shannon's fairytale

guess who's 20?!!!

2008-08-26T12:37:00.000-07:00

ME!! and i'm not very excited about it except for the fact that i went to disneyland on my birthday day with 4 of my best friends!! But before i left i was in my room getting ready and i hear a knock on my bedroom door and i'm like who's knocking alex and mel always just come in??!! i open it and sarah and laura suprised me and came in with presents and a card!! it was so wonderful!!! and they visited with me while i finished getting ready and then when i went downstairs they had posted signs up that said we love you in german and stuff it was so sweet!!! oh AND when i had very first woken up i went into the bathroom and there was writing on the mirror that day happy birthday shannon and i love you and stuff and a crown that fit over my head when i look in the mirror and it said birhtday princess!! i loved it! i guess mel had done it while i was asleep!

back to disneyland though...I went with laura, matt, jeff, and shane!! it was so much fun even the car ride! laura and i were singing disney songs and trying to get the boys to sing along!! and then when i got there they give you a button that says "happy birhtday shannon" and you wear it around and if a worker sees it they wish you happy birthday!! its so weird that i'm 20 now!! yuck!! anyways it was a perfect day! nice weather barely anyone in the park!! i dont think we waited more than 20 minutes for a ride and i got to go on space mountain and indiana jones twice!! my two favorites!! we ended the day with indiana jones though cuz thats my favorite favorite!!! it was just so much fun and only matt and laura new each other and shane and jeff knew of everyone but they all got along great and are just great friends and great ppl and it made the day even more special!! and they kept saying like whatever you want to do shannon it's your birthday!! and then we ate at the rainforest cafe, the COOLEST resturaunt i've ever been in and they didn't make fun of me for getting chicken strips since it was my birthday!!
i love them!!

then it gets even better!! I came back on campus and mel told me loralie gilmore was through the canyon eating and i had to come so i was lik oh my gosh i'm obsessed with her i have to go and then they called me and told me she had just left so i was like dangit and turned around and went back to pepperdine and told them that before i came home I was gonna go say hi to dex and royce!! so I'm visiting with them in their new place and alex calls me and is like you have to come over right now! i have a suprise for you and i'm getting really tired and want to go to bed and i was like ok ok i'm coming!! so dex and royce say they'll come too and see my apt. and we get there and (first of all it took forever cuz i could'nt find any parking!) and alex and mel run out in the garage to see me and are like we have a suprise for you!! and i said "is is a puppy??!!!" well i walk in and they decked out my entire appartment in cinderella princess party decorations!! there were mobiles and pop out dresses and wall posters, a pinata (which i had been looking for all over and couldnt find one!) a princess baloon and pin the princess in the window game!!! i freaked out and was like so happy and hugging them and saying they were the best!! and hten they said thats not the best part though, open the blinds so i go to open them, and i can't of course cuz i'm shannon and am retarded and i was like how do you do it and they wouldn't open and she goes just come over here and open the door and i do and out on our little patio are like 15 of my favorite ppl!!!!!!! i was so excited and happy that i didn't even know what to do with myself!! i was just hugging everyone and had to sit down cuz i was so overwhelmed with how great everyone was!!!! i have the best friends!! it was basically the best birthday ever and i was the most worrie about it cuz i was going to be turning 20!!!! so everyone hung out and we played this game called signs for like an hour and it was just wonderful!!!
oh yeah and they made me a cake!! like this cake was so legit!! alex and mel made the entire thing and it was of the care bear that i am! like we made care bears up for each other and drew pictures of them and little descriptions and they made my care bear into a cake!! you have to see the picture i thought they bought it and just adjusted it a little but oh no they made the whole thing cuz they're amazing!!!

BACK AT PEPPERDINE!!

2008-08-26T12:28:00.000-07:00

Ok sooooo... i'm gonna try and be better at posting on here but i can't make any promises!!!

Mema told me that I should just write short little things so that way i can have time to do it but i just get so carried away in writing the stories of what happens that sometimes it takes me over an hour for one blog!! But I want everyone to know whats going on in life with me so I'm gonna try and keep em short and sweet (its way to hard for me to do though, i just want to write about everysinge detail!!)

so i came back to peperdine on the 13th! the drive went well and i didn't get lost once! suprising i know!! my appartment is amazing! i'll post pictures later cuz i dont have any on my computer right now!! but i love it! and when i came in alex had the living room and dining room all decorated and it was even more adorable with it looking all homey!! i'm obsessed with it!!

NSO started (new student orientation) and the training was super boring but I got to hang out with my friends whom i haven't gotten to do that with in FOR-EVER!! so it was worth it! and one day while we were walking around campus for training trading spaces was filming in a freshman dorm (before they all moved in) and the guy was like hey do you guys want to be on camera?? and i was like yes and ran over to the front and all of us did the wave (i dragged alex to the front with me!) and then we ran into the cameras!! and then page the host came out and i freaked out cuz i want to do that like be a host for a tv show or somehting, not an actress but a host!! and they told us we had to leave so i couldn't talk to her and i just wanted to make a connection and so before i left i waved to her and said "i want to be you when i grow up!" everyone laughed at me but i didn't care cuz it was true and i wanted to talk to her and i was so upset we had to go =(
alex said if anyone else would've said it it would've been weird but since it was me it was funny but whatever!

the freshman moved in and i already have lots of new friends! pat sajacks (from wheel of fortune) son goes here!! he's also named pat sajack! he's in my friend gregs dorm! i thought that was pretty cool!

oh and i randomly saw my friend daniel from camp who lives in oregon cuz his sister goes here now! so that was fun too!! i cant think of anything else exciting during nso just that it was a lot of work and a lot of fun and i got like 10 shades darker in one week!! oh and lots of beach time before school started!!

luv shannon

2008-02-23T13:57:00.000-08:00

So while in madrid, sorry i haven't blogged about this yet but its been crazy mad busy lately and i haven't had any time to do anything, anyways while in madrid, sarah (my new roomate whom I love!!), Laura, and I got finished with this really weird museum and hour before we were supposed to meet to be back on the bus to go home and so we decided to film a music video to a silly song in madrid and it turned out the only one that all three of us knew all the words to was "My Humps" it was pretty much amazing!!! so here it is!! i hope you like it!!!

luv shannon

2008-02-18T06:52:00.000-08:00

So I am in complete and total love with paris!! I was so excited to go I’d been listening to my Anastasia soundtrack that has a paris song on it all week long, listened to it when I got ready before leaving Friday morning and played it on the train about a zillion times! I watched a france movie the night before falling asleep to it just to get me even more excited, and searched desperately for passport to paris with mary-kate and Ashley!! And lets just say it certainly was not disappointing whatsoever!!
Laura and I sat together on the train and laughed and laughed the entire time and when we finally arrived in paris it was amazing!! Amber, a girl that was in the Heidelberg program before, met us at the train station because she knew one of the girls in our group! She’s living there for a year and teaching English to a highschool!! I want her life! Anyways it was so wonderful that she was there to meet us because she told us exactly what kind of metro pass to buy and where to go and we didn’t even have to think about anything! It was a smoothe trip from the very beginning! What do you know it can actually happen with me in a group, weird!! Haha!!
So we get to our hotel and I’m already obsessed! It had ivory little balconies on every window and when you looked out it was just as I imagined a little apartment in paris to look out over a sweet little street with a just as cute building! It wasn’t the most amazing hotel but it was adorable!
Then we just dropped our stuff off and went to meet amber and dustin in front of her apartmens metro stop, which was right next to the eifel tower!! Yeah, like I said, I want her life!! So we emerge from the metro and we see them and then she says come on the eifel towers just right here, and so we’re walking and I’m following her and we’re all getting so excited and I feel like it’s just around the corner and we round the corner and I’m looking slightly to the left and I think I see it and I get all excited and it’s kind of far away and I can’t wait to walk to it, and then…. I look a little to my left… and there it is in all it’s glory towering above me!!!! I screamed and smiled so big you couldn’t have wiped that smile off my face for anything in the world!! I just can’t explain it in any other way other than it was fantastic!!! I couldn’t take my eyes off of it!! we all were the giddiest girls you’ve ever seen!! We just walked with jaws dropped up to the ledge and stared and kept saying “I’m in paris!! I’m in paris!!” and then off course we took a million pictures!! It was just amazing!! I don’t know what else to say!! I was totally in a dream!! The entire time all of us felt like we were in a movie, everything we did seemed so movie like it still doesn’t feel real!! I think it also helped that we made sure to make it a girls only trip, didn’t let it get spoiled by boys attitudes!! ;)
Then we walked down to the bottom of it and realized that it was even more amazing cuz it was so ginormous!!! And we walked to the top!! Ok, well not the top but as far up as you can climb the stairs!! I was so excited it didn’t even phase me that we walked over 600 stairs!! And on the first level there was an ice statue of the eifel tower and snow!! It was wonderful!! And then the second story was the most incredible view I’ve ever seen!! I felt like I was in sleepless in seattle (mostly cuz I’ve never gone up the empire state building so this was the closest relation I had to it!!) and then we got so lucky and were up there for sunset!! sigh me n paris were just meant to be together that weekend!! The sky was beautiful and clear all weekend and everyone else had been having miserable weekends there with rain and freezingness!! Not us though!!
Then we found this incredibly adorable street, I think we found out later it was called latin street, or something like that and we found the coolest little crepe place! It looked like Greece inside and our waitor was so handome and spoke little English but tried to hard to help us out and I had so many languages going on in my head that when he handed me some water I stuttered and then finally gratzi came out (which is itallian) and I laughed and said oh no sorry merci (frecnch) and he laughed and said in a different language which weirdly I understood that he didn’t speak itallian either but he spoke a little Spanish! And we laughed together about our language barriers! Then when we were leaving he said bye to everyone and then to me he said (in ittallian) cia bella cia bella and winked and laughed at me!! He was so sweet!! And then we made our way to the luve, home of the mona lisa!
The outside of the building alone was enough to impress me and as we were walking up everyone was walking in the same direction from all different entrances and some guy was playing the clarinette and I was like “I feel like we’re following the star of david to jesus’ birth cuz everyone’s emerging out of nowehere all to the same place!” and my friend was like oh my gosh yes!! And then we realized It was probably because the clarinette player was playing away in a manger!! Haha!!
Me n Chelsea C. decided to take the stroll aroud the luve together cuz we both like looking at stuff but don’t really like reading EVERY description or pausing forever to take stuff in but we do enjoy just wandering!! So we set out first to find the mona lisa!! We finally found it with much confusion regardless of the many signs pointing on how to get to it! it’s not as small as I expected it to bee so that was fun!! Everyone always made it seem like it was like the size of a piece of paper but it was normal painting size! I still don’t get why it’s so wonderful and I tried to read the description to see, however I still don’t speak French so…. That was that!! And then we strolled around and just talked and looked! It was fun! We saw king louis’ crown and other jewels and then randomly ran into another group of ours that was in paris, joe and jarred, and we decided to meet up with them later. And then, another weird thing was that Chelsea said this girl looked familiar and wanted me to ask if she went to pepperdine and she did!! It just makes me feel so happy when stuff like that happens cuz it really is such a small world after all!! And then I saw that there was a ruben room and I love ruben so we tried to find him for like 45 minutes and walked EVERYWHERE we couldn’t even move our legs we thought they were gonna fall off!! And we “got in our map” many times and still were never going in the right direction and then we finally found it and just sat down and took ruben’s massive paintings in!!
Then it was time for the luve to close so we met back up with everyone and went on a search for hot chocolate!! The place we wanted to go to wasn’t open so we followed joe, our own personal tour guide, around cuz he’d been to paris like 5 times and is obsessed with history so he would tell us while we were walking like every monumental building and the stories behind it! It was so wonderful to have him around! And then we realized we’d been walking for an hour to get to the Champs Elysees because when we left the eifel tower was sparkling and when we got there it was sparkling again, I’ve never actually had my legs hurt so much where I don’t even know how they’re lifting than that day!! But it was totally worth it! the champs elysees is this amazing street like the 3rd street promenade in santa monica times 10!!! It was amazing just to look around at all the wonders of a shoppers dream! And then we walked all the way down it to the arch d’triumph and joe gave us a little history lesson about that and it’s basically like the unknown soliers memorial and there’s a flame burning!
Then the boys were so sweet cuz they were starving and hadn’t eaten like all day and it was like 11:30 at night and they took us all back to our hotels because they didn’t want us riding the metros alone that late at night and weren’t sure how long they ran so they didn’t want us to get stuck somewhere, they didn’t get home themselves until like 2 in the morning =(
So then the next morning we woke up and went to the pantheon! Which was cool cuz it has all monumental French ppl buried in it I didn’t go inside though cuz crypts really aren’t my thing if you know what I mean?! Then we walked our way over to notre dame! It was cool to finally see and of course I posed like the hunchback of notre dame in my picture!! I wasn’t really impressed with the inside of it though cuz I don’t like gothic style things, kind of depressing! But there was this really fun playground outside of it, so of course I played on it! I think I’m the only person that can find a playground wherever I go!! And then what are the odds, I’m stuck trying to get out to play on the now free teeter totter when the other Heidelberg group that was in paris comes along!! And they were all watching for a while and I didn’t even know! And then this homeless man was speaking to us in French telling us to get off cuz it was for little kids and a French dad translated for us and laughed and he goes “he’s saying its for small kids, you’re just tall kids!” see the French aren’t so rude as everyone says they are!
Then Christina Chelsea c. and I went to find this old bookstore where the top floor is reserved for just ppl who want to read and it has old rickety chairs and cats bathing in the sun! I was so excite to go but we couldn’t find it anywhere, it’s so hard to read maps! But we did stumble across an igloo skating rink and man made sledding hill and carousel, and a paris thrift store!! I felt like I was in what a girl wants! We tried on all these crazy outfits and were all smooshed in this little dressing room laughin and taking pictures with pictures of exotic dancers on the wall!! I’ll never forget that it was like a movie, really!!
Then we just got lost a little more, on purpose, and found this toasted panini stand for only 3 euros and walked the streets some more before we finally headed to the museum we were supposed to meet everyone else at! My favorite part about paris was just walking around and feeling like I belonged there! And there were all these stands with painings and old photographs and everything matched my room and was like a euro so of course I bought a few little posters!! I wanted some of the paintings so bad but they were too expensive for me but I was basically OBSESSED with everything I saw!! Then we met up with the rest of the group and I split off again with Chelsea B., Dustin, and caroline to go shopping at Lafayette, a 7 STORY SHOPPING MALL!!!
It looked like what I pictured the macy’s thanksgiving day parade street to look there, and there were just people oozing out from everywhere!! The first floor was designer accessories and they had the funnest hats of my life! I wanted to try on every single one! And the way the shops are set up is like theres no stores each merchant just has it’s own little area that there clothes are and its just all out in the middle of everywhere!! I was in heaven!! But everything was so expensive! I was saving my money all weekend so I could have a dress from paris, but it just wasn’t in the cards because I was supposed to meet another group at the eifel tower at 6 and so I could only stay for like 45 minutes, it was painful to leave I must say, I was in love with everything!!
But alas, I had to run so I left them there and went by myself to meet the other group at the eifel tower, they didn’t want me to go by myself but no one wanted to go meet them and my friend matt was in the group we were supposed to be meeting up with and I knew that he would wait like an hour and would be kind of upset if no one showed up so I went! And really, I know I keep saying it, but I felt like I was in a movie, I was late so I was running down this hill that’s directly in front of the eifel tower and just staring up at it as I was running and it was starting to light up cuz It was getting dark and I was holding onto my hat so it wouldn’t fall off and my long coat was blowing in the wind and I had that paris song stuck in my head!! I felt like I was watching myself from the tv screen cuz it was totally a movie moment!! I was just amazed at how blessed I am the entire trip!!
Well, of course there were a million ppl there so I couldn’t find them and Chelsea B. didn’t want me to wait alone down there cuz they were all gonna meet there at 8, so she told me to go to a coffee shop and just sit there till 8 but I got too nervous cuz not know the language intimidates me so I walked back to the eifel tower and by that time it was time for the glitter show of the eifel tower again so I sat down on the steps and wathed it and then looked at all my pictures, and you know how I hate being alone?? Well I was so content and happy just to sit in front of this amazing structure and be in awe and amazed in silence and be alone!! It was wonderful!! A moment I’ll never forget!! So then I waited by the metro stop hoping someone would come early and then 8 o’clock rolled around and I wanted to see the light show again so I stood right in the center of this platform where no one was so I would be in clear sight and watched the light show again and was still even more obsessed and I started to get freezing and I just decided if noone came by the time the light show was over I’d just go back to the hotel cuz I’m not gonna be alone, so I was standing there and prayed that I was so thankful to be there and so amazed by the beauty, but also that someone would come soon because I was freezing but I dint’ want to go back and I didn’t want to be alone at night on the metos, and I’m not even kidding like 1 minute later I hear my name and I freaked out!! I started turning in all different directions praying that they were talking to me!! And then I see two figures emerge out of the darkness saying my name and it was Chelsea C. and Laura and I hugged them so hard!! I was like I’m so glad you’re here!! And they said they’d been there since 6 too and the other group had too and that they didn’t find each other till like 7:30!! So moral to the story never pick the eifel tower as a meeting point, only do cuz its amazing to keep getting to see it!! so then right as we were about to leave and just go get dinner by ourselves, we see Chelsea dustin and caroline running up the stairs!! And we all embraced again and they were so glad we had found each other and they were worried about me!!
So then…. We went to eat dinner and we ate dinner at a café’ in front of the eifel tower and watched it glitter two more times and were served an amazing French dinner for only 8 euro and had the most charming French waitor!! He reminded me of bert from marry poppins!! We all wanted to marry him!! He was adorable! And we took a picture with him!! And then it was off to the Moulin rouge for us!! We asked our waitor how to get there and he was very concered and protective for us he said stay close together and showed us how to hold our bags so we didn’t get pick pocketed and that we should be very alert!! And then he told us two stops too early to get off so we had to walk in the red light district of paris!!! We decided we were gonna make shirts that say “don’t’ mess with us, we WALKED to the Moulin rouge!”
It wasn’t that bad though, you just had to avert eye contact and ignore when you were clearly being spoken too!! And caroline had mace wrapped around her knuckles from laura, so we were golden!! And then this cute british couple was there taking pictures too so we felt safe and there was a metro stop right in front of it so we didn’t have to worry about walking back by all the creepers!! But then we got on the metro going the wrong direction and made the mistake of getting off to change sides at this teeny tiny station and we were the only ones there and we kept hearing footsteps and our hearts were beating so fast and we had to switch sides twice cuz one of em went off the board and we thought it was done running and we were freaking out and we were all praying inside our heads cuz there was just this one kind of shady looking guy there and that was in and then we heard a few set of footsteps coming down the stairs and all of our hearts stopped and then it was a couple and we all let out sighs of reliefs and we shifted towards them and then more ppl came and we could finally relax!! WAY scarier than the red light district!! Anyways, not that I’ve freaked out all of my relatives, we got back just in time, made the last metro of the night!! And they locked the gate up right as we exited!! Carazy!!
In the morning we dropped our stuff down at ambers apartment, which by the way is probably the cutest thing I’ve ever seen!! I want to do what she’s doing!! And she can see the tip of the eifel tower from her apartment!! It looks like a bird house on the inside! That’s the only way I can think to explain it!! And then we went to a bakery she told us to go to which had the most amazing pastries and bread of my life!! I could’ve just sat there and smelled for life!!
Then we walked down to the bottom of the eifel tower one last time and did cartwheels in front of it just like on passport to paris!! And then it was off to Versailles, home of king louis!! The castle was the most humongous palace I’ve ever seen and the gardens are what we walked through and I felt like I was either in the notebook or pemberly (you know where mr. Darcy lives!) I was so in love!! We just strolled around while I read out of my “how to be lovely” book!! I felt like we were in little women!! It was amazing!! I just love the picture I have in my head right now!! The more I think about it the more I can’t believe I didn’t see Mr. Darcy there!! It was absolutely gorgeous!! I’m such a nature girl though!!
And then we said our last goodbyes to paris and to amber and were on our way home =(
I coulnd’t take my eyes off the tower I didn’t want to leave, but it was even better not doing everything I wanted to do , cuz we all just decided we were leaving it to do for when we came back, which would all be with our husbands we decided!! Ahhhh, I just love the romance of paris!! It’s true you can’t help but be romantic in pari’!! I missed my sister and my mom a lot while I was there though, I mean I now amber’s seen it, but I knew that I would’ve loved to have shared the experience of paris with them, so I decided we’re all going sometime!! I’ll pay!!
Avec amour’
shannon

