Grundschule Summer Celebration/Night on the Town/Monkey Habitat/Lake of Constance

So in earlier posts I talked about heading back to the Grundschule for their summer fest celebration. We were supposed to dance with them, but we arrived a little late so we ended up just watching. (made me sad! I would have really enjoyed the dance again!

But even without us Americans, the celebration went on. It was a blast! All the grade schoolers danced the dance, and sang, and did skits about the four elements, earth, wind, fire, and water.

That dance was hilarious!

They brought in a fire blower for the fire section. It was intense!

My favorite part of their 'concert' was the air pipe orchestra. They played a symphony piece ( I cannot for the life of me remember which one it was...) and the children "played" along with their air pumps. Was it musical? Not at all. WIll I use it if we ever do an Earth/wind/fire/water show? Oh heck yes!

I really enjoyed their festival, but it came to a point (during the play) that we didnt really understand, we felt like everyone was staring at us, and it was really crowded, so we left.

We wanted to check out the celebration on the oldest street in Esslingen. (Remember the scavenger hunt last week? Well its a good thing we did this!)

My brother would be interested in this, they had a hookah booth on the street as part of the celebration. It smelled amazing while passing by, nothing fake like most American tobacco smells. Just ... good... I wanted to ask what they were smoking, so I could buy it for my brother, but I realized I had no idea to ask any of that in German. Oh well.

They had a live band playing, they seemed about my age. Then again, it seems that someone who is my age turns out to be 17 or 18. Everyone looks so much older here. And the other girls in the group found this out when heading out for some drinks!

I really enjoyed some of the decorations on the street. They had live music everywhere, and one guy playing the violin. He was really, really good. We got married and now he plays violin for me every day. (let's see if Steve, the boyfriend, is actually reading my blog... :) )

That night we went out on the town. We got all dressed up and ready to go experience the German night life, went to dinner, and then I started feeling sick and went back to the hotel. Cause I am lame like that. But I was able to talk to my family for the first time in 2 weeks. I love Skype. So much.

Today, we went to the Lake of Constance. It is a vacation spot for Germans, when they don't feel like heading out of Germany. And it is beautiful! They had stork nests everywhere. Literally everywhere! On top of roofs (or rooves? no roofs sounds better... right?) tall posts, everywhere!

Now this is where you need to get jealous. We got to feed monkeys. We went to a a monkey habitat, that houses endangered monkeys. There is a path that you get to walk around with a handful of popcorn. And you feed them. And they take their little cute hands and snatch up the pop corn really fast and then just eat it. No you cannot pet the monkey, and you have to resist the urge to just wrap him in your arms and go "MOOOOOOOONNNNKKKKEEEEYYYYY!!!!!"

Which was a very hard urge to resist...

^Bettina (our awesome professor)

^Emily

^Tasha

^Marcella

^Sarah

^ MEEEEE FEEDING A MONKEY!

We just chill. Thats how we do it.

Now lets talk about these salads. They are delicious. Amazing. Beautiful. Just absolutely everything you want in a salad. The onions don't taste like onions. They taste like pure love. The dressing is perfect. And it comes with potato salad under it, along with sliced cucumbers, carrots, radishes, and sometimes even noodles. American salads are boring, ugh. I am not looking forward to going home. I will miss the food dearly.

Now lets talk about my main dish. Felchen is a fish that is local in Lake of Constance. And I ordered it as my meal. not really knowing how it would be cooked. I had in my mind a bulging ugly fish with gross eyes, slimy scales, and giant teeth. Imagine my relief when it arrived Beer battered and delicious. And I ate it all.

Amazing how I can eat so much fried foods and yet look so slender. :) juuust kidding. I am sure I will be at least 5 pounds heavier when I get back to the states!

Look at how beautiful the lake is! No sand where we were, just painful rocks. Ouch!

We were right next to the Stone Age Village, which is 6,000 years old. Houses on stilts! It was an amazing view. We could have taken a tour, but decided to lay out in the sun!

Trying to get my tan on! You can see the tan line right above my suit top! Sweet!

This is how we spent the last half of the day, and it was totally worth it. Thankfully no burn. That I know of. But from what I learned from Florida earlier this year, I probably won't notice a burn until tomorrow!!

Good night all!