Another one of those don't CRY because its over but SMILE because it happened kind of trips!

THIS PAST WEEKEND WAS ONE OF THE MOST MEMORABLE OF MY LIFE. 

(aside from my family coming to visit!)

The weekend of April the 16th my best friend here in Italy, Yenni Le and I packed up our belongings, food, and happy pants because this was the weekend we went to MUNICH, GERMANY. 

We booked our trip through this fun little weekend trip company here called Bus2Alps. Bus2Alps is really great because they take such great care of you. Not only do you get transportation, room, and breakfast. You also get a planned out agenda of events they organized for the group. 

It is a seven hour bus ride from Florence, Italy to Munich, Germany and it is an absolutely breath taking ride. The mountains are unlike any I have ever seen and the grass is so incredibly green. We departed around 7 and made it there around 2 am. Unfortunately, my sweet Yenni and I went to stake our claim for a room together and there were no rooms available for two people. So we had to split up. While we were trying to get a room together I noticed a name on the list of Bus2Alpers going to Munich  that looked familiar. In fact, the name looked so familiar that I had mentioned it to Yenni while waiting to depart from the train station earlier that day because someone in our group looked like her. So I went up to her and asked her if her name was Haley and BAM! Just like that, a friendly familiar face from high school.  

Haley is a year older than me, we went to high school together, she went to Texas Tech, and is now living in Northern California. She is the only person besides my family I have seen here from back home. It was quite exciting for the both of us.

Day one in Munich, Germany: April 17: BIKE TOUR AROUND GERMANY!

Okay so I now know that "The Sound of Music" was filmed in Austria but I still felt like I was in The Sound of Music while touring around this city. There is just something about traveling around Munich, in a group, on old school bikes that makes me feel like Julie Andrews is leading our pack. However, I do not believe Julie Andrews would take us to the English Gardens where we have a "Beer Break" before finishing up our tour. (Yes, it was about noon.) Here we were able to see and sit under the beautiful Chinese Tower.

Next we adventured around and came back to Mike's bike shop where we were set free to eat at this lovely place called "Kuchlbauer's Bierwelt". Where I tried my first german pretzel. (Not so impressive.) 

We finished off our day with a pub crawl through Munich. Dinner and unlimited drinks for the first hour and a half and a tour after that was the offer for only 15 Euro. Can't beat that! Only the beer they served was unbelievably heavy (it was called Guntengurg), the food had meat in it, and you were surrounded with amazing people you could not help but talk to! Luckily, if you were one of the first 10 ladies there you got everything for free. I do not know who the other 7 girls were but and Yenni, Haley, I got everything for free. Yay!

At the next pub we went to, the CEO of Bus2Alps was an absolute sweetheart and bought Yenni and I a drink as a "Thank you for being accommodating" referring to Yenni and I's room split up. 

Day 2 in Munich and Dachau, Germany: April 18: CONCENTRATION CAMP and SPRINGFEST

Yenni and I woke up early early early and headed over to find out more about taking a tour of the first concentration camp established in Germany. This camp is located in Dachau, Germany. It is just 10 miles outside of Munich. All in all this was the most intense moment of our trip. During this trip we stood were unfathomable amounts of people died, were humiliated, tortured, used for experiments, and forced labor. 

Never in my life did I think I would stand in a Crematorium were bodies were burned. Never in my life did I think I would stand were the bodies of those who suffered during the holocaust had once laid. Never ever in my life did I think I would stand in a gas chamber. There are very few words I can think of to express how much this experience impacted both Yenni and I.  

 The Dachau concentration camp is huge. One can literally spend all day there. There is so much to see, so much to read, and so much to let soak in. As hard as it is. The crematorium I mentioned earlier was hidden within the concentration camp. This is a characteristic our tour guide says is proof that the Nazi's knew what they were doing was wrong. While leaving this crematorium I noticed a plaque on the wall stating that in February of 1945 the crematorium ceased to be used due to THE COAL SHORTAGE. This shocked me. 

Next we came back to the hostel which was amazing! Unlike our first experience with hostels. Our hostel's name is The Wombats Hostel and I recommend them to everyone! 

Springfest was the best possible way to finish up much an intense sad day. Springfest reminded me a lot of our fairs in the states only quite a bit more...... oh what is the word.........GERMAN. Instead of a boring "food court area" there is a tent and underneath there are hundreds of people packed in tables. Most are standing at the tables, singing, dancing, drinking out of gigantic mugs of beer, and eating. Everyone is friends with everyone! Your waitress is wearing a cute little german dress and there is also live german and english music playing. I had my first legit german pretzel here. Yummy!

Outside are rides and foods of all sorts. Meat, meat, meat, and oh did I say meat? This I did not enjoy but oh mamma mia did I enjoy the sugar roasted pecans and chocolate covered strawberries!! They have chocolate covered everything at springfest! Eeek! 

I had a hard time making the transition from speaking Italian to German. Most everywhere you went they spoke English and Yenni would try to tell me, "We are lucky Teia, they speak english!" but I kept being difficult.   

Day 3 in Munich, Germany: April 19: Deutsches Museum

Once again Yenni and I woke up unbelievably early and headed out to find our task for the day. Today our task was anything inexpensive because Yenni's debt card got demagnetized and my income of zero can only get us so far. 

