Weekend in Bremen

I wrote this a week ago...

This past weekend I visited the other two interns from Calvin and the guys who are doing the Engr. 202 summer program up in Bremen.

I had a great time, Katrina met me at the train station then we proceeded to go to the teerhof where the 202 summer program guys are staying. We finally got into the building, after Katrina’s attempts of trying to hit the windows with small rocks.

We visited the place where Eric and Chris (The other two interns from Calvin in Germany) are living this summer. For dinner, we went out to get a dönner, while sitting we decided we wanted to go up to the North Sea go to the dunes and the mudflats and walk to the island. Well we thought the last train was leaving at 11:00pm, it was 10:00pm already. We hurried up, walked back to the teerhof, got everything packed up for an all nighter and a beautiful sunset at the beach. These sweet plans got destroyed once we realized that the last train had left at 9:30om and not 11:30pm as we thought. It was a really sad moment for a lot of people, since we were all ready to go.

The summer program guys were sweet and let us use a mattress they had, there was a couch downstairs in the lobby so Katrina and I slept in the lobby of the place. We woke up at 6:00am to go up to the North sea, Eric and Chris met us at the train station and here we were all ready to go, this time we were for reals going.

We all had a great time at the beach, we walked on the mudflats, found a lot of crabs and took pictures. Then it was time to leave and head back to Ingelheim. After a 6.5 hour train ride I was back in my apartment. I had been craving gummies, because I had finished a 1Kg on Thursday, it turns out that Carsten who actually stayed in my apartment until Sunday (I was gone all weekend) had left two bags of gummies on the counter for me as a present for letting him stay at my place. It was a great feeling.

From two weeks ago!...

This week I had a visitor! I enjoy having people over because that way I don’t have to talk to myself!

Last semester when taking Organic Chemistry, Carsten Hamann (my lab partner) told me that he was going to be working in Sweeden during the summer. Well I did not know exactly when he was coming but he sent me an email on Monday saying he was coming on Tuesday. Well I got off work and biked to the train station, there he was waiting. We wanted to go to castles but when we got to Bingen I showed him the Germania statue across the river and the gondolas that take you up there and I asked if he wanted to go there to the castles? He said that either one was fine with him. We decided to get off the train and go to Rudesheim (Across the Rhine rive, from Bingen). We took the ferry, crossed the river, walked around Rudesheim and went up to the Germania statue in the gondolas. It was a really nice view from there. We walked through the vineyards on the way back, we ate a ton of berries on the way down to Rudesheim. We crossed in the ferry again and came back to Ingelheim.

Wednesday, we had agreed that he would go to Koblenz and that I would meet him there after work. I took the train at 4:00pm and got there at 5:00pm. Carsten had mentioned about getting a haircut, but I did not think he would get it somewhere around here nor he would shaved his head!!! Haha. So I got to the train station, he was waiting downstairs. I could hardly recognize him, he looked very different with no hair! Haha. He tried to get me to shaved my head too, I refused the whole time, no way I would ever ever do that I think. Well we walked to where the Mosel and the Rhine meet, it is a pretty cool place. Then we saw the castle on the other side of the river and decided to cross. This took forever cause we had to walk back towards the train station (30 min) then cross the bridge (15 min) then to the castle (30 min) we did not know how to get there. So we had to climb walls, cross the train tracks and just climb more! We also trespassed to go into a fortress.

On our way there we saw this tunnel (like a water drain) it was really small but we knew we would fit there so we went in, we crawled til we got to the end. We took our cameras inside because it was so dark that we couldn’t see anything. The camera flashes helped a lot. While being in there, I heard people talking outside, we had left our bags out there but I didn’t think someone would take them, plus I yelled: HELLO! When I heard them talking. Well I decided to go back out just in case. I making my way out by crawling really fast, I was almost out when I hit my head against the bricks and it hurt a lot, I bounced back and sat there while having feeling a bit disoriented. Well, I soon recovered and kept crawling cause all I could think was: my bag, my passport, my rail pass, my money, my wallet, Carsten’s bag, his apple laptop, his passport and everything. So I made it out of the tunnel and the bags were not there. My north face jacket was there but nothing else. I looked around, this place was right next to the river and there is only one path that takes you there so there was no way someone could run that fast and disappear with the bags. I saw them right away, they were walking away with our bags, I RAN and got said: excuse me!!! Then they said: oh yeah we grabbed them because it is not normal to see bags by themselves. They said they were going to take them somewhere (this was all in german, so I didn’t understand where they were planning on taking them) but I will assume that the jacket did not fit here and that the bags were cool so they were going to end up in their house!

