Zurich

The reason I am awake right now is because I accidentally took a 4-hour-long nap after work and now I can't fall asleep again... (Mom and Dad, no need to comment. I will try not to mess up my sleep schedule in the future, but I just worked too hard today). In light of this situation, I decided to be proactive about updating my blog because this weekend Kevin and I are flying back to Italy to visit Pisa for a day and then spend 3 days in Florence. I know that I will have a lot to share about that vacation and it will most likely completely overshadow my day trip to Zurich, so it is best if I write a brief little post about that now.

So, during the Heidelberg conference, my friend Melissa let me know that she had a 10 hour layover in Zurich, Switzerland on Sunday (the day Kevin was leaving to go home). Since I have never been to Switzerland, I decided it was necessary to take a spur of the moment trip to Zurich and spend the day with her there. It was Melissa's first time in Europe and she doesn't speak any German, so it was nice that I could join her so that the whole experience wasn't as overwhelming. I think she was in shock the entire day, but we had a good time. She kept saying, "I can't believe I'm in Europe right now." Tell me about it. This is going to seem like it was a dream when I get home and back into the reality of daily life, school, and studying for the MCAT... but for now, European adventures prevail.

Back to Zurich. From Mannheim to Zurich was only a 3 hour 20 minute train ride and I met Melissa in the central train station at about lunch time after giving her a crash course in German vocab and specific directions to get from the airport "flughafen" to the central station "hauptbahnhof" using the suburban train sytem "S-bahn". After meeting up, we got a map and wandered out into the streets. We walked aimlessly towards pretty buildings and over the bridges to admire the beautiful architecture and scenery. We went inside a few churches and we climbed a TON of stairs up the tower of the biggest church we were in so that we could get views of the entire city.

We had a lot of fun catching up and sharing stories about how our summers were going thus far and meanwhile wandered a lot. Before we knew it, our time was up and we both had to start heading home. I learned the hard way that the USD and Euro had recently dropped in value compared to the Franc... The Franc is so strong! Everything in Switzerland was so ridiculously expensive that I am glad I only had to eat one meal there and I couldn't stay for more than an afternoon.  A small side dish of potato salad at a street vendor cost me 6 something Francs (which i didn't have) = 8 euro = about $11.50 USD... That was the cheapest non sausage thing I could find. So I starved a little until I got back into Germany and I could splurge on a whole sandwich for 3 euro. I deeply enjoyed my expensive potato salad on the water front and took these pictures of the swans who probably aren't fed very much because food is so valuable. Also, here are some other pretty pictures I took of the boats on the lake :)

Anyways, it was a nice day trip and I am glad I got to have a mini Switzerland experience. Now I know why most people go hiking there and just enjoy the scenery, it is soooo expensive to do anything else!!! Maybe one day when I'm rich and successful ;) I will be able to visit again (if that ever happens).. Here are a few more pics of pretty buildings and such.

Heidelberg Conference

Last Thursday morning, Kevin and I arrived in at the Youth Hostel in Heidelberg for the DAAD RISE Conference not knowing what to expect at all. We were both wondering what it would be like to hang out in a group of 300 other science nerds.. and we were about to find out. Everyone was actually really cool. As soon as we arrived and put our stuff in our rooms, we met in the cafeteria to get our complementary buffet style lunch before heading off to the welcome ceremony and first day of speakers.  After being introduced to the DAAD RISE staff and being welcomed by an American, Canadian, and British ambassador, we were introduced to two past RISE students who continued their studies in Germany after having such a great internship experience and they shared some funny stories and some advice about getting accustomed to the German lifestyle. They were very funny because we all picked up on the same quirky German antics and find ourselves beginning to adopt them ourselves. After the talks, we were bussed out to the Schwetzinger Brauhaus where we were all served a delicious dinner (with a free small beer).  The dinner was fun because we had the opportunity to meet and talk to some new people and hear about how their internships were going. After eating and regrouping with my Munich friends, we decided to go into Altstadt (the old town) to go out. We ended up at a little dance club type place and had a really good night.

Friday morning we woke up early for breakfast, which was served between 7-8am, and then met in the lobby to go out for a company visit. Both Kevin and I were in the same group and we had a morning visit to EMBL (European Molecular Biology Labs) and spent the afternoon back on the Heidelberg Campus at the German Cancer Research Center (Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum, DKFZ). Once were were back on the University of Heidelberg campus, they showed us their new 7 Tesla MRI machine and let us play in the same room as it. Supposedly there are only 3 of these in the world and they are the most high-tech magnetic imaging systems to date that have been developed and are in use.  The magnetic field around this machine was so strong that absolutely no metal could be brought into the room. We were playing with a hairband with a tiny metal piece and when i accidentally let go of it, my reflexes tried to catch it from falling down, but it flew up and through the chamber. I didn't get too close because of the metal in my face, but I could feel the magnet pulling my face and creating pressure. That is when i left the room haha. But it was really cool. Kevin couldn't even go in the room past the warning line because of this inner ear prosthetics. It is scary how powerful this thing was. Even with thousands of pounds of steel (or some material) added to the walls to contain the magnetic field effects and a special floor, they said that the physics research buildings nearby were angry because they could still detect the magnetic alterations... oops. +1 for medical technology. After hearing all about the 7 Tesla MRI scanner, Kevin and I headed into the old town of Heidelberg again and had a nice dinner.

