You can call me the Lowen Frau

I've been here for a week and a half and only just now noticed that I have a view from my room of one of the most famous landmarks in Munich, Frauen Kirche. I guess churches aren't really on my radar so much.

What is one my radar is lions. They are everywhere. Braunshweig is, apparently the city of lions. Herzog Henrig von Lowen (Duke Henry of Lions??? I think) was from Braunschweig. I guess he's the German equivalent of Richard the Lion Heart in England. Henrig also went on a pilgrimage (read: crusade) to Jerusalem. We visited a church in Braunschweig with carvings of Herzog Henirg conquering the non-Christian's one of which depicted him standing on someone's head. It was supposedly a non catholic church, which is easy enough to believe as it was not nearly as ornate as most catholic churches that old are. However, Herzog Henrig's crusade pre-dates (I believe) any sort of Christianity other than catholic. In any event there was a large bronze statue of a lion in the courtyard of this church and a series of benches, which unfortunately I didn't get pictures of, that had lion statues as their feet and each lion was in a different pose, one was sleeping, one was roaring, one was yawning, etc. They were so cute.

Lions abound in Munich as well. Those of you that have been living in Seattle for a while will probably remember when we had pig statues all over the city. It was a benefit for the Pike Place Market Foundation and local artists were enlisted to decorate the pigs which were then displayed on street corners for a while and ultimately auctioned off for charity. I can only assume that Munich did a similar thing with lions, though I think the auction has already happened as some of the lions are now in store windows though some are still on the sidewalks and I saw one at the Olympic Park.

I went, yesterday, to the Olympic Park with my flat mate (the Brit). The main attraction there is a tower that's, basically, a lot like the Space Needle (though I think perhaps shorter). We went a bit late (at around 10:00PM) but still I was kind of shocked not to see more people there. I mean I've lived in the Seattle area my whole life but I still go to the Space Needle every now and then (and it's always busy), plus I've been to the Seattle Center more times that I can count. There was practically no one at the Olympic Tower or in the Olympic Park.


There was a swim team practicing in the pool there though. This pool was beautiful. I mean, it was a pool, like any other, but much bigger. When you hear people claim that a pool is Olympic size I can almost guarantee that they are lying. The ones at Universities (at least at UW and Western) come close, maybe even match in size but not in scope. Obviously there is a regulation length for the Olympics and, maybe, the pools that claim to be Olympic size are as long as this one was, but I doubt as wide and it wasn't just the size of the pool that was so grad. The whole scope of the buildingwas awesome. There was a second, regular sized, pool (presumably for the Olympic swimmers to warm up in) behind the main pool and the stands could probably seat well over two thousand people. It was amazing. Really.

The Olympic tower was, in itself, unremarkable. It was tall, there was an amazing view from it, and expensive rotating restaurant in it (which we didn't go in because it appeared that they only served 3 or 5 course meals), etc. There's a rock 'n' roll museum in the top of it which is small but interesting mostly for the fact that it's there, in the Olympic Tower, in Munich. I didn't get any pictures but it was cheap enough that I'll probably go back sometime, during the day, to take pictures of the view. It actually cost less to get up the tower than the U-Bahn ticket to get there cost.

The best thing about the trip to Olympic Park was the company. I wish my flatmate weren't leaving after this week. She has a cousin at the University in Granada who she wants to visit over the Easter holiday. I'm trying to convince her to just wait a couple weeks so she will be there at the same time I am, but she seems to have her heart set on Easter. I'm exceptionally shy but when I do meet people (and they talk to me) I often connect with them immediately and so it's hard for me, sometimes, to meet new people whom I know I'll only really see for two weeks and then probably never see again. I'm also really bad at keeping in touch with people so even if there was a possibility of seeing someone again I often ruin it through my laziness about keeping in touch. I hope I'm getting better at it. I made a resolution to be better at it and so far I think I am. You guys would know I guess. Am I? Doing any better at it? Or if you've met me within the last six months or so are you asking yourself "What the hell is she talking about she keeps in touch plenty"?