That was sooo close! AGH! Well it was fun, after that experience we walked towards the castle and we had to climb a wall, then cross a lot of train tracks and just a lot of things. We finally made it up to the Festung Ehrenbreitstein (the castle), there is a nice restaurant with an awesome view. We, well Carsten, got food there and I tried the Riesling wine. The most famous wine in by the Rhine, I live in Ingelheim which is by the Rhine and I was not going to live this enchanting place without trying the wine from this region. It was pretty good, it was a bit sweet, so it was not trocken (dried) which was good.

I had a ton of fun, since I haven’t gone exploring and trespassing and climbing since I got to Europe because I hadn’t have the chance but now I sit here with a big bump on my head. Every time I make a face expression I can feel it and it hurts. My legs have given up so I stayed at the apartment today (Thursday, July 16th).

In the Netherlands

Last weekend

Where am I going? Calvin College? – That is exactly what I thought when I got in a train from Swolle to Steenwijk in the Netherlands. Everyone looked so much like Calvin people!

I went to Steenwijk to visit Margaliet, a friend I met three years ago in California when working at a summer camp. Margaliet and her family are Dutch and they are one of the cutest families I have ever met. I got to experience the real Dutch way of living and I loved it.

Margaliet’s dad had asked me to prepare some real Salvadorean food. I have to confess that I don’t cook unless I really have to! Haha so here I was thinking I needed to make pupusas in The Netherlands. Well we went and found flour (not corn flour!) we found cheese (not exactly the cheese you would normally use) and we bought tomatoes for the salsa. Well to make the story short, we made Dutch-Salvadorean pupusas and it was great! They liked them a lot, we all ate two and Michael ate three.

I also have to confess that I do not bake! And I was taught to bake this really typical Dutch dessert. The dessert turned out great, it was delicious.

As soon as went upstairs, Michael room’s door was open, I saw this black light bike. I soon realized he was into biking. He told me that was his winter bike, and that he had another race bike, so he showed it to me and he said: “try it” AH! I was so excited about trying it. Well that is not the best part, we have the same shoe size so he let me use his cleat bike shoes. This was a carbon fiber bike and I have never wore cycling shoes before (I have always wanted to) so I was nervous about not being able to unclip the shoes on time. I did great though, I got the hang of it right away, well Michael grabbed his mountain bike and said: “wanna go on a 5 min bike ride?” well it turned out that we ended up biking 20km. He showed me the road he usually bikes when he trains. He told me his cycling story and how he is in this team and he is the youngest one (he is only 16) but how he loves cycling with them. I told him, my bike’s name and he laughed he said: “yeah, we, cyclists are weird”. Michael gave me a huge amazing cycling catalog/magazine he had (I have looked at it almost 3 times now, this in one day)–This bike ride has made want to save my money so I can buy the shoes in MI as soon as I get there. The pedals, I will buy here because they are cheaper.

Margaliet took me to Geithoorn, a small ancient village in the Netherlands. Here no cars are allowed, you travel by boat and there are many little shops around the village. We rented a boat and I got to steer it, it was a ton of fun, it was such a nice cute little place. Later on Saturday, we all went to the movie theater and watched the new Ice Age movie on 3D!!!!!!!!

Sunday, we got up early to go to Church and I loved it, we sang in Dutch and in English. I did not understand the sermon at all, because it was in Dutch but it was still good to be there. It was raining and we rode bikes on the way bike, so I rode on the back of Thirza’s bike, this while wearing a dress! haha

It was Thirza’s birthday (Margaliet’s sister), we had a typical Denmark meal. Then the exchange of presents came, this part was interesting and really cool too. Her parents gave her a card saying she gets to go climbing a mountain! Then Margaliet offered an adventurous weekend. I think it is really cool that they offered adventures that will bring memories and that will probably never be forgotten.

It was really sad to leave, I enjoyed my time so much. The Dijkstra family are just so cute and great and I loved spending a weekend with them. On the train, I opened my bag and I found a bag full of Dutch candies!!!! It made my ride together with the cycling magazine which has 919 pages and not 500 as I had told some of you.

Ps. Margaliet is getting married on October 30th in California to Mateo, one of my good friends from California! I was the first one (outside the family) who got to see the beautiful dress!!!!

