Dachau Concentration Camp

Last night I slept pretty terribly. Beds smaller than a full and I just do not get along. I miss my queen at home. :-( But I woke up a lot of times in the night. I finally just gave up. We therefore got up sooner than planned. We left and took the metro u and s lines and got the marstenplatz or something like that where our tour was going to start. We got there early and decided to walk around. There were so many cool building like right together. We walked around and I got a pretzel and a breakfast pastry that looked like of like a cinnamon roll but wasn't cinnamon. I don't really know what it was but it was good. After that Cassandra found a bratwurst and I said to myself, I should probably get one since I am in Germany. So I had one of those too. It was a lot of food but I figured better to not get hungry on the tour!

 

We walked around a bit more before going back in front of the cathedral to a little column with a gold statue on top to meet our tour guide. There were a lot of people there but only because they have different tours meet there and do them in different languages.

Our group ended up being 10 people including us and our guides name was Tom. We then got one a bus to go to a train to go to another bus to get to the camp. On the way there our guide Tom told us some of the history about the camp. This was one of the few camps that was open for all 12 years. It was opened easy on just as a detainment camp which later on was used as a concentration camp. This camp was also next to the SS "School of Terror" where all elite SS came to learn how to be in the SS. We didn't visit that part of the camp but I can only imagine what it would be like considering it was nick named the school of terror.

When we got there the first thing we did was go to the visitor’s center which was outside the actual camp. There we talked inside about some more of the history. They had a cafe there so I got a coke and then felt sort of horrible to be sitting in a cafe with the camp so close by... It just seemed sort of... I don't know really how to describe it, just knowing so many people a couple hundred feet away starved to death 70 years ago. It was just kind of not a good feeling.

After that we started out. We went and talked about the front gate with the famous work will set you free phrase that you can also find at Auschwitz/Birkeneau. It was originally true because this camp was originally a work camp where you would be released if you did good work. But then after the second and third phase it was just a sick joke. The original barracks have been destroyed but there are two which have been rebuilt with consult from survivors. We went through the entrance of how getting into the camp worked. First you are met by the admin of the camp who tells you that only the devil laughs here and that he is the devil. Then random people are beaten and then you are taken into the maintenance building to be shaved, showered, numbered, and given a uniform. The uniform had pants pockets which you weren't allowed to use or else you were shot or beaten.

The maintenance building still stands and the paint has been taken back to what it would have been like. It was pretty horrible. The shower room they would also tie the prisoner’s wrists together and then hang them by their wrists with their whole body weight which was really painful and could cause permanent damage. In this camp you weren't tattooed with your number but rather given it on a piece of cloth. So I guess that was something that they came up with later. There were also some numbers given as to the prisoner count in the camp but we know those numbers now to be a very low guesstimate.

After that we watched a little documentary which was about 3 minutes long with footage of the camp right after liberation. It was pretty sad. Obviously. But it was hard to watch. We also saw a beating table where each SS had to everyday beat a prisoner 25 times. Most of them actually looked forward to this part of their day. But the terrible part was that the prisoner would have to count out each strike in German and if he wavered or slurred it would start back over at one. This wasn't as bad in the beginning days (as bad... Bad word choice as either way it’s horrible) but as the camp went on and they got polish and Czech prisoners who didn't speak German it just got worse. Prisoners would have to learn to count to 25 perfectly or else they would be pretty much beaten to death.

After that we went to the Bunker which was where political prisoners that they couldn't really kill were taken. This was one of the worst places in the camp though because even though you wouldn't be killed, you would be tortured. They had over 70 little rooms where the prisoners lived which each had toilets and a heater furnace. The switch for these heaters was on the outside of the cell. In the winter it would get to be like -20 degrees outside and because the building was made of just concrete the cells would get really cold. So whether you were well behaved or liked would determine whether your heater was turned on or not. They also would turn the on in the middle of summer when it was blistering hot. Pretty horrible. They also had some cells which were called standing cells where they divided the already closet size room into six and then made them shorter so that you had to hunch to stay standing. There wasn't enough room to sit or to stand straight and prisoners would be left in there for up to 72 hours. It sounds horrible. Also they cut most of the rooms in half so that you couldn't stand or sit, and most of the cells were black. Some had windows, which just let more cold in. The guards would run up and down the halls all the time and threaten the prisoners. Pretty scary stuff. There was a little portable alter which could be put in different rooms of the higher up political prisoners here so that was kind of nice. Mostly prisoners here were like Austrian Princes and more known people that the government just couldn't kill. It was pretty terrible.

