The Grand Duchy

Two of these people are Grand Dukes of Luxembourg, one is James Bond- try to guess who's who!:

(http://www.banzaj.pl/pictures/kultura/film/Filmy/James_Bond/james_bond_6.jpg, "Henri of Luxembourg (2009)" by א (Aleph) - Own work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Henri_of_Luxembourg_(2009).jpg#/media/File:Henri_of_Luxembourg_(2009).jpg, http://pixshark.com/james-bond-pierce-brosnan-wallpaper.htm)

For Jochen's Dad's Christmas gift, a gift to see the city of Luxembourg City was gifted ( yes, my English is on point).  The Opa had never visited and was pretty excited to take some videos. Unfortunately it was very cold and rainy.

Luxembourg is an hour or so away and it was also my first time.  I was embarrassingly suprised to discover that the city is actually a giant 'castle' of sorts (LuxemBOURG Burg= Castle). Which brings up naming and language first.

As mentioned in a blog post about water and power from October, Luxembourg has a silly French/Germanesque language.  Luxembourg has existed for over a thousand years between the influence of it's original language, French, and German.  Here is just a recent history picture to give you an idea of the mix-up and fusion:

By Spanish_Inquisition (LuxembourgPartitionsMap_english.jpg) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC BY-SA 4.0-3.0-2.5-2.0-1.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0-3.0-2.5-2.0-1.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Luxembourg has remained its own country, I'm going to imagine, in some part due to the awesome ramifications of Luxembourg city and the mystical power of money often associated with royal dynasties.  But, I haven't watched a documentary on it, so this is speculation.

The entire city is on top of a plateau that seems to have been completely fortified.  Here is a sunny day picture of a part of it that remains:

"Bockfelsen Luxemburg" by Roland Struwe. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bockfelsen_Luxemburg.jpg#/media/File:Bockfelsen_Luxemburg.jpg

And if you look closely across the gorges that surround the city, you notice lots of cleverly integrated buildings and doors/holes for fighting.  Here is another picture from a camera with more than 1.2 MB.

"Luxemburg Felsenbatterie-Kasematte Rham 2012-04" by Zinneke - Own work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Luxemburg_Felsenbatterie-Kasematte_Rham_2012-04.jpg#/media/File:Luxemburg_Felsenbatterie-Kasematte_Rham_2012-04.jpg

We walked around and let the Opa satisfy his desire for 3 second video-clips of different sights.  It reminded me of an obsession a certain brother has...

Here is our short trip:

After searching for parking for an hour, we got to walking.  We started with the most famous landmark, the Gorge bridge:

 If you squint your eyes and pinch your nose it actually looks like this:

"Topography of Luxembourg IMG 0943" by Владимир Шеляпин - Own work. Licensed under CC0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Topography_of_Luxembourg_IMG_0943.JPG#/media/File:Topography_of_Luxembourg_IMG_0943.JPG

And looking the other direction:


The weather was somewhat gloomy, but it didn't slow down our videographer:

This is the whole blood-line of The Grinders:

We went inside the Notre Dame Cathedral but it was the middle of a service we didn't want to interrupt.

We walked to the Judicial center:

Photo-bombing and confusion about my rear-facing camera-use runs in the family:

 This is the other side of the plateau with respect to the Gorge Bridge picture.  The plateau is maybe a quarter-mile wide at this specific point.  The area between the two ramifications is the Füßgangerzone (walking, luxury import car lot, and absurdly expensive shopping zone- translation unofficial).

More pictures of this area:

 

Approaching Feet-path-zone:

 

We walked around and saw some of the shops and sights for about 30 minutes and then went home.  Here is one of the better red-colored cars I saw:

 I almost got videography brother a pen- but i was 4,000 euros short:

Although our trip was cold, wet, and short, it was really cool visiting and having a reason to read up on the Duchy.  We are now looking to rent a documentation on the city because we had a lot of unanswered questions, and reading is too hard.

Plagiarism

Okay not plagiarism because Erin said it was okay!  Erin has a blog and I thought one of her posts had a lot of nifty observations I myself wanted to share but couldn't express properly.  She broke the rule of lists by having more than 10 entries and no GIFs, which is why it is very nice.  Check out the original post/source here.

I added my emphasis with bold text formatting.

" What I refuse to leave in Germany.

After spending close to 8 months abroad, I have started to fall in love with certain aspects of the German lifestyle, now more than ever. My love for Germany was formed at a young and impressionable age from a trip filled with bavarian castles, first beers, pretzels, and beach bars in Berlin. Yet this year has really allowed me to tease apart what aspects of the culture I fell in love with and why I regard them so highly. Some of these things are not true everywhere, some of them are changing as we speak, yet I still consider them to be fairly German. These things I hope to incorporate into my life back home, as much as possible. Rather than simply remarking about how much I love them,  I decided to make blog post about them (at the suggestion of one my lovely fellow participants, Shelby). Also, to ensure that I don't forget them.

