Germany - "Beautifulness!"

For the Christmas holidays I will be visiting my friend Carolin and her family in Germany! Here is a map of where I'll be travelling (starting with Besancon). as I will first spend 4 days in Heidelberg with her twin sister Steffi, then a week in Schwabisch Hall with their family, then New Year's in Konstanz with Carolin.

You can zoom in/out to get a better look:


View Germany Trip in a larger map

I left Besancon with the two German language assistants who live near or in Heidelberg, and arrived around 3:30pm to couchsurf with Daniel, a German student studying law here.

Daniel was incredibly welcoming - he took my suitcase up a few flights of stairs for me and I was immediately comfortable with him, but perhaps it was the Australian accent (he just got back from a year of studying abroad there). But no really, he was incredibly friendly from the start. He and I drank some sort of bubbly apple juice for a couple hours while we talked and exchanged stories, and he and his two flatmates answered my plethora of questions about Germany during dinner whilst eating raclette; an impossible-to-describe sort of mini-oven where you make little plates of food and put it inside of the thing to cook, and while you wait you have a bit of a chat.

I asked them to tell me about Germans since I knew/know virtually nothing about Germany, and we had a great evening discussing and trading cultural tid-bits that ended in me watching them play some pretty competitive darts for 30 minutes and the movie "The Departed," which was surprisingly good.

After a wonderful morning of sleeping in, we had what I like to think is German toast with German jelly/syrup, and Daniel and his flatmate were incredibly kind and gave me a ride to Steffi's apartment (Carolin's twin sister whom I've never met). We got a bit turned around, but finally we saw her waiting outside and it was really bizarre seeing and talking to her for the first time as she looks and talks and even acts like Carolin, but isn't, but we hit it off wonderfully and had a great laugh at the fact that she knew Daniel's flatmate. Small world!

I am now enjoying the beautifulness of Steffi's hospitality and the new usage of the word "beautifulness" that I learned while she was translating a German poem for me while cleaning dishes together after a late lunch/early dinner. If she reads this though, she might throw another pillow at me for continuing to mention it...

Her apartment is so charming and her room is big and orange and red with all the signs of someone who has lived and actually nested somewhere, which brings me such a warm and cozy feeling at the same time that I feel a pang of tiny sadness that I can't exactly nest at this time, but I didn't harp over it and instead spent a wonderful afternoon drinking coffee with Steffi, exchanging stories and laughing at a hundred little nothings. She is as warm and kind and funny as her sister and I feel so grateful to know them both.

I alreadly feel like I've known her as long as Carolin, though our stories are only just beginning, and it's beautifulness :)

I'm currently enjoying a warm cup of Christmas tea in an overly large Starbucks mug in a cozy orange chair under soft and cozy yellow lights with the cozy smell of cinnamon coming from a cozy red candle, and I don't mind for a moment that I've been in Germany two days and have seen virtually nothing of Germany yet...I feel like I've snuck into the lives of those I've met here in this midst of their living normally, and I'm experiencing a kind of happiness and excitement that has nothing to do with big castles or old historic towns or hot wine. It's about people, always has been and always will be.

Still gonna see the castle, though.

Love and beautifulness,
Katie