Then we went outside and saw the two memorial statues that have been put up by the Maintenance building. One is a sort of warped human body sculpture which also looks like barbed wire. The other was a chain that was made with the different triangles and stars the prisoners wore. This sculpture still misses the green triangle, pink triangle for homosexuals, and the black triangle for asexuals or pretty much anyone who didn't fit in society’s box. This would include beggars, hermits, and gypsies. These are missing because in the 60's when it was put in, it was still illegal to be a homosexual so they are still missing. I think it is pretty sad that lessons weren't learned from the holocaust and that those are still not included.

After that we walked across the big space used for roll call which was probably a bit bigger than a football field, to get to the model bunkers. The first room showed what the beds were like in the first phase where each prisoner had a separate bunk with a shelf. The shelf was to be a constant reminder that they had nothing to put on their shelf. They also had mattresses made with straw which every morning had to be made in perfect rectangles with their blankets stretching down the line with perfect stripes that matched up from one bed to the next. This was pretty hard to do so there were special people that were in charge of doing it. If it wasn't perfect everyone would be punished. There were also wooden benches where the prisoners could sit before bed. Next was an example of beds from the second phase where there were no partitions between beds and also no sides on the beds. There were also no benches. Lastly was the room from the third phase on where there were just a top, bottom, and middle bunk with no breaks or anything. I don't think they had straw mattresses on the last two phases. It didn't look like they did anyways. There was also a bathroom where the toilets all faced each other and a really inadequate wash room with two fountains like sinks. It was pretty horrible. There were like 8 toilets for four rooms of prisoners. Each which had like over a two hundred people in them at minimum. It was pretty horrible. There was an example of a call for that bunker which showed that at minimum there was 800 something people and on that sheet the max was 2800 people. We know that number now to be a low number for the camp.

 The prisoners would get 3 rations of soup per day which was really just water with a few vegetables (if you were lucky) in addition to a small pieces of bread which would need to last you all day. There was a debate in the camp whether it was better to save it to last all day or to eat it all at once to feel full.

 After the barracks we went down the line of where the barracks were to get to the shrines. There were over 25 barracks. The outlines of the foundation are still here and now are marked with each barracks number. At the end of the line there are four shrines that have since liberation been put up. There is one for Catholics, Jewish, Protestant, and Russian Orthodox. The protestant one looks all wonky which was their way of saying screw you to the Nazis who made the camp with perfect angles and stuff like that. There are still the authentic guard towers and such though the fences have mostly been redone with the exception of one section which has stayed intact to show the area on the outsides of the camp. So first there was a grass section which if you were seen on you would be promptly shot and considered to be trying to escape. The SS would sometimes take a prisoners hat and throw it on the grass and tell them to go get it. If they did they were shot and if they didn't they were shot for refusing orders. Pretty messed up... But if you got through the grass you had to go down and back up a canal. After which were rocks and barbed wire, after which was the barbed wire fence, then a river stream, and then after that if they survived they found themselves in the SS School of Terror. Needless to say, no one ever escaped after the first phase. Only one person is known to have escaped but then he fought in the war and died so we don't know how he did it.

After that we crossed a bridge which did not exist at the time but has now been added, and went to see the crematoriums and gas chamber. These were definitely used but it is still unknown as to what extent. The first crematorium one had two opening to put in bodies. It is low ball estimated to have been used for 11,000 people. Low. I cannot even imagine. Later a second one was made which also included a gas chamber. It was so emotional to see and walk through. The "shower room" had 30 shower heads of which only one remains. The poison crystals were put in on the sides after the doors were locked. These would take anywhere between 3-30 minutes to take effect as they would react from the heat. It was pretty terrible. The room was very short and not very big. We know that the gas chamber was one of the later ones added as it has outward opening doors. Next to this room were two chambers where they would pile the corpses before burning them. The new crematorium had four oven openings and the smoke would be cycled underground and then out of the chimney. Behind this building which is surprisingly small for the terror it caused, are now memorials for the dead. There were many mass graves for the ashes from the crematoriums. It is impossible to tell they say by the remains of the ash how many people were victims to this but it is presumed to have been a lot.

