I just experienced one of the greatest events of my entire life this past weekend!!! The one thing that I had to do while in Europe was go to the real Oktoberfest in Munich. When we realized that our finances and our class schedule would allow us to venture to the great festival, we immediately jumped on the opportunity.

It is quite difficult to describe in words the magnitude of the fest. Oktoberfest was kind of like the Kentucky Derby on steroids. In fact, combine: all the action of the state fair (rides, booths, attractions, etc), the party atmosphere of the Derby, hundreds of thousands of people, and German food/beer and you have Oktoberfest in Munich. Everywhere you look, you could see thousands of people in their traditional lederhosen. There was also plenty of music to go around for everyone to enjoy, as well.

The beer tents were immense; I read that some of them could hold around 5000 people each. Imagine that amount of people singing, drinking, dancing on the tables, etc. You don’t even have to drink to have a great time. I strongly believe that anyone would be able to enjoy themselves in that environment regardless of the circumstances. Everywhere you look, you see people from all over the world with a big smile on their face.

There was even a mini-amusement park inside the fairgrounds. It contained a few roller coasters, a ferris wheel, small children’s rides, typical county fair rides, etc. Quite literally, there was something for everyone to do at the festival. There were people there that probably ranged from 3 years old to 90 years old. And the food……the food was fantastic. The streets were lined with different snack and sandwich vendors. I definitely got my fair share of schnitzel, sausage, pretzels, and anything else you associate with German cuisine.

All in all, Oktoberfest was more than I expected. I am so glad I was able to go, especially since I have no idea if I will ever be able to return. If you enjoy parties, festivals, beer, food, music, and a great atmosphere then Oktoberfest is your place to be. I honestly feel that this is one event that everyone needs to attend at some point in their lifetime.

Thanks for reading,

Josh Heeman

This past weekend, I took my first trip outside of the Netherlands. Six students from U of L, along with one other girl went to Dublin, Ireland for a long weekend. Getting to and from Dublin was kind of a hassle (about 12 hours of airports/planes/train stations/trains going there and about 10 coming home), but nonetheless it was well worth it; I have no complaints. I really enjoyed spending three whole days in Dublin, rather than the two that we were originally planning. We were able to see and do everything that we wanted to plus a lot more.

On Friday morning, we took a 3 hour walking tour around the city. The tour was through the website neweuropetours.eu. I highly recommend that if anyone goes to Europe to check out this website. They offer free walking tours in probably ten major European cities. They will take you to a lot of the famous sites for three hours and give you a lot of historical background information. When you are done, all you have to do is tip them (if they did a good job of course). The tour took us to Dublin Castle, Trinity College, Village Green, some cathedrals, Jonathon Swift’s birthplace, etc.

Later on Friday night, I partook in my first pub crawl. It was a really fun time, especially meeting many college age students from all over Europe and the United States. The crawl took us to 3 pubs, one pub/dance club, and one club all in one night. Needless to say, we enjoyed ourselves. Dublin’s main strip is called Temple Bar. Everywhere you look, you see restaurants, upscale shopping, pubs, and clubs. I personally thought that it was a much better version of Bardstown Road. It is quite touristy, but nonetheless it is a good place to enjoy yourself.

On Saturday, we kind of did our own thing. We went to a famous prison that housed and executed many political prisoners during the Irish rebellions against the British. I have always enjoyed history and learning about the Irish’s centuries-long feud with Britain was quite interesting. They had 5 revolutions in about 300 years, with it all culminating with the Easter Rebellion in 1916. The Irish have a lot of pride, and we were able to experience some of it while touring the prison and seeing the sites where the political leaders were held and executed.

Afterwards, we toured the Guinness brewery. We went to the Heineken brewery in Amsterdam, but the Guinness brewery was much larger. In fact, there were about 20 or so different buildings scattered within one complex. They did a good job explaining the various steps in the brewing process. The end was the best part-we got to drink a beverage at the top of the tall building. The “Gravity Bar” was circular and completely encompassed by glass windows. You could literally see the whole city. It wasn’t nearly as tall as the Sears Tower or Empire State Building, but nonetheless it served the same purpose.

On Sunday, we went on a tour bus to venture away from the city a little bit. We went to the countryside for a few hours and got to see the famous Irish rolling hills, green grass, and lots of sheep and cattle. It was the Ireland that we had always imagined. Afterwards, the bus took us to a city called Kilkenny. The city was well-known because of a castle that has been maintained in almost perfect condition. It was nice to walk in a real and fully-standing castle.

Overall, Dublin was a great experience. It was definitely a nice change of pace to be able to communicate with everyone and read signs in English. The city wasn’t the cleanest by any means, and with the exception of some scattered cathedrals and castles, there were not that many nice buildings to see. On the other hand, the people were extremely helpful and friendly. However, after some people began to drink, they could possibly become quite loud, aggressive, and possible violent. I believe that kind of behavior is overlooked by the population (which is quite different than in America). Needless to say, I would never want to be a police officer. Regardless of these facts, I still had a lot of fun, and I recommend that you travel there if you ever get a chance.

Thanks for reading,

Josh Heeman

Last weekend I had the opportunity to participate in an international event of rare quality: the Berlin Marathon. This event, over the course of the weekend, caters to just under 50,000 athletes from 122 countries. Most of them are in the capstone race, which is the 26.2 mile marathon that takes place on Sunday morning. It is part of the most prestigious series of marathons currently: the World Major Marathons.

