Frank Vest: Germany

My name is Frank Vest and I traveled to Germany through the American Association of Teachers of German (AATG).  I lived in Rauenthal and went to school in Wiesbaden.  My group also took a five day excursion to Berlin.  This blog contains my five favorite pictures with descriptions of my experience.  Here is my story.

This photo is of the Feinmahle, or public viewing, of the German versus Netherlands soccer game.  Our group was on an excursion to Berlin.  On Wednesday, we were allowed to go around and shop for things the game.  We all went around and bought German flags, jerseys, scarfs, and eye paint with the German flag on it.  The whole day was preparation for the crazy night that would soon come.  I had expected there to be about ten to fifty thousand people at the most.  I was thinking it would be about the attendance of an American football game.  There were seven hundred thousand people at the Brandenburg Gate to watch the game.  The whole game was a surreal feeling.  We all were constantly in awe of how many people showed up.  The Germans don't mess around with soccer, and when Germany scored.. The only word that comes to mind is chaos.  The Germans threw their food, drinks, or whatever was in their hands into the air.  There was a shower of random items after every German goal.  Thank God there were only two goals, because I don't think that we could have survived the disorder that would ensue if there was a third German goal.  This night was by far the most energetic night that I had in Germany.

The Rheingau is one of the largest producers of wine in not only Germany, but all of Europe.  Rauenthal, the little village that my host family lived in, overlooked the Rhine.  This picture shows the wine yards that make the Rheingau so famous.  These wine yards have been used to make wine for over three hundred years.  My host father told me that French monks were the first people to come to the Rheingau and harvest wine.  The monks set up a monastery in the Rheingau and had wine yards all over the property.  The wine from the small little monastery in Germany was so good, that people moved to the Rheingau specifically to cultivate the wine that is today renown around all of Europe.

The Rheinstein is one of the oldest castles in Germany.  The castle was built in medieval times and was the home of German nobility.  The nobility chose to build their castle so close to the Rhine so that they could tax anything that came on a boat past their castle.  The Rheinstein owned part of the Rhine, and for boats to be allowed to go on the Rhine, they had to pay a tax to the Rheinstein nobility.

This picture you see is the fruit of much labor.  There was a very simple way to climb up to the top of the Rheinstein castle, but my family was very adventurous.  We went the long way up.  We hiked up a crevasse and walked along the ridge of a hill for about five or six miles.  After lunch and too much walking, we reached the Rheinstein.  It had been kept up very nicely, which can be attributed to a renovation in the last twenty years.  From the highest vantage point on the Rheinstein, one could see roughly twenty miles of the Rhine river.  That was one of the most beautiful images, and a view that I will never forget.

The Wiesbaden train station was the bane of my existence when I was traveling Germany.  The Germans are so precise about when trains and buses leave and arrive.  It was a difficult adjustment from American transportation.  There was more than one incident where I was in a full sprint trying to stop a bus or train from leaving without me.

One time I was being escorted back to the Wiesbaden train station by another German. 

We departed from Mainz and half way through our ride we got up and walked the length of the train to get to the front.  As soon as those doors opened, it was like the starting gun to the 100 meter dash went off.  We were both sprinting as fast as we could dodging innocent onlookers.  We got out of the station and waited a painful ten seconds for the signal to change to green so we could sprint across the road to the bus station.  I've played lacrosse for six years, and I honestly think that chasing down my bus was the fastest that I have ever run in my life.

Currywurst along with Doeners are the fast-food of Germany.  Currywurst is the only one pictured, because it is my favorite.  Currywurst is a sausage that is cooked over a flame and then cut into bite-sized pieces.  Then a delectable sauce is drizzled over it.  Currywurst is often served with a side of french fries, or Pommes.  The Germans are funny about their Pommes.  They enjoy putting a sort of mayonnaise on their french fries along with ketchup.  It was edible, but not their best culinary showing.  However, the currywurst with the sauce on it was outstanding, so it made up for the weird french fry sauce.

For two weeks I think that I did a very good job of trying all sorts of different German food, but in the last week I succumbed to the deliciousness of currywurst with french fries.  The Germans know a few things.  They know how to make good cars, they know how to run an economy, and they know how to make good food.

My experience in Germany is one that I will never forget.  I made friends across the world and experienced a culture unlike anything I have ever seen.  My German flourished and improved daily throughout this trip.  This trip is once in a lifetime, and I cannot express how grateful I am to the Wilson family for this experience abroad.  Thank you for changing my life.