Day #279

Monday, June 22

Unfortunately, this was the day we left Copenhagen. We brought our bags with us and ventured to (wait for it....) THE POST AND TELEGRAPH MUSEUM! That's right people, Copenhagen has a museum entirely for mail and phones. It had sheep made of telephones. Weird, but cool? I guess?

Also there was a boat?

On our way out of the museum, some lady asked us to watch her baby. I guess the Danes think that only responsible people visit the Post and Telegraph Museum on a Monday before noon? 

We headed to the airport and, thankfully, had an uneventful flight and bus ride back to Heidelberg. Peace for now, Copenhagen. 

Day #278

Sunday, June 21

So there's this giant tower in Copenhagen at the Church of Our Savior and we climbed all the way to the top of that thing to take some pretty panoramic pictures of the surrounding area. LOOK HOW TALL!!

We also explored this place called Christianshaven which is basically the part of Copenhagen where people aren't allowed to take pictures because that's where all the drug deals go down. We did not know this when we went there. It was a little bit scary because people wore things over their heads (so they couldn't be recognized for illegally selling drugs) and people seemed like extreme hippies, but in a slightly more alienated way. Not a place that I want to revisit. But a cultural experience? I guess? Maybe? 

To recover from the sketchiness, we got some delicious (and inexpensive!) sandwiches, sat by the canal, and watched tour boats go by. We counted the amount of tourists who took our picture thinking we were locals and posed for them. Joke's on you, tourists, it's only our sandwiches that were authentic- authentically DELICIOUS! *drops microphone and retires from career as a comedian*

We jumped on a few more sidewalk trampolines and walked around the town center and a giant park (since it was Sunday and, as we know in Europe, almost everything is closed on Sunday's). We found an open grocery store and bought rations for dinner, making a delicious stir fry and watching the sun set from the balcony of our Airbnb as we ate dinner. Not too shabby, to be sure.

Day #277

Saturday, June 20

So I'm going to brag about my engineering skills a little bit, since they're hidden very, very deep inside my talented being and usually don't crop up very often; this was a rare case of technical ingenuity. Even Matthew, the mechanical engineering student brother, complimented my work. Here's how it all went down:

In the bathroom of our Airbnb, the shower appliance was attached to the faucet in such a way that you have to turn on the faucet and pull a lever in order for the water to come out the shower head. Unfortunately, the lever must stay pulled out for the water to continue running through the shower, and the lever did not want to stay pulled out on its own. Kimberly puts on her thinking cap, and voila:

I attached two hair bands together so that one was around a hook above the sink, and one was tied around the lever, effectively keeping the lever until the contraption was unhooked from the hook, and the lever went back in and the water flowed back out the faucet. All this from a student of words and books and people!

BUT THAT WASN'T EVEN THE BEST PART OF THE DAY, FOLKS! Oh yes, Copenhagen had many a surprise in store for us on this day.

First of all, may I just say... Sidewalk trampolines. Yes, you read correctly. Trampolines that are built into the sidewalk. Need to relieve some stress? Sidewalk trampolines. Need some extra exercise on your morning jog? Sidewalk trampolines. Want world peace? Sidewalk trampolines, I'm convinced, would be the answer.

As for the rest of the day, we took a boat tour of the canals (during which we saw some ESPN-type of competition for diving, which took place off the roof of an enormous building build on the water), were hailed on for roughly 10 minutes and hid in a public bathroom before it became a beautiful day, and saw the quintessential town center of Copenhagen. 

We visited the statue for Hans Christian Anderson's "The Little Mermaid", some windmills, and finally Hans Christian Anderson's grave (a tad creepy, but cool) before heading home for the day.

Day #276

Friday, June 19

Copenhagen, yeah! My two friends and I took a train to the Frankfurt airport around 9am, then (after figuring out those darn electronic ticket things and having our gate changed one we finally got close to the depths of the airport) boarded our plane at noon! I pretty much just read Harry Potter the entire ride, as per usual. And snapped this classic plane picture.

We landed a little after 1, and got to our Airbnb around 3, leaving plenty of time for exploring the rest of the day! Our Airbnb was a super adorable studio apartment with a balcony that overlooked the sunsets at night. Speaking of sunsets, we were in Copenhagen during the longest day of the year- over 17 and a half hours of daylight! Funnily enough, I was pretty far north for the winter solstice as well, and enjoyed 6 splendid hours of sunlight while traversing the Scottish highlands. 