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long weekends in rome and venice make my life!!

2007-11-18T07:30:00.000-08:00

For the long weekend I went to Rome and Venice!!! I wasn’t really that excited about it at first but it was such an amazing place to go for the long weekend in so many ways!! I went with jon, Emily, jill, taylor, and Amanda, but there were so many more people that went kind of with us but weren’t staying in our room so that was so hard at first because there were 12 and that is so many people to figure out what to do, too many opinions!! Haha!
But we started out the trip on a night train to rome and it was perfect cuz there were 6 of us in each compartment and we knew everyone and no weirdos in the compartment so it was perfect and fun to sleep with people you actually knew!! But I was sick so I just took niquil and was passed out!! I guess the conductor had come in and woke everyone up and I had no idea!! They had to yell my name like dr. lerner to wake me up!! So that was good to get a good night sleep!! And then we had to go through florence because something happened with our trains so we took a train there and it was so sad to be in florence when no one was there!! I like wanted to go to the villa and see everyone but they had already all left for the long weekend too so it was almost depressing to be there =( but I felt cool cuz I took jon and Emily and jill to the dumo cuz I knew how to get there since I had been in florence a few weekends before and it was just as amazing as before and they were obsessed with it! but we only had an hour there and had to get back on the train but we didn’t want to pay 15 euro for a seat reservation so we took the slow train and it took 6 hours to get to rome so we didn’t even arrive until like 6 or 7 Wednesday night and we left Tuesday night!! It was awful but a good bonding experience!! At this time we were still with karsten, jeff, bobbi, Nathan, Andrew, and matt, pluss my group so it was kind of fun and I tried to get everyone to play train games and one time we pretended to get our stuff really fast and get off to freak the other group out!! That was funny!!
So we finally get there and all we want to do is eat and go to bed!! Oh and it was a process getting into the hotel cuz it was only for 4 but there were 6 of us going to stay in there cuz that’s how you have to do it or its super expensive!! Even hostels are expensive!! So that was funny slash scary!! We go out to eat at this itallian place but I didn’t really like mine all that much I think it was more of a tourist trap not real Italian food but whatever! So then we went back and went to bed to get up early so we could see a bunch the next day!!
We went to the Spanish steps first thing in the morning!! They are so extremely old it was so cool, and there was like no one except for us there cuz it was in the morning on a weekday so no tourists were really out!! So we have a ton of cool pictures on there!! And then we made our way over to the trevey fountain!! It took us such a long time to find it was ridiculous!! So then we decided to make a game out of it and go two separate ways and see who could find it first!! My group definitely LOST!! We had no idea where we were going! We walked around for days!! And then finally we just asked someone for directions cuz obviously we couldn’t read a map and we finally found it and the other group had been waiting there forever!! The fountain was so cool!! It was ginormous!! We all threw coins in of course and made wishes and it was really fun and again NO ONE was there!! It was so weird!! Usually you like can’t even move at those two tourist attractions or at least that’s what we were told, and we have pictures with like no one else in them except us!! And of course I almost fell in cuz I got really excited and grabbed my friend and tripped over her and I almost pulled her in with me!!
Then we made our way to the pantheon, where we were going to meet dr. satler!!! He and his wife were in rome for the long weekend too and he told jon he wanted to meet up with us and he would give us a tour of the city!! It was so awesome!! Dr. satler is one of the most brilliant men I’ve ever met, he knows everyone and knows everything about everything!! Him and dr. lerner are just amazing!! So we get there and no one thinks he’s gonna show and then here he comes around the corner and it was so cute!! He hugged everyone and I don’t even really know him cuz I don’t have him for classes this semester!! And then everyone that was staying at different hotels started showing up and it was like a reunion and he was like “oh my this is like class so many students!” and he told us “you all listen to me like we are in class, we are not in class” it was so funny!! And then he took us inside the pantheon and told us about it and how the circle in the ceiling is the one form of light and if it rains there are drains and the floor is slanted and if it snows there will be a pile of snow in the middle making a perfect circle!! It was so cool!! And then he just straight up leaves and we follow him all around the city and he just stops randomly at places and talked to us about them it was so funny! And at one point I was right next to him and I go do you know me, I’m not in any of your classes, and he links arms with me and starts walking with me and he goes “no, that is very peculiar and strange for that to happen what is your name?” and I said I was Shannon and he goes “oh like the river!! Did you know that and the airport!” And he starts talking about my name! it was so funny and then he brings us to this cool place where all the artists were painting and it was so pretty and peacefull and we took a group picture in front of the fountain of poseiden with him!! He spoke itallian to ask someone to take the picture, he amazes us all every day!! And then he took us to this museum and tried to get us a discount for museums all over but he couldn’t and they all thought he was so cute there cuz he’s just this sweet friendly old man who everyone loves!! And then he all of a sudden is like I’m late I must go meet my wife!!! And like goes to leave and says bye to all of us and jon asks to take a picture with him and then someone else is like oh dr. satler can I have a picture with you too?? And he straight up runs away!! Haha!! It was so funny!! I’m not even kidding he ran!! So then we were on our own again and we wanted to find the colloseum!
None of us could figure out the streets in rome but we realized it didn’t even matter because every corner you turned these amazing buildings just emerged out of nowhere!! It was incredible!! It was like history just jumping out at you everywhere you went!! So we just started walking and we ran into the most amazing building which turned out to be like the unknown soldier memorial and it was humongous!! And this guy in a gladiator suit was standing out in front of it taking pictures with people and he comes over to me and grabs my hand and pulls me over to take a picture with him and I was like ok and he like held my hand like to kiss it and then he took another one pretending to cut my head off with the sword and I was laughing at him and then he goes there you go and the he says two euro ok? And I was like what?? So I had to give him two euro and he made me come over there, and then they were everywhere and I kept telling everyone don’t let them trick you!!! I learned my lesson!! Haha!!
There were amazing ruins everywhere you turned and the entire city was just a masterpiece I was in love with just how old and magnificent everything was!! And then we ran right into the coliseum!! It was incredible!!! Just like in the text books!! It was absolutely amazing!! So we had to go wait in line and in line we learned how to haggle with the itallian venders!! This guy comes over with these retarded flour dolls and is like 6 euro and amanda’s like I’ll give you a euro and he says no and keeps talking to us and kept calling me bella and staring at me and telling me to take one and I was like no I don’t want it I don have any money and every time Amanda said a price he would say no and then turn to me and say 6 euro bella and kept staring at me and I was weirded out so I sat down next to taylor and then he finally gives it to Amanda for a euro and he turns to me and says 1 euro bella here and I was like NO!!! I don’t want one!!! It was so funny he would not leave us alone!!! But we couldn’t believe he actually gave it to her for a euro!
And then we finally got into the coliseum and it was so cool!!! Like it was perfectly preserved and you could see the underneath too where they would keep everyone!! I can’t believe so many people would go watch that for fun!! I could never imagine watching people fight to the death for an afternoon activity, it made me sick just thinking about it!! we took some fighting pictures in there and then ran into the rest of our group there and then decided to go to this place where all the ruins were! On the way out of the coliseum there was constantines arch and it was really cool so I was trying to take a picture of it and the sun kept covering the whole picture so I kept moving to get a better angel and then when I turned around my entire group of 12 had dissapered and I was turning in all directions and I couldn’t see them anywhere I started freaking out and this guy could tell and he points and goes they went over there and I looked where he was pointing and I was like oh my gosh thank you so much!!! And he laughs and he goes “I saw the whole thing happen I was coming over here to give you guys a flyer and I saw the look on your face and I knew you thought you lost them!!” It was so funny! I think I had my lost in Disneyland face on!! The one Patrick kept making fun of me for cuz I always seem to loose the group and he would always be watching me and would see the look on my face I got and made fun of me every time for it and I’m sure that’s the face I made!! Haha!!
So anyways we go to the ruins and it was so cool!! Like these buildings and stones were around in jesus times! That’s the way someone put it and I liked the way it sounded!! We took roman ruin pictures and then split off for lunch!! I’m poor so me n jon separated and ate peanut butter and jelly in a park and then went off to see the circus maximus which was basically just this old field but its what the chariot races were held on so that was cool to walk where chariots used to race!! And then we went to this church to see st. Theresa in ecstacy a famous sculpture we learned about in class and that was really cool! It took forever to walk there and then jon really wanted to see this sculpture at this museum in this amazing park but I couldn’t afford it and jon really wanted to see it so I told him I was fine and I would just hang out in the park cuz it was pretty and I liked that kind of thing so jon gave me his backback and all his stuff and went in and was like “I’ll be real quick” and I was like no take your time I’m fine!! And so I started walking around this massive park and I was fine at first and then I was like oh my gosh I have all of jon’s stuff and mine and if someone just swiped it from me right now there’s nothing I could do about it!!! and I started getting a little worried but I was like no I’m fine!! So I walked around and enjoyed myself and when I could see that it was gonna start getting dark I started heading back towards the museum and then sat out in front of it and jon came out after like 10 or 15 more minutes and he was glad he went but said it wasn’t really worth all the money he just really had to see his statue!!
So then we made our way over to one more church to see the conversion of paul and that was a really cool painting! And we actually walked in during mass but it was so cool and we just sat in a listened for a little bit and then went and saw the painting and then went back to meet the rest of the group which had all crashed and been taking a nap in the room for the past 2 hours!! Haha!!
We just went to dinner after oh wait and we went and saw the trevey fountain at night which was really pretty cuz it was all lit up and there were a ton of Italian venders there trying to sell those flour dolls again and I got one for 50 cents!! Haha!! I told him I didn’t have any money and I kept saying 8 cents cuz that’s all I had and then I said 50 even though I didn’t’ have it and then jon kept saying 50 and he gave it to him and jon gave it to me, a pink one!! And taylor bought one for a euro so he was mad that I got it for 50!! It was more of a funny souvenir and story than anything!! And then we went to find food and this guy handed us a flyer and we were like ok lets go here and he goes here I’ll show you where it is and is cracking jokes with us and stuff and we’re all following him and then he starts to lead us down this alley way and I get freaked out it was like the movies everyone just laughing and walking carelessly after someone and then they attack you!! And I told jon I was scared so we start to hang back and then we see people randomly coming out of stores and alleyways as the whole groups passing and I’m freaking out and I’m like I’m not going down there and jon tried to get tailors attention who was a the front of the group to tell him it wasn’t a good idea but taylor was jut laughin a the guy and so we walk away fast cuz it really did look shady and then I was like we should go back I don’t want to get separated from the group so we tried to find a different way to get there but we couldn’t so we were about to back track and then I was standing right in front of this resturaunt and I was like that kid really looks like david and then I bent down to see him better and I was like I think it is and hten he started staring at me and I kind of waved cuz I still wasn’t sure and then he gets excited and waves and I was like oh my gosh it really is a small world!! And so we go in the resturaunt and theres ben and david and mark!! I didn’t even know they were coming to rome too!! So that was fun and then we told them the shady story and they went with us to try and find them and I was kind of worried but then we took them to the alley and at this point it’s me and jill and 4 huge at least 6ft. tall each guys so I wasn’t scared and then we did find the returaunt and they were all in there and they were fine so that was good!! And we told them why we didn’t follow them and they were like oh my gosh no way that’s so scary why didn’t you say anything!! And we were like we did you all weren’t paying attention though!!