Here and there

This past week was a strange week, Monday came flying like it always does. I got to work and I was sent to the analytic department. We had talked about this earlier when I came but I wasn’t sure if it was actually going to happen or not. Well I spent Monday and Tuesday analyzing my the substances I had been working on the week before. I really enjoyed being there, I met new people and Joel who know a bit of English taught me what they do there. I basically prepared solutions for the HPLC’s and I made some standards and samples for “Reinheit” (impurities) check. I loved how they had about 8 different color-tapes! Haha I used al of them so my samples look crazy, I wonder what Joel thought about me wanting to use all the colors haha.


After learning a lot in the analytic department which is in the building next to where I usually work, I came back to the lab and fixed all of my reports. Yeah I fixed 20 reports! Well the problem is that they never told me I needed to add some specific details. I also needed to attach the analytic data to the reports. Well I sat in for of my computer for a long time until I finished.

Work is going well overall, Mrs. Kroybe and Dirk (two of my lab partners) have been working in the pilot plant and things are not going so well for them. Mrs. Kroybe started her reaction last week and they used the wrong reactor in the plant so white smoke started coming out and people had to evacuate the place. On the other hand, Dirk working on another plant had some drainage issue, on Thursday our boss was in the lab talking to Dirk and they were all scratching their heads! I was wondering what was going on, I was able to pick up a few things they were saying. Then Dirk confirmed what had happened. Well when “absaugen” (vacuuming) the crystals, they used the wrong filter and 10kg went through it into the Mother liquid. This was the API material which means it is the final step in a drug campaign. This 10Kg are worth 100,000€!!!!! So that is why they were scratching their heads.

I have started a new set of batches at work, I have also started to fall in love with work, the people and Germany in general. I have been thinking a lot about living here after school, a masters maybe? I am going to Mainz next week to check on a materials science school. Education is free is Germany so it sounds like a great idea to come here for another 2 years, learn German and see what comes up.

Hope all of you are having a great summer, can’t wait to see you all.

Weekend in Switzerland with Michelle

Sometimes I forget why I am here! I think I missed the part in the contract where it says: “Mondays are weekdays and not part of weekends”. I say this because every Monday I feel like I should go back to bed. I have been traveling every weekend since the day I activated my eurorail pass. Sundays are always the same, I get back at around 11:30pm, and Monday I wake up at 6:30am to go to work.

Last Friday, my lab partners and I went and visited a pilot plant, one out of like 20, here in the company. I saw about 20 reactors in there, and that was only a small plant the guide said. They had raw materials, APIs (Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient) among other things. I got to see some 10,000€ distillation columns, and reactors made out of different materials. Unfortunately the tour was in German so I got a summary version of it which was translated by Barbara, one of my lab partners.

Saturday I went to visit Michelle in Switzerland and we had a ton of fun. We walked around lake Zurich and the city itself. On Saturday I saw these two kids jumping into the lake from a bridge (I actually don’t think this is allowed), I thought it was sooo cool and wanted to do it right away. I was wearing dressy shorts and a tank top and I was sooo temped to just jump into the lake with all of my clothes. Michelle decided she wanted to do it as well, so we concluded to go back there on Sunday morning.

On Sunday the water was warmer than on Saturday so it was perfect. Michelle decided she wanted to go first, I am glad she did, because I was nervous and she wasn’t! so I let her go first, she jumped and I laughed really hard! Then it was my turn, I stood right at the edge and while looking down I was tempted to say: “I don’t want to do it anymore” haha. It was approximately 12 feet jump which is not that high at all but I get scared when doing things like this.

After jumping into the lake, Michelle and I went back to the hotel to take a shower and change. On the way to Switzerland I saw the Rhine waterfalls, which are actually the biggest waterfalls in Europe. I told Michelle I wanted to go there, so we did. We took the train to Shaffhousen, then to Neuhausen and walked for 25 min in a trail by the Rhine. It was beautiful, it was just amazing! We took a ton of pictures and we had a lot of fun.

It wasn’t much fun to leave Michelle though, I had seen her two weekends in a row, in different countries and it was just hard to say bye. I miss her a LOT.
Switzerland is a beautiful and expensive place, I want to come back and tour Switzerland someday.

Pic from Munich

Berlin Pics III

Berlin Pics

I got a checkpoint charlie stamp on my passport and on my arm too, I realized I had it on my arm after I started walking away from the place... haha

Switzerland! Lake Zurich, here I go!...

