Freizeit? Was ist Freizeit?

I looked up that cafe I was in last night and it's advertised as the first kosher cafe in Munich. Presumably that doesn't mean first ever but first in the last 60 years or so. It was a great place. The proprietor sat in the corner with a group of people debating the intricacies of language. At least I think that's what they were debating. They kept switching back and fourth from Hebrew to English to German (or possibly Yiddish or possibly both). The part of their conversation I caught was about the meaning of the (German) word Mench.

In German they often have one word for things we have several words for in English (like Die Krebs which is cancer, both the disease and the astrological sign, but also means crab, the animal) but just as often they have more than one word for things we only have one, if any, word for in English. Mensh is one of those. It means man. Der Mann also means man (or husband), but Mensh is the more global sense (like mankind). It's used where we might say "one" in English. It's in a German proverb I learned from my landlady "Des Menches wille ist sien Himmelreich" (Man's will is his heaven). Anyhow, one of this group was trying to explain to another what it meant (because she didn't speak much German), at that point they switched back to Hebrew and I couldn't understand any of it anymore. I kind of wish I spoke Hebrew (and/or better German) so I could have joined their conversation.

I also wish I could have found a place to plug in my laptop there because I could have had an equally interesting conversation online with a friend of mine about the same topic if my laptop battery hadn't died just then.

Today, for the first time I found myself responding to a question in German without having to search for the words. And today the sun finally came out on Sunny Street just in time for me to go north where it's still freezing and wet. Also, today, I felt for a moment like my time here is something to be gotten through rather than something to be savoured. I think that's partly because I don't have much free time while I'm in Munich. I'm in classes everyday from 8:30AM-5:00PM. I planned on getting out and seeing more of Europe on the weekends but now that I realize how little of Munich I get to see during the week I might stay in town on at least one of my weekends. I'm conflicted about it though because there's so many other cities I'd love to see too. Prague is one that I really can't miss. I can't imagine being this close to Prague and not going. The main reason I chose the Goethe Institut in Munich (as opposed to the one in Berlin, or Hannover, or Gottingen, etc) is because of its proximity to Prague.

Prague holds some sort of mystique for me that I can't quite explain. There is, of course, the fact that both King Wenceslaus and Saint Nicholas are from there which I find both interesting and somewhat funny. But the mystique of Prague is more than Christmas iconography. I'm not sure why I'm so drawn to it but it's one of the places I felt I had to go to. One of the only places that I'd even be willing to skip class to go to if I had to.

So, the itinerary was going to be:
This weekend (March 23-25) - in Wulfenbutel
Next weekend (March 30-April1) - in Prague
The following weekend (April 6-7) - in Belgium for the Tour of Flanders
Then on to London on April 15th, Spain April 19th, Ireland April 25th, home May 1st.

The Tour of Flanders turned out to be too expensive and time consuming so instead I'm going to leave for London a day early (on April 14th) and go from there to the Paris-Roubaix. I'm still going to Wulfenbutel, in fact I'm almost there now. Prague is a must but I'll probably do that the following weekend now to give myself a break from traveling and time to really enjoy and explore Munich.

Travelling kind of saps my energy and by travelling I mean the time spent on planes, trains or buses not the whole experience. I try not to think of this as a metaphor because I like to think of myself as, metaphorically, someone who enjoys the journey as much as the destination, not more, but as much. The literal journey, however, I kind of can't stand. Being in any kind of moving vehicle makes me alternately, and sometimes simultaneously, sleepy and nauseated but trains (and boats of course) are especially bad.

The 4 1/2 hour train ride from Munich to Hannover didn't just sap my energy it kind of sapped my will to live.

However, again just as I was starting to think the cold and fatigue were killing my spirit, I find myself in one of the cutest places in the world. I booked a hotel/train package (because it was significantly cheaper than the train ticket alone) and this hotel is fantastic and adorable. It's off on a side street in an old building. I arrived late, at around 11:30 and the reception desk was already closed for the night. It would have stayed open for me had I not completely messed up my reservation. I might not have even gotten in but for a cute old man who was just leaving the hotel to take his dog for a walk (I really love hotels that allow pets, by the way). He let me in and I called the receptionist from the phone in the lobby. They were super accommodating even though my astounding ineptitude was the sole reason for the mix up with my reservation.

Also, the room is basically the room I always wished I had at home when I was growing up. It's in the top corner of the building and the roof is sloped so I can only stand up fully in half of it. All the furniture is super dark wood and there's a skylight in the sloped part of the ceiling. This room is so cute I can hardly l stand it. And instead of a mint on the pillow there was a tiny bag of gummy bears.

It's places like this that make the time spent on planes and trains and buses worth it. Places like the cafe last night, where I thought I could happily sit for days drinking tea and eating potato soup and listening to interesting people have interesting debates that I could only partly understand, or this hotel where I wish I could set up residence and just sit in this room writing all day and night. If I had more time.