This camp was one of the final ones to be liberated and is one of the longest standing. The people in the surrounding were well aware of the camps existence but operated under a don't ask, don't tell policy when it came to what actually happened within the camp. The Nazis even went so far in the early days as to publish photos of the prisoners on the cover of a Munich magazine. The public of Munich was well informed about the prisoners as they were not trained directly to the camp but rather to Munich where they were then paraded through the city while the public was encouraged to throw things, beat, insult, and attack the prisoners. They were shown to the public as " the criminals who wanted to see Germany burn to the ground". The atrocities at this camp cannot be duplicated and I present this blog to you in such detail so that you as well will remember what happened and will help ensure that this doesn't happen again in the future, though it is already happening in other countries right now. The holocaust was the cause of losing one third of the world’s Jewish population. Though I am not a Jew, I do believe it is wrong to prosecute those of other religions solely based on this fact. It is important for all of us to remember the events that led to this discrimination and watch for the beginning signs of this behavior in the life around us. This kind of hatred for other people didn't happen overnight but was based on a growing discrimination.

Pictured above is the Gas chamber. Then the tour was over and we got back on the bus to the train to get back to Munich. When we got there Cassandra and I decided to go walk around until we found something to do. Cassandra wanted a real German beer so we set of in a direction that our guide had been talking about. On the way there we found a stand selling chocolate covered fruits on a stick and candied apples. I have never had a candied apple but I wasn't really feeling like eating a ton of sugar so I went for a chocolate covered apple instead knowing that German chocolate is supposed to be really good. Yeah I know like chocolate was any less sugary... But whatever! Then we kept walking and it was already dark by now as it was about five thirty. We then stumbled upon not the beer hall that our guide had told us was the best but a second one which he said was almost as good. It is the only beer hall in Germany to have survived World War II. We decided to go for it.

We got seated at a table with two other couples which are how they do it in beer halls I guess. It was fine with us but the Asian couple next to us did not look happy about it. We decided to split a dish that had like four different kinds of meat in addition to both getting a beer and some soup. Oh man that soup. It was like goulash and potato soup which pretty much to me was beef stew. It was sooo good! The beer was alright I guess. We didn't really know which to get so we asked the waiter and he was like get this one it is the best and the most famous and it wasn't super expensive so we were like okay sure. I am not a big beer person. It smells bad and tastes bad and doesn't really appeal to me in any way but it was one of those I should do it because I can say I did. I didn't finish it though which I was fine with but I guess it was probably the best beer I have had out of the handful I have had. The meat platter wasn't very good to me. I am not a big meat eater unless it is chicken breast or steak or like hamburger. Meet on the bones kind of freaks me out, not because I don't know that meat is from an animal but I just don't really like to deal with bones and they kind of make me lose my appetite. I did try all of them though. There were two porks, chicken, and duck. I really didn't like the duck. It had a gross aftertaste. But I wasn't feeling too hungry.

Our waiter was kind of funny and when the couple sitting next to us left he tried to get us to talk to the two Korean boys who took their place. We were like not having it though. I did talk to them a bit though because they wanted to know what the thing was that we had. Then we had the waiter bring us our check and left. From there we continued to wander and poke in stores.

We found one with cool Christmas stuff, which I may have bought a few things at. Mostly I was looking for a nice coat to buy because everything in Munich was so cheap. I did find one I liked but they didn't have it in the size I wanted. We probably went to like 8 or 9 different stores. Some of them were scary and coats were like 500 Euros or more. But the one that I liked was only 59! That is pretty cheap for a coat like that. But they only had it bigger and smaller than my size :-( so that was pretty sad. But I guess it wasn’t meant to be. We walked around shopping for a pretty long time. All the stores closed around 8 though so once they did we gave up and decided to go back to the hotel. We stopped at a convenience store and decided to get some snacks though. I got some cherry gummies and a fanta. I also found plain m&m’s! What! They are so hard to find but I found them! The way back to the hotel was really simple because for once the line we were taking was actually going all the way to the end of its route. Every time until now we have been kicked off a few stops before and had to transfer even though the line was supposed to go farther on.

 

When we got back to the hotel we were happy to be able to rest our feet and relax but we were also sad that we weren’t going to have any more time to explore Munich. I really liked Germany and would love to go back. The atmosphere was just very relaxing and much calmer than Aix. For a big city it doesn’t seem bent on rushing around or being too loud. It was relatively quiet and didn’t give me the uneasy/antsy feeling that I usually get in big cities. I really liked all the pretzels too. They were all really good! Overall, it just seems like a pretty nice place. I wouldn’t really want to live there but it was nice to see and experience and I wouldn’t mind in the slightest going back. I wish I had been able to see some of the castle and things around and to get a better sense of direction in the city.

We ate our snacks and watched TV in English which was the late show with Jimmy Fallen who I don’t really know because I regularly don’t watch that show, but it was nice to hear some English. I then took a shower which went fabulously until the shower like freaked out and sent like burning hot water at me. It hurt so badly and I was quick at turning it off but my head hurt for the next five minutes because it had been so hot. I was done with that shower after that. Then I relaxed in bed and attempted to write my journal but I was really tired so I decided to wait and finish it tomorrow. (Which is today, or really very early this morning for you!)

