So I decided to combine yesterday’s blog with today’s blog! Lazy much? I think so! But anyways, yesterday we took a two hour bus ride to Frankfort to go to the Deutscher Fussball-Bund. This place is basically the head quarters for all soccer in Germany whether it is young children or professional. In the building we got to see the world cup trophy for the Men’s German Soccer team and also other trophies both the Men’s and Women’s team have won. There was also a picture on the wall of the professional soccer player, who is now a coach, and we got a picture with at the last soccer training place we went to: pretty cool! I also snagged a paparazzi picture of the head coach for the National German Soccer Team. I was in the same building as him which was pretty cool as well. We were given a lecture by one of the employees there and had a question time.
After taking pictures in front of the big soccer ball outside the complex, we walked down the street to the Deutscher Olmpischer Sport Bund, or DOSB, which is the German Olympic Sports Center. Here we got to sit in the conference room where the actual big wigs of the German Olympic Committee sit discuss matters. In that room we got a lecture from one of the employees who focus on International relations in sports. All was pretty interesting and intriguing. We then got to eat lunch in their cafeteria, and to put it nicely that food was disgusting. It definitely upset my stomach and didn’t taste good at all. I AM SO READY FOR MOMMA COLE’S HOME COOKING!!!
Best part about Tuesday? After all of our festivities our bus driver gave us a little quick bus tour of Frankfort. As we are driving down what they call the “red light district” of Frankfort Viktoria proceeds to tell us how this is a pretty safe area for there to be so many bars and strip clubs. And just as she is saying that we are stopped at a red light, and we look out the window and low and behold this guy is shooting up heroin. He has his what we guessed was a girlfriend as a ‘watch dog’ for him and immediately she starts yelling at the guy that cops are coming and he rips the syringe out of his hand and blood goes everywhere. He starts sucking all of the blood up and the cops started questioning him and then we drove away. It was so crazy and of course we had to give Viktoria a hard time about it. We made it home and I had bagel bites for dinner thanks to Caitlin going to the store for me and getting them!
The drug addict guy with a bleeding hand- eek!
Today, Wednesday, started off with another bus ride! But this time we took it about an hour south of Bonn to a little town that is home to one of the biggest, oldest castle’s in Germany. This castle had long underground tunnels that were only 3 feet high and about 2 feet wide. They made us walk through them and it was definitely testing my claustrophobia but interesting to see how the soldiers that protected the castle. We also learned a funny fact about the Castle. The Duke of the castle has two red brick boulders that were outside underneath the window. You then rest the piece of board across the two red bricks and the wood had a circle in the middle. This is where the Duke went to the bathroom. The best part? He pooped outside and from 3 stories high and if it landed on one of the soldiers they were allowed to go up to the Duke and request double pay for that day! So you can double your pay by getting shit on! Incredible! The sky was foggy for most of the morning which called for crappy pictures by the time we left the fog was starting to lift!
Following the castle, we hiked down the hill to the Rhine River to take a boat cruise. But of course pit stop first: gelato. I think there may have been 1 or 2 days that I haven’t had gelato. It is so good everywhere here! The boat cruise was so wonderful and relaxing. I got some amazing pictures and had a great conversation with Molly, Caitlin, and Dr. Batista. In fact, this entire day was a very relaxing and calming day. The cruise ended in this adorable little town called Boppard. We had a chance to look around and I did some souvenir shopping! I walked through this really cute old man’s art shop and saw some amazing art. Mom- he had painted a picture of a clown and it reminded me of Grand Daddy Adams and I wanted to get it for you so bad but I didn’t know if I should or not! After we walked around town we headed towards the best part of today which was a chair lift up one of the mountains! (Even though it is more like a hill) This was scary but breathtaking. I have to say that after seeing what I saw today it is impossible to believe that there is not a God. The scenery, water, hills, and valleys could not have been made by anyone else but God. It was a breathtaking moment and definitely a reminder of how thankful I need to be during all of this. Which brings me to my next little point: I would like to make: thank you to anyone and everyone who made this trip possible for me. It has been a life changing experience in more ways than most people will ever know. I am so thankful to have an opportunity like this one at the age of 21 and I couldn’t be more thankful, so thank all of you!
I slept the whole bus ride back and after we got back we went and had wonderful pizza (yes salami again) at the Italian place we went to the other night! A lady who had a stroller, dog, and toddler sat across from us and was obviously frazzled when she walked in. Ends up the little girl ran off and the mom didn’t notice and then she basically starts panicking. All 12 of us that had gone to eat were literally searching the restaurant up and down and asking people and checking the bathroom, etc. Finally, Gentry had walked outside down the side walk and found her playing. Let’s just say even my adrenaline got going, so I couldn’t imagine how the mother felt. Needless to say today was a fabulous day and we are exactly two weeks away from coming home. The first couple weeks have FLOWN by!
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