christmas.

so christmas at the bode was a rush of confusion and awesomeness. we lost four students and will gain two when we return. for various reasons, they left to go back home. we had copious christmas festivities. we visited the Stuttgart Christmas market, caroled in Fischbach, caroled in the friedrichshafen christmas market, had a banquet, had a K group christmas party and an open mic night. the k group christmas dinner was possibly the best part. we had raclette which is a cheese smelling like unclean bottoms melted in your own tray while you grill meat and veggies on the table grill. the end result is delicious. well. christmas festivities blew by quickly and i was off with my crew to dublin. we arrived in dublin problem free and had low expectations for our accommodation but we were overwhelmingly pleased to find our apartment nothing short of amazing. dublin was my favorite! i loved it. we went to christ church cathedral for church the next day. it's a cathedral from 1030 ad. it was awesome. they had this very holy and reverent sermon and i suspected the church was kept in this manner. wrong. we went to the crypt for a tea and coffee reception afterwards where we found a giftshop, a picture with santa station, and a cafe. along with a tour for about eight euros of the treasury. exorbitant. the sermon was by a kind woman who said we needed to focus not on the commercialism of christmas but on god. then we found the basement picture of santa for six euros booth. hmm.

but dublin was awesome. temple bar had the best restaurants and bars and cheasy shopping areas. the sights were well worth the hike it took to get there. i would not mind living in Dublin some day. anyway. dublin went by with few scrapes and we were off to paris. we had a flight delay that didn't actually place us behind schedule. on our final part of the trip, a train ride, someone killed themselves by jumping in front of out train so we were delayed again for 2 hours. an uncomfortable time to be certain.  paris went by in a flash of sights and whatnot. we went to disneyland paris for a cold christmas day. a very cold christmas day. my feet were soaked and icy accompanied by the wost headache i have had since i arrived in europe. paris degenerated form here and i failed to be charmed by the famed city. it was sprawling ugly dirty and snobby. but the louvre was well worth the visit. too big to cover in one day but still well worth it. after three of the guys left, me and the girls left for a hostel nine miles outside of paris. it was not too sketchy. but we walked around the next couple days and i finally left for england. (realize these are incredibly condensed versions of the actual accounts) my flights were fine but i had to run top speed through heathrow to make it to my second flight. i made it, but my bags did not. so i had to camp out in edinburgh until they got there. then for about nine more hours  until i coulod catch a bus to the train station to get a taxi where i crashed here to type this.


and here are christmas formal pictures. holiday pictures later.

http://picasaweb.google.com/bittermanwill/WinterFormalAndStuff?authkey=Gv1sRgCMTwrJK48eTyCw#

so...i guess i have to say something dont i.

well it is christmas time in germany....wow. already. american christmas time carries with it a level of stress. german christmas is...fun. there are christmas markets everywhere which are magical places where many remarkable treasures can be found at great prices. and by great i mean exorbitant. but still...the magic of christmas is in the air. and the bode is full of life...full of crazy busy christmastime fervor. we had caroling throughout fischbach in the pouring rain with our k groups. it was slightly miserable. there is a lot of snow here which is highly untypical for this area of germany. none of us are complaining about this. we then had a christmas concert at the friedrichshafen christmass market. it was cold. we have another concert planned for saturday plus a k group christmas dinner/white elephant. next week i have 2 big papers due and i need to get cracking on them. christmas plans were as follows. dublin, paris and rome. due to lack of proper funding, rome fell through and i am now going to be saying with Matt and Liam at matt's grandmothers in england. this is exciting. matt and liam are people you do not know. so i wont go into great detail. hmm. not much else to report. we are losing 4 students next semester and getting 3 new ones. sad and exciting at the same time. well it is almost lockup time so i need to go. sorry these postings are so ridiculous and choppy. bye. and sorry for the typos. bye.