New Continent.

On this epic Journey across Spain and Portugal it only made sense to do yet another thing that many people cannot say they hace done. That thing is visiting Africa. We took the ferry from Tarifa, Spain to Tangier, Morocco. We signed up for a city tour but just as I suspected that any visit to Africa would be one for the books, I was of course right. Turns out that this tour of Tangier that we signed up for was more like a timeshare presentation, only property was not what they were selling. We started out with our tour bus rear ending a taxi cab downtown. That was pretty interesting. Then they took us to a restaurant where all of these Muslims were playing traditional music and the women were dancing in traditional dress as part of the atmosphere. We had traditional Moroccan food which was quite filling.
From there story takes off. We were completely bombarded by street salesmen selling all kinds of junk you didn´t even know existed. On the long walk there the tour guide took through some mundane sights to a rug presentation. Turns out these people are fantastic rug makers. We were all suspicious that this was a bogus tour and that it was in fact just a forced shopping excursion since we spent 20 minutes at the rug place, and then another 20 minutes at a spice presentation. As we were walking from sight to sight I couldnt help but be overwhelmed by the stetch of this place and how they had sewage running through the market place filled with people that had no teeth practically.
We finally complained and told them we were not here to shop and wantedt o actually SEE the city. To which they jumped up and said ¨OH OF COURSE, BUT I HAVE SOME YOU MIGHT WANT TO BUY.¨ IT was now clear that this was a complete shakedown and not a real tour of any kind. We were trapped in a poor and perhaps dangerous country being forced to shop for expensive junk that we didn´t want. You might think that this came as a surprise to me but it didn´t. I went on this tour for the soul purpose of visiting a completely different country, and that is exactly what I got. IT would have been nice to learn about the one city I saw but oh well. There are many impressions that are almost impossible to explain but once we finally got back on the boat I felt like I had caught a true glimps of life outside the western sphere of inluence in which I was brought up. All I can think is THANK GOD for it or whatever forces that maybe at play. I had been to third world countries before but this experience actually brought me outside my comfort zone, and that was exactly what I was looking for.

Southwestern Europe trip

At the beginning of April Jessie and I met her father Ken in Lisbon POrtugal to take a roadtrip through Spain to the edge of southern france. I am now in Valencia, Spain and I have to decided to update as I can now check off many must sees that I put on my bucket list so to speak. For starters I never thought that I would make it to PORTUGAL of all places. Seriously, what business could anyone ever have there? Well we met JEssie´s dad In Lisbon and saw much of the city. I was quite surprised at how no one speaks any english at all. Compare that to Germany where almost everyone understands it at least. I imagine that the kids who study abroad to either Spain or Portugal are really forced to learn the language because the never have english to fall back on like I do in Germany. Anyway, from there we went to the rock of Gibraltar which is basically this tiny piece of the United Kingdom in Spain. IT is at the mouth of the sea there and has been under british control since the 1700´s. Not only does it provide a spectacular view of Spain, the Atlantic, Africa, and the Meditarranean (spelling). Gibraltar is also Europe´s only host to wild monkey´s. APes to be exact. Though it is not recommended, it is quite easy for visitors to interact with these apes as well. It is quite sureal to pass by families of monkey´s just hanging out freely.
I climbed to the top of the rock with Ken via the extremely long staircase (shared by apes of course). The weather was fantastic, and a welcome relief to what we had experienced in Germany over the winter. From the rock of Gibraltar we drove to the southern most point of Spain and windsurfing capital called Tarifa.

End of the Semester

My first Semester in Tuebingen has now come to an end. I am quite happy actually with the way my grades turned out. I got a 1- in Massenmedien, a 2+ in Bildern Lernen, a slightly disappointing 3+ in Aufbaukurs, a 2+ in Panorama Deutschland, and a 2- in Nachkriegs Geschichte. Those are actually semi good/decent grades I suppose. NExt semester I will be quite loaded with classes. 