1.) Fresh air is EVERYTHING.*
2.) Plan ahead. There is no reason not to be prepared.
3.) Compartmentalize your life.*
4.) Sunday is for family.
5.) Good bread=happiness and health (Also, I need to become a baker).
6.) Ice cream monstrosities should be thoroughly enjoyed in the summer.
7.) Walking or biking (razor scooters are also acceptable) whenever possible.
8.) Public transportation should be utilized and encouraged.
9.) Real meals should be enjoyed everyday, filled with real food.
10.) Be direct.
11.) Advent is the best time of the year.
12.) Invest in good quality things.
13.) There is no reason you cannot drink a beer (time of day is irrelevant here)
14.) Work hard at work, simple as that.
15.) Coffee and cake should be consumed regularly and often, intermixed with good conversation.
16.) Children should be allowed to be children-give them space to discover (especially the outdoors).
17.) Growing up speaking multiple languages should be encouraged, if not expected.
18.) Everyone is entitled to an education.
19.) Not everyone is cut out for the traditional education path-this is okay.
20.) There is no reason to be prude about everything. It's just life.
21.) No news is good news.*
22.) The environment should be respected and valued.
23.) Real friendships are much more important than superficial ones and should be regarded as such.
24.) Everyday is a good day for a festival.
25.) Respect and value traditions, but be open to innovation and change.
26.) Being punctual is underrated.
27.) Every child deserves a sleeping bag stroller cocoon (?) and perhaps every adult as well.
28.) Males should be able to wear baby wraparound carriers without being looked at twice.
29.) Paternity leave should be a part of every culture.
30.) Gardens are an important part of cityscapes (as is gardening).
31.)Wearing pajamas in public is not acceptable.
32.) Coffee tastes better out of real cups.
33.) People aren't against you; they're for themselves.*
34.) Going outside with wet hair is extremely dangerous and may cause spontaneous combustion.
35.) Hiking is good for both the heart and soul.
36.) Real books should be read as much possible, and real planners should be kept.
37.) Never show up empty handed.
38.) Smalltalk is overrated.
39.) There is no shame in acting like a couple in public.
40.) Teenagers are just young adults, and should be handled as such.
41.) If you make plans, do not break them.
42.) Scarves can dress up or down any outfit.
43.) If it isn't raining, you should probably be outside.
44.) If it is raining, you should be outside wearing rain pants.
45.) ...?

1*: I have seriously been in classes that have paused because the air was too stale. Headaches are often attributed to bedrooms being too warm at night, and almost every one I know opens the windows first chance they get.
3*: As I have mentioned in many previous posts, German culture really embraces relaxing on the weekends and working hard at work. There seems to be less mixing of the two worlds, and consequently, less stress carrying over to family time.

21*: "No news is good news"or "Keine Nachrichten sind gute Nachrichten" is a saying I hear so often over hear. Apparently they don't immediately jump to the conclusion something bad has happened, but rather the opposite.

33*: At first I was somewhat insulted by the number of times I was being bumped into on the train with no acknowledgment, or by how close other bikers seemed to be coming to me. Yet slowly I have come to realize that everyone tends to mind their own business here (the best phrase I could think of to describe it). Rather than worrying the other biker is going to swerve, everyone is more concerned about their own biking. This seems to carry over into a lot of areas of life here. [...]"

Oops, halfway through that list I realized I was going to highlight and bold everything.  I tried to be extra-discriminate, but more or less there was quite a bit of truth in every one of those.

Can't read a paragraph? Read a list!

As much as I hate internet lists and the world's obsession with them, I'm posting a couple of lists, because these ones do a particularly good (and humorous) job at painting a small part of the German experience.

The picture is from this article, and the writing (which I didn't copy and paste) is insightful as well:
http://www.babbel.com/magazine/10-steps-to-germanize-yourself

List being said, expecting too much from any stereotype is going to be disappointing. I have yet to hear someone say "Sinking" instead of "Thinking" on accident.

Super Smart

The guys from the wind lab were super smart.  Super duper smart, to be exact.

One of the guys, Carson, can will any thought into a reality.  For fun he decided to build a 4-axis computer controlled milling machine.  He also decided that, to save money, it should build itself.  Danny and I stopped by to check it out one weekend.  This is all in his man-cave basement.

The first step was to build a basic two axis mill.  With this mill, he cut some of the parts he needed to make it 3 axis out of wood (3rd axis is up down z-axis). But, wood isn't vary stable, so he cuts a better design out of wood and replaces all of the parts he first cut by hand and with the basic machine.

