Featured image: Me in front of the famous Berlin landmark, BrandenburgerTor. Fun fact: over the summer I could see the monument from my apartment. Berlin, much like myself, is a project under construction. I fell in love with the Großstadt Berlin during perhaps the most confusing time in my life to date. Let’s rewind a little. My choice to come to Berlin came alongside my Vassar acceptance letter. Like so many of my peers, I applied to Vassar because of…
“Berlin is a summer city!” they all say. “Nothing like Berlin in the summer!” Sure, I suppose when you’re resigned to 8 months of the year being gray and chilly, the warmth of the sun at last is a welcome repose. On the other hand, if you are a coddled American accustomed to air conditioning and screens on windows, the sudden heat wave and increasing number of insect visitors to your bedroom are not so welcome. I like a little…
Well, we had nice warm, sunny weather for a few days there. Otherwise, cloudy and cold as usual. Above is a perfect example of what you would likely never hear in a German conversation. There’s pretty much no such thing as small talk; why waste your breath talking about the weather when anyone can step outside and see for themselves? Besides, there are a lot more interesting things going on in the world. Namely, politics. It’s a particularly interesting and…
That long Vassar winter break is nice when all your friends at other schools are doing schoolwork and you’re still lounging in your pajamas, but imagine it dragging on to the end of January, then slogging through February, and spilling over into March…So naturally it was both exciting and relieving to finally be on a plane to Berlin. I love traveling, and am fortunate to be able to sleep on planes, but I always get antsy at the end of…
As I sit reflecting on my first month in Berlin, I can hardly fathom how fast the time has flown by. I know it’s cliché (what about having a travel blog isn’t cliché), but time really could not be moving faster right now. Living in a huge, bustling city like Berlin is such a dramatic and welcome change from life at Vassar, and I’m so grateful that I’m able to have this experience. I suppose I can begin at the…
It’s hard to believe that this semester is ending. As cliché as it sounds, it seems as though last week I had arrived in Germany, getting ready for orientation. And now, I have completed my finals and am packing to go home. It’s even harder to fathom that at one point I did not want to leave home. After meeting so many people and making so many memories, I’m glad that I decided to come. December sure has been…
As part of my European Healthcare and Welfare class, we took an excursion to Bremerhaven, a port city in Germany. We had the opportunity to meet with Dr. med. Gábor Keresztury, who is the chief physician of the vascular surgery clinic at Ameos Klinikum St. Joseph Bremerhaven. The topic of our class was the medical profession, so we met with this doctor to shed some light on how he became a doctor and his experiences in the European healthcare system….
This weekend, my European Healthcare and Welfare class, which is a seminar specifically for study abroad students, went on an excursion to Berlin. (Thanks Vassar for footing the bill!) There is a lot of American history in Berlin, from the separation of the city into four sectors and the subsequent Berlin Airlift to the fall of the Berlin Wall. The experience of visiting the city and the history it encompasses was definitely a weekend well-spent. A really nice touch to…
The great thing about studying abroad is the new places and people you meet. The bad thing about traveling abroad is that if you don’t know the language, you end up wandering aimlessly for a month trying to figure out basic language skills. For example, try saying “Welche sprachen sprechen Sie?” three times in a row. Despite initial language barriers, I feel somewhat integrated into the German lifestyle. The last month in Germany has exposed me to new experiences and…
After 18 hours of traveling (including layovers), I was glad to finally have reached my destination: Bremen, Germany. If you had told me that I would be in Europe a year ago, I would probably laugh. As a chemistry major on the pre-med track, going JYA is difficult if not impossible. So as I looked out my plane window and saw my first glimpse of the German landscape, it finally hit me that I was a on a completely different…