Into India: From Delta to Dust

India reminds me of nowhere I've been, and everywhere at once.

In high school I sat bent over a desktop screen watching Jab We Met, my initial contact with Bollywood. What caught me was an iconic scene – that of a train speeding away, and the protagonist (Kareena Kapoor) rushing to jump on. Years later, when I arrived in India, I hit the tarmac racing through customs, baggage claim, to the next gate. My runaway train was my connecting flight to Pune.

My Favorite Finds in Marburg

St. Michael's Chapel

Marburg, like all cities, has its planned routes, its "must-sees", its monuments that put it in the guidebook, if not on the map. The Kaiser-Wilhelm-Tower, the Landgraves Castle, and the fairy tale trail through the old city are all fantastic adventures that take less then a day to complete. But after four months studying there, I was bound to find some hidden treasures:

1. St. Michael's Chapel - This chapel and graveyard was consecrated in 1270. I found it exploring the staircase near a döner shop at the Ketzerbach intersection, and later returned with Deb. Although we didn't go inside the chapel, the graveyard is enough to be amazed at: centuries old tombstones are sunk into the ground or attached to the side of the chapel, the edges withered and the faint epigraphs are the only reminders that these slabs might have labeled a grave. If you continue the upwards climb, you'll discover two routes - one leads to a winding neighborhood with a fantastic view of the castle, the other to Wehrda, Marbach, or the Emil Adolf von Behring Mausoleum.

A piece from the Shinto collection

2. Emil Adolf von Behring Museum - Behring (1854-1917) is accredited with discovered the diphtheria antitoxin and researching immunities. The Museum is located in Marburg's chemistry lecture hall, and I only stumbled upon the museum because my Arabic final took place there in the great lecture hall. I didn't get too much time to look around, but it even briefly skimming the notes, artifacts, and images from this collection was fascinating.

3. Marburg's religious collection - This gem can be found in the old city, on the way to the castle. There's a high wall with seven large hats - the seven dwarfs - and a building with slanted windows. Here, you'll find a vast array of artifacts - sometimes authentic, sometimes not - from world religions. Each floor houses two or three different practices, as well as seminar rooms, as the building functions as a religious studies center. If the museum isn't open, you can ask the desk on the 3rd floor, and they will happily open the entire exhibit. And if you don't know any German, the items are described in English as well. Hinduism and Buddhism definitely dominate, but there's a lot to be said for Christianity, Shintoism, Judaism, Islam, and other pagan beliefs.

The Marburg flea market.

And as a bonus, you should definitely visit the flea market. When I went to scour the finds, it was located in Waggonhalle. It's about a 20 minute walk from the train station, and like the one in Berlin, you can find just about anything there! It's many thanks to my tandem partner that I even decided to go.

Which reminds me, the one must-do when studying abroad: find a tandem partner! In Marburg, you can be matched with someone in the language center, and you can even get credit for doing it. It's a great way to meet new people, practice your German, learn more about your native language, and learn more about your host city!

Bis Bald! Goodbye Germany - For Now!

From up above, Marburg really is a beautiful city.

As some of you may know, my time here in Germany is coming to an end. To be specific - I leave this Thursday.  And I still can't completely believe it. For the past weeks, I've been treading through paperwork, packing, and saying my goodbyes. There's definitely a side of me who isn't ready to return, who wants another week, another month, maybe.

But I'm also ready to go home. It's time to start up my work again. And as much as I'll be glad to be in a familiar culture, speaking my native tongue, there will be things I miss.

A large part of my day is spent traveling, 30 minutes from my dorm to the city center. Everyday. But I'll miss the trains even more. Here it's so simple to travel long distances, and it'll be something I think about whenever I try to maneuver a trip from Knoxville to Memphis. The variety of Megabus-like services will  be stuck in my memory, too - as I've used both the Meinfernbus and Deinbus when traveling to Berlin and Munich. A loss of this vast public transit system is a loss of freedom.

There's also the food. I'll miss quick bites at the Lecker Ecke. I'll miss auflauf, curry wurst, schnitzel and döner. But I'm also excited to get back to inexpensive and more authentic Mexican and Chinese food.

Greek wine and a broken cork...but we
 found a solution!

The scenery in Knoxville is definitely a downgrade from Marburg. Don't get me wrong, Knoxville can be lovely. But it isn't a picturesque German city with a castle from the 11th century built on-top of a mountain. However, both cities require me to walk to school up hill both ways, so at least I'll get a work out back in the USA.

And of course, I'll miss the friends I've made here - both through my dorm and through my tandem program. :)  For those who don't know what a tandem is, it's a language exchange. You find a partner with the language you are learning, and for two hours you practice - one hour per language. I've really enjoyed my time with everyone here, and I only wish I could stay longer!

