November 14th: Rothenburg ob der Tauber

Hello!

So, I feel like I should apologize. It has been two weeks since my last blog post. Two. Weeks. And frankly, that is unforgivable. I am not sure if this post will be long, but I suppose we shall see. I will get you up to speed and talk about some future plans.

I think this post took awhile for me to write because many things are becoming so ordinary and I am falling into a rhythm. Earlier, everything was so new and I was traveling every weekend. Now I have a schedule and that schedule has some variations, but nothing too wild. This causes time to fly by rather quickly. I blink and the weekend is over. I blink again and it's Wednesday.

In this blog post, I will discuss two big events that have occurred/that are occurring. The first one is the local English club/school called Mortimer's. The second thing, and the title of this post, is my trip to the very scenic Rothenburg ob der Tauber.

Just two streets away from my house in Germany is a small business called Mortimer's English Club. My host mom knows the owner and teacher, Bernd. I met Bernd at a Stammtish (bonus points if you remember what that is) he was having for students of his school. Almut invited me and I got to speak with some of his students and they were excited to be speaking with a native English-speaker. I was then introduced to Bernd who is a young, charismatic fellow. Frankly, I thought he was a native speaker when I first met him. He was happy to meet me and happy I came to talk to some of his students. He then invited me to come and attend a course at his class to see how it operates and to offer my services (I suppose) as a native speaker.

This was several weeks ago. I attended the evening conversation course (there is a different conversation course every weekday at 6 PM) and had an absolute blast. The classes are usually between 3-6 people. And I was surprised at the average age of the students in these classes. In the first class I went to on Wednesday, roughly half of the class was 60 years or older--with the oldest being 73, I believe. They were incredibly warm and inviting. And although self-conscious of their English (which is honestly quite good), they were very happy to speak with me and to ask me questions about the USA and what I thought about Germany and everything. It was such a good time that I agreed to come back the next week. And after the next week, Bernd convinced me (although it didn't take much convincing considering how much fun I was having) to attend the evening conversation course whenever I could. And I have tried to do just that.

Doing this, I have met many people spanning various ages (17-73), professions, reasons for learning English, and levels of English competency. I have learned a good amount about their culture and the "average" German's view of America. In fact, in the first class I attended, Bernd threw out his lesson plan and we did an impromptu lesson about different stereotypes and conceptions (or misconceptions) of Germany and the USA. It was quite and interesting experience hearing what they had to say and sharing what I believe to be commonly held German stereotypes by Americans. (Only representing my country--no big deal.)


Last Saturday I decided to take a Saturday trip to a town called Rothenburg ob der Tauber. First, let me tell you a little bit about the town and then I will show you some pictures. The reason the name is so long is because Germany contains several Rothenburg's. And in order to tell them apart, there is a second part to the name. In this town, they added "ob der Tauber," which means "over the Tauber [a river]." It is often shorted to just "Rothenburg odT." The town is incredibly old. I believe dating back to the 14th Century or so. It was built on a plateau overlooking a valley through which the Tauber flows. The town is surrounded by a large wall as a kind of fortress to protect its citizens and royalty.

Due to its beautiful setting and historic buildings, the Nazi Party in the 1930's considered it to be the ideal German town. It was essentially put up on a pillar to be admired by all Germans. During WWII, there was only minor bombing (compared to the other cities I have visited like Augsburg where large portions of the city were destroyed) because the US general understood the historical importance of this city and ordered it not be shelled with artillery. When the German soldiers occupying it realized the Allies would win, the commander went against Hitler's orders of fighting to the bitter end and threw down their weapons in order to preserve the town. To me, this is an incredible demonstration of both sides understanding the importance of history and not wanting to destroy it.

Now, a little about my trip (though there really isn't much to talk about...oops). I woke up QUITE early to shower and get what I needed. I rode my bike in the cold darkness of morning to the Neu-Ulm Bahnhof, bought my ticket, and jumped on my train three minutes later. Like my trip to Füssen with Becky and my trip to Freiburg, this trip involved changing trains many times. Luckily, I had a small index card in my wallet where I wrote out what time I would be arriving at what stations and what platform my next train would be on, so I was never in a hurry and always knew what was next. In total, the trip to Rothenburg odT was 3 hours one-way. Similarly to my trip to Füssen, the closer I got to Rothenburg, the more Asians I saw. It's interesting, really.

