After our eye-opening trip to the Würzburg Volksfest we knew that we wanted to make the most of the larger one happening later on in Nuremberg. We decided to spend most of our Saturday there even though we were leaving for Amsterdam early the next morning – and I’m glad we did. We arrived early via regional train, stopped briefly at the (very disappointing) Nuremberg Easter Market, and then made it to the fairgrounds nearly an hour before the attractions […]
Category: Germany
Love Locks in Germany.
Germans aren’t exactly known for being romantic, but all the love locks throughout the country would suggest that there is plenty of romance going on in the land of beer and sausage. The tradition of love locks has been around for a century or so but Europe didn’t start seeing them in large numbers until the early 2000’s. While they are meant to be a sweet gesture or symbol of lasting love, the locks have caused quite a controversy in some places. Fortunately we’ve […]
How the German Restaurant Experience Is Different Compared to the US.
I was a bit overwhelmed the first time we went out to eat at a restaurant in Germany. The combination of having a language barrier, not being able to translate all the words on a non-English menu, and my lack of understanding about the process in general resulted in an intimidating situation. We still experience confusion sometimes when we go out for a meal, but we’ve definitely got a better idea of how to act and what to do after […]
15 Times Google Translate Failed Hilariously on the German Amazon Site.
We started purchasing products from Amazon.de pretty much immediately after we moved here. Amazon was all we knew – we had used the US site faithfully for several years before we moved and it was our go-to for just about everything. We’ve since learned how to shop in Schweinfurt and and use online sites other than Amazon, but there are times when it’s still our best option. Thankfully they have an English version so we can search for items and […]
Our Cost of Living in Germany Compared to the USA.
I’ve been asked a few times how much it costs to live in Germany compared to America. That’s a hard question for me to answer completely because we don’t pay for housing or utilities in Germany nor did we pay for them in the USA after college. (Mr. Meena’s company has provided us with free housing for two and a half years.) But I have kept an extremely detailed budget since we’ve been married, so there are some comparisons that […]
The Spring Fun Fair in Würzburg.
When I found out about the Frühjahrsmesse & Frühjahrsvolksfest (Spring Fair & Festival) happening in Würzburg I knew we couldn’t miss it. It’s been a long winter without much to do nearby, and we hadn’t visited Würzburg since the Christmas Markets were in town. The fair starts three weeks before Easter and is the first big fair in Bavaria. According to the Würzburg city website, the amusement park has some 50 attractions and plenty of food and drink options (including […]
6 Thoughts I Had at the Schweinfurt Fish Market.
1. Is this just an excuse to have another festival? Probably. 2. Wait a minute, this might be an excuse to sit outside and drink lots of beer. That’s more likely. 3. Why is there a giant pirate ship? I don’t know. But they serve beer. 4. Is that Linkin Park that I hear blasting? Yes, and it’s coming from the merri-go-round… 5. Can I ride this?? YES!!! I can and I did and it was awesome. Mr. Meena might […]
A Typical Day in Our Hotel.
Have you ever lived in a hotel? We’re seven months into our stay in one and it’s testing my sanity a little bit. This is how a typical weekday goes. 5:30am: Mr. Stomp Stomp, our upstairs neighbor, wakes up and begins stomping back and forth in his bedroom, directly above my side of the bed. I wonder what he is doing. 5:45am: Mr. Meena’s alarm goes off and he slowly wakes up (he is not a morning person at all). I […]
12 Differences I Experienced While Going to the Movies in Germany.
We’re really not big movie goers in general. We like using Netflix and usually we have enough patience to wait until a movie is released on Google Play so we can rent it for just a couple bucks. We used to have a great setup for watching movies at home before we sent all our stuff into storage and moved to Germany. Even when we did go see one it was usually in the afternoon (matinee prices!) and a week […]
The Schweinfurt Pigs.
I started learning about the Schweinfurt pigs the day that we got the offer to move there. There isn’t a lot of information about Schweinfurt available online (you can read most of it in about an hour) and the pigs were the only thing that was interesting to me at the time. It was my one fun fact to share when I told people about the small German town that we were moving to (because 99.9% of people had no idea […]