There is one major thing I've been missing throughout the experience - American higher education. This may sound strange, for the money Germans pay to the university, it isn't bad here. But it's very different.

First, attendance may not matter at all. There were some classmates I only saw twice - once mid semester, and once during exams. Second, none of my lecturers or professors graded homework, or even took it up. Sometimes nothing was assigned. Classes also went at a slower pace than those in the US. It was definitely more laid back, and although I liked not having to buy a textbook, I feel like I thrive better in a more regimented environment. And I remember more.

Three of seven dwarves outside of the
 Religious Collection building.

Exams are one last thing about the education system that I really do prefer in the US. Here there are no tests until your final - at least in my department. It was difficult to study, because there was so much anxiety about the pressure to do well. When I go back, I think I'll be much more relaxed about exams, since I know in the US I have a grade buffer.

And a small tip for those studying abroad: I would suggest studying another language when you're abroad. I know that sounds insane, but it really made a difference for me. I took an optional course in Russian through the Language Center. Everything was in German, and it proved to be more useful than my Sprachkurs (Speaking course, in this case for German). In addition to that, I found studying Russian through German to be simpler, because of the similarities in grammar, such as the case system.

Studying in Germany never really matched my expectations, but it was definitely a great experience- good days and bad. I can't really tell if it's "changed me" - maybe that will come out when I'm back home. 

Nach Berlin mit Liebe

Hanging out with Marx and Engels! 

In June I finally had some relief from German bureaucracy. Since May I had been working to get all the documents for a German visa - not for myself, but for my boyfriend, Deb. Because I was inviting him, and I wasn't a German citizen, everything was more complicated - but nevertheless, I found myself waiting at the airport for his arrival. :-)

It being his first time abroad, everything was exciting - even my small town of Marburg!  But to be honest, we started sight-seeing two days later, in Berlin.

Berlin is like any other big city - at least, what I imagine big cities to look like. But it definitely has it's own quirks - the Ampelmännchen traffic lights, the retro subways, sometimes with wood-paneled interior, and hidden monuments. Seeing all of Berlin in two days is impossible, but we certainly saw a lot!

Our first full day in Berlin, we walked from 9:00 in the morning until 12:00 at night. We ventured into all the main sites - the Brandenburg Tor, Museum Insel, Checkpoint Charlie, the East Side Gallery, Podtzdammer Platz. As we traveled from the middle of the city to Kreuzberg, the hub for multicultural cuisine and indie shops (and my favorite district of Berlin), performers jumped from subway car to subway car playing music. This was much more enjoyable than the cursing drunkardette picking fights on our way back to our hotel, located in Moabit.

A gorgeous mosque in Kreuzberg,  located in-between a
Mexican and Korean Restaurant.

Both Moabit and Kreuzberg turned out to be where Deb and I enjoyed ourselves the most. While in Berlin, we both contracted a cold. The next day, after walking from Moabit to Charlottenburg - which is exhausting, and visited the flea-market on 17th June Street, we made a quick stop in Kreuzberg. As we began walking in Kreuzberg, it began to rain heavily, and we took shelter next to a Korean restaurant. Deb and I had hoped to try some Korean barbecue, but without a reservation, we would have had to sit "yoga style", and both of us were too exhausted for that!

So we ended up back in Moabit - which is a beautiful area, and I wish we would have seen more of it! After freshening up and walking around, we settled for a small Indian restaurant, where Deb taught me how to eat biryani, rogan josh, and naan properly. More than tasty, the food was delicious! A hot one, at that! The next day our colds had nearly vanished - and then we were off to Marburg again.

Sculpture of Shiva, from Marburg's
Religious Collection

Although I enjoyed our time in Berlin, we had a ton of fun in Marburg. We visited Elizabeth's Church, dedicated to Elizabeth of Hungary who became a cult figure in the middle ages. The Marburg Castle was not nearly as interesting, as it has been modernized and turned in a museum for fairytales - with some folk galleries. They are working on the bottom of the castle, I think to show off a preserved version of the castle. Regardless, Deb and I both enjoyed observing the artwork, the religious icons and the armor and weaponry exhibits.

It was on our way to the castle that we stumbled upon the university's religious collections, which at the time were closed. So on Monday we returned, and ended up being the only ones interested in seeing the artifacts, taken or bought by Rudolf Otto. So we had a kind of private showing that encompassed nearly all mainstream religion - Hindu, Christian, Muslim, Shinto, Buddhism and so forth. Deb was able to contribute more to the Hindu and Buddhism descriptions - not all of which were authentic or correct on his account. And when we found an image from a Bollywood movie in the Islamic exhibit, we couldn't help but laugh!

Eventually, though, Deb did have to return to India. And although I missed him the moment he left - and I miss him now, my upcoming exams didn't give me much time to do anything but study!