So then we ate and went to bed and half the group got up to go to st. peters church and the Vatican at 5:30 in the morning and half of us were like heck no we don’t mind waiting in line!! So then were going to go at 9:30. but then jon told us that there was a train strike (dr. satler knows everthing he had warned us there might be one!!) and so it was at 6:45 so we should leave before then and so then we got up an hour later than the other group but that extra hour sleep was so nice!!! We caught the train to st. peters and it was raining, that’s why we didn’t want to walk, but the rain made it look even cooler!! And we didn’t even have to wait in line at all and there was like no one even inside of there so we could take our time and enjoy it! it was gorgeous!! I would go back to rome just to visit st. peters church. It was humongous first of all and just mouth dropping gorgeous!! Supposedly peter the apostle is buried there, I don’t know if I believe that but there is this massive like shrine basically for him and it is ridiculous how much stuff is dedicated to him in there!! And masses have to be held outside because so many people attend! But there were mini masses while we were there and some of them were singing and it was so incredible to hear everyone singing in a different language I loved it!! and there was a madonna there and I love those they just make me feel so connected to jesus’ death and make me just think…..
So then we made our way over to the Vatican and we had to wait in line there but only for like an hour because it didn’t open until 10 and so we really only stood in line since it was open for 30 minutes because we got in line before it opened!! It was good bonding time though! I was with jill, taylor, and Amanda and we had fun! Taylor bought an umbrella for 2 euro just because he wanted to see if he could get it for two and then as soon as he bought it it stopped raining!! It was so funny! And then me and Amanda ran and got gelato and then the line started moving fast and I’m a slow eater an I had to shove like half of it in my mouth right before I walked in the door my cheeks were popping out of my face!!! Haha!!
And then we were finally in the Vatican!! It was so crowded but still totally gorgeous!!! This hallway we walked through I felt like a hearded cow cuz you couldn’t even stop to appreciate it cuz everyone had to just keep moving but it was absolutely incredible!! I was obsessed!! And we saw all the Raphael rooms!! I can’t belive all the murals he’s painted!! I’m obsessed with every single one!! They were all mouth dropping good!! He painted entire rooms, covered in amazing murals of everything you can think of and they all just have so much detail and beauty, it was like half his life just to paint the rooms in the Vatican!! And then we got to see school of Athens which is this painting that I’m now even more in love with since I saw it and we were tested on it in school and it’s huge, like life size and it’s of Aristotle and plato and showing that you can mix religion with philosophy and knowledge and that they don’t have to be seprate!! I loved it!! and then we finally made it into the Sistine chapel which was not what I was expecting but it was incredible!! The entire thing was painted by Raphael and it was the entire ceiling covered in this giant mural with god and adam trying to touch in the middle, you weren’t allowed to take pictures in there but I tried cuz taylor forgot his camera and that was his favorite and I got in trouble and I freaked out cuz I thought he was going to take my camera away but all he said was no pictures!! I don’t know how he saw me I was doing it so sneakily too!! Haha!! But it was amazing!! Like we stood in there for probably 15 minutes just staring up at the ceiling and there were so many people it was like a mosh pit!! Haha!!
Then after that we had really seen all we wanted to see so then we just enjoyed the rest of the beautiful day and went and got food, mine was disgusting it tasted like slimy slugs and the lady was rude but whatever, it was still I warm perfect beautiful day in rome!! And we found this place that had tiramisu and it was A-mazing!! Best tiramisu ever and I couldn’t even finish it cuz there was so much!!
And then we wandered around some more and finally came back to the hotel and then we all decided to go to the hard rock café rome and it was amazing!! I ate something before we went cuz I couldn’t afford it but we stayed there for like 3 hours, not even exadgerating cuz it was so fun to be somewhere that was totally and completely American!! There were music videos playing all over and all the American food and it was just so much fun!! We had the best time ever!! And it was just the 6 of us who stayed in the room together so that was good cuz there weren’t a million people and we all got along really well and it was just relaxing and great!! And we talked forever!!
Then the next day we got on a train to Venice!!! I was really excited about Venice!!! It was freezing when we got there though!! Like the sun was out but all the town is buildings and narrow little roads and they’re al in the shade and all the buildings create these wind tunnels!!! But it was still gorgeous!! We were supposed to meet people in san marco (the main square) and that happened to be like a 40 minute walk from the train station and we didn’t know that so we have no idea how to get there so we’re just following all the signs that say san marco this way and our train was delayed too but we were like walking so fast we didn’t get to enjoy the city at first and then we get there and there are like millions of people EVERYWHERE there and we were late!! And I was like there is no way we’re finding them but it was no big deal so we just run out to the middle where all the pigeons are and did the whole feed the pigeon thing so they get on you!! I just stood out there waiting for Emily to get feed and they started flying on top of me and I was like freaking out cuz it’s so scary at first!! They kept just perching on my arm and I hadn’t even fed them yet!!! I kept screaming then and I was so scared!! As soon as Emily handed me the bag of food they knew and all flew at me and I freaked out!! And Emily was like here get them to sit on your head and I was like how do I do that?? And she threw seed on my head and they all attacked my head I screamed!!! Most of my pictures I have this freaked out look on my face but some of them I managed to smile for!! And jon was mean to them he kept kicking them and I would get mad at him and hten he punched one right into my face it like almost knocked me over, it was funny though!! And then I got paranoid of bird flue!! Haha!! But I’m still fine so it should be ok!! Haha!!
So after that we decided to eat and then we would take a gondola ride!!We ate at an asian itallian returaunt, that was interesting, we weren’t having the best luck picking good places to eat at!! Then we went on a search for a gondaleer and we found one right away and they told me I was good at bargaining so they made me do it and I was like how much for a medium length ride?? And he said 20 euro each for 3? and I said no there’s 6 of us how much for 6, and he said 20 euro each and I said how that doesn’t make sense, if it’s 20 euro each for 3 then that’s 60 euro so if there’s 6 of us then you are getting a lot more. So can it be just 60 euro total? And he said “no 20 euro each” and I kept telling him that he was getting more since there were way more of us so then he says ok 15 each and no one thought we could get less than that so we took it and it was totally worth it!! it was so much fun!! And pretty and he was the cutest gondaleer EVER!! I’m not even kidding he was all dressed up in high black pants and a stripped shirt and a straw hat with a black thing tied around it!! it was adorable and none of the other gondaleers were even dressed in black really!! And he was whistling and he knew everyone and was talking to people every corner we turned!! And he was really nice too!!
I asked him if he ever let people try and he said “yes sometimes, but they never can do it” and then I said would you let me try?? And he said ok come up here and so I got to do the gondola!!! It was so much fun!! It was so hard though, taylor was so nervous he thought I was going to fall in the whole time!!! He makes fun of me for being clumbsy, but whatever I didn’t fall in!! I couldn’t do it at all though, I don’t think I even pushed it in the water once it was so heavy!! He was laughing at me and trying to show me how to put my feet but I didn’t understand him so he was like moving my legs for me! It was fun!! I’ll never forget it!! and then I sat back down and we enjoyed the rest of the ride!! At some points it reminded me of splash mountain in diseyland because we would bump into boats in front of us cus some canals were busy and would have a lot of boats in them and they would get backed up! He told us he had learned how to do it when he was 9 and didn’t take anyone around until he was 21 and that there are over 400 gondaleers in Venice!! It was awesome!! My favorite part was when he took us out into the open waters and there were gondolas everywhere and they were all going so fast it looked amazing!! I took a really cool picture of it!!
And then the girls all wanted to shop in the stores because Venice is famous for it’s glass jewelry and it was all so beautiful, I just liked looking through the windows though! I bought a necklace and this beautiful scarf I’m obsessed with!! The boys were making fun cuz all of the stores looked alike and the girls wanted to go into every single one!! I mostly hung out with the boys during the shopping part cuz I didn’t want to spend money!! It was fun though and then it was time to try and figure out where the train station was!! Venice is the most confusing city EVER!! It’s like a maze!! We ended up at san marco’s place every direction we went!! And then we’d start passing the same store multiple times because we’d recognize something in it!! it was awful! We didn’t think we’d ever find it!! and every time we asked for directions it was so confusing to get to people could only tell us like two directions at a time and then we’d have to ask again!! And then for some reason jon took charge and totally figured out where to go!! And we found the main street after like 2 hours!! And then we looked for dinner and could just relax and have fun until our train at 11! We found, finally, a good real itallian place for dinner!! And they had calamari!!! I was so excited when taylor read that I freaked out so we orderend calamari and this 4 cheese pasta and split it and it was so amazing!! I hadn’t had calamari in so long!! Everyone else enjoyed Italian wine, a little too much though!!! Taylor didn’t drink either cuz he doesn’t like whine, and they were all super tipsy when dinner was over, but it was fine but then when we finished dinner they wanted to get more and this is when the nightmare started.
I really respected taylor for not drinking with them, I think he didn’t want me to feel like I had to be responsible for everyone and I thought that was really a good guy thing for him to do. And he made sure he got all the train information from jon and everything and then we were walking to make sure we knew exactly where the train station was and we ran into karsten, bobby, and geoff so that was really fun!! Karsten didn’t drink either and I was so glad to have two boys to help me cuz it was so hard to get 9 drunk people onto a train!!
I didn't really mind that people were drinking but i was tired and cold and also sick so then i just lay my head down to rest which was so stupid cuz i'm supposed to be watching everyone and everyones stuff and then jill goes oh my gosh i think that guy just took jons bag!! and i jump up and am like what??? and i turn and look and i'm like are you sure?? and she's like i think i just saw him take his bag but she's been drinking and i didn't see so i dind't want to go up to some guy if i wasn't sure so i'm like freaking out and the first thing i can think to do is yell taylor!! and he turns around and i'm like i think someone just stole jons bag and he's like what are you sure?? is his bag there and i'm like i dont know i dont know jill saw and i saw the guy she pointed too but i dont know. so he gets up and starts running up the stairs over this bridge that this guy went over and i follow him cuz he doesn't know what the guy looks like and then i see him and im like its him its that guy the one in the leather jacket and taylor goes up to him and asks to check the bag and whatnot and it was his bag. And the guy doesn’t speak much English and keeps trying to walk away and is like its no problem it’s no problem and tailors like is everything here??? Did you take anything?? And the guy keeps on trying to walk away and is just like it’s no problem and tailors like whatever and walks away. Thank goodness taylor like towers over this guy cuz I think that’s why it was no problem to get the bag back. It was awful!!!! i just wanted to go home!!! and i was so glad to arrive back in heidelberg!!!
Luv shannon

pictures

http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2040859&l=7b268&id=8506273

http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2040865&l=9df27&id=8506273

The Duomo, The Michaelangelo, The Medichi, Gelato, and Wonderful people!!

