The shoes are in the bag

Today is the first day that I'm really not sure what I want to blog about, so I'm just going to go with the most recent happenings. We've had a bit of a frustrating start to our trip to Amsterdam. It took me much longer to take the dogs to the kennel than anticipated (thanks to traffic on the bus, not to me being late), I needed to stop and get Euros, we needed o finish packing and I was met at home by a frantic BK who was certain we were going to miss our flight. Not how I like to start any trip.

BK was funny because he wanted instruction on what to do with all of the items to be packed that I had laid out on the bed. From the tram (almost home), I told him the one thing to do was to put the shoes on the bottom so that our suitcase didn't fall over every time we stepped away from it. When I arrived back at the apartment he had put his shoes at the bottom of the suitcase...AND THAT'S IT. Having already organized everything, I packed the suitcase, got an additional bag we needed and we were on our way. On that note, let me just say that it irritates me when I can't fit all of our stuff for a long weekend trip into ONE carryon. I'm not sure why, but it just does. I blame the tennis shoes needed for our bike tour tomorrow.

Of course, all turned out fine, and we made the flight, but not without a couple of additional frustrations on the way. Airport security gets me every time. Even if you are not a frequent flier, surely you watch the news and know that your computer has to come out of your bag, your shoes have to come off and your liquids need to come out of your bag. It gets me when I'm stuck behind someone whose bag is about to go into the x-ray machine and they haven't taken their liquids out. At the time I'm thinking "you can't be serious with this!!" I just don't understand. Those rules are for everyone- even you, the clueless one.

Then I made the mistake of forgetting about the fact that BK would be bringing his work backpack along with us. We're flying EasyJet. They're cheap because they get you with the little fees. So upon boarding our flight, we were informed that BK would either need to fit his backpack into our carryon suitcase or pay 50 Euros to check. No fitting the backpack, so we had to pay the 50 Euros. My bad on that one. I've now been informed that I should pay more for an airline with better service. Lesson learned for this budding travel agent.

So that brings us to now- in the air on the way to Amsterdam. We arrive a little before 9pm and are then heading straight to a tour of the Red Light District that starts at 10. Hopefully the rest of this trip goes a little smoother...scratch that- BK's Pepsi just overflowed on his tray. Maybe we'll start looking up when we land. Just heard that we'll have an early arrival. One step forward.

Ich heisse Frau King

It's amazing how much faster the day, and week, goes by when you have something challenging to do. Specifically for me right now that challenge is intensive German lessons. Not that training the boys was not challenging, or that doing work for groups in the US was not challenging, but I appreciate the opportunity to get up, get out of the house and do something. Now when I come home from class, half my day is gone and I still have lots of stuff to do, including homework.

Monday I started intensive German classes. I am enrolled at a local school and am in class with three other women who are also expats. One is from the US, I'm guessing around my age, and moved here around the same time we did; one is from South Africa, is a little older than me and has been here for around nine months; and the other is from China, around the same age as me, and has been here for four-and-a-half years. I'm not quite sure how she's survived that long here without speaking the language, but she's been working on her PhD in Chemistry and they only use English in that environment. I've about had it with not knowing the language and we've only been here for 12 weeks.

In the time that I've spent getting us settled in, I underestimated how much I value being able to get out and meet new people. The first day I went to class was exhilarating- a new subject, new people to get to know and lots of new knowledge to soak in. BK is very excited that I'm meeting new people and has already suggested that we invite a couple to go to dinner. I need a little more than four days for that. I'm an extrovert, but he takes it to the extreme sometimes.

Being in class for just four days, I've also realized how much I love learning. I'm not sure that I would have described myself as such before, and it's not necessarily that I have a passion for the language, but I really enjoy learning new and different things. I think part of what makes learning German exciting as well, is that it opens up a whole new world for me here. After learning the language I will be able to volunteer and get involved in the social work community, which is where my heart really lies and what I'm eager to do. I'll also be able to communicate with neighbors and other community members at a basic level.

