Unlike the Schweinfurt pigs, I didn’t need to work hard in order to find the Berlin bears. I saw four in my first ten minutes in the city after dropping off the car. In the end I photographed 24 of them, although I saw a few more than that. The Buddy Bear movement started in Berlin in 2001 during their Buddy Bear Berlin Show. The idea behind the bears was to welcome people to the city with raised arms, which are […]
A Great Time at the Nuremberg Volksfest.
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 […]
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 […]
Street Art Samples in Tarragona.
We had just one day to wander the streets of Tarragona, Spain, after our great but exhausting day at PortAventura World. There was abundant street art and graffiti throughout the city, which we’ve come to expect from European cities. Here are my favorites from what we saw that day. C is for capacity, or rather lack of it. This heart is referencing the fair that was held in October 2015 (on Capacitat Day) for people with disabilities. Safety pins […]
Amsterdam from the Water: Our Canal Boat Tour.
After several attempts to book a private boat tour with a local, seeing excessive lines and wait times at the docks, and being told at the boat tour booking office that all the boat tours were full, I was afraid that a boat tour wasn’t going to work out for us. Mr. Meena decided we should just walk along the docks until we found one we liked, and so we did. The tour cost €32 for both of us and lasted for […]
The NAP Monument & Visitors Centre in Amsterdam.
I was immediately intrigued by the NAP Monument & Visitors Centre because it stood out as something a bit different from the rest of the typical tourist activities in Amsterdam. The acronym NAP stands for Normaal Amsterdams Peil (or Amsterdam Ordnance Datum in English), which is a centuries old measuring unit and vertical reference point for water levels. The NAP is roughly the same as the MSL (Mean Sea Level), but it was based off of the older term Amsterdam […]
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 […]
Five Coping Strategies for Depressive Episodes.
Sometimes my depression disappears like an insolent teenager that is truant from their classes. Other times it’s as inescapable and frustrating as a screaming baby in an airplane. On those days that my depression takes a backseat I feel amazing and I can function with relative ease. Those days make me feel like a normal person. I retain hope that my whole life will be like that eventually, but in the meantime I have to be prepared for when my […]
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 […]