Task found! Deutsches Museum only 3 euro entry fee. This was the coolest museum ever! There was so much to see and so much to do! Marine Navigation, Modelrailway, Aeronautics, Hydraulic engineering, Energy technologies, Museums's history, Federal presidents award for Technology and Innovation, Scientific chemistry, Altamira Cave, Glassblowing, Ceramics, Astronautics, textiles, environment, foto+film, and oh so much more. 

Honestly, I just really enjoyed seeing real airplanes, massive ships, the environment section, and the foto+film room was AMAZING!!! I could have stayed there for hours upon hours! It was also quite compelling to see a world perspective from Germany. 

Through this trip I got to really see Germany. One might feel some uneasiness towards Germany due to their rough and recent history. I might have felt some uneasiness towards Germany before this visit but Germany embraced me with open arms and now I cannot wait to go back!

Thank you so much for reading!  

Sempre,

Teia Hagood

ps- I really want my family to come here with me *cough*cough*

Say a prayer for my family.

MY WONDERFUL FAMILY WAS HERE IN ITALIA!!

My family made it to Italy safe and sound on saturday April the 5th. My Aunt Selena, Momma, and Daddy arrived in Rome and we had a great time. Our first night, we took a night tour of Rome where we quickly saw: 

an eyehole in a door with a beautiful view of the dome of Saint Peters

a piazza with a view of the city

the Spanish Steps

Trevi Fountain 

Basiica di San Pietro

Vatican entrance

Pantheon

Castel Sant' Angelo ("the angel castle")

Piazza Navona ( "the 3 fountains")

Colosseum

Palazzo Venezia

the wedding cake monuement

We finished up our first amazing evening together with dinner at a restaurant named, La Maieletta. This is not the correct spelling. I should spell it correctly due to the fact that I have it written on one of our Holiday Inn Rome West maps. However, since I have ten maps from our Holiday Inn experience I cannot find the map our wonderful hotel clerk, Vincenzo, gave us with the name of the restaurant. Our waiter at La Maieletta was a hoot and a half. My family got to experience their first shot of Limoncello. They thought I was insane when I ordered it because they were absolutely full and they thought I was ordering "Limon Jello"! Silly silly fun fun times! 

The following day we took the day to revisit all of the above places and much much more to see them during the day and get better pictures. We saw the tomb of Rafael in the Pantheon, the inside of the basilica di S. Pietro (Saint Peters Church), had some of the best coffee and hot chocolate in town from San Eustacio's, and later treated ourselves to some of the best gelato in town from Crispino's. This was the day following the horrible earthquake. Thank you all for your concern. We were not affected by its disaster. We probably would have felt something but my parents were recovering from jet lag and I sleep like a rock. We also went shopping and had dinner at a nice little Trattoria. 

The next day, April 7, was our Vatican tour. It was amazing. Crazy and hectic but all in all amazing! We then soaked up some of the beauty the colosseum had to offer. We ended our night with dinner in our hotel and it was to our surprise OUTSTANDING!

April 8th, we took a sweet little trip to Naples and Pompeii. One word... Glorious! Oh minus our tour guide that smelled of cigarette smoke and loved the sound of her voice a little too much. Naples known by some here as "Mafia central". My personal opinion is that it is worth seeing during the day. Pompeii was one the best experiences we had on our trip. We had a much better tour guide for our walk through Pompeii. I got to see casts of people that are FROZEN IN TIME! Great creepy picture opp!  

April 9th was Cinque Terra Giorno! (Five Islands day) My momma is convinced they are not islands and simply villages. This was so much fun and the beauty of the islands is unreal. We became experts on using the train in italy on April 9. We took the train to Cinque Terra in the morning and ended our night by taking a train to Florence. We had dinner at my favorite Restaurant "Gloden View" and then had some Hotel Chaos but ended up at a wonderful bed and breakfast.

April 10 my family and I visited the Uffizi gallery, saw the David, Piazza Sinoria, Piazza Vecchio, Duomo, had an exquisite tour of the Basilica di Santa Croce by one the best tour guides in town (Me!), and of course we hit up San Lorenzo Square for a little shopping. That night we made the complex decision to come back to Rome via train.

April 11 we soaked up our last day together shopping and enjoying each others company in Rome. To conclude our magnificent Italian experience together we decided it would be best to have dinner at our favorite restaurant we went to our first night in Italy, La Maieletta. Our waiter remembered where we sat and a lot of what we ordered. 

Unfortunately, we did not get to end our trip happily. On the night of April 11 (early Easter) my grandmother, Jessie Hagood, passed away. My grandmother was the cutest woman and she looked adorable in hats. She use to teach me to croce (you know ... that thing you do with yar n) and would make me the most rockin' egg sandwiches ever. We also loved walking over to the dollar store together and buying useless knickknacks that served no purpose but to make us happy. She lived such during such an interesting time. During her lifetime her husband fought in WWII and the first African American was elected president of the USA. Woah! 

I do not want my grandmother to be gone but I understand that she had to go. I especially do not want her to go while I am unable to say goodbye but I understand I will get to say goodbye. I do not like not being able to lend some support to my family, I hope that I am able to do so from across the globe. 

I love you Grandma.

I love you family.

I love you EVERYONE!!   

 

Thank you for reading and HAPPY EASTER!