2007-11-18T07:21:00.000-08:00

Florence was amazing!! I went this weekend with Amanda, Stephanie, and Cameron to Florence and on the way there we realized that taylor brown was on the same train as us and a whole other group of fun guys were on a connecting train with us to Budapest hungary! So it was so much fun traveling on the first two hour train with everyone, I tried to study a little bit and then ended up watching two episodes of lost with karsten on the train. Then we all separated which was kind of sad but a least we had an hour together in the munich hauptbahnhauf. We reserved a whole compartment but unfortunately our seats didn’t pull down to make one big bed so we had to sleep upright for a little at first but then we realized the train was empty so two went into a compartment and I stayed in one with steph and Cameron. I slept on the floor and it was so warm by the heater until all of a sudden our heater broke and it started spewing out a ton of cold air. It was awful steph woke up too and we were both freezing, I put on my leggings and all my socks and sweatshirts and we couldn’t even turn the heater off it was full blasting cold air. Finally after like an hour the conductor comes by to check our tickets and I said to him excuse me, why is there cold air coming out of here? And he felt it and then said that is no good change compartements at the next stop. So me Cameron and steph all huddled together on the same seat with a blanket over us for 40 more minutes then changed compartments and hten it was better and I got like 3 hours sleep!
We finally arrived in Florence (after a two and a half hour delay there’s itallian trains for you) and Katie and sandi picked us up (well walked) from the train station and led us back to the pepperdine Florence villa! We got to the villa and it was amazing! You can’t really compare moore haus and the villa because they’re completely different! But it was beautiful and huge and everything looked new! And there were awesome collages everywhere from every program that had been there! I loved it! But we didn’t get to stay there cuz the house was full so we had to find our hotel (hotel aline) but I was so glad the house was full cuz that made it even more fun because I more enjoyed the company there than Florence itself. Not that Florence wasn’t wonderful it was just so good to see everyone!! It was like a pepperdine reunion cuz half the lausaine and London kids were there as well as all the Florence kids! I loved it! and I had the best surprise ever when they showed us the music room and I saw my friend alex cox in there! He’s in the lausaine program and I was really sad cuz I didn’t think I was going to get to make it there this semester and he’s only there for one, well anyways I screamed when I saw him cuz I was so excited and surprised!! So that was fun!
We found our hotel, which was a little sketchy but it was only 63 euros a night for 3 ppl so we were fine with it, and then Katie and Sandi took us all around town showing us everything from the Duomo to the David. The Duomo was beautiful it had such intricate designs on the outside, I liked the outside more than the inside that’s how beautiful it was. And then we went to the Gold bridge and looked out over the town and the water (apparently it’s the only one intack from WWII cuz Hitler looked at it and said don’t bomb this one it’s pretty, so they didn’t and it’s still there) but there’s gold shops all along it and then it started pouring and I didn’t have a jacket or umbrella so I was completely soaked and dried off in the museum where the David is. It was absolutely incredible. Never before have I been so impressed with a piece of art that people rave about. Usually I’m a bit disappointed cuz it’s not as great as I expected, but the David is a masterpiece. You can’t help but stare (mouth wide open) at it for like 15 minutes. It’s just incredible there are no words to describe it! and it was even cooler because on the way too it they show michaelangelos’ unfinished works so you can just see that it all started out as this huge block of marbel, it’s just ridiculous how amazing it is and what it came from! I was totally and completely impressed!
Since we were all soaking we went back to get ready for an itallian dinner! I was super excited about that! So we wait for Amanda’s friend who lives in Florence (not a pepperdine student) to pick us up cuz he wanted to and let me tell you itallians slash anyone in Europe drive crazy!! They just drive so fast on these little narrow streets and barely care about pedestrians! And he leans over to us and says, if you live here you can’t have a nice car, you bump into stuff a lot so no one has a nice car, it would be ridiculous!! That relieved me and steph so much let me tell you!! Anyways we got to this resturaunt that andrea (amanda’s itallian friend) knows and he’s friends with the owner so he orders us millions of appetizers and really nice wine and we all got a main dish and bread and olive oil and vinegar and a shot to cleanse your pallet at the end. And It was amazing!! But we were all thinking oh my goodness how much is this costing us!! 10 euro, that’s it!! they must have given us a huge deal and it was so amazing!! Best meal of my life I think! And it lasted 3 hours!!! Oh I’m in love with it!!
So then he’s a club promoter and takes us to this American club that has karaoke and darts but really no place to sit and me and steph are exhausted and kind of just wanted to go back but we suck it up and he takes us to club lockness where you have to be a member to get in and he gets us memberships, its so funny its got a picture of the lochness monster on it! so we go in there and there’s pool and fuzball and we just sit and talk in there for a while and then we finally get to go to bed, I’ll admit I was being a bit of a party pooper cuz I was so tired!
The next day I got to see jeff!!! We went to breakfast at this café they get to go to for free until 10:30 and so you can get whatever you want off the menu and everything was amazing! Pastries and croissant sandwhiches!! Mmm!! And I saw jeff there and I freaked out and ran over too him and he gave me the best hug in the world, he’s a good hugger, it like almost made me fall down when he let go!! So then we ate and decided to go to bubbly garden park!! It was just a few of us me, jeff, Amanda, and Stephanie, but it was so cool that so many people were there cuz we ran into like everyone in the streets and it felt like my hometown so small and everywhere you go you see someone you know!! And I saw alex cox and he was serenading me with songs he “made up” for me, like backstreet boy songs!! He’s so silly!! And then he takes my hand and takes me over right in front of the bubbly gardens in the middle of this huge cobblestone platform that no one was really walking on and he starts dancing with me and singing to me!! It was the cutest thing of my life!! And we were waltzing and then he dipped me!! He’s so sweet!! And funny!! So then we all decided to go to the bubbly gardens together!! And it was gorgeous! I’m such a hippy but I could stay outside forever!! And Florence was so hot and nice outside, I missed warmth!! And we were higher than the city so it was gorgeous to look out at Florence!! And the bubbly gardens basically looked like my secret garden!! it was so pretty and relaxing and then we found this perfect patch of grass and we all took a nap on the grass and the sunshine felt so good on my skin! It was just a perfect day!!
And then everyone else was going to the Michael bublay concert so they went to get changed and we were gonna meet back up with them for dinner so me and jeff went inside his favorite church which was amazing cuz on the outside it just looked like nothing but it was gorgeous and huge on the inside and just simple!! I really liked it! then we went to an itallian café and I got hot chocolate and it was so good and we sat and talked in there for a while and then we sat out and waited for the group but they were taking forever and we were huddled on the stairs trying to keep war cuz the sun went down and it got windy!! And jeff taught me how to ask what time it was in itallian and made me ask someone but I don’t remember what he said I just remember I was really nervous to ask! And itallians aren’t very nice at least in Florence they weren’t!! and then it was way past the time we were supposed to meet so we asked someone how to get to the resturaunt and we figured it out!! And they had just gotten there when we got there cuz they were running late and they hadn’t forgotten about us someone had been running to go tell find us but we must have just missed them!
The resturaunt was so good and so many people were there, me and jeff sat with these two girls neither of us knew but they were so nice and it was so cool to just get to know more people from pepperdine!! But yeah the food was amazing!! I’m obsessed with itallian food! It was like the first time I’d eaten something I liked in a long time!! And then they all left for the Michael bublay concert and me and jeff walked back to the villa!! It was so good getting to talk with jeff he’s such a good guy and I miss him so much!! There are just wonderful people everywhere you turn at pepperdine!! I seriously love everyone!! And everyone that was there that weekend was amazing and it just made me wish that everyone could all be in the same program so I could get to be with everyone!!
And we got to the house and went to gelato with some people at the best gelato place EVER!! Jeff and I shared cuz we had already promised another group we were gonna go get gelato with them but we forgot we had promised this group we were going to get gelato, so we got banana and chocolate the first time which was amazing! It tasted like a banana split!! And then we walked back and two minutes later went with the next group to get gelato and this time we got baccio and they’re specialty mencha something but it was absolutely to die for!! It was soooooo good!! Best gelato combo you could ever make!! And then we got it in a cone that time and jeff didn’t like the cone part so he gave the rest to me and of course I knocked the whole top part off and down my shirt!!! It was so funny was just sitting there making this face and bending over and everyone was like “what??” and then they were like oh my gosh Shannon, you would!! And then I was so sad cuz I had to throw it away =( haha! Katie kept telling me I was her favorite thing in the world!! Haha!!
And then we went back to the house to watch love actually before we had to leave and everyone was watching it and it was so fun we were all like sitting on each other’s laps there were so many people in there!! And then more people I knew came in the door who I didn’t even know were there the whole time!! And one of them was chris rahe and he like full on tackles me when he saw me!! It was so fun!! And then we had to leave and it was so sad, sandi, Katie, and jeff walked us all back to the train station and we had to say bye and It was like the sadest feeling ever! And then we went to the wrong train station and almost missed our train but we caught up with it in a taxi so everything worked out!!
But basically I loved Florence and everyone in florence and it was just what I needed to satisfy my missing my friends feeling!! It really did come at the perfect time!! It made me less homesick and really was a turning point for me loving it here so much!!
Luv shannon

pictures
http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2039398&l=d3e1c&id=8506273

I feel like I'm in the Worlds prettiest snow globe!

2007-11-15T05:49:00.000-08:00

IT SNOWED!!!! I was in my room super exhausted and tired because it’s just been a super busy week and I was actually on a skype date with Amber while trying to finish a paper and a worksheet that was due the next day, plus review for a test that was also the next day, when my roommate comes in and whispers to me (my other roommate was asleep) “it’s snowing outside!” I immediately jumped off my bed and ran out the door and down the stairs and everyone’s down there and I’m like screaming and I’m like “is it really snowing??!!!” and my friend comes in and he had brown hair and he looks at me and he goes “Shannon it’s snowing!!” and his hair was covered in little white snowflakes!! My eyes got so huge and I screamed out of excitement and ran out the door and I stopped dead in my tracks!!! It was gorgeous!!! The snowfall was so light and beautiful! Never in my life have I ever seen anything more amazing!! Especially with the view of Heidelberg down below our house on a mountain top!! It is something I will never forget!! I just held my arms out and started laughing and screaming cuz I was so excited!! And my friend turned around the corner and I jumped on him and yelled “Karsten it’s SNOWING!!” oh my gosh I’m still so excited from it! it was like I was in a snow globe and it was all in my hair and I could taste it! I’m obsessed!!! I took pictures!! I’m gonna try and figure out how to get them on here!! And then the next day my friend Blake was like “so Shannon, I heard you weren’t excited at all about the snow!!” and he just grinned at me! Apparently I was the most vocal one about how much I loved it!! I finally made myself come back inside especially since I had just jumped out of my conversation with Amber without saying anything!! She was excited for me!! I miss everyone so much and am obsessing over how soon it is that I get to come home!!! I’m so excited!!! I might pass out!! Haha!! I’ll try and post from previous trips I’ve taken I just got really busy all of a sudden it’s like the midterms that will never end!!! But I’m here this weekend so I’m hoping to catch up on blogs!!
Luv shannon

Pictures

http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2040867&l=79d93&id=8506273

I could live off belgium chocolates and waffles!!

2007-10-22T07:58:00.000-07:00

So there was supposed to be a german train strike on Friday so we had to leave a day early and a trip that was supposed to only take 5 hours was now going to take us 12. Of course I’m setting off again forgetting something because it really wouldn’t be a trip if I didn’t and this time I had grabbed a visa gift card instead of my debit card so when I went to get cash out of the machine for the trip it wouldn’t let me. But my lovely lifesaver alex said don’t worry about it and pulled out money from her account for me!! I’m so retarded!! Good thing I have such amazing people in my life!