Welcome to Germany!

So this morning I woke up at 9:15 and had breakfast and tidied up my room. Then I headed out in the direction of the school with a pit stop at the spa to reserve our things for the spa day when Cassidy is here. It was relatively easy with the exception of needing to remember my cell number. I finally gave up and couldn't just check the phone because I didn't bring it knowing that it wouldn't work in Germany. We are all booked and ready! Then I made my way over to the school and waited downstairs for Cassandra to come down from her class. I was feeling pretty hot because I was wearing multiple layers as I figured that Germany was going to be cold. I decided to get a water from the machine and when I went over to it there was already a euro credit on it! So i got a free water! Woohoo!

Pretty soon Cassandra came down and we decided to leave to go to the bus stop. I jokingly asked got your passport and she was like ... Oh crap! And i was like you are kidding right? And she was like no! Oh crap! So we were like well because we are in the EU do we REALLY need it? We asked the librarian on the way out the door and she said yes mostly for getting back in not going out. So we were like crap. We made our way to the rotonde towards the bus stop she knew was by her house. We decided we would never make it there and back in time to get to tyne bus stop to get to the airport in time. So we decided to get a cab. I was like okay do you know your address? And she was like uhhhh no. Ugh.

 

So we got in the car and she told me directions to her house and i told them to the driver. We got there fine and then there was some confusion on us just stopping there and then going to another ace but we got it worked out while Cassandra ran up and grabbed her passport. Then we started off towards the Bus station. We got there right after the airport bus left so we bad to wait 30 minutes for the next one. Gah the waiting was the worst! It sucks when there is nothing you can do but wait when you are in a hurry. Also needless to say "hey remember when you forgot your passport" became the running joke.

Then the bus got there and we got on for the price of 2 euros rather than 7 because we had bus cards! That was cool. We got to the airport at 12:05 and booked it to the hall of our flight. The security line was like two people long so we went through really quickly. The airport here was like super quiet and calm. It was really a kind of strange ambiance for an airport. But I kind of liked it.

We bought a can of pringles and some callissons in the airport because i had never tried them. My opinion was that they looked pretty more than they tasted good. If that makes sense. Then we got on our flight! It was kind of a smaller plane just because it was a short trip. On the plane they gave us a sandwich which was pretty good (haha sand-wich which!). They also did a beverage service and then the flight attendant got to me she stafted talking to me in German and after she was done in English i was like "do you have coke?" She smiled and was like yes diet or regular? It was kind of funny. I do look German though I am now aware so I guess I understand why I'm easily mistaken as someone who could speak it. The ride went pretty smoothly. Cassandra and I went through the flight magazines and critiqued the prices in them. Then we made all the airplane jokes from Bridesmaids (well I did) and she would laugh. Then they came on announcing our flight was selected to do customer surveys. They came around passing them out and I was like yeah sure why not. They give you a box of free gummy ladybugs! It was cool. Then pretty quickly we descended into Germany!

 

The view of Germany from the plane was pretty awesome. Lots of green grassy fields of farms and quaint little houses. It was very quiet looking. When we got to the airport we found the exit to that auto bahns (metros) and then found our way to the hotel (after getting Starbucks). We were following the directions the hotel gave us to get to the hotel but it actually took us all the way around the city and through it rather than just going down from the airport. It was kind of silly but i guess now we know! When we got off the ubahn we tried to find our way to the hotel. However it was already dark and we didn't gave a map so we used a bus stations map. We were attempting to figure it out when a younger woman was like do you guys need help? And we were like YES! She told us how to get there by going back through the station and then we went through and at the other side we were like crap kay we are lost again. Not 30 seconds later she came following us and was like I will shoe you, i missed my bus anyways! She was really nice and didn't laugh too hard when i butchered the street name we were looking for. She got us there and we said thanks before going to check in.

The hotel is nice with two twins and a bathroom with a great shower. It reminds us of a dorm room. We were starving so we left to go find some food. We walked down and found a grocery store where everything was super cheap! We bought lots of food for 10 euros. Including a 29 cent pretzel! We were happy and I found a cool little thermal jacket with finger holes in the sleeve that was only 10 euros that i liked. We came back later after finding an atm and I bought it. On our way back to the hotel we bought two Kebabs sandwiches from a place and then came back to the hotel to eat them. They were SO spicy though we had to give up. We decided to go find an atm with directions from reception and then ended up going to the restaurant connected with our hotel. It was really good once we got English menus. We were going to blindly shoot for something when the waitress came back but she could tell and was like you want some english menus and we were like Yes please! I got a baileys hot chocolate which was really delicious and also a steak lumberjack style with roast potatoes. It was really good and together with the drink was just over ten euros. What a deal! Germany is cheap!