BK gets to learn too. Right now our apartment is labeled in German words to help me learn. There are various colors of stickies to remind me of their gender- pink for feminine items, yellow for masculine and orange for neutral. The German language is built on these articles, so let's hope I can get and keep them straight.

After this class is over I will have gone through levels A1 and A2, and hope to keep going for a couple more levels. We'll see when the time comes. BK and I are headed to Amsterdam tomorrow night. As always, there are more adventures waiting to be had.

In case you're wondering, the title of this post translated into English is My name is Mrs. King. And no, I don't go by that, it was just for effect.

And Now On To Transylvania...

After the wedding fun subsided, we all recovered on Sunday, including a post-wedding dinner/happy hour type event with L&V's friends from home. Transylvania was our next destination, and L&V so graciously offered to take us there on Monday and Tuesday. Don't worry...we didn't barge in on their honeymoon or anything. They go to Italy in August to celebrate.

For those of you who aren't familiar with Romanian geography (I wasn't, and am still a little foggy) Transylvania is a region of Romania, not a specific city. The region is northwest of Bucharest and boasts a lot of countryside, mountains and small villages. I believe the biggest town in Transylvania is Brasov, which is in the southern part of the region.

Before we got to the mountains we stopped at a monastery. It's famous because legend has it that when it was being built, the builder would build during the day, go home to sleep at night, then the next morning everything would be undone. One night in a dream, the builder had a vision that he needed to build his wife into the monastery and it would solve this problem. So the next day he did, and there she stays to this day. V said they learn this as a love story in school. Not sure what to make of that.

Romania has two or three highways (debated between L&V), but after you get off the highway, or if you want to take the scenic route to the top of the mountain, here's what you have to drive through:

I won't lie. I spent much of the trip to the top of the mountain laying down/sleeping in the back of the car, only to rise when something really interesting happened. We drove for quite a few hours, but the reward was awesome, and somewhat unexpected. We ate at a great diner-type restaurant and enjoyed views of the mountains, a lake and lots of sheep being herded on the mountain side.

I believe when we made it over the top of the mountain, we were officially in Transylvania. From there went through some other small villages, then made it to Bran, which is where the castle is located. We stayed a great little resort called Club Vila Bran. I'm under the impression they do a lot of business around Halloween, but there were still a fair number of people there. V made sure BK and I had the room with the view:

In the evening we relaxed, enjoyed the views and had another traditional Romanian dinner. Each time I mention dinner we were usually trying new things we had not yet experienced.

"Dracula's Castle" is actually Bran Castle and was obviously made famous by the story of Dracula. The story was inspired by Vlad the Impaler who ruled in this area long ago. We toured the castle the next morning. It was not at all scary and was really your typical European castle, furnished with period pieces throughout.

On the way back to Bucharest we briefly stopped to view the residential palace, although now that I think about it, I am not sure who lives there since Romania is not a monarchy. I was raining again, so we just viewed from afar.

The only bad thing about the trip was that BK had to change his flight to go back to Switzerland a day early, which also happened to be our 8th wedding anniversary. Unfortunate, but not the end of the world. I spent the evening with L&V hanging out in Bucharest, relaxed the next morning, then went to see the Village Museum. I would recommend this stop. It's an open air museum in which they have brought in homes from the different regions of Romania to illustrate the various cultures and architecture.

Romania was an extremely interesting trip for us. As I previously mentioned, I found the push and pull between their past and their future very evident, but that is also mixed with people who are very proud of everything their country stands for. Many thanks to our friends L&V for their hospitality throughout our entire trip!

Oh yeah, and one more thing. When you hear that Romania is full of gypsies, don't believe it. There are gypsies in Romania, but no more than any other European country. A long time ago, Romania just happened to be the only one who didn't kick them out as soon as they arrived.