So we meet alex’s friend megan (from Switzerland) at the Heidelberg haupbonhof and set out on our journey to bruge, Belgium. I was so excited because I really didn’t have an opinion of going there at first I was just going to go but I didn’t even know where it was or anything about it and then I started hearing all these amazing things about it and how it was so wonderful and like they’re favorite place they went to by far while they were here so I started getting super excited about it!!

One of our connecting trains was at like 12 in the morning and it was to get on a sleeper train so I was excited about that cuz it was my first time on a sleeper train. Well anyways we were waiting on the platform forever and like no one was around and I was freezing and tired so me and my friend jon sat on the ledge of the platform and dangled our feet over the edge (its kinda hard to explain) well no trains are coming or anything so we’re just sitting there and then after a while this speaker comes on and someone says something in german but we didn’t know and I said “I wonder what they just said” and jon goes, “they were yelling at us to get up off of here and to get away from the tracks” and I was like oh really and started getting up and he goes, “no I’m just jokin I don’t know what they said” and I was like you’re dumb and then we sat there for like 5 minutes more and these security guards come out and start speaking to us kind of angrily in german and are like motioning us to get up and I’m like what is going on?? And then we get up and they’re still talking to us in German and I said “sprechen sie englisch?” and then they started telling us “you aren’t allowed to sit there that’s a crime we need to see your passport. And I’m like what the heck?? I don’t feel comfortable giving anyone my passport even ppl in uniform. And jon goes, “why?” and he said that it is dangerous to sit where we were sitting and that they announced to us to get up and when we didn’t get up this was purposefully committing a crime and intentionally ignoring authority and he needed to see our passports so we get them out and give them to the guy and he walks away and gets out his walkie talkie and starts talking to someone and then the other guy tells us that they’re checking our backgrounds to make sure we have no other offenses and I’m like about to laugh because I am so blown away that this is really happening to me right now. And then we explained to him that we didn’t understand what they were saying and that’s why we didn’t get up and we didn’t know we weren’t allowed to sit there. So then he tells us that since we didn’t have anything on our records this can be a warning but next time we’ll have to pay a fee for committing the crime!!! It was crazy!!! So I now have a record in Germany!!

The sleeper train wasn’t that bad. We made sure we had a guy in both of the rooms and I got to sleep up on the very top across from my friend geoff and lex was underneath him so I couldn’t even see anyone I didn’t know. But it was so dark and cramped that I couldn’t put my sheets on the bed and you know how I freak out over stuff like that so I was like thank goodness it’s dark because otherwise I would be totally grossed out right now and not be able to sleep. But I definitely slept in my clothes and used the money belt my mom made me buy and I slept with my backpack like a teddy bear with the zippers facing my stomach. I slept pretty good and was woken up by some german lady staring right in my face and saying something to me in German and I was so disoriented I had no idea what was going on so I just sat there and stared at her and she kept repeating herself and then lex was like Shannon she’s telling you this is our stop it’s time to get up. But alex, karston, and megan had a worse experience with like a fat naked man in there sleeper room and poor jon didn’t have a reservation so he had to sleep in the restaurant =(

So we finally get to bruge and it is gorgeous! I’m obsessed with it!! All of the buildings look so entirely different but are right next to each other sharing the same wall!! And a river flows all through the town and it’s just too pretty to describe!! And there’s chocolate stores everywhere with the most amazing chocolate that you could ever imagine! All of us were still in the same outfits from the day before so we pulled a quick change in the middle of the street (were so pro at it too) threw on some deodorant and went to the chocolate museum which was completely disappointing but we did get to see a chocolate demonstration at the end and get one free piece of chocolate wooh!

Then we went on a boat tour of the town and our tour guide was so funny!! He was like picking on my the whole time and told me to sit in the magic seat right behind him but I made jon!! It looked like we were riding a toy train it was so funny! And he kept saying things like that’s where the naughty girls go, and would like turn around and look at me and I was like I’m a good girl and he goes oh ok you go to the convent up here and pointed it out and he goes this is where blondies going. What’s you’re name? and I was like Shannon, and then he kept calling me sister Shannon. And then we went by the torture chamber and he told me that’s where I would go if I was naughty It was hilarious and hten we passed by his sons resturaunt and he kept looking at me and saying what a good cook his son was and how handsome he was and that he would make a perfect date and silly stuff like that and he told me he would show me a picture of him after the tour and I was like oh ok!! Haha! And then he kept saying stuff about romantic things because bruge is one of the most romantic cities and he said women like everything big, big windows, big bridges, big houses, the bigger the better and he goes to jon, “this guys big how many girls do you have?” and jon said zero, and then he goes but you’re big women like everything big and jon goes, “well I’m just not big enough!!” it was so funny!! The guy was hilarious I wish I could remember everything he said!! But I took a picture with him when we were done cuz I loved him so much! Oh and he said the water was so romantic it was like American viagra and me and alex just turned and stared at each other with awkward faces and then just burst out laughing so hard!!! Oh man!! He was funny!!

After the boat ride we went to the chocolate bar!! Oh… my… goodness it was the most amazing place of my life!! Like anything chocolate you could ever imaging just name it and it was yours!! I got the most amazing desert of my life and I enjoyed every single bite of it!! It was pretty much awesome!!

So then everyone’s tired and wants to go back to the hotel n take a nap but me n jon are like no way we can sleep whenever when else are we going to be in Belgium??? And plus when we first got on one of the buses we got on the wrong one and the guy said it was going to Holland and so we were like whoah this is not right and had him let us off somewhere so me n jon were like lets go to Holland I mean why not?? So we go to the main train station to catch the bus that was going there and then we were like hey, why don’t we just take a train?? So we did and then it ended up dead ending in this random town called knokke and the next train didn’t leave for an hour so we were like hey lets go check out the town and then come back so we walk outside and are like oh my gosh we think this town is on the coast so we go back inside and get a map and it totally was so we set off to walk to the beach!! It was the longest walk EVER but it was totally worth it!! And we found the cheapest most amazing Belgium chocolate store ever and we got a box with one of every chocolate in the store in it for 8 euro so me and jon would take on and eat half and then pass it cuz we wanted to try them all and they were all A-mazing!!

So anyway we finally get to the beach and it has like the coolest playground I’ve ever seen in my life!! Like a teator totter and this orbit spinning cage thing and an old school marry go round it was pretty much awesome!! And the beach was the most gorgeous beach I’ve ever seen!! It had seashells everywhere and there were these marbel docks that went out into the sea from the beach and they had moss growing in between the cracks so it was absolutely gorgeous! We hung out there for a little bit put or feet in the water and then tried to find this volcanic activity thing we found on a map of the town and we were so stocked about it and then realized that it was an adverstisement for a film festival and it was just one of the pictures entered in the contest but since we didn’t understand the language we thought it mean there was volcanic activity… anyways long story short we almost walked a very long way to be extremely disappointed but figured it out before we made it all the way there!! Thank goodness!! It was the best random trip of my life! I think those are the best kinds of trips!

So then we try and go back to bruge and we arrive at the train station at 8:30 and it says the bus to the hostel doesn’t come till 50 so I’m like freezing and we’re waiting for…ever!! And then our bus gets cancelled and that was the last one running for the night so we’re staind there like what the heck do we do now?? We were gonna meet up with everyone at 9 and go out in town and so there were night busses running to the center of the city and that’s it and so we were like well we can just take one there and then wait for them to call us and tell us where they’re at, and jon had been wanting these French fries we heard about that for over 50 years there had been rival stands next to each other with the best fries in all of Belgium. So we decide to go into the city and we walked around for like an hour and a half trying to find these fry stores and once we finally found them they were right where we had been dropped off at the very beginning and they were just these little like carnival stands but we bought them and they were pretty much a-mazing!!! So then by now it’s been like two hours and the group hasn’t called us so we figure they didn’t do anything so we go back to the hostel and the bus driver drops us off in this shady ally and I was so scared thank the Lord jon was with me or I would’ve died I was so scared!! And so we get back to the hostel and they’re not there and we didn’t have a key so we had to follow some girl in and jon had seen a resturaunt like 100 ft away that he figured they were at so he was gonna leave me in the loby of the hostel and go see if they were there and I was like you beter not leave me jon I’ll hate you forever if you leave me in here!! (I had to stay there or we would be locked out of the main lobby again) and he was like I don’t see what the big deal is look I’ll run and I’ll be gone for like 5 minutes you’ll be fine. And I was freaking out I was like I’m not even kidding I’m so scared to be left alone you beter not leave me if you walk out that door I’m following you!! And he was laughing at me and being like you’re being ridiculous it’s not that big of a deal your locked in here and I was like yeah who knows whats locked in here with me they give anyone keys to hostels as long as they have money and he’s like oh my gosh Shannon!!! And sighing at me and stuff and I’m in the middle of freaking out on him for even thinking about leaving me and I see him looking to the side of me and kinda smiling and so I look to the right and screamed bloody murder and shot up out of my chair because stupid karston had his face right up in the window that was next to me and I freaked out and they were laughing so hard at me and he came in and I went to hit him and he just hugged me until I calmed down cuz I was freaking out!! Oh it was awful and they thought it was so funny!!! Stupid boys!

So then we walk around town and find this place that has music coming out of it so we go in there and there’s like this dance floor and music and birthday decorations up so we go in there and are all excited and start dancing (ppl in Europe don’t really dance) and we’re the only ones dancing and then the DJ keeps changing it to techno music so then we sit down and we kept requesting R&B and he wouldn’t play it and we were like look we’re the only ones dancing!! Can you just play what we want??? We didn’t really say that but we did keep bugging him so it was getting late and we decided we would stay and dance to two more songs and then he finally started playing all R&B so we were like dangit!!! But we left and went back to the hostel, which I can’t remember if I said already but it was like super nice and cute and the mattresses didn’t have weird stains on them so that was exciting, the only thing was my blanket had a little weird stuff on it but I just put it on the floor and used my sheets!!

We woke up and were made our way to Brussels the capital of Belgium. When we got out of the train station we were severely disappointed and me and alex were like, um, ok so lets go back to Heidelberg… but we got a map and made our way to walk to where it looked like the cultural part of town was. We walked for….EVER and it was super sketchy looking and not cute at all, and then we finally found the cute slash old part of town and it was well worth the walk. There were these buildings that looked so incredibly old and were amazing!! And there was a scarecrow festival going on?? Yeah I don’t know what that was all about!! Oh and I got to try on a 6,000 euro ring cuz I was admiring it and the guy was like do you want to try it on?? Come on!! And I was like “ok!” it was awesome!! And I ate a belgium waffle with Belgium chocolate poured over the top of it!! *sigh* it was wonderful!!! Mmmmm!!! And there was a radom marching band that just came through town!! That was cool!! I love the randomness of Europe!

Oh and then we found this really cool hooka place and I had hooka for the first time. Now don’t freak out its like this smoke stuff but it’s not addictive and it like tastes good, its basically just fun cuz you get to act like the catipillar from alice in wonderland!! Haha!! But apparently my friend carston lied to me cuz since it’s smoke you know I didn’t want to do it if it was bad for my lungs and so I kept asking like a million times are you sure this isn’t bad for you?? And they all kept saying no its not bad for you at all!! And then later I found out that it is bad for your lungs so I was like jerk you lied to me, but it’s ok cuz I’m never going to do it again but it was just fun to do once and I didn’t know it wasn’t good for your lungs, but there’s pictures and they’re funny cuz I was like trying to do the frenchie from Greece n stuff!! But yeah I just had to write this in and warn you that it’s just hooka coming out of my mouth and not anything bad (well I guess it is bad for you but I dint’ know that when we did it!)

So then we took a cab back and that’s about it…. oh wait no its not I forgot… so It was just me, alex, and lex on the way back cuz the boys were going to Switzerland cuz that’s where geoffs family lives and megan lives there too she was just visiting alex. So we get on this train and all the sudden alex tells me she thinks that it just said we need reservations to be on the train and we’re like what??? So we start to get up (for some reason the three seats we picked to sit in were the only ones no one had reserved) and get all our stuff to get off cuz you can get fined for being on a train w/o reservations, and then the train starts moving so we’re like oh no!!! so then we decide to sit with the luggage and we sat with the luggage for like 40 min and the conductor came by and told us that our eurails didn’t work on that type of train so then he was nice though and just made us pay for a reservation to sit with the luggage and we had to get off at the next stop which was some Podunk town in the middle of nowhere and the station was a portable!!! But it all worked out and we got back safely and it was just another funny story for unlucky Shannon!
Luv shannon

two different links for pics cuz there was so many from this trip!
http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2037876&l=e93e7&id=8506273
http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2037878&l=3f1ec&id=8506273

pictures!!!!

2007-09-28T09:52:00.000-07:00

hey guys I finally figured out how to get a link on here so you can all look at my pictures! at the bottom of my posts theres an underlined link and all you have to do is click on that and you can look at all my pictures that relate to that post!! let me know if it doesn't work for you!!