Berlin and this race were absolutely unbelievable and my only regret is that I did not have more time to explore this city. Though I saw more landmarks than I ever needed to throughout the race, there was a certain nagging, distracting pain inhibiting my enjoyment of the history surrounding me. Shortly after the halfway point I passed the Rathaus Schöneberg, where JFK gave his famous “Ich bin ein Berliner.” speech. All I could think at that point was “Ich bin müde.” (tired)

One of the most fascinating points about the race is not only that it introduces history to a runner the way only a marathon can, but also that the race itself is a part of history. Before the reunification of Germany in 1990, the race course was only in West Berlin. The only way an East Berlin runner could participate was to sneak to the other side of the Wall. So many people in the East crowded the top of the Fernsehenturm (TV Tower) to watch the race from the East side in the 80’s that it had to be closed during the race in ’87 and ’88. In 1990 the marathon was held on September 30th, while the official reunification of the country was to take place on October 3rd. The race director, in a wise move, was able to allow the race to flow through the Brandenburg Gate for the first time ever to the East side. Because this race actually occurred before people were allowed across, registration was flooded that year. In 1989 16,410 people ran, but in 1990 they had to limit the influx of entries to an astounding 25,000 who were eager to be apart of history. That year and the city’s history make the race the world class event it is today, which attracts the most elite athletes the world has to offer. Today the race crosses between East and West Berlin four times, including the most prominent one, through the Brandenburg Gate, 400 meters from the finish line.

In the end, I ran a 3:15, good for 2,581st place. Not my best performance in a marathon, but what was supposed to be my peak training days for the race were spent backpacking across the Mediterranean area. The lesson for the trip, however, is to make sure you have a seat reservation on the train out of a city after a marathon. I neglected to have this foresight, and had to spend the duration of the trip in the gangway between cars. Leg cramps abounded, but life goes on still.

Since this is my first blog post for the business school, I’ll start by introduce myself.  I’m a 21 year old Computer Information Systems major from Edgewood, KY (a town in the middle of über-suburbian Northern Kentucky).  I am studying in Oestrich-Winkel, Germany at the European Business School for the duration of fall 2009.  Why did I chose to study abroad?  Originally, to figure out if I should, I asked myself the inverse question: “Why not?”  Since there were no outstanding reasons why not and way too many reasons to do so, I chose to look into options to study at a partner university.  To bolster our experience, my friend at U of L’s business school, Joe Huber, and I traveled around a large chunk of the Mediterranean Area for three weeks prior to arriving in Oestrich-Winkel.  For a verbose and extensive chronicling of that adventure, see Joe’s first post on this site.  I will not repeat his thoughts on the experience as mine are much the same, but I may write about random revelations on the experience in a future post.

So this brings me to the subject of this post: my experience with the German language.  Thus far, I have only taken German 121, or the introductry semester in the language at Louisville.  This class and it’s exceptional teacher (I have to mention Monica Krupinski.)  gave me a good basis.  This class and the limited use of the Rosetta Stone products led me to believe that I could handle the basic level of the intensive German class that leads off the semester.  (There are three levels: beginner, basic, and intermediate).

Last week I realized that I was quite wrong in this assumption.  On the first day the professor spoke 100% German and started issuing instructions for an assessment exam.  The test might as well have fit the cliché and been in Greek (and yes, we found in Greece that despite knowing the alphabet it does live up to the old adage as a very confusing language).  My professor cracked jokes when the tape player that directed the listening portion of the test did not work initially.  Most of the class laughed.  I did not understand any of them.

The process of learning a language is a slow one.  Through some miracle, I was not dropped to the beginner level after that first test, so it appears my German was not quite that horrible.  The first day of actual class I understood only an odd word here or there that my professor said.  I thought of asking to go back to the beginner level.  Two of my classmates in fact did very quickly.  I chose to stay and ride out the storm, since if I dropped down I knew I would not learn anything new at all.  Luckily a Hungarian friend of mine who is quite proficient in English explained the particularly convoluted instructions.

I just finished this Intensiv Deutschkurs this afternoon, so I can now look upon it with some very short hindsight.  Although I still do not understand a lot of what the professors say, some of it does sink in slowly.  The theory behind being taught entirely in German makes some sense because you associate new words with other German, rather than English or any other native language.  However, if you do not have the basic vocabulary, it becomes quite difficult.  Example:  On the first day of lecturing I did not understand the word “sterben” and asked my professor about it.  He started speaking about several synoyms, little of which I understood.  I feared that without the basic vocabulary I needed, I could never learn new words.  However, when he started to speak about the German word for death (Tod) and Michael Jackson, I caught the drift.  And indeed, the word meant “to die”.  It’s experiences like that make a word very easy to remember.

Learning German outside the classroom is also an adventure.  If you go up to any person in customer service and mumble something like, “Mein Deutsch ist nicht sehr gut…” (My German is not very good), most of them will launch into an English conversation with you.  However, where is the learning experience in that?  Sure, when I was in Turkey, Greece, or Italy I felt no guilt in having someone switch to English for me or use gestures to communicate, but the knowledge that I am in this country for an extended period of time motivates me to assimilate to the culture as quickly as possible.

There are some small victories involved.  I can go to the grocery store without incident (although there is little talking involved there with the cashier).  Last weekend I got my haircut in the nearby city of Wiesbaden.  None of the stylists spoke English.  My German friend who attended the University of Louisville, Martin Weckenmann, in the spring left to get a beer across the street while he waited for me.  I told him I would be alright.  I am proud to say that I came out of that day with a haircut that did not resemble any sort of lawnmover accident.  The process of learning a new language is a slow one, so just make sure that you have delved enough into a culture before you go anywhere near somebody with scissors.