian traditions and culture. And on Friday, I'll be taking a day tour with ACS (Army Community Service) of a town nearby called Weiden. 
• I'm applying for jobs. So far I've applied for three jobs and I'll probably end up applying for some more. As an Army spouse living abroad, jobs are few and far between. Honestly, our best option is to work on base. Most places off base in the economy require a work visa, which I don't have. I used to work at the Child Development Center on post back at Joint Base Lewis McChord but I'm trying to get a job where I won't have to lift children as often since I hurt my lower back and recently finished physical therapy. 
• My best friend from San Francisco, Stephanie, just arrived in Florence, Italy yesterday. She's spending four months studying abroad and has even started her own blog as well! Check it out here: Tanti Baci from Firenze . I'm so excited to meet up with her and hopefully go on some adventures together.
• I started a Facebook page for my blog so people can be updated through that page instead of me taking over their news feeds with my "NEW BLOG POST!" statuses on my personal page. The link will be added to the sidebar under CONNECT soon. 
• I went to an FRG meet up the other night. I wasn't really active in the the FRG back at JBLM (mostly because I was so busy with work) so I thought I'd put myself out there and attend some gatherings and make some friends. FRG's usually have a reputation for being filled with drama but I'm hoping that won't be the case with my FRG. So far, so good. 
• Did I mention that our Honda CR-V finally arrived? About two weeks ago we were able to finally pick it up. I feel so "free" having my car again. And it's automatic so that is definitely a plus! 
• Our household goods shipment arrived last Friday. It's so nice to have our stuff again, especially our king size bed. Nick is really enjoying having that back. The only downfall about the move was that the movers in Washington took apart some of our furniture to make more room in the shipping crate, and now some of the furniture we can't put back together because it's missing screws and also we don't have the instruction manuals. Some of the pieces are two or three years old. Who saves instruction manuals from that long ago? Not me. We're still unpacking though. Our little kitchen is so crowded with appliances and other essential items. I'm definitely going to donate some of our non essential items and put the least used items in storage.

Day 1: Unpacking the kitchen

Remember when I mentioned in a previous post how pretty the scenery was on the trails near our house? Well, today I went out and took some photos so I could show all of you how pretty it is. I'm still learning to use my DSLR camera so forgive me if some of the photos are slightly out of focus or blurry. I'm working on learning more about aperture, shutter speed and ISO. I'll end this post with a couple of pictures from my walk today. Enjoy!

What?! New Layout!

If you are a frequent visitor of my blog, you may notice that my blog has received a makeover recently. I decided to change it up a bit and I wouldn't be surprised if I decide to change it again in the future. This whole "blogging" thing is still pretty new to me so I'm experimenting with new designs and such so bear with me through the changes. I just wanted to let you all know what was going on. Do you like the new design? Leave a comment below and let me know your thoughts!

Bloglovin!

I wanted to write a short post about this neat site called Bloglovin which may be beneficial to any of my readers or followers out there. Bloglovin is a site where you can follow all of the blogs you read on one site. So instead of having to go to each individual site to read a blog, you can add your favorite blogs on Bloglovin which will organize them, and you just read your favorite blogs all on one site. Pretty cool, right?

I like Bloglovin because it saves me time when I'm trying to catch up on my favorite blogs. And I think YOU would like Bloglovin also, especially if you read more than one blog. All you have to do is go to Bloglovin and create an account. From there you will be able to enter the blogs you follow and add them to your favorites. Then when you want to read new posts from your favorite blogs, just go to Bloglovin and all the posts will appear there. And if you have a blog yourself, you can get a widget to put on your page so your readers can follow you on there as well. Speaking of widgets, if you look on my right side bar and scroll down, you'll see a button where you can follow me on there also.

If that sounds like something you're interested in, go ahead and click the Bloglovin button in this post, or head on over to www.bloglovin.com and start following your favorite blogs!

Imperial Castle in Nuremberg

Nick and I decided to explore the Imperial Castle in Nuremberg last weekend. Nuremberg is only an hour drive from our home so we figured it would be the perfect day trip. Our GPS took us on the scenic route instead of the autobahn, so we were able to see some small German villages on the way there. It was a really neat drive. 

The Imperial Castle is also known as Kaiserburg in German. It's a medieval castle, built on sandstone rock with a bit of tudor architecture and while historians aren't quite sure the exact year it was constructed, most believe it was built around 900 years ago, or about 1100 B.C. The castle was considered "one of the most important imperial castles in the Holy Roman Empire". 

