And then there were four...

Weeks that is. Yes, that's right, today marked the beginning of my last 4 weeks at the Fraunhofer Institute. DAMN! I knew time would fly, but REALLY?! To say that time is flying would be SUCH an understatement.

My supervisor asked me last week if I am starting to feel ready to go home. I had to think about it for a moment, but I realized that, honestly, I'm not. There is so much more that I want to see and do here, and simply not enough time to get it all done. At the Institute, it is possible that I might actually have some publishable work, but is four weeks enough to finish all my experiments, write a paper, and get it ready for submission? With a lot of luck, it's possible, but not probable. Is three weekends enough to visit Rügen, Koblenz, Cochem, Strasbourg, Metz, Bad Kreuznach, Göttingen, Brussels, Freiburg, and Tübingen, as well as revisiting Luxembourg and Berlin? Not a chance!

I have to resign myself to the fact that I am simply not going to finish everything and go everywhere that I wanted to this summer. Just like I had to convince myself that a weekend trip to Rome and a weekend trip to Barcelona and a weekend trip to Edinburgh were just not in the cards for this trip, I also need to convince myself that doing EVERYTHING in this area this summer is a) not possible, and b) not necessary. To put it in the words of the Governator, I'LL BE BACK. I'll get there someday.

But in the meantime, I have 3 weekend trips left! Before I get into them, let me talk briefly about this past one...

Amsterdam. Sin City of Europe. The Venice of Holland. Whatever you want to call it, it is a unique place that made my jaw drop the first time I visited, in May. But Kathryn and Adam were there over a weekend, so I knew I had to go back. I took an extremely long series of trains to get there (Saarbrücken to Mannheim over Heidelberg to Stuttgart, and then on to Amsterdam). In Stuttgart, I was finally able to board my sleeper car, where I shared a "room" (more like a little box, with 3 beds on opposite walls) with 5 other people that got on and off at various points throughout the journey. When I got on, I was exhausted (it was 1:30am), freezing, wet, and ready to just crash. I found my bed (it was the middle one on the wall, so not on the floor, but not too high up either), took off my shoes, and was asleep in 5 seconds...until the ticket man started shining a flashlight in my face and asking me for my Fahrschein. I honestly couldn't see what I was doing (probably because my eyes were closed), so I just grabbed the pile of tickets in my bag and thrust them at him. He went in the hall to shuffle through them, and I assume eventually found the right one because he didn't throw me off the train. By the time he came back, I was sleeping again, so he put all my tickets in my shoe. Totally fine by me!

Next thing I know, we're stopped in Köln and it's just after 8am. At 8:30, I actually started to move, and I realized there were only 3 of us left in the room: a social justice lawyer from the north of Holland, a university student studying music from Maine, and me. After we had all gotten cleaned up and ready to disembark, we folded down the middle bed to make a little couch, and we chatted for the remaining 30 minutes. The lawyer was actually the first person from Holland that I have ever had a real conversation with (and the musician's brother was living in Holland), so it was quite nice.

Eventually we arrived, and I headed off to find my hostel. I already knew where it was because I had handpicked it last time I was in Amsterdam (PS - if you are ever in Amsterdam, stay at the Flying Pig! It is fabulous), and when I arrived, Kathryn was there! YAY!

And now I think this story is getting a little too descriptive - next I'll be telling you everything that I had for breakfast that day. Which was quite a lot actually - a whole English breakfast!

Anyway, we hit a lot of sights that day - we started with a couple of hidden churches, moved on to the Rijks Museum (a must-see!), and then headed over to the I amsterdam structure where we proceeded to blow an amazing amount of time taking pictures. Italian food and bar hopping ensued, followed by an attempt to get into an unfortunately sold out screening of Inception. Our disappointment dissipated when we treated ourselves to more beer and massive slices of cheesecake. The only thing missing from the evening was a plate of the elusive Dutch pancakes, which we managed to find the following morning for breakfast (Mm, Mm, Good!).

Following a surprisingly restful night and those yummy pancakes, we had our photos taken with 3 James Bonds, 2 presidents, Brangelina, Mona Lisa, Princess Di, MJ and the Dalai Lama. Yes, we visited Madame Tussaud's. More beer (surprise...) and then I had a train to catch!

It really was a weekend entirely on fast forward unfortunately, but seeing Kathryn and Adam was well worth the long journey. And besides, I adore travelling by train. I wasn't sure how I would feel travelling by train, since I hadn't been on one since...well, then...but I know that was a freak accident, and I also know that I could spend whole days on a train and be completely content. Maybe it's just that I love the feeling of being on the way to somewhere, so much so that I often feel disappointed when I actually arrive. Until I get off the train, of course, because then excitement for my new surroundings takes over.

And now I have already written a book (and I guess it's about time, since my latest posts have all been quite short), so I guess I will leave my future trips for another entry. I will say this: next weekend I will be couch surfing in Stralsund in order to visit the island of Rügen, in the Baltic Sea, with Caitlin. And the following weekend I will head to Koblenz, with a stopover in Cochem. After that, one weekend remains before I move out and move on, and that weekend is still in the early planning stages!

Und jetzt muss ich schlafen. Bis bald!