Alicante Spain

Hello everyone, again. Sorry that I have been posting quite a lot lately, but just felt like I needed to inform everyone before I forget all of the details.

This last weekend, March 12th-14th, I went on an adventure to Spain. And this was not just anywhere in Spain, but Alicante! For geographically uninformed people like myself, it is in Southern Spain right on the Mediterranean Sea! This trip was taken for really three reasons. One being that I was tired of being cold and in cloudy Germany. Two I hadn't seen SAA friends in over three months, and was going through withdraw. Third, it was Brittany's birthday!!!!! When a friend turns 21 you have to go out with them, but when there are in another country turning 21, then it is a absolute must; plus it was on a beach so i made an exception, lol.

My trip started on Friday the 12th. I was the fortunate one in my office because I was able to leave early and avoid staying for the entire departmental meeting, but I think it was over when I left. As I made my way to Frankfurt-Hahn Airport I got to experience a different part of Germany, the western country side. To get to Hahn you have to take a bus, and this can be enjoying because you can see some more part of the country. However, the bad part of my trip was the fact it was 0 degrees C and was spitting rain and snow. As you can imagine I was more than ready to get to Spain and enjoy the sun, beach, and a little time with some good friends.

After arriving in Spain 30 mins ahead of schedule, I made my way to meet up with Brittany and Laura. We met at the bus stop, headed to the hostel, and then proceeded to start the reunion celebration off right. One lesson that I learned in Spain is that you don't mess with a 250 pound, red headed drunk female. To elaborate further, this particular red head about 'threw down' with Brittany within the first few minuets of meeting all of Laura's friends. The way it started is Brittany decided to borrow a plastic cup for her wine, needless to say they didn't really appreciate it. After putting the cup back, the angry red head came chasing Brittany and nearly started a good old fashion brawl. Luckily Brittany escaped with only the memory of the angry red head haunting her dreams for the next few days!!

Upon awaking on Saturday after nearly being up for 24 hrs, we decided it would be good to go and meet up with Laura. We met up with Laura and headed to a local market near the university in Alicante. This market was neat for the reason it had everything. When I say it had everything, I mean literally everything. They had everything from fruit, shoes, clothes, underwear, and much more. After tights, white linen pants, and some strawberries we decided that we had experienced the market to its fullest and headed for the castle.

Now someday I might actually remember the names of some of the places I saw, but you never know. Regardless, there is a mountain in the middle of Alicante which plays host to an enormous castle. After hiking our way to the top, we were a little worn out. Our exhaustion was soon forgotten. The view from atop this castle was just amazing. I have pictures of what I saw, but they just don't do it justice. It always amazes me of all the magnificent view that I have seen in my time in Europe. These views can be seen in pictures, but the true beauty is never really known until you can experience it first hand.

After tromping up and down the mountain, TWICE, we finally headed for lunch. At lunch the group introduced me to my first real Spanish dishes. We stopped at a local place that did what I would consider an afternoon lunch special. This would include everything, but the best part of this was that it included four courses, bread, and drinks!!! The food was simply amazing, much like all the food I have had when traveling. Lunch was now over and we headed to the beach for a nice relaxing time.

While on the beach we sat, talked, play volleyball, drank some wine, watched a memorial service, and even had the chance to workout. On the beach they had some workout machines and of course we had to check them out. After a while everyone parted ways until dinner and went on to do their own thing.

Around 11:30pm we headed to meet everyone for dinner. We got to the local diner and ordered us some drinks and ate. At this particular location the main event was about to occur. Brittany finally turned 21!!!!! As a typical American tradition she got to take her first legal shot!! After celebrating a little while longer, we decided it was time to hit the town. Now typical Spanish night life is like nothing I have ever experienced. They don't go out until 12-1 am and don't quit until about 6-7am. For someone who is used to getting up at 7am to work, this was a lot like jet lag. However, I managed to make it through an eventful night, and probably some of the most fun that I have had since being in Europe.

Upon waking at 12pm on Sunday, time was running out for enjoying the sun. As I left the hostel I walked around the main strip and got to do some really good people watching and take in all the beauty of the beach, sun, and the sea. The last few hours in Spain were spent on the beach enjoying good friends, food, and an unbelievable view. At 4pm I had to leave new and old friends with some great memories. I was a little sad, not only about leaving friends, but the fact that it was about 30 degrees colder in Germany than where I was currently. Upon arriving back to Limburgerhof, I had the nice surprise of finding out that my bike seat had been stolen, who knew there was such a black market. Anyway that minor negative was not near enough to dampen the highs from an amazing weekend

Until next time

EU: Amflora Approval

For those who just joined us, I am doing an internship with BASF Plant Sciences. Recently there has been an increased buzz running through our campus here in Germany. It was a couple of weeks now, but the European Union has finally made a break through on genetically modified plants. The EU Commission approved Amflora!

