Directions

So today was an interesting day full of a couple of new experiences!

First I had breakfast with my host mom and then got ready for the day.  Then my host mom walked me most of the way to the IES center....explaining to me a couple of times how to get back home.  Since I still get lost in my tiny town of 40,000 people, this was actually quite helpful!

We filled out a bunch of forms today; residency permits, etc. After that we went on a walking tour of the Berlin Mitte (middle of the city - the area surrounding IES) for about an hour and a half.  I had seen nearly all of the things that they pointed out to us when I was here last year, but it was good to orient myself.

After that we had a welcome dinner at a cafe which was nice.  Then I went with a couple of people to Prenzlauerberg.  I was going to go out to a bar with them, but I was a tiny bit uncomfortable walking home in the complete dark.  But then Amber (a girl Tyler and I go to school with at Lawrence) messaged me (she's in Berlin for a few days doing some research) and said that she was going to meet Tyler at a bar, so I decided to go with.  It was a wine bar, where you pay 2 Euro for a glass and then refill it as many times as you want.  When you give the glass back you pay how ever much you think you should.  (One of the Germans with us said that he usually pays 2.50 for each glass he drinks - alcohol is much cheaper here).  This sort of thing would definitely NOT work in America, but in Germany it does - everyone is very honest and most Germans wouldn't even think of not paying.

I was a little bit nervous after that, because I had to walk home alone and it was around midnight and I didn't exactly know the way.  I had a map and I asked one of the Germans for advice...it turns out I was only a 8 minute walk away, so armed with my map, I started walking...

...and I didn't even get lost!  I'm really loving the location of my apartment.  Even though there are no other students that close to me, I'm very centrally located.  There isn't really any public transport super close, but that's okay.  A couple are about a 5 or 10 minute walk away - a good excuse to get out and about!

~StephanieAnn