Movie in Manheim

2007-09-28T09:18:00.000-07:00

classes were cancelled in the morning on thursday becuase our fieldtrip got back so late so that was amazing cuz i didn't have class until 4:15!! and then after class we all went to see an english movie in manheim!! they play one english movie and i think it changed every week but this weeks was the breave one with jodie foster, I didn'really like it but is was fun to go! and there was the cutest german boys I've ever seen sitting in front of us so that was fun!! haha!! dont ask me why they were seeing an english movie though!! oh and it's so weird seats are assigned here so we all didn't get to sit togther so there was like random groups of like 5 or 6 all disperssed throughout the movie theater so it was kinda funny!

oh my gosh and they had the coolest like waiting area for the movies to start there were like these "big comfy couch" couches and they were leopard print and zebra print and they were HUMONGOUS!! I sat all the way with my back up against the couch and my feet barely made it over the edge of the cushion!! that is how ginormous this big fun couches were!! Loved em! so going to get one!! haha!! but yeah it was fun to go to the movies with everyone!!

today everyone went to munich to go to octoberfest. I was going to go but i knew i really wasn't going to have that much fun and i probably would've wanted to go home the whole time and just been in a bad mood cuz i wanted to go home so I didn't go! I had a train reservation and everything but whatever! the only reason i was going was just to say that i went and then when i realized it wasn't that important to me I just decided not to. Me and my lovely alex went to get hot chocolate this morning and found the cutest little coffee shop and we decided it was our new place that we were going to go whenever we needed a mood booster cuz it was so cute and yummy!! and we walked across the bridge and looked at our town from the otherside and decided we dont know why anyone wouldn't want to come to the heidelberg program becuase it's so stinkin pretty!! I'm so lucky and blessed! and then we got crepes and walked back to the house where I've been doing pretty much nothing all day!! but thats fun sometimes!! and we decided we're going to belgium next week so that was productive!! and I got to journal!!

luv shannon

Educational Field Trip to Trier

2007-09-28T09:17:00.000-07:00

This last week was the 2nd week of school and we had wednesday off for an educational field trip to trier. I wasn't really paying attention the whole time so dont really ask me what the significance of trier is cuz I dont really know I just know that it's where karl marx grew up!! haha!! I'm such a good student can't you tell?! what I did learn though that I thought would be a useful piece of information is that I really dont like tours, I just like to look at things myself and read the significance of what I'm looking at if it really interests me because I cannot focus long enough to pay attention to some tour guide who is dishing out all this information at once like how the walls were built and why they used this type of stone instead of that type of stone... blah blah blah blah blah!! i'm kind of bitter about it if you can't tell!! haha!! I think I would've rather been in class and that's bad!! the town was allright, heidelbergs much much better though!! but i did by the coolest duck umbrella that has a bill built into it for a euro and I had the best icecream in a waffle horn so there was some good outcomes out of it!! =)

Oh yeah I almost forgot!! the best part was on the way back on the bus! all 48 of us plus dr. lerner (our crazy humanities teacher) and the her d. and the rouses were all on the same bus, and guess what happened?? of course while on the autobond still about 1 1/2 hours away from home there's an accident and traffic is completely stopped I mean we're not even inching for like 2 hours!!! so everyone gets up and is like walking around and we're all visiting and stretching and then we decide to have a music battle between the front and tha back of the bus!! it was so much fun and hysterical!! so basicallly what would happen is one side of the bus, say my side, the front side, would pick a song and we'd belt is as loud as we could all facing the back side of the bus and then the back side of the bus would have to pick another song by the same artist and sing as loud as they could to us and then we'd have to do it again and it would go on with the same artist for up to 4 times and then if both teams could think of two songs by that artist then it would be a tie and it would be the next teams turn to pick an artist!! It started out with britneys spears and went all the way from aqua to simple plan!! it was so much fun I was almost glad we were in traffic cuz it was so much fun to play a game with like the entire group here!! and then we switched to disney soundtracks... totally dominated that!!t! we started with mulan and ended with the sound of music I think!! we changed the rules for the disney sountracks one and you coul keep going and going until you were out of songs for that musical and if the other team could think of another one that you couldn't think of then it was their point! the sound of music one was the best one I think we sang every song on that one, even the lonely goater one!! haha! oh I wish I had it on video tape cuz it was so intense everyone was getting all into it and watching people sing and get intense is so funny!!!

and then we have wednesday night worship but we were on the bus so they suggested to do it on the bus and we turned off all the lights and just sang every christian song we knew for like an hour!! probably one of my favorite worship times ever becuase we jsut got to sing and sing until we were out of songs!!! I loved it!! we finally got home at around 12 that night and we were scheduled to get home at 9 but it was totally worth it to me I think!!

luv shannon

pictures: http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2037339&l=599c9&id=8506273

first week of classes =( =)

2007-09-28T09:12:00.000-07:00

first week of classes =( =) I put a happy and sad face cuz I couldn't decide if I was happy or sad about classes starting!

Last week was the first week of classes and I was kind of really excited to actually start school so it would give me something to do during the day but then i realized, am I retarded??? If I didn't have classes I could be out exploring the world on the week days! But anyways there's not really all that much to tell except for I have to go down to class every day at 9 and then I dont usually come back home until around 7 or 8 because it's waAAAaaaYYy too far of a walk to come all the way back up to the house in between classes! So starbucks has become my new best friend! I dont even like coffee but i've discovered hazelnut heisse schokolade (hot chocolate) and it is pretty much a-mazing! and the atmosphere is so cozy in there! It really is the cutest starbucks I've ever been to and the people that work there are really nice too! and I dont think they've ever heard the name shannon before becuase every time i say it to them they have trouble understanding what i'm saying and my order is usually under sharon or something like that!

anyways i have a really funny story about how we were studying in starbucks on my first day of class. So we're sitting there with all our books spread out accross the table and in germany if there is a spot open at a table other people ask if it is free and then sit down! so there's 3 of us sitting at this circular table and this old german man comes up to me and says "enshuldigun, is heir nacht frei?" (excuse me, is here free ( like open to sit down at)) and I said "ja, bitte" and so he pulled out the chair and sat there with us and he folded his arms across his chest and closed his eyes and kind of was mumbling to himself, it was kinda weird but we were told germans just sit with people if a chair is open even if you dont know them because they dont have to make conversation if they're sitting near someone they just sit there.so we're studying for a while and he's sitting there and he keeps looking at me so i smile every time i see that he's looking at what i'm doing and then all of a sudden he gets up out of his chair and is like right up in my face and is like "woher komst du?" (where are you from?) and he keeps saying it and saying it cuz I couldnt hear what he was saying so i was just looking at him and then my friend said "he's saying woher kommst du" and i was like oh "Ich komme aus californian" and he just nodded his head and sat back down and i like laughed cuz it was so weird how he just jumped out of his chair out of nowhere and got all intense about where i was from so then I said "woher kommen sie?" (same thing but you say that to people that are older than you) and he said "heidelberg" and I said "oh! Ich studieren in heidelberg... deutch!" ( I'm studying in heidelberg...german) I said it out of order a little bit but he knew what I meant and then he closed his eyes and folded his arms over his chest again and began mumbling to himself and then like 10 minutes later he got up and looked at me and said "tchuse" (I dont know how to speel that but it means goodbye like slang kind of" and I said tchuse back and then i realized as he had said tchuse this huge strand of saliva had dripped from his mouth all the way to his shirt and it was just hanging there and i was like gagging cuz it was so gross. and I realized that the whole time, he was there for like 30 minutes right, the whole time he had never even had a drink or apparently ordered one cuz he just sat there and then left! sooooo awkward!!well thats my funny german story! classes are going good! I feel like on the weekdays though all i do is go to class and then finally come back home and then study all night and then go to bed!! but its what we have to do since there we dont have class on friday and we're allready behind cuz we started class so much later than the kids in malibu did. so I guess we have to make it up someway!

luv shannon

Baden-Baden, the black forest, mainaue (my-now), and a whole lot of plans not working out!

2007-09-17T11:07:00.000-07:00

Baden-baden

My first weekend travel was an absolute nightmare but totally memorable and super funny when looking back on it all!! We set off to what we thought was a good start woke up with plenty of sleep and headed down to the train station. Alex couldn’t get her eurail validated again so that stunk but it was ok cuz there were six of us; matt, jon, jeff, lex, ales and me, and we could buy a 5 person ticket and a 1 person ticked and for there and back it cost us each only 15 euro. It took us a while to figure out how to buy a ticket but then we realized that we bought the one on the way back right there too and it might have validated it so we thought we were gonna have to buy a whole nother set of tickets for the way back but we decided not to worry about it and we would figure it out later.

We’re riding along on the train when all of a sudden we decide we really need to figure out how to validate our tickets but none of them will fit in the machines so now we’re thinking we bought the wrong kind of tickets and we’re riding the train illegally and we try and get people to help us but they don’t speak that much English and they really have no idea what our tickets are for either so we were just like, ok we’re gonna just play the ignorant American card when the conducter comes around and hopefully he’ll have pitty on us. Then a few minutes later alex comes up to me and matt (we didn’t get seats all together at first) and tells us that she left her eurail and copy of passport at the train station and she’s gonna go back and get it! She’s super upset and I have no idea what to do and she called ula (one of the workers in the house) and she said ula laughed at her and said “I can’t help you you should go back!” (all in a silly accent of course). And Her D. the program director wasn’t answering his phone. I told her I would go with her and she said she didn’t want to ruin my trip and it was fine and before I could process anything we were at a stop and she gets off the train and I’m standing there like wanting to jump off the train but she took the single person ticket which would mean I’d be riding without a ticket and I was looking from her (outside the train at this point) to matt and my brain was just freaking out cuz I didn’t have any idea what to do but my instinct was to jump out the train with her and before I could do that we were off leaving her behind!!!

I called her when we got the station where we were transferring trains and she said she was fine and then later she called back (all on jeffs phone) and said that she had found her passport copy and her eurail and she would meet us at our connecting station cuz the trains left every hour so it was no problem waiting for her to come! Thank goodness everything worked out and she found us fine at the train station thank goodness cuz jeff’s phone died right after he told her where at in the trainstation we were! She told us that as soon as she saw the train pull away she started bawling and was trying to read the train schedule and this guy came up to her and was realized she spoke English cuz he had heard her on the phone I think and was like, “why are you crying??” and she said he was trying to help her but since she was crying and he barely spoke English he had a super hard time trying to understand what she needed! Poor alex! I felt so bad for her! =(

So we’re on our way again, meanwhile we find out the tickets we’re traveling on aren’t valid and the reason is because we thought that when it asked to punch in two numbers it was asking how many people there were when really it was asking what day are you traveling on. So we were basically traveling on tickets for October 5th when it was September 15th! And of course we got checked and the guy thank goodness didn’t even say anything and just told me to write the names of the people down on our ticket!! Thank goodness!! So we finally get to konstance and we get out of the train station and are basically like, ok…. Now what??? We wanted to go to mainau which is this amazing island in between Switzerland and germany and it has all these flowers and statues out of flowers and gardens and green rooms and rose gardens, basically any outdoor lovers paradise! But of course, none of us really know how the heck we get there so we’re looking at the bus menu trying to figure out where it is and then trying to figure out which direction we need to take the bus. Also we’re not sure if the tickets we have work for busses as well and the bus we think we’re supposed to be taking keeps coming by so we just decide to hop on it and again decide we’ll play the stupid American card if they ask us for our tickets and just show them the tickets that we have that don’t really work! Fortunately we did take the bus in the right direction and we figured out the right stop and got off and enjoyed mainau! It was really worth all the ridiculous stuff that happened in the morning and it was a beautiful day and just totally amazing! I have pictures but it’s just not as great! You can’t see how many plants there were EVERYWHERE! And again germany has the best stinkin paygrounds of my life! There were like huck finn playgroundw with baby rivers around them that you floated on rafts on! It was awesome!

We were starving so we ate there and this guy that was our waitor was so funny! We wanted the family meal which came with 8 schnitzel and 2 kilos of fries for 30 euro (like 5 each) but apparently that was only if you had kids so then he started with just our drink orders and it gets to me and I say oh nothing for me and he snaps “why?” and I was so surprised so I looked up and said, “because I’m not thirsty…” and he goes oh, and then looks at the next person to order and right as they’re ordering he takes all our menus and says I’ll bring you the family meal, just tell them your kids are playing over there if the manager comes by!! It was so funny! So we basically demolished the meal and the boys ate all the fries it was pretty ridiculous!!!! But amazing, and so good!

We looked around a little more and discovered a castle and the most amazing place to get married EVER! Mainau was pretty much the best place for all that kind of stuff, proposals, first dates, anniversary’s, weddings, it was just that beautiful and romantic! So we realize we should probably head back so we can catch our train and get into Baden-Baden so we can get our reservations. We again are super nervous about riding the bus and not sure if our tickets work or not and are relieved when we get off the bus and back at the train station. So here’s where the story gets super interesting again….

We make it with like 30 minutes to spare at the train station so we’re siting there just hanging out at our trains area when this one train pulls up and stops in the lane that our train is supposed to be in, which is normal, but it stays there for like 20 minutes and the closer it gets to our time to leave we’re like this stupid train needs to get out of the way so our train can come, and it better not be broken down or something cuz we want to leave, by this time we’re tired and cranky! Well it comes to our trains time and our train isn’t here and this one is still in the way and finally it leaves. Meanwhile almost every single one of us has gone down to check the schedule to make sure that this isn’t the train that’ we’re supposed to be taking and we keep second guessing but we’re sure it’s not it doesn’t say the right thing on it! So it leaves and yes, I’m sure you’ve guessed it, our train never comes!!! So then we ask this lady “this train we were supposed to be taking isn’t here are you taking it too?” and she says “no!” and then we said what time it was supposed to be here and she goes “oh it’s probably not coming” or something like that and we said “is that normal?” and she said “no!” so then we check the schedule and of course that was the last train of the night to Baden-Baden! So now we’re stuck and we have no idea what to do whne lex (who speaks a lot of bit more german than any of the rest of us) remembers that she saw a sign in german on the bus map we were reading that says youth hostil!