Then we made a run to the store to get the jacket and returned home. We both took showers (aaaaaaaamazing!) and then watched some German who wants to be a millionaire before giving up on picking the hardest word to pronounce game and turned it off. The running joke now has been how badly we can butcher German names and words. I am really good at it. Good = bad. Hey at least I look the part! We have been having a good time and have been getting along really well. I am excited for our day tomorrow when we can explore a little more. So far Germany seems very relaxing and chill. I am okay with that. It reminds me a bit of home. Also the pretzel smells aren't bad either :-)

That Time I almost ate one of the Do Not Eat Things

Madame and I have been getting along very well together lately. I like it. That will make it hard to leave. She is really a nice lady and funny too!

I woke up early today and took a shower. Then I had breakfast and noticed that Madam had bought a different kind of apple sauce. It was NOT good. I said blech. So then I was glad no one was home so I didn’t have to eat it… Merry Christmas sink! I don’t know what it was about it but it just tasted really strange. Not like apples. Yeah so then other than that it was an uneventful breakfast. Then I dried my hair and went to school. It was nice because now that I have small headphones I can listen to music in one ear on the way to class. When I got there Cassandra was already there so we started talking. Not long after LaSia and Gina came in. We talked about Cassidy coming a bit and they facebook stalked her. I am excited for her to come. Three more weeks! I am also excited for Munich! Woo hoo! That should be lots of fun.

I ate a piece of candy from my bag and was like what is this hard thing so I like took it out and it was one of those little balls from the bags that are at the bottom of bags and things when you first buy them that say DO NOT EAT. I guess my backpack had one and it broke open and got in my candy and the bottom of my bag. Good thing I checked. I almost died!!! I was like well now how do I get all these things out? Being on the 3^rd story naturally I didn’t want to go downstairs to tip it over and I couldn’t risk it in the house in case Beebow found one and ate it so I ultimately decided to use the bathtub and then wash the down the drain. In retrospect that could be potentially bad for like the pipes or something or the water system? Maybe? I don’t really know what they are made of but hopefully nothing bad happens! 

Class started late as always so at 12:05 I went downstairs and got a cherry coke out of the vending machine. It was delicious. One thing I don’t think that I have mentioned before is that cans here have a reinforced bottom so they feel weighted. They sort of trick you because you think there is more liquid in it than there really is so you are always a bit disappointed to discover there isn’t. But that is okay. Class got going and we talked about Great Britain and their isolation in the 1840-1900’s. It was kind of interesting but not exactly the most exciting thing. 

After that I went downstairs and made a microwavable rice bag that was off brand and really not very good. But I ate some of it. So looking back I didn’t really have a very good lunch. But oh well. I went to my Lit class which was really not very fun to sit through. It was too much of my professor saying false things about the Christian belief and me having to sit through it because I don’t know enough evidence to like refute his falseness. So that was annoying. 

After class I went to the other building and checked in for our flight to Germany and printed our tickets. Then since I had nothing else really to do I went home. On the way there I ran into Julia and her mom so I said hi and then when I looked up the street Madame was coming down the road! So I waited and walked home with her. Then we came upstairs and I tried to put photos on a cd for her but there wasn’t enough space. So then I stopped. She went down to look after Paul after cleaning up a little bit and then I attempted to start writing a paper but then decided to watch the movie instead. It wasn’t exactly what I was looking for but it was still good. Then I did some research for my paper before learning it is pretty much the same paper as I just wrote for the test in that class so then I said I don’t want to do this right now and started reading Brothers K instead because I’m getting close to being caught by the class. Then mom started IMing me making it kind of impossible to read. So then Madame came up and made dinner of sausage and sauerkraut and potatoes. I said to myself: “Oh I must be in Germany now!” But no that is tomorrow.

We had waffles for dessert tonight but they were more like a sort of sweet bread in the form of a waffle but a lot denser than a waffle. It really wasn’t a waffle but just the same shape. We had them from a box with nutella. We talked about Germany and my plans again. We had mustard with the meal and we finished off a jar but she had another one and she made a point of showing me that she buys soft mustard not like strong mustard because then it is too strong tasting for her. The second jar ended up somehow being way spicier than the first! I was like eyes watering and she was like oh this one is way stronger than the last one even though they are the same! It was funny.