Amflora is a potato that produces only the amylopectin starch required for industrial starch use. Conventional potatoes contain amylose and amylopectin starch and separating them is very uneconomical. See the wiki page for more information or google it!

Anyways I felt I should share this information because the people I work with are the project managers who have worked to get approval after 13 years!! Seeing their product be approved and begin preparations for market introduction has been really a great experience.

This is a big step in the agriculture world. With the acceptance of GM products evolving in Europe show positive signs for many years to come. It also means that this is a trait that is not owned by Monsanto. With this increase competition, agriculture could be looking for some major changes in years to come and that is something to be excited about!!

Trip with the parents Part II

When we arrived in Torino Italy, we as most of the trip were completely lost! However, with mom's amazing skill of reading a map she was able to find us a place to stay, and we dropped off our luggage and headed to the street.

After asking the front desk where to go, we headed off. The first thing we did was wonder around till we found a pizza joint. Now when going to Italy I was probably more concerned about eating the food than actually walking around. We finally found place to eat some pizza, and we got to watch mom chug a beer, lol. For those of you who know my mom, well... enough said haha.

After we all three scarfed an entire 25 cm pizza, we started walking around. As we walked we saw some pretty neat churches and buildings through Torino. The way this city was laid out was interesting. It seemed as if they built it up with space between the buildings, and urbanization hit and caused the city to become one huge structure. Walking around you would find a church here, a museum there, an old palace or barracks in the middle of town, and then out of now where you would run into a giant courtyard. The size of some of these buildings was just amazing, not to mention the train stations. After walking around window shopping and getting some drinks we headed back to the hotel to relax before dinner. As we walked towards dinner, I was stilled amazed at the buildings we would see. As we stopped for dinner, the food was everything I could have imagined. I had a plate of spaghetti that was to die for! not to mention the wine that was cheap and absolutely delicious. After dinner we headed back to the hotel, where we all crashed.

After sleeping in, we all got up and headed to breakfast and planned our next journey. We decided that we would stay in Italy for another day, but instead of Torino, we headed to Milan. Milan, for those who are unaware, is one of the fashion capitals of the world! Upon arriving in Milan, we again had no idea of where we were going to stay, but didn't matter it just made the trip a little more interesting! AFter finding a place to sleep, we encountered a concierge that was great. He told us where to eat, shop, sites, and even told us about the Soccer match that was in town. Milan was playing host to the Inter vs. Chelsea game, and everyone was excited. As we walked through the streets we would constantly hear people start chanting for their team and occasionally we would hear an argument between fans.

The places we saw during our stay were: a really big church built in the 14th century or even sooner than that, the church that housed the "Last Supper" painting, but unfortunately they were sold out for the day when we got there. After seeing a few major sites, we headed to the shopping district. I have never seen so many stores for so many blocks. It was just amazing the number of stores that the streets had. I mean there was absolutely no empty buildings! Now the stores were nice, but the cars parked outside of them was even more amazing. After stopping in a few of the stores, we headed for dinner and then would call it a night!

Our next adventure would take us to Zurich. As we boarded the train, we all were tired enough to just crash almost instantly! On the trip to Zurich we got see some of the most beautiful sites we could have wanted too. The Swiss Alps were just amazing and words can't really describe what we saw, so just look at the pics on facebook.

Once we arrived at our hotel in Zurich, we started to wander around the city again looking at the shops and some of the little restraunts in the old parts of town. We then made our way to Lake Zurich, and again the view was just unbelieveable! After gazing over the lake for awhile, we headed back to the 'magnificant mile', or what is a really expensive part of town. Here we got see the infamous Swiss watches. Just a random fact, there is actually a law that governs the quality and branding of the "Swiss Watches". If you have some free time, Google it and its pretty interesting. Some of these watches that we saw were in the range from $100 Swiss Francs to about $50,000 Francs, no joke! The part that really got me was the $11,000 cell phone, I like expensive phones, but that is as much as a nice used car, or a down payment on some persons home.

Much like most people I am a sucker for fashion, or at least I like to spoil myself every now and then. What I am getting at is that I broke down and bought me an original Swiss watch. The neat part about some of these watches is the years of business the watch company had been in business. There were some that had been around since the 1700's! Mine is only from 1888, but still I felt like a true Swiss for a little bit, or maybe it is an ignorant tourist, but ohh well.

When we awoke the next morning, we headed to the train station to begin our journey home. Mom and dad were going to be leaving at 2pm, and we were still four hours from Frankfurt. As they dropped me off in Mannheim we said our good byes, and they were off.