So we go back out to the bus stop and try and find it and then we try and buy bus tickets because by this time of course with our luck we’re gonna get caught on the bus riding without valid tickets, and the stupid machine wont give us tickets and we can’t figure out what kind we want to use. This lady sitting next to us can tell we’re having troubles so she comes up to help us and can’t figure out what kind of ticket we need (of course) and so she tells us we can just ask the bus driver and then trys to help us somemore and then says she’ll ask for us and we told her she didn’ t have to that we’ve already troubled her enough. We try and figure it out for a little bit more and can’t and our bus comes so we don’t want to miss another means of transportation so we just jump on the bus, and of course the lady does too and she ends up right in front of jeff and jon and is giving them dirty looks the whole time cuz she knows we’re riding without tickets and they’re freaking out that she’s gonna tell on them and this creepy guy with a growling dog is right next to me… and finally we get off at the stop we’re supposed to get off at, and again… we have no idea whatsoever where this youth hostil is and its dark and all I want to do is take a shower cuz I feel disgusting and go to bed!! This lady points up and goes youth hostil and then walks away so we were like, ok I guess we’ll go up there. So we start walking up this hill with no youth hotel in sight and are just hoping we’re going the right way! We still don’t see anything and are loosing hope thinking we’re gonna be stuck on the streets and good ol texas jon says in his thick accent, “you know how y’all were wondering how many hobos have slept in that ol’ train back there, I’ll tell you 6, us, lets go back!” and we all just die laughing cuz it’s so true!!! We were so ready to just sleep somewhere, anywhere!! Finally this guy comes walking down the street and lex asks him in german if he knows where the hostil is and he told here just keep going up the hill and it’s to the right. So we finally find it and as we’re getting closer I hear alex from behind me say, “is that a graveyard??” and I’m like “what?” and jeff looks over the hedges and I hear him say “yup!” and I start freaking out! Yes, right next to the hostil we were walking towards to sleep at there was a graveyard!!! I freaked!!

So once we get in there I don’t even care about the graveyard anymore I’m so sick and tired, and just want to drop dead! The guy makes us fill out all this paperwork so we can be apart of hostil international, and then I notice all these ways to tie knots and examples of course hanging on the wall at the front desk and I’m like oh this is reassuring all the guests no how to tie fool proof knots now, excellent (sarcasm)! So then we finally fill it all out and bring it back up to the guy and he says to us, “is too late, no more rooms!” none of us said a word!! I’m leaning on the counter for it to help me stay in an upright position and I just stare at him with my mouth open and we all just stood there, and no one knew what to say, and then like 30 seconds after we’re just sitting there staring at him, he goes, “I just kid! Haha! Give me your information!” he had no idea the day we were having!! That totally would have been our luck!!! We were so relieved! So we get in, I took a shower, drank some hot chocolate, and fell asleep, but not really! It was one of those sleeps where you’re just laying there with your eyes closed all night because you know how I’m a freak about dirty things touching me, I was so scared if I fell asleep I’d toss and turn in the night and my sheets would come up and then I would be touching the mattress in the morning!! Paranoid I know but I can’t take not knowing whats been in my bed!!! Ahhhhh!!

So we get up early and decide we’re just going to go to baden-baden instead of the black forest as well and take an early train back into Heidelberg because all any of us wants to do is go home!! So here I am thinking this is the worst EVER and I’m thinking maybe I don’t like traveling and how am I gonna be able to do this every weeked but I get up and we buy bus passes from the bus driver himself so theres no confusion and get on the 3 hour train ride, which since I was sick was passed out on the entire time and I’m sure theres some lovely pictures as well because I can’t breathe through my nose so my mouth was wide open! We finally get there and again, don’t really know exactly where we’re going but kind of get lucky (for once in the trip) and take the bus in the right place and hten kind of guess which way we think the roman spas are going to be and we got right again!!

So here’s the awkward part, the spas are nude there though!! You know how I’m like afraid of nakedness so it was so awkward but the packages was only 21 euros for 3 hours and only 8 dollars more for a 30 minute massage and it all sounded so good and I definitely think we deserved it from our miserable weekend so we all paid for the massage packet! And in the pictures all the ladies have towels around them in the spas and in the massage picture its over their butts so we’ere like this is ok, we’re gonna be fine!! Definitely liars!! They told us to get naked and didn’t give us a towel and then when they would give us towels then they woul take em’ away from us!!! I was so embarrassed the whole time!! Oh and I forgot an important part, sorry, it was separate!! Heck no was it coed, there’s no way I would have even thought about doing it if it was coed!!!!! Are you kidding me! But the lady did warn us of this one part where it’s like three different temperature swimming pools in the middle and that was coed and the guys we went with were like well why don’t we work it out so we’re not in there at the same time (cuz how awkward would that be, I’d never be able to look at them again!!!) and all of us girls were like ummMm… you don’t even have to worry about that because there is no way we’re going in the coed part!! You couldn’t pay me to!!

So heres how it went, once they made us get naked, with no towels in case you forgot, then we went into this room with these huge showers and it was so warm and then you went into this room that felt like Hawaii and I felt like I was getting a tan just laying in there, it felt so good and then the next room was even hotter but that room was pretty ridiculous it was so hot we only stayed in there for like 2 minutes!! And then it was the massage time with soap and brushes but we had to lay FACE UP at first!! It was so awkward!! That is defninitely not how they were in the picture and that’s where they took the towels that they gave us for the hot rooms away from us =( and then there was this amazing sauna that made me feel so much better cuz it was like aroma therapy air and it was like I bought a vaporizer and I just sat in there forever and could feel my nasal passages and throat clearing and I just breathed in so deeply it felt amazing!! But then I walked in a second time and I thought I saw a guy and I was like no, I’m not sure, she probably just had short hair and then I sat by lex and alex and they were like there’s a guy in here, and I freaked out!!! I was like oh my gosh I though so!!! So we’re all siting there like trying to cover ourselves up and he’s like behind us and I’m like freaking out cuz I’m thinking is this the coed part??? She said it was a pool and I was freaking out that our guys that we came with were gonna come in any minute!!! But we didn’t want to get up because THERE WAS A BOY IN THERE!! So we’re just sitting there and finally he gets up and then he realizes he was in the wrong room because he goes to go into the girl massage room and gets yelled at!! And he turns around smiling and embarrassed and walks out!!! So awkward!!! So then there was a cool pool you swam in and then this freezing cold pool that I didn’t want to get in but I was like I payed for it to I might as well!! And then the most awkward part of all was the moisturizing room, and it was filled with mirrors and you put this really nice lotion on in there, but it was the worst cuz it was like you coul see yourself naked and you knew everyone else could see you naked!! Ahhhhh!! I was so awkward and there was like a space wehre there wasn’t mirror and I kept trying to hide behind it so at least I wouldn’t have to see me and know everyone else could see me!! And then we weighed ourselves, I’ve defnintely already lost 6 pounds, not good!!! It’s only been a week!! And then she asked us if we wanted to rest and we were like “yes!!!” so she led us to this room and we layed on these beds and they wrapped the warmest and softest blankets I’ve ever felt around us like a cacoon and we got to sleep! It was pretty much amazing!! And then the last step was that you could read in the nude but that was a little awkward so we skipped out on that and finally got to put our clothes on!! But I really did feel a million times better and I felt the cleanest I think I’ve ever felt and my skin felt so soft!! It was amazing besides the fact that they took our towels away from us!!

The funniest part is that we were done before the boys were and they were a little unsure about it and I think they liked it a little bit more, maybe a lot bit more, than we did!! There faces when we saw them were so happy and like relaxed, it was hilarious!!!

So in the end we made our early trip ride back to Heidelberg, thank goodness!! And ate a big/cheap meal at food corner and came back and relaxed!! It was sooOo good to be home and I was glad we came back a day early! I think we all were!! And I was also glad we went to baden-baden because I really didn’t even want to do that I just wanted to come back!! But going there made me change my mind about traveling and that it really is worth it you just can’t be sick and can’t have a super unlucky day!! Mainau and the roman spas in baden-baden were definitely worth it all though!! And I’m totally going there whenever I get sick now!!

Luv shannon

Pictures: http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2036882&l=4a621&id=8506273

Castle Garden

2007-09-17T11:06:00.002-07:00

So I took my ginormous intensive german test that I just stayed up till 1 o’clock for and woke up at 7 for and the good news is it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be but the teacher that I didn’t study his information really at all (cuz he gave us like no information) was the hardest part!!! He put so much hard stuff on there that I had no idea what he was talking about or what it was asking me to do and then we had to answer in complete sentences in german and it was hard =(

But then we got rewarded and got to hop on the buses and go to this castle that has the most amazing garden of my life!! People don’t even go there to see the castle they go there to see this beautiful slash massive garden that is I don’t know how many acres wide! It reminded me of the garden of the castle in the princess diaries two, except much much bigger and much much better! It was pretty cool! Except we had to follow Her. Lerner around for like 5 hour lectures every 5 feet! I would have much rather just walked around with a few friends and enjoyed the garden myself and I would have got to see a lot more of it but instead when the tour he gave was over we were allowed to go and do whatever we wanted but I was way too tired by that point to go explore on my own! Got some really good pictures there so I’ll be sure to post them!

Oh and then we went to the trainstation after being completely exhausted from walking around all day and I tried to exchange my eurail cuz I bought the wrong one since of course that would happen to me, and it didn’t work so it was a trip for no reason but I got it all straightened out $90 later =( whatever it’s my fault for not reading carefully and understanding what the eurail I was buying was saying…. It happens… but the good news is todays day is almost over and I get to go on my first experience of traveling tomorrow!!! Next stop… the black forest/bodenboden/some cool flower island! It should be a pretty good weekend!Luv shannon

pictures: http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2036880&l=3c00a&id=8506273

Learn how to travel 101

2007-09-17T11:06:00.001-07:00

I had to learn how to travel today! Which basically entailed me following Emily and lex around since I have no idea what im doing half the time! We had to take a bus to the streetcars to the train station and like write down information, it was pretty cool cuz now I do actually feel a little more comfortable with the idea of traveling every weekend! Especially since I do know how to get to the train station now! Oh bad news though, I found out I just bought the wrong type of erail but luckily I haven’t activated it yet so I think I can get it refunded… hopefully =( I’m like the only one who seems to be having trouble understanding how they work, but I think that’s usually how the situations always go with me!

Oh yeah and I almost totally forgot!! We met the mayor of Heidelberg today!!! We went to like the city hall or whatever it is they call it here and we had a little meet and greet session just him and all of us heidelbergers! It was pretty cool! He told us that he’s in charge of the environment part of the towns concerns. Like how they just changed all their schools to being solar operated and they have one of the biggest (or maybe the biggest) solar operators in the world and that it looks attractive too and it is very efficient! I was actually really interested in it cuz ever since my hippy environmental English class I’m kinda really concerned and into all that environmental stuff… I know I’m a loser, but it still doesn’t hide the fact that that stuff intrigues me!! Haha! Anyways we got this really amazing schocolade (chocolate) and it was wonderful! We got a postcard and pencils too… who should I send it to…??? =) Oh and he was young too which was suprising and he kept asking how you would say certain words because he gave the presentation in english which is really cool and I felt bad for him when he had to ask some words like he didn’t know how to say lightbulb, I don’t even know how to say the!!! It was pretty cool! We got all dressed up and whatnot, so you know I liked it!Luv shannon

Laudenberg

2007-09-17T11:05:00.001-07:00

Laudenburg

We went to laudenburg today! I was gonna wake up and go with the rouses to church and then go to like the next town over called laudenburg because their town was having a festival and if it’s one thing germans know how to do it’s festivals! But I was like oh I don’t need to turn on my alarm I always wake up early and then my roommate comes in and I hear her in the morning and I was like what time is it and she said 10 till one!!!! I don’t think I have ever slept that long in my entire life!!!! It was so weird! So then I freaked out cuz I thought they were leaving for laudenburg at 1 and I really didn’t want to miss that but it wasn’t until 1:30 so I got ready really quick and got to go! Thank goodness I didn’t miss it I would have been so sad!!!

It was also my first bus/streetcar/train experience so we took pictures to commemorate it!! Very exciting slash not so confusing cuz I just followed the rouses along! When we got there I was completely surprised cuz I was expecting kind of like a carnival, it was definitely a whole town wide garage sale! It was pretty awesome!! I bought ashenputtle (Cinderella IN GERMAN!!!) for only two euros and I also got this super cute watch for only 4 euros and it just opens and closes super easy so I don’t even have to fuss with it when I want to put it on!! I defnitnely got tired realy quick in there though! There was so much stuff and so many people it was a little overwhelming!! Mom would have loved it though I know that for sure!! We also took a little break and there was this celtic band performing and in between there songs they would say some funny stuff in german! It was cool to watch something in another language and hear everyone laughing cuz it made me laugh too even though I had no idea what they were saying!!! I loved it it was so much fun!!