The weekend with the engaged couple, pics from Berlin

I will not be mentioning anything related to the story behind the engagement yet, because I want everyone to hear this story from Mike and Michelle first. Michelle will be back on Monday and Mike is already back so give him a call or wait for Michelle to get back so that you hear the crazy, awesome story about their engagement, here in Germany by the Rhine river. I have all the story written down, but I will post it in about 2-3 weeks so be ready to read about it.
The following describes the weekend with Michelle and Mike, after we had stopped in Bingen (So after the proposal)

The weekend was full of adventures, we walked around Bingen took a train to Berlin, spent the night in Berlin. Sunday, we went on a tour around Berlin, then took a train to Munich, spent the night in Munich, Monday we went on a tour around Munich then on our way back to Ingelheim, we stopped in Mainz, and spent the night in my apartment.

A lot of things happened during the weekend, but one more thing I really need to mention is about our train from Köln to Berlin. Our Köln train was delayed and we had about 30 seconds to get to the other train at the station in Koln. While Mike was looking through one of the windows I was looking through the other one. Michelle was keeping track of the time.
Mike: “I see the station”, Diane: “I don’t see anything yet, Michelle how much time we got?” The only reason of why I was so nervous was because this was the last train of the day from Koln going to Berlin. Having a hostel booked in Berlin, was making us all nervous about being in this delayed train. The train stopped, we had just a few seconds to run from platform 3 to platform 2, fortunately right next to each other!
I tried to open the door but I didn’t get it far enough, so I had to finagle my way out of the train. Then I bolted across the platform, a mere 10 feet, while Michelle and Mike followed. It turns out the train was ridiculously close and as we burst into the new train a 50 year old men was laughing at us. We proceeded to then sit on first class and get kicked out.

We got to see pretty much everything in Berlin, the Brandenburger gate, Checkpoint Charlie, TV tower, Hitler’s bunker, Jewish memorial and a lot more than that. Katrina came to Berlin and she brought along, of course, the Rick Steve book and read to me some of the history about the TV tower and others! The guy on the tour said the exact same joke about the tv tower so we concluded that he also
has Rick’s book. It was nice to see this friend once again (three weekends in a row! Is quite impressive)

The night in Berlin was nice, the hostel room (Wombats hostel) was really nice. The room had 6 beds but only one was taken when we got there. Jenni (our roommate) came in the room at midnight, she was from Germany and was spending 4 nights in Berlin. Her accent was funny, she said she would come back at around 4:00am but that she would be really quite and make tiny little steps so that we wouldn’t wake up. She never came back!.. Ohhh Jenni! Haha….

Sunday night, we made it to Munich and of couse the Hofbrauhause was in the schedule for that night. We asked people how to get there, we got there 45 minutes before closing time (11:15pm) I will let this night to your imagination! JK!I need to tell you what happened in this place! Well Mike ordered his beer, they sell litters of beer! So Mike ordered one. Michelle and I hate beer but we were sitting on the world’s most famous beer hall, so we ordered one litter and shared it, we also ordered dessert because we had not eaten much during the day. The dessert saved our lives, the smell of beer was making me sick, but we needed to drink that litter in 30 min! well we started this long journey, Mike finished that thing quick, and he was mocking us.
Zip, a bite of dessert, zip, a bite of dessert… until we had about 1/5 of it left… here I took another zip and quickly covered my mouth with my hands, why?! Everything was about to come back out from my mouth! I held it and took another bite of the dessert! Same thing happened twice! Michelle’s story was the same! We did not want to drink it anymore but we only had about 1/10 of it left by now! And Mike said: “so you want me to finish your beer, when you have that much?” Michelle and I looked at each other, we were so tempted to say “yes” but instead we said “no”! We proceeded to finish it! The waitress was hurrying us up because she needed to clean the plates and the table. WE FINALLY FINISHED THE ONE LITTER!!! WE LICKED THE DESSERTS PLATES!! Oh man, I promise no more beer ever again in my life, I really do not understand how people can drink beer!! ………I only drank that one because I was with Michelle and Mike. I was ok after it, we walked back to the S-bahn station and looked for the hostel, we found it and went to bed after g-chatting with Amanda and Lerae (2:45am)

There were 10 people in this hostel room (Munich 4 you), bunked beds and two beds in the middle, these two beds were just perfect for Michelle and I, right next to each other and right in the middle of the room. Mike slept on a noisy bunk bed! Haha.
We saw Munich, took pictures, went on a tour, and decided we were super tired and needed to go back to Ingelheim, took a train and left. Stopped in Mainz walked around a bit, then made our way to my apartment. We were exhausted, I wanted to cry from walking, Michelle had 7 blisters on her feet! Walking back at 11:30pm and thinking I had to get up early for work on Tuesday (I had taken Monday off) was not sounding good at all.