I just want to say thanks to both my parents. I know that our trip was probably more expensive than any of us could have imagined, but then again I am priceless, lol! I just want to say thanks for coming to see me and the memories that will last forever. It means the world to me when you fly almost half way around the world to see me for a couple of days. Again thanks for everything, because if it wasn't for you I probably wouldn't be doing what I am or be the person I am today. Thanks for the great memories, and I love you both!!

Trip with the parents

As you may have guessed from the title, my parents have recently just visited me in Germany. They arrived on the 20th of February and left on the 26th. Throughout our time together we decided to do a little bit of traveling, or actually we traveled a lot, approximately 2400 km.. I think. This may seem like a lot except when the train is going 300 km/hr it doesn't take long to get from place to place.

Our first stop was Mannheim Germany. Not to far from the Frankfurt Airpot, but was an easy location for us to decide where we wanted to go from there. During our time in Mannheim mom and I walked around and looked at the city, figured out the plans, and scouted a place for dinner. All the while dad was trying to get some sleep, and that is also why we stayed in Mannheim the first night was to allow them rest since they had traveled the entire day before.

After we left Mannheim we headed over to Paris, France. So our journey started at 9:30am on Sunday as we embarked on a very unplanned vacation. Upon arriving in Paris, by train, we tried to figure out where our hotel was. Believe it or not none of us had ever been to Paris, and there were no free maps to be found. So instead of wasting time trying to Google map our way and walk and further waste time; ohh wait we did do that. So after a few minutes passed we finally, by we I mean dad, decided to hail a cab. He took us to our hotel, where we couldn't check in until 3pm, dropped off our luggage and head for the cites. Now the easiest way to get around Pairs is the metro system, and that is exactly what we did for the next couple of days. Our first stop was Notre Dame. Holy Cow!! This church was enormous!! The shear size and and detail work on this historic place was just unbelievable and is definitely a must see when in Paris. After losing mom countless times in Notre Dame we decided it was time to make her more visible; therefore, she bought a hat with the say "Paris" on it. As if we didn't look like tourists before we sure did now!!

After touring Notre Dame we decided that it was time have a snack before we saw anymore. We stopped over at a small cafe right next to the church and had Crepes!! These are the sugariest pancake things you could ever imagine, especially if you get carmel and whip cream on them. After we could all barely move from the overdose of sugar, we headed off to the see the Arch of Triumph. The Arc is probably a very central point in the city, and was built to honor the Triumphs of Napolean. While standing at the base of this enormous landmark, off in the distance was the Eiffel Tower.

After the Arch we headed towards the tower. Now before getting to this Eiffel Tower I knew that it was a large structure, but little did I know just HOW LARGE it really is. This tower is just huge!! Words really don't describe it until you are standing at the bottom of it and looking up at. As we walked around for a bit we contemplated the idea of having dinner at the top, but decided we would just go up and have a look around. We then hopped in line and waited for around an hour to go up, and then spent about an hour or so having a look around Paris from one of the highest points in the city! The really cool part about going to the top of the tower was being up there at night. At night you could see all the main sites lit up and you could really see just how big of a city Paris really is!

As we end dinner and head back to the hotel, we were wondering if leaving our luggage in the front lobby of the hotel was actually a good idea. Luckily all the bags were accounted for upon our return to the hotel, if that is what you would call it. The first problem was our room was on the fifth floor and the elevator was barely big enough for the bags let alone three people. When getting to the room I opened the door and first noticed the camo wallpaper, flower curtains and plaid bed spread and the fact there was just a full bed for three people, not good. Luckily the hotel/hostel had an extra room that the odd third wheel could sleep in; that was me if you didn't catch that.

Upon awaking for day two in Paris I was room less and we had no plans for the rest of the trip and it was only Monday morning. Once we all got ready to go for the day we decided to figure out our plans for Tuesday, or at least figure out where were going to sleep. So after having mom run up pack everything up, checking out once with no refund, and then about to leave and googleing hotels near by, the hostess suggested switching us to a three person room. Wow that would have been really nice to know before we ran around like chickens with our heads cut off.

On to site seeing. Our first stop on Monday was the Louvre. Now when I got the Louvre I had heard that it is big and that there is no way you could even see half of the place in a day, but much like I was with the Eiffel Tower, this was the biggest museum I have ever seen!! Once I thought I found the end of it, and was wrong because it just kept going even further!!! After getting over the size of the building we had lunch and started in looking for just a few of the main attractions. We stopped and saw the Mona Lisa, Venius statue, and few other really large and famous painted, sculpted things. After we saw a tiny part of the Louvre we then set off to see some other places.

The first place we went after the Louvre was some really big church over looking the city and then after we went up and down the giant hill we stopped for a drink at a local place we thought would have wireless, but it was broken. The next thing we did was head towards the infamous Moulin Rouge. Then later that night we went and saw the show at Moulin Rouge. After the show we made our way back to the hotel, and then next we would be headed for Italy!!