München und meine letzter Tag in Deutschland…

Today, I spent the day in Munich with the McCallan’s (Kelly, Chris, and Shauna). The day started out by waking up on a half-deflated air mattress and hopping in a non-community shower for the first time in nearly a month. Man was it nice to use a real shower for a change instead of the community shower I used in the dorm. From there, we had breakfast (Frosted Flakes and coffee for me). The McCallan’s haven’t found coffee creamer over there, so they’ve been making their own. I must admit to it being rather tasty. After breakfast, Shauna and I headed to the store before we all left for the day since the store would be closed before we made it back to their apartment.

After returning from the store, we departed towards the Deutsches Museum, Germany’s equivalent of the Smithsonian. As soon as we left the apartment, it began to rain. Luckily, we were taking the U-Bahn so the rain mattered little. Once we got of the U-Bahn and headed towards the museum, the rain had stopped. We walked a few blocks from the U-Bahn stop and arrived at the museum. Once inside, we began the arduous task of making our way through the museum.

The first area we entered the “Electrical power’ section. This focused on electrical generation and transmission. This area included everything from power generators to transmission lines to transformers; it contained a lot of different aspects of the end-to-end power supply process. We then proceeded into an area with machine and engine components. I thought it was pretty cool to see how a rotary engine (like the ones used in the Mazda RX-8 ) operate. From there, we ventured into a big open area with all sorts of planes and helicopters. We looked through all of that and proceeded upstairs, where more plane stuff was.

We continued upwards, finding more and more aeronautics stuff as we went. Once on the third floor, we discovered the space exhibit. This contained some info about the solar system and a big space exploration portion. Chris and I wandered around into the Photo & Film and Printing exhibits. Here we saw old-school printing presses all the way to modern printing technology. We had gotten separated from Shauna and Kelly, so we waited around for a bit then met up with them. We all made our way to the ships to look at old ships and models of fancy ocean liners. In our quest to find a stairwell, we wandered through the machining section. Eventually, we found a stairwell and made our way to the Physics and Energy technologies exhibits. Both were pretty cool. The whole museum reminded me of a cross between a traditional museum and the Science Place. With much still to do and see but little time, the gang departed the museum for lunch.

On our way for lunch, we walked through Marienplatz, looking at the old Rathaus and Mariensäule. Apparently, the Mariensäule in Munich was the first built north of the Alps and inspired others to be made throughout Europe. Finding a nice Italian cafe next to Der Alter Peter, we stopped to eat. I had really good tortellini with a mushroom cream sauce.

After eating, we walked our way to Odeonsplatz. There, we saw the Feldherrnhalle and the Theatinerkirche St. Kajetan. In my Architecture class, we talked about the Alte Pinakothek. This museum was damaged heavily by bombs in WWII. During the rebuilding of Munich, it was decided to repair the building but not blend it with the intact portion. This was meant to act as a reminder of the War whenever anyone saw the building. Since we talked about it in class, I had the desire to see it. So we ventured off in search of said building. Noone in the group had gone to the building before, so it was a bit of a challenge to find it. After going the wrong way on one road before heading back and going the right way, we eventually found the museum. Since we spent all that time looking for it, we decided to go in and visit the art gallery. It had a lot of cool old paintings from the 14th-18th centuries.

We looked around the museum for a while, then headed back towards the main part of town. At this point, it was midafternoon, and we were all in need of a good sit for a while. This led us to go to the Hofbräuhaus. that was an experience. Imagine a huge, barn-like building with row after row of wooden tables and benches, all full of people drinking beer, eating pretzels, and having a ball. We sat for a while, enjoying a beer and pretzel, listening to traditional Oom-pah music, and talking to an older couple who met each other on a boat heading back to Germany from the US.

After the Hofbräuhaus, we wandered around for a little while more. Shauna’s knee started to hurt her, so she went back to their apartment. Since I still hadn’t found my Dirk jersey, Kelly, Chris and I ventured our way to one of the big shopping areas. I wandered into 5-10 different stores looking for this jersey, all to no avail. Time had run out on the hunt as the clock struck 8 since all the stores begin closing at that time. With little choice left, we retired back to the apartment, me slightly dejected for not finding a Dirk jersey or at least buying a German national soccer jersey. Once back, we lounged around the remainder of the evening, looking at pictures of the day and conversing. Since we hadn’t gotten dinner while we were out, Chris ordered a really good pepperoni (salami or pepperoniwurst, not what Germans consider “pepperoni”) pizza. I guess with that, I’ll conclude for the day, though my day technically won’t end until I’m back in Dallas tomorrow…stay tuned for the journey homeward…

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