Lost in Deutchland.

Although our standard posts are based on the principle of showing pictures of the only member of our family who is too young to to be embarrassed by having pictures of her being shared with the world, this post will be about my foray into the land of the Deustch, or as the indiginous people call it: Deutschland.

Our story begins with a beautiful strapping young man who was called on a mission to cross the great seas and share an important message about a inspired excel spreadsheet that would bring happiness into the hearts of the Deutschlanders. Our hero's excitement for this trip prevented him from getting any sleep on the 9 hour flight to Deutchsland. In fact, in an effort to bolster this task to a difficulty worthy of our young hero's attention, he strategically chose to neglect learning even the most trivial piece of the local dialect. Instead he chose to depend wholly on his ability to communicate through charades. This proved a worthy challenge when the drivers of taxis obtusely refused to take their eyes of the road long enough to appreciate the expertly crafted hand gestures signaling that the driver had just passed our hero's destination. However, soon the taxi driver succumbed to the power of his graceful charades and felt compelled to take our hero to his hotel.

Our hero spent the remainder of the day wandering the streets of the small city of Rannheim gazing upon the homes that are so accurately depicted in the movies. Because skipping a nights sleep on the plane was a such a joy, our hero drugs himself up (two benadryl) and goes to bed extra early. Fortunately, his will is so strong that he conquers a second night without sleep, perfectly preparing himself for a full day of important meetings.

The day begins with a complex set of charades aimed at directing a Pakistani taxi driver to the Horscht Industrial Park. Although the Industrial Park is only 10 miles away, and is the size of a small city, our hero must present 4 different maps for the taxi driver to find the destination. Finally, the taxi driver dumps our hero out at the south gate of the industrial park, takes his euros and disappears as mysteriously as he appeared. As fate would have it, this entrance was not for visitors, and the nearest visitors entrance is about 2 miles away. After a lot of confusion and charades someone is given the honor of chauffeuring our hero to the other entrance. After obtaining a badge our hero learns that its a 3 mile walk through a maze of chemical plants before arriving at the building for his meeting. His amazement grows as he sees that all three of the days meetings are in different buildings on opposite sides of the park (the word park here is a misnomer... There are no swings, trees or grass in this park... Just huge masses of pipes, tanks and the smell of sulfur.) After a day of meetings, walking, and being lost our hero catches the train into Frankfurt to see the Christmas Markets.

(The narration style is changing now, I am becoming weary of my own story)

The Christmas Markets were awesome. They conclusively proved that nobody knows sweets like the Germans. Wondering through the masses of people (eating a giant soft pretzel) I was amazed at how the city mixes the old with the new. I completely loved it.

Because I had several confrontational meetings scheduled for that next day I really wanted to have a good nights sleep. Unfortunatly, it didn't happen. Laying in bed all night in that hot hotel room, with the smell of cigerette smoke wafting in the open window I began questioning the awesomeness of the trip. At about 5:00 a.m. I gave up on sleep and prepared all my notes for the day. I felt like a zombie and I am fairly certain I looked like a zombie. That night I got back to my hotel, and fell asleep in my chair as I waited for my waiter to bring me my bill. It was now Thursday, and I hadn't had more than a hour or 2 of sleep since Sunday night. After I ate, I went to my hotel room and crashed on my bed. I slept for 12 hours straight. When I woke up I discovered a very worried wife who hadn't heard from me in a day and had no way of contacting me.

Feeling like a new man, I caught a high speed train (174 mph) from Frankfurt to Berlin a 4 hour trip that crossed nearly the entire country. In Berlin I met Flourin Mohss, an old friend from high school, and we saw the city. I stayed with him in his apartment for 2 nights and saw a lot of the city. It was a fantastic way to spend the weekend. (see pictures)

This looks really gross, but I tried it and liked it. Its called Doner Kebab, and I think it is made by people from Turkey, but only in Germany. (Heath told me about it years ago so I was glad to finally try it)


A picture of a city I passed while in the high speed train. All these cities seemed so magical to me.


The Christmas Market in Berlin. These were really fun.


Big Gate in Berlin, seperated the East from West.


Mall in Berlin... A lot like in the US.


Picture of Flo and a painted piece of the Berlin wall.


Picture of me by the river separating East and West Berlin. Notice the German hat which clearly indicates that I am not a tourist.


Amazing church in Berlin... Possibly an LDS church... It's impossible to tell.



German Parliament Building


The Wall


An underground fallout shelter.


A cool motorcycle


Downtown Berlin


Sunday morning we packed up Flo's belongings and took the autobahn from Berlin to Cologne (a 6 hour drive at 95 mph back to the other side of the country). In Cologne I met Flo's girlfriend and saw the house they were going to buy (his girl is amazing and cooked me a wonderful German meal). I then took another high speed train back to Frankfurt, and a normal train back to Rannheim and then walked a mile to my hotel. It was an awesome weekend but I was worn out.

My meetings during the next two days went well and I flew back on Wednesday morning. I am still recovering from the jet lag, but at least I have been able to fall asleep at night. Its soooo nice to be home with Cynthia and Kaitlyn again. I missed them like crazy.