My first impression of the system so far are positive on the whole. However, there is actually a lack of structure here which rather present in the US system. First of all, normally in the US we have class more than once a week and there are very clear and defined class goals. In these classes we met once a week, and the professor or whomever talked for the duration of what what was only a semi informative class. This sort of forces you to do homework without directly being assigned it. I suppose that all student in all lands have to decide their own level of involement in school beyond simply showing up to class, but I found it to be rather difficult adjusting to the open ended nature of this new system. I realized that I sort of like mandatory assigned readings and homework due everytime. That could be just because I am used to it, but it really helps you know what to study for a test or whatever.

The only courses I have actually been completely disappointed by so far are the grammar courses. It may have been the teacher I had and her complete lack of charisma, but I swear I did not learn anything new that I could not have looked up on my own in 5 minutes online. And it is not as if the class was too easy, rather the difficultly was just right. The structure and teaching style sort of left me cold. Oh well at least every other class turned out well.

Zeitungszeugen

So here is a good example of something that would only happen in Europe.... Or Germany for that matter. There was recently this newspaper periodical that was released entitled "Zeitungszeugen" in which contains old reprints of communist and nazi newspaper reprints from the years spanning 1933-1945. WELL... as most people know published any nazu related propaganda or anthything with a swastika is typically illegal. However, these newspapers have contemporary poitical comentary in them to explain the contents or whatever, so in essence the newspapers are really nothing more than a gem for all buffs of history to collect. Unfortunately after the second world war the allies handed over the copyrights to all things nazi related including Hitler manifest "mein kampf" and therefore the Bavarian government owns the copyright to these old newspapers. I believe the newspapers are printed in Britain and therefore they are subuect to copyright infringement and therefore these are grounds to halt this re-publication of these historical newspapers. When I went to buy the third issue this morning, all there was to buy was the cover sleeve with words stamped on it in red which read "ZENZIERT... DIE FOLGENDEN ZEITUNGEN FINDEN SIE NICHT" meaning "CENSORED" "THE FOLLOWING NEWSPAPER AS ADVERTISED ON THE COVER IS NOT IN THE SLEEVE" essentially. I was shocked. As it turns out the Bavarian government was able to have all of the newspapers siezed and the subsequent issues censored. Very interesting I find. I was only able to get a hold of 1 issue which features the infamous Reichtag fires which ended up being the basis for the subsequent laws which allowed HItler to gain more power. I looked on ebay immediately to see if I could get a hold of the first issue, and that one in addition to the one I already had had more than tripled in price on ebay. A friend of mine bought several copies of the first one, I may try to convince him to sell me one haha.

First week of actual classes

Since my last post I have finally started classes and been to PAris France! Needless to say it has been quite a productive month. Paris was a very neat city with tons of history all around. The people there were all at least polite and unlike the Germans, when they say they know "a little english they mean a VERY LITTLE english. The prices in Paris were also ridiculously inflated. I swear if they lowered their prices to reasonable costs for anything from a simple 6 euro beer to a 10 euro hotdog, EU core inflation would probably be cut in half. It was well worth it though. Three nights in Paris at a fare and decent hostel cost me less than 300 euros since I brought much of my own food with me. We went up into the Eifel Tower (which by the way is a lot more amazig in person than in the photos) and spent the day in the louv're which was left something to be desired unfortunately. I went with three guys from the program here whom I didn't know very well so it was an interesting experience. I don't suspect I will ever go back though since it is pure agony everytime you have to pull out your wallet for anything, including fast food. I cannot believe how expensive paris was compared with all of the places I have been in my life.

Classes so far are uneventful since we are just getting into them. None of my classes run too late and none start to early. It is a decent schedule, I have Nachkriegsgeschichte in bildern, faschismus, panorama Deutschland, an intensive grammar course, and class about mass media. Then to put everything to practice I have a conversation course. I am still very much in love with where I am living. Although things are very different they are the same in the ways that keep me comfortable. Most of the changes and differences like the people, the language, and the fact that things are actually quiet on sundays are welcome changes. The german language has been slowly but surely more and more integrated into my daily speech. So far eveything has been exactly what I have signed up for and more.