Mulhouse France, Freiburg Germany, and Basel Switzerland

The "high speed wireless internet" is "temporarily experiencing problems" at the hotel I am staying at.  So, I am at the Syracuse Unversity Center in Strasbourg and about to load a post I wrote days ago. Not exactly what I had in mind for my first blogging experience.

Mulhouse, Freiburg, and Basel

Three European cities in three days, whew.  The conference divided us all into groups of 10 to talk about lots of social worky issues and tour the countries.  The best part was that each group included people from each city – and townies make the best tour guides J  This is my wonderful group who I was fortunate enough to be-bop around with all week long.

In each city we toured a social service agency and were given a presentation. The most poignant insight from this activity was that is SUCKS to sit in a room with someone talking to you when you have no idea what they are saying. Especially when you know that as soon as that nonsense is over you can go walk around a European city you've never seen.  In Mulhouse France, the presentation was made in French, then my English-speaking Swiss friends thought about it in German, then gave me the main points in English. This was exhausting for all parties involved, and made me want to come home and learn another language. 

We ate dinner at a beautiful French restaurant and the food was delicious. The best part of this whole tri-national experience was individual conversations with kids my age from other countries with a common academic framework to anchor and encourage conversation. So, while I have no more patience for sitting in lectures, making presentations, or doing busy work, it was worth it to have that basis for connecting to the other students.

Downtown Mulhouse, France

 

I tried a local Guwertziminer and pretzel in downtown Mulhouse…so good!

Freiburg, Germany

There is a local sayint that if you fall in the stream in Freiburg,  you will marry a Freiburg man and never leave.... (kinda like the Gunk, right?)

Given the Social Justice nature of the trip... I thought the "F-You System" Grafitti was worth a pic.

At dinner in Freiburg , I ordered pancakes and white asparagus (spargel) with a hollandaise sauce that was possibly the best thing I have ever tasted. I made this choice based on my new friend Anna (who goes to school in Freiburg) who informed me that in this region people tend to eat with the seasons and that spargel is only available and on the menu this time of year. She also recommended a yummy local beer.

It is super expensive to eat (or really to do anything) in Switzerland. So, we drove out of Basel and to an Aldi in Germany to get food for a barbeque back at Schloss-Beuggen, which turned into a giant party and was a great way to wrap up the week.

Basel, Switzerland

Simon (from Switzerland), Anna (from Germany), and Me in Basel



Diana Galbaldon rocks no matter what language you speak :)

















Party-time back at Schloss-Beuggen

We got barbeque stuff and lots of local wine at Aldi to take back to Schloss-Beuggen

Doris (from Germany) and I ... long story.



Randi and Andri (from Switzerland). I could NOT have made it through the week without Andri. He (along with Simon) was my most faithful interpreter.



The American Girls!

This week was so fun, so educational, so hard. I am used to being pretty effective at nagivating new situations and feeling like I can get the hang of things pretty quickly. One cannot learn a language based on osmosis or determination. So I was lost and following people around like a little puppy most of the week.I would have died without the patience and hard work of the bi and multi-linguists who did there best to include me even when it was hard.