Wednesday June 23, 2010

Today I traveled to the Burg Berwartstein with my exchange group. Today's weather is verz beautiful; clear blue skies and it is hot, but there is not as much humidity here as at home in Vermont. We left Neustadt later than planned in a blue Mercedes bus, known especially for giving tours, which drove us south 1,5 hours on the Auto-Bahn, through wine country and beautiful European towns. We drove up a side of a mountain, where we were dropped off to hike. The trails were what we would consider in America as being access roads or carriage roads, but occasionallz we walked on singletrack, which made me sad because it reminded me of home and my bike. After hiking through towns and on dirt roads for two hours, we stopped at the top of a decent sized hill at a pleasant restaurant. I ordered a nice salad (with cabbage and cucumbers) and a yummy plate of vegetable pasta in red sauce. My other friends ordered Bratwurst with slaw, special cheese pastas and German soda pop. It was all verz delicious and very filling. We arrived starving, and left so full that many of our hosts joked that they must "role down the hill" in order to get back to the bus!

After arriving back at our blue Mercedes bus, we drove for nearly 20 minutes and arrived at the Burg Berwartstein castle. We were given a tour of the castle in German, which I found very exciting since some of it I could easily understand. Other times, even if I only understood maybe a couple of words, I was still able to understand the concepts of the sentence. The castle had many intersting rooms and certaintly had lots of history. There were torture rooms, a wild game room with preserved animals, bedrooms, a kitchen, and a very deep well. Although it has since dried up, our tour guide showed us how deep it was by emptying a bottle of water and waiting for it to hit the bottom. It took about 14 seconds to hit the bottom! We stood atop the highest balconz (which was reallz like a small courtyard!) and were told that at one point it had been struck bz lightening. Unfortunetely, there was also a young woman in her room when this happened, and when she saw that she would not survive, she jumped off the balcony and fel very far down to her death. Our tour guide told us that people believe that her spirit still exists within that section of the caslt, especially in the secret stone passage leading to the prisoners room (which was very dark) bellow the balcony. The tour guide joked that she also liked boys, so they must stick together while we walked through the tunnel. Although the tunnel was not very long, it was very dark, wet and claustrophobic for some! The tour guide lit candles for us, but we were all very terrified. Nobody wanted to be the last person walking through the tunnel bbecause they had to blow out the candles, but Mr.Lavigne stood up to the challenge easily because he was more excited than scared for his life. It was spooky!!
 

As if the daz couuld not stretch any longer, the same night was a World Cup game involving Germany and Ghana. Christiana and I went to the Marketplatz to view the game with her friends. The streets were no longer filled with easy-going people casually dining or shopping, rather, there were many rambunctious fans sporting German flags, team jerseys and other team memorabilia. Many cars here also have German flags on either side of the passenger dooors and some have side-mirror covers that mimic the colors of the flag. Apparentlz, everyz summer thezy bring in sand and have  beach chairs at this site, but I found it silly to be seeing sand in such a beautiful place! Maybe they find it will make Neustadt more interesting, but I think that Neustadt is beautiful without such things.

In the prior World Cup game that Germany plazed they did not win, so many of the Germans were hoping that tonight would break that spell and they woud beat Ghana. I suppose that fußball here could be compared to Nascar in America. People of all ages are very passionate about tehri home teams and are not shy to let others know. When Germanyz scored goals, the 'beachh' area went crazy. When it was apparent that Deutschland won the game, I think that the whole town of Neustadt was awake and cheering. The neighboring restaurants were also showing the game, and zou could hear shouting around the Marketplatz. A good 20 minutes after the games was won, people still drove around in their cars honking their horns and cheering.

For someone who has never experienced such 'night life' before, it was overwhelming, yet it was also a very neat thing to be a part of. Watching the World Cup in America is okay, but seeing it in Europe is much better because of how passionate people are about the game.