The group outside EMBL

7 Tesla MRI scanner at Universitätsklinikum Heidelberg

Saturday we checked out of the hostel and went to more meetings in the morning, followed by research presentations by 5 student interns in our field of study (Biology) who volunteered to talk about their projects. Then we headed to the old town for the afternoon to take a private tour arranged by DAAD RISE. I thought that the tour was great! We learned a lot about the history of the town and the stories behind some of the restaurants, shops, and breweries. Heidelberg is home a store that sells more varieties of absinthe than any other place in the world.

Kevin at the beginning of the tour

The famous Absinthe shop

View of the old bridge

Entrance into Altstadt (old town) from the old bridge

View of the Heidelberg Castle from the bridge

He looks excited.. it was a long day

View of the area near Marktplatz

Playing with toys...

Another interesting place we heard about was the called Heidelberg's Studentenkuesse ("student kiss"). Heidelberg's Studentenkuesse is the town's oldest confectionery store famous for its delicious homemade chocolates, which are now considered to be a traditional Heidelberg specialty. Back when the university days when dating was supervised by a chaperone, young men would purchase these "chocolate student kisses" for the girl they were seeing and present it to her as a gift. The tradition stuck for a long time and now has become very famous. The store has been passed down through for many generations and the family still produces hand made chocolates according to the original recipe from 1863. Of course I had to go in and Kevin and I bought chocolates to share!!! Gotta support those family owned confectionery businesses!

Heidelberg's Studentenkuesse confectionary store

Before heading back to Mannheim on Saturday night, Kevin and I had dinner at Brauhaus Vetter, a famous brewery on one of the main streets of Heidelberg. The food was fine, but the beer was absolutely delicious! It was probably some of the best wheat beer I have had in Germany so far! You can really taste a difference when it is fresh and has never been bottled.  Unfortunately, we didn't really take pictures, but I do have one picture I took of Kevin :).

View of the street with Brauhaus Vetter

 

Kevin enjoying his beer

And after all of this, we returned to my flat in Mannheim for the night and had the pleasure of skyping with the Jordans :).

Ludwigsburg/Stuttgart

This weekend I decided to stay in Mannheim to save money, so I planned a day trip to Ludwigsburg and Stuttgart and I posted about it in the DAAD RISE Heidelberg group asking if anyone would be interested in joining me. Sure enough, I received 4 replies (all from people I had never met before) and we decided to meet in the Heidelberg Hauptbahnhof bright and early Saturday morning (yesterday).  Two of the girls, Leila and Wenye, are students at Oxford University and have grown up in Manchester and Cambridge, England, respectively. Another girl, Selynne Guo was from Calgary, Alberta. And the only boy, Jackson Chu, grew up and is currently a medical student in Vancouver, British Columbia (the west coast of Canada for those who forget geography..). For the first time ever, I was the only American. On the hour-long train ride to Ludwigsburg, we had a great time talking and sharing stories about each other's miscommunications with the Germans in our lab. I also learned a lot about how differently universities are run in Canada and England compared to in the US.

When we arrived in Ludwigsburg, we went to the Marktplatz, then the Rathaus, and then began our quest to find the real attractions we were drawn to visit, the palaces. First, we went to the Residence Palace and the fairy-tale gardens surrounding it. We also were lucky enough to catch a 2-hour English tour of the inside of the palace (which is the only way that visitors are allowed inside). During the tour, we were guided through 60 rooms and learned a lot about the history of the palace.

Residence Schloss

Wenye, Leila, Selynne, and me :)

View of the Palace from the Interior Courtyeard

Receiving Room for Guests

Where the King would talk to Guests

The King's Bedroom

Queen's Bedroom

toilet

the Queen's Drawing Room

Lunch Room in the Queen's part of the house 

Hall of Monarchs

The King & Queen's box in the theatre

The King's Theatre

One of the 4 small Game Rooms 

View out the window of the Gardens

The King's own personal Church

 Across the street was the entrance to the Favorite Schloss. The Favorite Schloss served as a hunting retreat for the royal family and they went there mostly during the summers. I really liked it because it wasn't so massive and was much more livable. In order to walk through it, you had to be in a guided tour, but unfortunately they only had tours in German. The tour in German was interesting because I would sporadically understand words and phrases. Especially when she asked if anyone had any questions at the end. I knew that from my language course because they constantly asked us in German if we had any questions and for awhile none of us knew that she was asking us for questions so we were always silent, but we actually did have a million questions. Anyways, it was a cute little place and a much more manageable walking tour than the previous monstrosity.

Favorite Schloss

After the Favorite Schloss, we got on the S-bahn and went to Stuttgart, which was only a 15 minute train ride.

Stuttgart Theatre

Neus Schloss (New Palace)

Neus Schloss (New Palace)

Stuttgart Rathaus (City Hall)

Concert outside the Rathaus

Chalk Artist on the Main Shopping Street