June 11, 2014, by Sarah

Top tips for student holidays: German escapades part 2!

So this is my second post about my student holiday in Germany, and I have some important news…

 

Lol. Only joking!

However although I didn’t get engaged I did have lovely time so I’ve but together a few lists of the fun stuff we did – I hope you enjoy!

 

My top tips for student holidays:

1. Find somewhere cheap and fun- if you know someone you can stay with- winner!

2. Find friends who are also cheap and fun (lol)

3. Pack and remember passport, clothes, dignity, soul, sense of adventure and toiletries.

3. JUST GO

4. Why are you dithering?? Do something fun and GO ON HOLIDAY!!

 

I did, and I’m so glad 🙂

 

What we did:

 

1. Outdoor jazz gigs

 

2. Smelling roses in beautiful park near the Rhine.

 

3. Walking by the Rhine

 

 

4. Cologne cathedral

So beautifully gothic!!!!! My reaction was akin to this:

 

 

5. Chocolate museum

 

6. Shopping in Cologne and Bonn

 

7. Eating all things all the time everywhere- haribo factory, bakeries…

 

8. Modern art museum and Malevich exhibition

It was actually good though, but when something is described as “art and a philosophical concept” the cynic in me gets involved!

 

9. Germany history museum. Unfortunately most exhibits were in German.

 

Opinions of Germany

 

Things Germany does well:

1. Breakfast- mmmm bread and cheese and salami and cereal and juice OMNOM

 

 

2. Bread and pastries. Britain does have some beautiful examples of baking but our standard highstreet chain Greggs is pretty ‘meh’. The German equivalent, Kamps, is EPIC. We all tried as many pastries as possible: Eerdbeer plunder, rhubarb plunder, puddingbrezel, streudel, cinammon things, marzipan horseshoe. Amazing. Also rye bread is LUSH!

 

3. Coffee. Germans are mad for it, and mostly have fresh. Supermarkets hardly have any instant because quality matters- good work Germany.

 

4. Outdoor music. One night there were two free outdoor music concerts near us, TWO. And they were on the daily/weekly. Also when we were in Cologne there was the Eurovision young musician finale randomly happening in the square. I didn’t even know that was a thing.

 

5. Other languages- I am such an ignorant pleb compared to all the multilingual Europelads.

 

6. Recycling. Like a beast.

 

 

Room for improvement:

1. Margarines are not kept in the fridge in supermarkets. This weirds me out.

 

2. Drinks that aren’t beer. Germany is mad for it! So if you don’t like it this is a touch limiting.

3. Smoking. It’s very common, adverts everywhere and it’s often in your face. My lungs probably weren’t loving Germany.

 

4. Queueing. Brits have this as a skill.

 

5. Meals that don’t involve meat. I’m a carnivore and proud but I think vegetarianism in Germany would be tricky.

 

Post-Germany I have just been tidying up my life – hoovering, filing, organising etc. as exams make my standards slip :/ Also lots of admin!  My friend Pete also stayed for the weekend (yay) and we watched a lot of TV and films – awesome! I saw Pulp Fiction for the first time as well, it was….interesting. I’m now trying to do lots of fun things in my last few days in Nottingham – I plan sunny walks, churros, settlers of Catan and spending time with some lovely people 🙂

…Plus there’s the small matter of results.

Ick.

 

Until next week!

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