the end of Berlin and Amsterdam

My time in Berlin has come to an end. I can’t believe how quickly the past 4 months have gone by. Its true what they say, time flies when your having fun and I really did have the time of my life. I couldn’t have asked for a better experience and I have no one more important to thank for this experience but my parents. I am entirely grateful that they didn’t stand in my way when I told them I wanted to study abroad. I made some amazing friends that just helped make my abroad experience that much better. Now after 4 amazing months I leave my home in Germany and embark on even more adventures with some friends and family. Next stop on my European adventure is Amsterdam then I’ll be going to Vienna, Zürich, and lastly I fly home to LA from Paris on December 28^th. These next few blog posts are actually being written while either sitting on the train from one country to the next or during some downtime.

Side note: traveling through the German countryside is absolutely beautiful. I feel like I’m in Narnia, everything is completely white with really cute country-style homes. Oh so very cute. Okay, now back to me, just kidding, but not really since that’s kind of what this blog is about…

Amsterdam was amazing, but getting there was another story. We started our trip at 7:31 in the morning where we left Berlin and went along our merry way to Amsterdam. Since Europe can’t function when its cold, rainy, or snowy our train broke down right before the stop we were supposed to get off at. From there we had to find our own way to the Amsterdam Central Station which ended up consisting of us running back and forth for 4 hours from one platform to the next missing all the trains. Finally, after literally sprinting to the front of like the 8^th train we attempted to catch, we finally got on after we sprinted with all of our bags. Since everyone else was in the same boat the train was ridiculously and I mean ridiculously crowded. I was folded in the most awkward position clutching my luggage for well over an hour. I can now honestly admit that in drastic times I can morph into a human pretzel. Since the trains weren’t running correctly there was a long back-up to get to the final platform, which consisted of us waiting in a crowded train stopped in the middle as we waited for our turn to get to the platform. Once we finally got to the platform it was pretty much smooth sailing from there on, I mean it is Amsterdam after all. In Amsterdam we took a city tour on a boat where we could hop on and hop off wherever we wanted. We saw the Anne Frank house, the house (more like factory) where Anne Frank and her family were hiding before some idiot ratted them out causing them to get captured and sent to Auschwitz where they later died a month before the liberation. Such a sad story. We also went to the Van Gogh Museum, the Heineken Factory (so much fun), the Ice Bar, walked through a few Christmas markets and along the cannels. Amsterdam was such a beautiful city; it definitely bypassed everyone’s expectations. We all want to go back. 

Here are some pictures of Amsterdam and Vienna:

Amsterdam

Amsterdam's canals

the perfect shoes

Vienna City Hall

Schloss Schönbrunn (Palace)

BelgiYUM!

Ahhh I’m behind on my posts! Sorry! Okay…what to fill you guys on? Hmm…

Well a couple of weeks ago I went to Belgium, which was awesome mostly because, lets face it, it’s the chocolate capital of the world. YUM! Oh and it was gorgeous! We stayed in Brussels but took a day trip to Bruges and Ghent. So ridiculously pretty masked with a nice overtone of FREEZING. In Brussels, we pretty much walked around the entire city and went anywhere that sounded interesting, aka we pretty much walked into every chocolate shop there was in Brussels. We accidentally ran into a Christmas market in a random plaza where we ate yummy food. Side note: European Christmas markets are amazing. They keep the Christmas spirit running at full force.

what else? CHOCOLATE

 After we ate some amazingness we went to a bar called the Delirium Pub. This bar is known for its beer. It has had thousands of beer on tap so obviously we had to try them all, just kidding we only sampled a few and they were all so good. Oh another side not: I have officially become a Beer Connoisseur…just kidding, but I feel like I should be.

A Christmas Market in Brussels

 We also took a day trip to Bruges and Ghent where we had a tour of both cities, both very cute and a lot smaller than Brussels. In Bruges our tour was a boat tour. The city is really small so it was easy to see everything via boat. Half way through the tour I lost feeling in my entire body cause it was so cold. But that was okay cause then we went into a chocolate shop where we drank amazing hot chocolate! In Ghent we were left to venture on our own, so what do we do? Oh ya, we went to the best waffle restaurant in Ghent where we ate the delicious Belgium waffles.

WAFFLES!!

 When we headed back to Brussels we hit up some souvenir shops and the next day was our last day so we hit up the European Union headquarters. Brussels is where the EU headquarters are so we walked around and saw the European Commission, European Council, European Parliament, etc. I thought that was really cool because all semester here in Berlin we constantly talked about the EU and what they do, so to actually see where all the EU politics occur was really cool.

European Commission

European Parliament