After that she showed me her collection of egg platters. They are like the plates that you use to put hard boiled eggs on display. She showed me all of them just kind of randomly because she bought a new one. She has about 16 of them! They are kind of cool and she told me she collects them now just because she thinks they are cool. 

Then we sat down and Madame came in and hit her leg on the coffee table and scared the hell out of Beebow. She laughed and said she was fine when I asked. I also then asked her if she knew about pickle ornaments on a Christmas tree and she had no idea so I had to explain it to her. So I learned that would make a good present for the family because they don’t have them already! Plus they should be easier to find in Germany than in the states. 

After that we watched some show that neither of us was really watching because she was sleeping and I was working on more research for my paper. Then Thad got home and I decided to turn in for the night so she told me to have fun in Germany and that she would see me on Sunday. I said goodnight and then went and Skyped Thad for an hour or so before going to sleep. Goodnight! Germany here I come!

 

Also I found I have 3 small goose bump sized bumps on the back of my hand that 2 are close together and one farther away that aren’t itchy, red, scaly, or annoying in any way. If anyone has ideas what they are let me know!

The Cookie

If you had been with me here today you really wouldn’t have missed much! Or shall I say you already didn’t miss much today! I woke up and got dressed and had breakfast. Today I had apple juice instead of the regular orange because we were out. Oooh darn… :-) So then I got dressed and went to school. I dropped off my laptop in my locker and went to sit in front of the Cathedral. We had class there today because half the class was in Geneva for a class trip this weekend/ until today so we couldn’t have the test as scheduled so it was put off until Monday. We just talked about the front of the church which was kind of fun but also kind of like okay this is a filler day.

So we talked about that but couldn’t go inside today because there was a funeral so we went back to class and took some more notes. After class I went and bought some mandarins and a soda. Then I went back to the cave and did my translation homework followed by a bit of work on study guides for the history test on Monday because I know I won’t want to do anything in Germany. Then LaSia and Sally decided to go get lunch so I decided to join them. We went to a place I had never been where LaSia was like I need to get one of these delicious cookies. And I was like is it hard or soft? And she was like soft and it is the best and I was like okay sold. So I walked down to the pasta place because this place only had fancy noodles and I wanted boring ones. We met back up at the cave and I had a bite of the cookie. Oh man. That cookie. Best decision I have made in weeks. That was a dang delicious cookie. I had also been craving a soft cookie because they are all hard and crumbly here. It was a bit expensive but man it was so worth it!!! I think I found a new favorite.

I didn’t eat it all though. I ate a bite and then used it for the next four and a half hours where I did my study guides. Yep. Four and a half hours I worked almost nonstop trying to do the study guides. And I did finish them. Well. Except one… But it is a composition of note that I have already done so it should be easy. Then LaSia and I went on a wild goose chase to find a song that I had stuck in my head from watching music videos that morning. But the problem was that I only knew the last part of the songs words which were la la la la. Soooo you can’t really Google that and find it… So we looked at a bunch of top 40’s. But we still didn’t find it. It was really annoying because I listen to songs I have stuck in my head to get rid of them and then I couldn’t because I didn’t know the words because I like it from the music part not the words. So dang… We wasted probably 45 minutes doing that. And we still didn’t find it so now I have to watch like the music videos all the time to find it. Oops. I printed the study guides and then went on to my translation class. So I was pretty tired of working.

In translation we corrected out homework which was hard. I did alright on the not verb parts though… Yeah I need to talk to her still. Also I was talking to another girl in the class and she was telling me that she thinks that she isn’t really getting better at translating she is just doing it a lot more. I kind of agreed. I feel like I am learning a lot of good phrases and stuff but my skills at translating don’t really seem to be improving… :-/ I don’t know. I think the approach with this class is like do it more and you will get better practiced at doing it. Which in principle would work but I don’t think I am that kind of learner? Or I just haven’t seen any improvements. Class was pretty uneventful though.

After that I came home and started watching Spencer's videos. I got half way through the second of the two before Mom got on Skype and I talked to her about the house, and thanksgiving, and her retirement. She can retire this year in January so they are trying to figure out what the best option is. They are also cleaning out and painting parts of the house to get ready to maybe move in the summer. (Yeah I’ll believe it when I see it.) I have no doubt that they want to but I doubt it will actually happen this coming year. But I guess I will see if they prove me wrong. She also talked to me about a big cat rescue in Sherwood which has like Tigers and Cougars and Lynx’s and stuff. How weird! I had no idea! I guess a trainer got killed there recently which kind of sucks. Hopefully they don’t put the animal down that would kind of suck. But I bet that will be the case. Sad though. But the rescue sanctuary looks really cool. You can find it here: http://www.wildcathaven.org/ It looks pretty cool and the animals are cool too.
 