We explored Trivoli Park, which is kind of like Epcot in Disney Land (World? I mean the one in Florida) with rides and food from different countries and, most importantly, AN EPIC PLAYGROUND. 

The coolest part? On Friday nights in the summer, Trivoli Park puts on concerts free with the entrance fee to the park. So, for roughly $15, we got hours of culture, food, rides, playgrounds, and JESSIS J LIVE IN CONCERT. If you don't know who Jessie J is, go look up her acoustic cover of "Bang Bang" on YouTube. Even if you don't like the song, you gotta admit she is extremely talented and has such a versatile voice. Who would have thought we'd see her live in concert in Copenhagen? What??Like how does this even happen???

Very tired but extremely happy, we headed back to our Airbnb and slept for days. 

That's a joke, I promise we didn't waste all of our time in Copenhagen sleeping.

Day #275

Thursday, June 18

Literally this day was nothing more than packing for Copenhagen and finishing a paper, no wonder I didn't post about this. Here's a door from our English department: 

They're really passionate about learning.

Day #274

Wednesday June 17 

So you know how I love saving money? If not, go back and read about how, for the first 5 months of this blog (when I was actually good at updating), the two themes were basically "free" and "food", preferably together. So that saving money thing. I waited it out- a skirt that cost €30 when I first got to Heidelberg WENT ON SALE FOR €7. Patience is a great thing, friends. I took a pic to commemorate the day in my new skirt. 

Also I made some friends with two lovely cows. And became a cow myself.

As for the rest of the day, I went to class and Mensa and studied with my friends and all things good.

Days #270-273

There were a few relatively uninteresting days, during which I took two german tests, studied a lot as a consequence (though in the opposite order of how I just listed those two activities), had some gr9 (better than gr8, better known as "great") talks with my lovely British friend Sasha, and stayed late at Mensa playing card games with the fam. 

In other news, Tom decided to set me a new background for my phone:

"Hey. Hey everyone. Hey where are you all going? Can I come with you? Hey? Guys?"

Day #269

Sunday, June 14. CLOSER!

Wow I studied a LOT of german on this day in the history of Kimberley's life. We're talking massive amounts. I also booked the Airbnb for my family's stay here (YAY) for during our time in Konstanz. My friends persuaded me to take a break from studying to explore the playground on the banks of the Neckar river. It was certainly a sight to behold. There was a thing that spins like a top where you RUN REALLY FAST HOLDING THE THING AROUND THE EDGE then you REALLY QUICKLY JUMP ON IT AND SPIN!

There was another cool pink car that rocked back and forth and allowed us to take an impressive selfie.

Don't worry, we waited it out so we got to go on the cool rides. But it did take a while- apparently those kids get to stay out really late on Sunday's! There were a lot of interesting people there, including one guy with long hair who kept challenging everyone to ping pong tournaments and kids that were hogging the fun rides. In other news, Heidelberg was beautiful. But what else is new?

Three photos to make up for my lack of photos in the last post. Okay?

Day #268

Saturday, June 13, 2015. Getting there. Poco a poco. Or should I stick with the German and say Stück für Stück? Yeah no that's pretty ugly. I'll stick to Spanish for this one. This one's short anyway.

A late start to the day. One of the local food eatery and bars, The Brass Monkey, closed on this day, so we got drinks and celebrated our first (and unfortunately last) trip to the fine establishment. We decided against going out, and instead ate gelato along hauptstraße to end our evening which, in all fairness, is arguably how all evenings should end.

Day #267

Friday, June 12, 2015. Yes, a very long time ago. I know I know I know it's been almost a month (that's TERRIFYING, by the way), but at least I'm doing it, right???

After a rather uneventful course of morning events, my friend and I traveled to a new location: a lake! Who knew there was a lake near Heidelberg? Apparently my friend, that's who. 

It's in a place called Weinheim (pronounced Vine-Hime), and is actually more of a pond than a lake. One of my friends there is from Scotland, and she was excited because she had never seen a lake before! 

Although we didn't swim in the lake, we read Harry Potter (at least the 2/4 of us who had the various books downloaded on our respective devices) and took the very long way back. However, the way back resulted in a super cool tram stop, so I wasn't complaining. 

It was an evening filled with watching videos of Manny Ramirez's best bloopers, Mensa food, and the Alte Brüke.