And then when we were killing time before we had to leave there was this awesomely ridiculous park for kids that we totally played on for like the entire time before we had to leave! They had these cool tire swing things that you jumped on and there were three and it kinda worked like a trampoline and when one person jumped the other two would fly up in the air!! Oh my goodness it was so much fun! I was out of control I was having so much fun!! It was way better then jumping on a trampoline for the very first time ever!!! The parks are fun here cuz there super dangerous and lawsuits waiting to happen but it’s not in America and people don’t do that here so there allowed to keep the fun stuff and not just leave the plastic unmovable rides!! Ahh so much fun!!
I think that was all for this day, I’m still trying to do this from memory since I got behind from not having my computatora!!
Luv shannon

cafe romantic

2007-09-17T11:01:00.000-07:00

Café romantic

So we got to go to the town of the three castles which was so super exciting to me since, I pretty much love castles cuz you know I’m a princess! Haha! JuUuust joking! It really was cool though! We got to ride the neckar river which is a pretty wide river that runs through Heidelberg and it changes levels to regulate flooding and you have to go in these things called locks and it’s basically like a water elevator for boats it was so cool! You’d be way below this wall and then they fill it with water and the boat rises and you go to the next level of the river! It was VERY exciting! Especially since I was sitting by Dominique (the little 10 year old boy, maybe younger, who’s family is staying in the house with us)! He was so excited by it and was explaining it to me cuz he’d been on it before and he was telling me what the river was called and stuff!! He was like my little pocket book of information! Oh and he said the funniest thing to me, we had to be serious in our backup pictures for our visas and I think were talking about how funny they all were and he turns to me and goes, “was it hard for you to take your passport picture?” and I said yeah why? And he goes, “cuz you’re always so happy I was thinking it was probably really hard for you to do. How many tries did it take you like 7 or 8?” it was so funny and everyone that heard was laughing! I was like I’m sorry!! Haha!

So the boat ride started to get very long after a while though especially since the sun was getting randomly covered and it would get chilly but we finally got there and it was totally worth it! We hiked up to one castle that was pretty much in complete ruins on the side of this hill but it had the best view EVER! Some very good pictures there!! It was my first castle and I was in love with it! We got to go into the dungeon looking parts and basically just explore it cuz there was no like guard or entrance fee or anything since it was all torn apart! The one I really wanted to go to was owned by someone and we didn’t know that till we got there =( it was sooOoo pretty! It looked like sleeping beauty’s castle and it had red flowers growing all over it somehow, just like on the walls or something! But someone stinkin lived there so we weren’t allowd =(

We walked around the town for the rest of the time, which was all closed cuz it was the weekend but we got to go inside my first church which was beautiful! The churches here are so old and have such historical value and the stain glass is beautiful! Oh I just love everything about here! It was a very cute town! And then when we came back we rode the boat and saw some guy with these sweet shoes which we of course secretly took a picture of under the seat! And we bonded! I was hanging out with alex, matt, and john all day and it was like the funniest day of my life! Everything that came out of anyones mough was hilarious!

We were starving when we got back and everywhere we looked to eat didn’t seem interesting and we had been looking forever so finally I was like the next place we see to eat is the winner, no matter what! Well lucky us we stumbled upon café romantic! Let me tell you it was sooooo romantic! Haha!! Well first our waitress was definitely most appealing, she had a mohawk and what alex thinks was male cologne that her guy friend wears! And she was defnintely wearing mens clothing. Then it was super dark and lit by like a manora! And then to top it off the menu was just fabulous! Lets see I got a tuna cheese sandwhich, alex got a cheese sandwhich, matt got what he said was really good bratwurst (which was defnintely a huge hot dog, we took pictures for proof but he denies that is was) and john got what looked like a bratwurst and therefore looked disgusting!! Oh and we defnintely ordered tap water (they don’t have regular water here, it’s carbonated) and she brought us out 4 of these massive glass bottles of water that we knew we were going to have to pay for so we told her we only wanted two then! And then we decided there had to have been something in the water cuz me n alex were really thirsty and we had drunk most of it and we got so giggly and silly! Like anything anyone said was so funny to us and I have no idea why!! Like we went to the bathroom and it was disgusting and I come out and I looked at her with a disgusted face and she looks at me and goes “I don’t even want to talk about it k?!” oh my gosh I could not stop laughing!! Should have been there!! So yeah, the boys were teasing us that the restruant had to have spyed our bottled tap water!! I think it was just exhaustion though!!! But it was definitely a memorable night and I will never forget good ol café romantic! =)
Luv shannon

Pictures: http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2036376&l=ff2ec&id=8506273

bright and early start/first day here

2007-09-17T10:57:00.000-07:00

First day here

So we had to get up sooOoo incredibly early in the morning especially for traveling all day but I think it was to get used to the time and not to get really bad jet lag, which I don’t even think I ever got, thank goodness! The breakfasts they serve here are mmMmazing!! There’s crossaints and yogurt and fruit and the most amazing kinds of sweet bread that you would never even think of! I love it! Especially since I love breakfast! we then walked down to our classroom and just on the 10 minutes there I became obsessed with Heidelberg germany! I don’t know when it happened but somewhere between moore house and my classroom on the haupstrausa, I fell in love with a town!!

Our classroom is pretty far from the house, about a 15 minute walk, but its so pretty and green like the cute little cobblestone roads where the cracks are bright green with growth! Ahhhh, I absolutely love it! I just can’t say it enough! I wish that you guys could see what I’m seeing just walking around and not just the pictures! Theres so many things that you just have to see in person so I just think that you should all just come visit me mMmk??

So once we finally get to the classroom (which is on the haupstrassa, kind of like the third street promenade, but totally way better!) and we have our own student break room and stuff in there, it’s pretty cool! They basically just went over rules and stuff with us blah blah blah, boring stuff, and then we got in groups and went on a scavenger hunt! Basically we got bored of it after like the first section of it because we were too overwhelmed with how beautiful the city was and all we wanted to do was take pictures of the old buildings that are everywhere you look and explore the streets that wind around on a cobblestone path for what seems like miles!! The scavenger hunt was a good idea though cuz it was like stuff that we should probably know where it was, you know like drugstores and grocery stores, but I’m sure I’ll find my way around better on my own! You know how I don’t like to read?! Haha!!

Oh and I got my first euro, took a picture with it of course and then I bought towels and an alarm clock at the kauf hof, cuz I didn’t have any, and I had to speak to my first german!! I was so nervous cuz here’s the deal, either I feel stupid speaking in german cuz I sound illiterate when I try, or I feel rude for speaking to them in English. But anyways here’s how it went down… I had to ask for change to take a passport photo in this photo booth, and lex (that’s my roommate that I knew from English last year) told me what to say, she’s been taking german for a while! So I said, “enshuldigun sie bitte, zwei fumf?!” that means, excuse me please, 2 5’s? see what I mean?? Illiterate, but he understood and it was the best I could do and he totally gave it to me and then some of my guy friends tried to get change too and he wouldn’t give them any! I guess you have to be a girl sometimes to get what you want cuz my friend knows WAY more german than me!

After a day of exploring we went to our first group dinner at this restruant called shanghai! I know I know our first two days here and we eat pizza then japaneese food??? Weird right? Well it was good except for we decided that the stirfry smelt like horses when they get all sweaty, we were “wafting” the smell towards us! Lots of good laughs and pictures! Royce sat by me so that is definitely why there was lots of laughs! He made me take a picture of the water jug cuz they measured their water! Oh and their was a hair in our tea and we kept being paranoid that people were switching glasses with the tea that was poured out of the hair tea! It was a silly night!

luv shannon

pictures: http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2036372&l=ec711&id=8506273

cars, planes, buses, and finally here!

2007-09-17T10:54:00.000-07:00

So I am totally and completely obsessed with germany!! Words cannot even describe so that’s why I have pictures!!! But first before I talk any more about germany I was a little late on blogging so I’m gonna go back to the airplane over cuz there’s some stories I don’t’ want to forget….

So my lovely layla dropped me off at the airport after I had just spent the last hour repacking so that everything fit and weighing my bag cuz I didn’t want to get charged the 120 euros for extra weight. So we’re driving and it didn’t even feel like I was going to go, no way no how, and then she dropped me off and I was a little bit late so I was kinda freaking out cuz I had no idea what I was doing or where I was supposed to be going but she gave me her phone number on my arm (I had to leave my phone with her to send back to my house =( so depressing, I still feel naked without it!) and went off into the airport. It was so big I was starting to get worried as I started realizing more and more that I had no idea where I was supposed to be or what I was supposed to do, and then this lady I guess could just see the look on my face and came up to me like the first second I walked in the door and I was like where would a flight to London be and she pointed me in the right direction and then I saw the massive group of heidelbergers awaiting the baggage check in! As I got closer and closer to the weigh station I was having a little mini heart attack and I felt embarrassed cuz I felt like I had so much stuff but Amanda did too so then we started laughing about it! So I get up to the weigh station and my bag said 27 something and I wasn’t gonna tell him that his thing was wrong and then someone goes “how much did it weigh Shannon?” and I was like “it says 27” and then I looked at the guy and I was like “but I don’t think that’s right” and then he said no it’s in kilograms and hten switched the symbol and it said 60.5! I was 10 lbs under!! Heck yeah! I could’ve left stuff in!!! and then he slapt a sticker on both of my bags that were 60 that said “very heavy” but I didn’t care I didn’t have to pay extra! Wooh!!

So the plane was assigned seating and I was kinda ok with that cuz I didn’t want to go through the whole awkward who do I sit with when I knew a lot of people but wasn’t like best friends with everyone, and then I was starting to get really sad and missing my friends already because a lot of people had already come with their best friends from last year like they picked the same program and it really made me want to come home cuz I was just getting all those nerves that everyone gets like am I gonna fit in, people already have good friends and I just have met them a few times… anyways I’m getting off track! So basically I was kinda regretting going especially since I had been at school for like 3 weeks and got all attatched to everyone and school again and I was like why the heck am I leaving? You know? But then I sat by Royce Prude and all my worries went away for the 10 HOUR plane ride!! He is so stinkin hilarious!! Like probably the funniest guy I have every met! I knew him a little bit last year but only like passing “heys” in the halls not like conversations, I never knew he was funny! So anyways we’re on the plane for like two seconds and he starts dishing out “that’s what she saids” and “what” and just random hilariousness! And then he wants the flight attendant to take our picture and he gives it to the guy and he takes our picture then walks away with it like he was going to take it and then starts taking pictures of the flight attendants and we were like this is going to be an awesome flight! And Royce kept saying things like this is gonna be a long flight, and I told him that it sounded like he didn’t want to sit by me so then I made him add an extra word whenever he said it like “this is gonna be a long flight, yes!” or something like that and he kept saying it whenever I said something retarded, you know how I do! Haha!! So yeah, Royce is hilarious and totally made my flight and so did the flight attendant! He was so funny too! Everytime he walked by he would give Royce high fives and then I would reach up for a high five too and he would like take my hand and hold it! And then when he was coming by with the food cart for the first time he told me to turn my head away from him and he flipped my hair and goes “oh my gosh I just love your hair, I was a hairdresser for 13 years before I did this, and I’m not even gay!” and then he flipped my hair every time he walked by me! oh and one time when he came by I asked him how long he had been a flight attendant for and he looked at me and goes “flight attendant?? It’s called tourier” or some british word! (we flew british airways so they all had super cool accents, Royce said he was gonna start speaking with an accent by the end of the flight). One time he said to Royce how’d you get to sit by all the hotties and once when he handed me food one time he said here you go sexy( don’t worry he was old it was all in fun) and then he handed me cranberry juice and said it’s good for your system! (it was the most disgusting cranberry juice of my life!)

One bad thing about the plane was that the movies weren’t working for like a good hour and a half and I could not sleep at all, but I guess in the end it kinda helped me not to get jet lag cuz I was so exhausted when we finally got to the house I slept when it was time to sleep! We had a layover in London for like 2 hours and that got delayed, oh yeah our flight from LA was delayed an hour as well, good bonding in the airport.. sorta! Haha! I definitely slept on the ground in the London airport and then we were off to Heidelberg!!! I was so excited and I did finally get some sleep on that plane! It felt like it lasted only like 30 minutes (thank goodness) and then the captain announced we were landing!!! And I looked out the window and was like “oh my goodness, I’m here! It was so sureel! Finally, here, after a year of knowing I was going to be living here, it was finally happening!!it was crazy!!

We were met at the airport by the director of our program Her D. and then we still weren’t in Heidelberg yet, we had to take a bus there and it was gonna be another hour and a half until we got there… depressing, I know! So by this time wer’e all realizing that we’ve had one and a half plane ride food in the past 18 or more hours and I was starving, tired, and about to drop dead. Definitely the longest travel day of my life! But definitely worth it. So once we finally get to the house it was dark so I really couldn’t see anything on the way there but even if I did I probably would have been too tired to remember it!! We were told we were about to perform our right of passage to live in the house, it was horrible!!!!! We had to carry our bags, (member my 60 lb bags that I was excited about that they were only 60?) up 7 (maybe more) flights of stairs and into the house!!!! No other way but stairs. I basically walked up one stair at a time backwards and heaved my bags (that were also as big as me) up each step… one… at….a…time…. it was ridiculous!!! Definitely a true right of passage I for sure feel like I deserve to live here just from that!!! David, oh sweet amazing david, carried my 2nd bag up for me!! I will be in his debt forever!! The guys were really good about helping and I think each girl only had to take one of their bags!!

We had a little bit of a talking to about rules and what was going on for the rest of the week but honestly I was too dilussional from lack of sleep to comprehend what they were saying and I was too busy scarfing down the pizza that met us there to care! We had to pull names for rooms, which was awkward at first cuz of course everyone wanted to switch but then I finally ended up in a room with alex and alexa and they are amazing and I love them both!! They’re both super easy going and we didn’t fight over beds or closets or anything all three of us were like whatever, so it’s perfect!! Alex is like one of my favorite people here! We’ve already had so many good times here!! So many!! It makes me laugh just thinking of them but I’ll explain later!! So all three of us took a shower and crashed, none of us even tried unpacking! Like I said perfect roommates!!
Luv shannon