After Madame came home and after I hung up with mom she was concerned that I was talking to mom because something had happened or because I had a problem. I told her not at all but she didn’t really seem to believe me so I told her about my parents thinking of moving and Mom looking at retiring. Then she seemed to believe me. After that we had dinner of pasta and chicken. Lots of Pasta today (oops.). Now I will be happy to not eat pasta for a while! Then I showed Madame the website and she really liked it and asked me to show it to Paul tomorrow. I also put her pictures on a jump drive that she bought. There are some cute pictures of Paul when he was a baby.
 

Then I Skyped Thad for a few minutes before he had to run off for lunch. After that we watched another big event where famous singers come and sing songs and do big production numbers one after the other in order to earn money to give to feeding the hungry. So we watched that and to my great excitement they sang my favorite song! It really is my favorite. Coeur du Pirate "Comme des Enfants"

 

Now I am going to celebrate my day of history by watching a movie on the Dachau camp so that I have a bit of reference or knowledge before going. I guess that isn’t really a reward but it should be interesting. Goodnight! Except now I just looked at the clock and it is 11:30.... oops. I guess no movie tonight.

Hair Tie Thief

Today was a pretty lax day. I woke up at 10 and took a shower. Then I had breakfast and talked at Beeboo. This morning I had a peanut butter roll instead of nutella. It was really good. Then I went to school where I printed off our Germany stuff minus our ticket because it wouldn’t let me check in before 24 hours before the flight. Then I went downstairs and ran into the girls. We went in and there were a total of 5 tables out of the usual 13. So we went and found them all and put them all out. It astounds me though that the school doesn’t think to like you know put the tables back after they hide take them out for something. Like HELLO how do you not think that a classroom will need desks…?

I was thirsty so I decided to go try the vending machine that never work. When I went downstairs I said okay now it is time to get mad at the machine for not working again. I put the money in and it WORKED! I was like holy crap and the like twenty people down there were like holy crap! And then everyone jumped up to use it. The thing is always taking people’s money and not working so it was like WHAT! Everyone sort of freaked out. 

So then I was really hyper before class because I like to see my friends, especially after a weekend without seeing them. We chatted about the weekend and such. Cassandra was in Amsterdam, and I was in Orange, and everyone else stayed here. It was typical morning conversations. We all had thought about skipping but we knew we were going to get our midterms back so we didn’t. Class started late as usual and we got our tests back and then he like explained the main points that pretty much everyone missed. I got an A on mine surprisingly enough. I was very happy about it. It makes me a bit less concerned for this class. So that is good. Class was otherwise boring.

Then after class we went and found lunch and then went to Lit. I had to talk/give a little presentation today but it was pretty informal and I told him I found it confusing so he helped me along. I don’t even think it was graded… But it was kind of uncomfortable. But then eventually we finished that class. I went downstairs then and read some of the book. It was boring so then after 5 I went and got my package! It had candy, my winter hat and ear headband, and also my contacts! Which I thought that because there was only the box for my right eye that mom ad forgot to send the left. But it turns out she put in 3 and 3 instead of the normal 6 for one eye. She is so smart but I did send her a text like you are so silly you only sent them for one eye! It was kinda like an oooooooooh moment. I am very happy to have my hat in time for Germany though because it is supposed to be really cold there. That will be good. 

I came home and then read for a long time and wrote my school blog and such. Then I facebooked a little before Madame came up to make dinner. She was funy and was like turn on another light can you see? And I was like yeah I can see fine, and she was like well turn on another light anyways that book is already hard enough to read. Lols! I thought that was really funny because it is true… Then she asked if grilled cheese with ham was good and I said sure. Paul came up and played on my iPod while we ate dinner. Two sandwiches each again but luckily I had a small lunch! It was good. Madame made Paul eat a banana for dessert before he could have a spoon of nutella. When she went and got it she was like I am always buying bananas because Kacy loves bananas, and I was like who me!? Nooo I never eat bananas. And she was like Yeah you love bananas I can tell because I always come in two days after i buy Bananas and they are all eaten! But she was smiley about it so I think it was good. It was fun.

During dinner Beebow hopped up on the sofa to mess with my stuff and found a hair tie and stole it and started playing with it. He kept getting it lost under the sofa and Madame kept using a ruler to get it out. Then one time she did it and three hair ties came out! I laughed and she was like are these yours? And I was like yep and then we laughed that he was such a thief. 