Now, with a better more stable wood machine, he starts cutting parts out of metal, and replaces all of the wood parts until the entire design is stable.  Genius.

The reason he is having all of this fun in his basement is because he thinks he'll be able to cut the mold for the wind-turbine-wing with the machine when it is finished, fur less money than buying a machine or having another company do it.  Because I made the files for the mold, I helped explain some of my old work so he can manipulate it and use it in the future.  Here is a video of the computer program determining how to cut the shape:

In the video it shows the path the drill bit will chase in order to make the contour. Interesting enough, the current design involves a LOT of cutting and tool changes, which adds up to like 100 days of continuous cutting to make the entire wing. I suspect once Carson gets a hold of my solid models he'll have a breakthrough of sorts.

But back to this dude. He wills things, and then they happen- it is insane what he has built- he's truly an inspiration.

He built a pool for his daughters, he built a race car for him and his dad to work on, he built model airplanes to race, he modified and raced a rc motorcycle (even going to Las Vegas to compete in the world championships), he pretty much built his whole house, he's built 3 different 3D printers with unique functionalities- the list goes on!  He also gave me two big RC planes to fool around with while I'm here in Germany.  I look forward to fixing them up.

I liked the water closet (WC) he built in a closet in his house for guests.  A lot of small bathrooms are really crowded, but he picked great items and this bad boy was roomy:

What does it mean when you start thinking bathroom remodeling is cool?

Galicia Friends

Two other international students work with the same company for their internships. They are both from Galicia, the northwest region of Spain.  They make it sound like the best and most beautiful place on Earth- I think I'll add it to my bucket list.

We end up taking the bus together to work- which is a beautifully dark and quiet ride as we are usually not fully awake during the 30 minute ride.

I sometimes try to speak Spanish but I think my German kicked all of the spanish words out of my head.  I can occasionally manage a 'Deja me', 'que tal', 'Si" or a 'No' oder half spanish half german phrase.  Luckily they are both great at English and German.

One day Mr. Laborador recieved ingredients from back home and he cooked a family dish and invited me.  It was a huge chunk of Schwein with potatoes and Chorizo- really tasty.  We talked a lot about food and dishes that are served on different holidays- it mad me miss the food from back home.

When the weather gets better and they return from vacation I think we'll go for some hikes and bike rides.

Romaniaaaaaa

We went to an arena and played soccer on Saturday night at 9pm- 5 vs. 5.  It was a lot of fun, but maybe too much running for a holiday!

After soccer we went to go eat dinner before heading to a party.  I ordered "the spiciest thing on the menu" and paid the price.  I instantly got heart burn and needed a drink- David jumped in to the rescue.  He is "proficient" in Romanian... or so I thought.  He says- go order lapte over there it will help you out.

I go to the counter and point and do my best to order the milk.  She looks confused, but sells me the bottle with a funny look in her eye.  We agreed later that her and her coworker kind of laughed at me.
 That was because it was buttermilk and I immediately went for the strong chug.  I haven't had buttermilk in a while (maybe ever?) and the sour taste and its consistency really caught me off guard- my eyes and face must of lit up because the bros both laughed at my reaction.

Beer pong is international(ly boring).

And then lastly, I slept on the most comfortable and simply designed futon while I was there. I want to build it later.

Okay not last, there are more pictures.

The best part of Romania was the food.  We went to a couple italian restaurants that really rocked my world.  I never knew how good a piece of pizza could be, or how sweet brochette could be.  If I ever make pizza, I'm going to try and recreate the experience- I think the secret is in high-grade salami/sausage.

One of the restaurants, with sliced and painted wine barrel decorations:

The morning after:

Romania was great.  While we were there I binge read wikipedia history of Romania which I found interesting.  The Romanian revolution and end of their dictatorship started just a block from where we slept.  Reading about the revolution was eye opening- I hadn't a big impression of how insane the romanian cult of personality Ceausescu was until this trip. I'd recommend a quick reading refresher if it's been awhile.

Also, fun fact, TImasoara was the second city in the world and first in Europe to have and electric streetlights.

Romaniaaaa

We went for a walk around once. Synagogue:

This is the main drag here.   Tons of espresso cafes, a giant orthodox church, the opera house, a clock, pigeons without end, and people hanging out.

Inside the orthodox church.

Outside the orthodox church:

There is this river/waterway that is incredibly stagnant.  During the summer, however, it is apparently the happening place to be, with beer gardens along its length.  The coolest one had a ship involved and tons of bails of hay- too bad it wasn't open or summer!

 

Opera house at night via another camera: