So About What I Said Last Time...

I lied. Like definitely lied. Sorry guys. I'm a liar.

In case you don't remember my lie, it went something like this: "let's pretend this month will be the one I post every Sunday." Fun fact - there are no more Sundays left in October. Whoops!

In all fairness, two Sundays ago I was amidst midterms and couldn't muster up enough lying power to pretend I was enjoying midterms. Last Sunday, I was in Germany. This past Sunday, I really wanted to watch TV.

Rewind!

Seriously, nothing exciting happened that first week I missed. I went to class, aced some midterms, and returned home to do work. I did make my first trip over to Sweden that Saturday though, which is surprising because Sweden is only a 30-minute train ride away. We visited Malmö and Lund, which aren't huge cities, but they have really cool architecture and urban design.

Malmö is split between an industrial half (which is completely devoid of people on weekends) and a more cultural half (which had a really cool fountain and a fake Chipotle). Lund is a younger, more lively city because of the university it houses, but because of the overcast weather, we gave up on trekking around and ended up in a nice cafe for some cake to top off the fake Chipotle.

The following week contained even more midterms and I think the only notable thing I did was check out the Rosenberg Castle in Copenhagen, which houses the crown jewels. Before you ask, no - I did not create a master plot to steal them. But thank you for asking; I appreciate it.

Alright, now we move into my awesome week in Germany. As I've mentioned before, this trip was to Berlin and Frankfurt with my core class, Video Game Development. There's 18 people in my class, plus our professor and academic director to round out the group to an even 20. We were gone early Sunday morning to late Friday night and we had a ~*blast*~. Seriously though, it was awesome.

We visited both gaming companies and cultural stops. I don't want to bore my interested readers with talk of nerd stuff, but some of these companies were unreal. Some produce video games (which is what I've been doing this semester), some create video game engines (which are then used to produce games), and some do 3D graphics and only do minimal gaming work. It was really cool to meet artists, animators, programmers, and everyone involved in making this industry worth billions of dollars.

As for cultural visits, Berlin held way more in store for us than Frankfurt did. Berlin visits included a city-wide bike tour, the Berlin Wall (multiple parts of it, including the amazing one with all the murals), the Berlin Philharmonic, and the Reichstag dome. A lot of people talked Frankfurt down because it's "boring," but my whole class thought Frankfurt was beautiful and well-designed. However, we didn't do many cultural visits so there's not much to talk about on that front.

Now let me just spend one paragraph talking about how unreal this food was. I cannot emphasize how luxurious this food was. Like wow. Who made this. Our study abroad institute paid for one group meal a day and they spent about as much money as it would take to feed me for a whole year. And I am not complaining. Pork this, duck that, lobster something. Tearing up just talking about this because I'll never eat that great again.

After we returned to Copenhagen, a few of my friends studying abroad in Dublin contacted me to let me know that they were visiting for the weekend, so I spent the past few days being a tour guide and food critic. I may just have a knack for one of those things. Scratch that, I may just have a knack for walking around and eating food.

Okay, I've thoroughly depressed myself with all this talk of deliciousness. I'll be headed to Amsterdam this weekend for Halloween, but I'll be back next week to start off your November right. Only seven weeks until I return home.

I'll be back soon. Mark your calendars - and mark my words!

Before You Say Anything...

...yes, I have not written anything in three weeks. Do I have a good excuse? I don't know, does four cities, lots of game-making, and even a run-in with the law count as a good excuse?!

Let's backtrack, shall we?

I attended lots of school while not writing this post, but I also didn't attend lots of school either. Our program allows for a lot of travel, so they give us two weeks of class, followed by one week of either independent travel or travel with your core class (my gaming class). Seeing as how my travel with my core class isn't until two weeks from now, I had this past week off for independent travel. And boy, did I travel.

But wait, I forgot to backtrack more. Those two weeks were filled with school. I'm sorry I don't have exciting recaps for note-taking, test-acing, or completing assignments, but I'll work on that for next time when I don't have to recap as much. That first weekend I traveled to Munich to experience one of the wonders of the world - Oktoberfest.

Now, I had an unfortunate and unwarranted interaction with security, which I documented in some public Facebook posts here and a necessary clarification post here. Before you ask, I'm fine. In fact, I'd go so far as to say I'm great. We all face adversity in life and I believe it makes us better. And also, I have way too much to recap in this post to focus on this already heavily documented topic.

Let's get to a fun recap!

During my next exhilarating week of class (not gonna lie - I actually am thoroughly enjoying all my classes, but I don't think recapping class is too exciting for you guys), I attended a hygge dinner with some fellow students and it was fantastic. I linked to that section of that Wikipedia page because the concept of "hygge" is impossible to fully explain, but Wikipedia is the master articulator.

After enduring my exhausting two full weeks of class (please note the sarcasm here), I finally got a break. I traveled with a few of my friends to Prague, Vienna, and Budapest. Eight days of being the best tourist I could possibly be - waking up bright and early to ride a double-decker tourist bus around each city and taking pictures of literally everything remotely interesting, and then somehow mustering up the energy to experience the nightlife of whichever city I was in (even if it was Vienna on a Tuesday night).

Prague was gorgeous, but super touristy and maybe a little bit sketchy. They love their bridges and I dug them, too. Lots of walking in this one and way too crowded because we were there Saturday to Monday, aka tourist time. Overall, my least favorite of the three cities, but only because the other two were so awesome.

Vienna, oh Vienna, how I love thee. We spent the longest amount of time here - three nights from Monday to Thursday. This city is full of life, history, and reminded me a lot of something my dad would enjoy. (Hi Baba!) However, this was one of those things that even I enjoy, too. Highlights of this city include:

• Wurstelprater (the oldest amusement park in the world)
• Schönbrunn Palace (a former imperial summer palace, which has the craziest backyard I've ever seen)
• Viennese Sausage (IT'S A HUGE HOT DOG FILLED WITH CHEESE AND THEN THROWN IN A BAGUETTE, WHO DOES THAT, IT WAS AMAZING)

Finally, we move to Budapest. Here's a highlight: 1 USD equals about 280 Hungarian Forint. Here's another highlight: I felt like I was the king of Hungary. I spoiled myself and still managed to spend less than in any other city I've been to thus far. #BallinOnABudapestBudget. The city itself is beautiful, the architecture is unreal, and the Parliament makes me salivate (I was also under the impression that I was rich enough in Hungary to actually just live there, but even I know that's not possible with my bank account). I returned to Copenhagen Saturday night and I'm still working on catching up on sleep, but I'll get back to you on that.

And there we are - Sunday. Welcome to October. Ignoring the fact that I only posted once in September, let's pretend this month will be the one I post every Sunday. C'est la vie (I had a layover in Brussels and am now fluent in French). Until next time, whenever that may be!

It'll be next Sunday. Seriously.