Then Paul left and we turned on the tv to the movie Shoah. Which is a movie about the holocaust which is fitting because I’m going to the Dachau concentration camp this weekend. For the first two and a half hours is survivors talking and Madame says for the second they show the places and such, or it is a film or I’m not completely sure I have never seen it. But it goes until 5 am so we aren’t going to watch it all. But it is definitely impressionable. That’s what we did all night. Also I backed up my computer which took forever.

Palais Garnier (WOU blog post)

So while I was in Paris for my fall break I literally went to one of the most beautiful places in the world. I went to the Paris Opera house which is formally called the Palais Garnier. It was built in 1861 to 1875. I was able to take a tour through it thanks to this cool pass I bought for my trip called the Paris Pass which was a really good investment because it allowed me to skip the lines of monuments and get into a bunch of museums and monuments for free. It ended up being worth the heavy charge at the beginning because it made the whole trip in Paris really easy and less stressful because we had so any options open to us.

We took our tour in English with a tour guide lady who was actually dutch. I really liked her and she made the tour really fun and gave us some cool facts that I would not have known from just walking around the building by myself. She also pointed out some hidden elements that I wouldn’t have seen on my own.

We first got there and entered into a big room with a really cool looking and ornate ceiling. It was a little dark but very nice. Our tour guide told us that we had entered through the doors of the entrance reserved for the King of France and that we were now by the entrance where the rich nobles entered. She told us that when people got to the opera house they didn’t look at each other until they had formally entered a few rooms ahead. This was in order to make sure you had time to check yourself and be sure you looked perfect before being seen by everyone. The idea was that if you didn’t look at anyone and they didn’t look at you, that no one would see each other before they all looked perfect. She told us that this was the thirteenth opera house that was built and that we couldn’t visit any of the other ones because they had all burned down because they were made of wood. They would typically take 5 years to make and then because they were made of wood and used candles for lighting up the rooms at night, they would burn down within 1-2 years. That made me laugh but it totally made sense. 

It was actually a competition to determine who would be the architect for this Paris Opera house and over 200 people submitted designs and models for Napoleon the third. It was Napoleons wife who got to choose our guide told us and when she saw the design by Charles Garnier she thought it was the most hideous building ever because he didn’t use a known style. So she made him come see her and she was like, “what the heck is this syle?” And he was like, “oh it’s a new style called Napoleon Trois” So then she had to pick it because it was named after her husband. 

It was really funny though because the architect thought that he was going to be forgotten so he actually hid a bunch of his own elements in the architecture of the building. For example on one of the ceilings he has his name spelled out and in the Grand Foyer, there are 8 busts of his head as lamps which when people saw them criticized him but he told them that they were just the busts of  Apollo. He told everyone it was a compliment that he looked like the busts of Apollo. The entire theater actually has the theme of Apollo and a Lyre throughout the building. 

He wasn’t far off though in thinking that he would be forgotten because there was a transfer of power while the Opera house was being built and all work on the building came to a halt during the Franco-Prussian War due to the siege of Paris. The new government of the Third Republic maintained an intense dislike of all things associated with the Second Empire, and many of them wanted to replace Garnier as the architect for the building. Economies were demanded, and Garnier was forced to suppress the completion of sections of the building. But then because the other theater in Paris was destroyed by a fire overnight there was a resurgence of support to finish the building. The theatre was formally inaugurated on 5 January 1875 with a lavish gala performance, which Garnier wasn’t invited to at first. Then upon hearing this the public was outraged and support for the political leader Adolphe Thiers who was in charge fell so in order to gain it back he sent a letter of invitation to join provided that Garnier could pay for his seat which they made sure was ridiculously expensive. So Garnier didn’t actually get to go to his own designs debut. I thought that was pretty sad. He did go later once things calmed down but he wasn’t able to go and see everyone’s reactions to it for the first time. 

While we were there a principal performer for the current production was there so when we went in to see the inside of the Opera theater she was practicing ballet onstage. Now this building is used mostly for ballet and there is another building in Paris where Opera and Plays are done. Our guide told us that there is no seat number 13 in the theater because once a lamp fell on the woman sitting in that seat and she died. Over time though the story has changed to a man and he still haunts the theater as the Phantom of the Opera. Yep! This is the real Opera house of the Phantom! Our guide also told us that it is true that there is a lake below the Opera house and that it is still accessible but that you have to have lots of clearance and such. But that the water was kind of a hassle during the construction of the building but they wanted to have it close in case of fires.

It was by far the most beautiful building that I have ever been in and it was really cool to see in person. I was glad that my friend and I on a whim decided to go there because it will probably stay one of my favorite places in Paris because of my love for theatre.