Mike left on Tuesday morning, Michelle and I went to Bacharach on Tuesday afternoon after work and we had a ton of fun. We went up to a castle and took pictures and ate a döner by the Rhine, so good.
Woke up at 4:15am on Wednesday to help Michelle out with the packing, since she was leaving at 5:06am from the train station. She took black hill 782 (my bike) to the train station and then I walked to work, it was a super hot, humid morning. I got to work and all I wanted to do was sleep, I vacuumed the acidic and non acidic crystals and put them in the oven. Then started writing reports since for some reason I was behind!

I am sitting on the couch missing Michelle and Mike and wishing they were here! But I am looking forward for the weekend, Switzerland will be it. I get to see Michelle once again in a different country, I get to laugh and joke around with her once again! Oh and see her beautiful, awesome ring one more time!

This pics are from Berlin

Friends

I came back from work yesterday. Opened the mailbox like I always do, but this time it was not empty or full with store adds. This white envelope was sitting there, I saw it and got REALLY excited! There were many letters/notes in there, all of them in different colors. I sat on the couch and read them all at once, I was laughing sooo hard while reading them.
Those letters made my day, it made me miss MI and it made me think how much I miss my friends! I have been thinking a lot about moving here to Germany but these letters got me thinking that I do not know if I could handle being far away from them for too long.

Friends, all of you! let me tell you that I miss you a ton! and I think of all of you every day, there are pictures of you on my walls and now your letters are up there too.

Lorena: N & F... I am glad you like the biking videos!
Sarah: nada nada limonada! Thanks for the CD! I still have to see it! I forgot to bring it to work today! "When I first got married"...
Michelle: You got here before the letters did! thanks for coming to visit!
Antonieta: way to go on the job offer!!! Congrats!
Little piece of my heart: Israel needs Scott bear!, I am happy that you got the job at HS nice work stud! Will buttons have a partner then!? haha...
Juli: Juliana que mala eres! JK! "Me leavanto en la manana para verte pasar"...
Hoff: I miss Marving and Eugene! "Wanna go to the beach in my car!?"
Sexy Glass: Hello friend! I hope you haven't had any bike accidents this summer, have you pulled any Sarah's run lately?! haha
Lerae: como estas Chapina!?! que ondas? Te gusto El Salvador?

I know there wasn't a color note in the package from you amiga Lerae porque ella esta en Guate entonces seria muy dificil para que hubiera una color note in there de parte de alla!! but I love you mucho!!! ademas tu me mandaste una carta a MI right before I left! and I still have to send you one back!!!

There are way too many people I am not including in this post! like my roomates and yeah, just a ton of people! but I love you all keep that in mind!

I decided to make you a video so that you could see where I live, I know it is more fun to watch videos than to read. I appreciate every single one of you, thanks for letting me be part of your group, since I was the "new" freshman hanging out with you my first year at Calvin. We have shared MANY adventures and crazy stories, I keep them all in my head.
I love you all MUCHOOOO!!

Thank you all for the letters, I have read all of them more than once now, I loved how they look on the wall too! thank you friends! SEE YOU SOON!!!
HASTA!!!!

DEAR FRIENDS GO HERE:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMAqVcmwbPo

or watch it here:

Biking second part!

Biking with Michelle!

Biking again!

I think I like biking too much and that is why Michelle and I decided to make a video while biking! (Do not try this at home! haha)

Michelle and I decided to go to Bacharach on Tuesda, after I was done with work! Bacharach is a super nice little town along the Rhine river, there is a castle which is a youth hostel now. We went up there and the view was just beautiful! We had a great time, walking back to Ingelheim though was rough. We had walked all weekend long and our legs were just not working properly anymore! Michelle had 7 blisters on her feet, and my legs were just giving up.

I thought it would be nice to ride the bike together! so Michelle sat between the basket and the seat and I sat on the other half of the seat.
Check it out!!!
It was late at night, so it is dark, sorry!...