Nick and I chose to take a self guided tour where we walked around and explored ourselves. Unfortunately for us, most of the artifacts had descriptions that were in German and we don't know much German yet so we weren't able to understand what some of the artifacts were. There were some descriptions on some of the larger items so that helped. Obviously items like crowns, armored suits and weapons we understood. We just don't know who they exactly belonged to! Hmm...Maybe we should have taken that guided tour.

The castle has a tower on the premises called the Sinwell Tower. It was used to defend the castle from intruders during battles and war in the middle ages. We were able to walk up the winding wooden spiral staircase inside and let me tell you, that was quite exhausting! After walking up those stairs, I can tell I'm a lot more out of shape than I thought I was. I was literally out of breath. I sat down for a little bit to rest and catch my breath but after that I was and able to enjoy the view from atop the tower. You could see almost all of Nuremberg. Sadly, a lot of the castle was damaged during World War II but it was eventually restored a short while later. Although the castle has been restored, it's sad to know that such a beautiful piece of history was damaged during war. 

The last part of the tour we took was a visit into the Deep Well. Again, the man who was describing the history of the well spoke mostly German but he spoke a little English so we sort of understood the history of it. He lowered some candles into the well to show us how deep the well was. It is almost 50 meters deep! That about 164 feet. Pretty darn deep!

After we toured the castle we stopped at a beer garden just outside the entrance to the castle. It was a charming spot to relax, eat and drink some good beer. I ordered a hefeweizen-radler and a salad with large chunks of feta cheese in it. Yum! And I believe Nick had a radler and some type of "wurst"...bratwurst maybe? I'm not good at describing German food. Sorry! It was a cute spot to eat and I thoroughly enjoyed my meal. I wish we were able to spend more time in the city so we could explore other parts but since Nuremberg is just an hour drive away, I'm sure we will be back again to explore some more! 

German-American Volksfest

Last weekend Nick and I attended the German-American Volksfest that was held on our local Army base. The Volksfest was a three day festival that was open to German nationals and Americans as an opportunity to celebrate the two cultures. We decided to go on Saturday and it happened to be a very busy day. We took a shuttle bus from post to the campground because traffic was horrendous. We were NOT going to deal with traffic jams. 

This was the first Volksfest I've been to but let me describe the atmosphere: Think huge American fair meets lots of beer drinking and German food. That pretty much sums up what it was like. There were people walking around in Lederhosen and Dirndls (traditional Bavarian clothing) and also a stage where Germans were line dancing to Bad Touch by Bloodhound Gang. That was quite an interesting sight but fun nonetheless. I saw a few Germans who were dressed up like cowboys. I found that pretty funny...I wonder if that's what Germans think of when they think of Americans? 

Nick was set on finding a German drink called a radler. A radler is essentially German beer mixed with Sprite, or lemon-lime soda. I know what you're thinking...that sounds gross. But to tell you the truth, it's pretty darn good. We continued on and found some delicious German flatbread food that I cannot remember the name of and played a carnival game involving ping pong balls and beer steins. Later on, Nick and his friend set out to find a blooming onion while I went off in the other direction, determined to find some funnel cake. It was so crowded and I had no idea where I was going but I followed my nose and found a vendor selling something similar to funnel cake called a Lángo. A lángo is a traditional Hungarian dish that is flatbread, deep fried and topped with powdered sugar. It can also contain toppings such as garlic, cheese and sour cream. Extremely unhealthy but super tasty. I wish I took a picture but I'll insert a google image of it so you can get the idea.

LÁNGO (image from http://goldstreamstationmarket.ca )

The cell phone service was very poor at the fest so I got a little lost on my way back to find Nick since I wasn't able to call him and find out where he was. Eventually we were reunited and he enjoyed another beer with his buddies before deciding we should head back home. The whole day was hot and sunny yet while we were waiting for the shuttle bus, the sky got dark, opened up and a huge downpour of rain showered us all. Not fun, especially since none of us had jackets. The bus finally came after about 15 minutes of standing in the cold, pouring rain and we were finally on our way back home.

The Volksfest was a fun experience. It was really crowded and hot but that was to be expected when going on Saturday in the middle of the day. And Nick and I are even contemplating buying our own lederhosen and dirndls for future festivals!