When I arrived at the tiny, tiny Bahnhof in Rothenburg (only one track that only goes to one other station), I was underwhelmed. I expected to be greeted almost immediately by this beautiful city. Instead, I was greeted by a very modern town. I walked to a street corner that I thought might be the way to the scenic section of the building and a German man came up to me and asked me (in German) if I knew where this particular building was. I shrugged and said, "I don't know" in English...it slipped my mind how to say that in German at the moment. He laughed and asked if I knew what he said and I told him yes and I translated the question into English, but that I didn't know where that building was. He then completely understood that I was here for the tourist part of the city. I asked him if he knew where it was and his answer was very simple: he pointed at a group of Asian tourists reading papers and said, "just follow the Chinese." We shared a laugh and I followed his advice. Of course, following the Asian tourists took me straight to the city.

One of the multiple entrances to the walled town.

What most of the streets looked like.

Had to grab a little snack when I arrived. The thing on the far left is a local specialty called a Schneeball, which means "snowball." It's a pasty made from strips of dough compounded together...or something. Pretty good.

I had no final destination or things that I HAD to see. So like my trip to Freiburg, I was armed with my phone camera and a desire to see some beautiful buildings and to see what Rothenburg has to offer. I also had a good gift ideas for my family back home, so I made sure to buy a couple of things. So instead of telling a story about my day (because it was basically just me walking around and admiring things), I am just going to post all the pictures and comment if I have something to say. Just like my day, I want you to just enjoy the sights.

Lots of colorful buildings.

These towers can be seen around the town. They used to guard the major roads in and out of the city.

The Rathaus. Unfortunately, they were doing construction (like the rest of Germany). But because it's a popular tourist spot, they put up a tarp that looks like the building, as you can see at the bottom of the building. 

Nice try, Rothenburg.

The side of the Rathaus and the bell tower connected to it.

One view from the outer wall.

It was surprisingly hilly.

Large church (for the town, small compared to the Münster and other churches). They wanted me to pay for admission. I'm sorry....but no.

A semi-creepy, Jesus-y figure outside the church.

People like to rub his finger for luck.

More colorful buildings.

This store NAILED their target audience. Good work.

Frankly, I don't remember taking this photo.

Another view from the wall.

The road split in two. This is a popular view of the city.

A smaller church.

Part of the fortification around the town.

You can walk on the wall and see the town from a higher vantage point. Very small walkway, though.

A picture from the wall.

Another tower and gate.

A view from the wall.

There was a part of the town that was basically a nice garden overlooking the valley.

Picture taken from the train back home. Bavaria is just killin' it.

Selfie on the wall overlooking the valley. Yeah, I'm rockin' the tourist backpack.

As for the future, this weekend is very busy. The magazine my host mom publishes is released once every two months. Therefore, I have to stay home and watch the kids all weekend while my host parents spend all day finalizing the newest issue of the magazine. So I probably won't have any pictures from places I go because I won't be going anywhere.

The Wednesday evening class at Mortimer's is also having a raclette dinner. A raclette is a grill that sits at the table and you melt cheese and heat up meat and other foods. It sounds similar to a fondue, but is a little different. I will be able to tell you more about it when it happens, but I am excited. This came about because we were discussing cooking and someone mentioned they had a raclette meal and I asked them what it was. We were talking about it for a bit and then Bernd suggested we bring some raclettes to class. People were assigned to bring certain things (I'm in charge of wine) and we are going to speak English and make some delicious food.

This upcoming week, I am going to try really hard to make a blog post about German culture. I want to discuss various aspects of German culture that I have found interesting during my time here. Many of these things I hope you will find interesting, too. It will consist of little things that you might not think of to bigger things that are hard to miss.

And for some very exciting plans for the future, I depart for Paris on the 23rd! I am very excited to spend the week in Paris with Becky. While she works during the day, I will be doing a little exploring on my own and we will meet up later in the day. There are a couple of things we are doing together, though. We both want to go see Versailles and I believe we are going to climb up the Eiffel Tower. You know, tourist stuff. I am excited that I will get to spend Thanksgiving in Paris AND with an American. Due to lack of kitchen in Becky's apartment, I have offered to take us to dinner on Thanksgiving. My way of repaying her for hosting me.

I will try really, really hard to write my next blog post about culture next week. I don't want to make any promises, though...things happen, you know?

Thank you for reading! Sorry again about the long time between posts... Hope you enjoyed.