Football fever!

It's here... the World Cup, el Mundial, die Weltmeisterschaft and I am excited.

Excited as in, planning my social life around the world cup games, checking the scores every morning, visiting the FIFA website to read up on the players, and reverting to talking about the World Cup in almost any conversational setting.

When did this happen? Last World Cup I only watched the games because it was either that or sit home alone.  This World Cup I'm messaging my friends to plan seeing the game together. I suppose it started happening when I was still in Colombia, and bought my jersey in faith that Colombia would make it into the World Cup since they were doing so well in the qualifying matches.

With Colombian friends after the Colombian victory over Greece  

And I'm even more excited now, since my team (Colombia.... in case you weren't sure) made it to the round of 16!  (And that other team I'm supposed to cheer for, you know, the US, they're not doing so bad either.  I'm hoping I can beg off of rehearsal for this play I'm an extra in so I can see the public viewing of the Germany-US game here on campus.  After all, it isn't every day you get a chance to cheer for your country while living in the country of the opposing team.  That could be an adventure.)

Just to even things out, I did cheer for Germany last Saturday.  I was in Berlin and we joined thousands of others at a triple screen outside public viewing area set up behind the Brandenburg gate.  I even had the German flag painted on my face, compliments of the random German guy behind me and his flag face paint crayon thing.  Despite the fact that Germany surprised us all, and didn't easily beat Ghana, it was still fun to be surrounded by thousands of fans in the heart of Germany, cheering on the German team.

Beyond expectations

I set off today with low expectations.  The ruins didn't look like much on google satellite view, and most of our "hike" would be on roads instead of hiking paths.  But still, how many chances will I have in life to hike to Roman ruins, and have it not cost me a penny?  And so, we set off for the town of Neustadt.

The day was beautiful- A sunny day in the 70s, blue sky, white puffy clouds, a slight breeze.  We took a few wrong turns (maps?  Who needs them?  I wrote down what streets to turn on, and besides, I'd looked at the map online before I left), but finally made our way down to the river.

The beautiful blue Danube

We followed the river, and then headed across fields, to where hops and corn were growing.  The rolling hills covered in corn reminded me of home, but we had to walk right up to the hops to figure out what we were seeing (and then google it at home to confirm our guess)

Hops growing to be used to make beer.

The ruins, when we finally arrived, were way more impressive than I had imagined.  Seen from above on the satellite image, they just look like lines in the grass.  But standing there, you look out across a giant field of wall after wall, waist high and higher, trying to imagine what it was like almost 2000 years ago, when the Roman fort was first built there.

The Roman baths originally in the settlement outside the fort

We sat on the outer edge of the fort walls, eating our lunch and enjoying the view.  The breeze picked up and the sun hid behind the clouds, that had gotten thicker.  We decided it might be better to take a bus back, instead of risking getting caught in the rain.  We still had almost an hour until the next bus came, so we explored the ruins some more.

The view from the fort walls

I was intrigued by what looked like aqueducts running under the floor in some of the ruins.  A sign explained the whole Roman under-floor heating system that was used to heat both rooms, and water for the Roman baths.  I pulled myself reluctantly away from my explorations when I realized the bus was supposed to arrive soon.

Flowers growing on the walls of the ruins

 Unfortunately for us, the bus came about 3 minutes late, and pulled up to the train station at the same time as our train was pulling up.  We jumped out of the bus, and hurried towards the tracks, then realized we needed to take the underground passage to get to the right track. Just as I was headed up the stairs, back out to the track, we heard our train pulling out.  The next one came in about an hour, which we decided was the perfect amount of time to head into town in search of an ice cream cone.  Generally speaking, it's a safe bet that there will be an ice cream shop within a stone's throw of the largest church in the center of town around here, but just to be on the safe side, I tried out my German with a family on the street.  "Excuse me", I asked them, "do you know where we can" . . . (and then, already committed to asking my question, I realized that I had temporarily forgotten the word for to buy) "pay for ice cream" I concluded.  My work around, while certainly a bit awkward sounding, did the trick, and they assured us that if we just kept going straight, we'd get to a shop on the right.  And, just as I'd predicted, the ice cream shop was across the street and half a block down from the church.  A snickers ice cream cone and a nap on the train rounded out a perfect trip.

Looking for ice cream in Neustadt?  Look no farther, it's right by the church

Water wars

His eyes glittered with mischief as he got closer.  He glanced between Nina and I as he decided who his next target would be.  Decision made, he ran up to me and poured water on my shorts, then took off shrieking as I ran after him.  I looked around for another watering can, and spurted a stream of water at him.  He giggled and squirted me back, then dashed off to escape my revenge.

The other boy was  a few years older and looked at me hesitantly, seriously calculating if he could throw water at this grown-up and get away with it.  I smile, encouraging his audacity, but didn't have the words in German to tell him to go ahead, so I just made the first move.  His face broke into smiles as the water splashed him and he splashed me back.

Watering can empty, he went to refill, and I waited to fill my can too.  Apparently any concern he had about getting grown-ups wet was gone, since he poured the entire contents of his watering can on me while I was filling mine up, shouting "warte!  wait!" at him.  (As my friends laughed at my ineffective attempt to use words to stop a child engaged in a water battle.) His watering can now empty, and me in control of the water source, he turned on his charm, and looked at me with those big pleading eyes that little kids have mastered, holding out his watering can for me to refill.  "Bitte, bitte" he pleaded, fluttering his eyelashes.  I laughed at his presumption, but again, was at a loss for words.  How do you say "why on earth would I help you after you just poured a bucket of water on me?  You better run, cause you've got it coming" in German?  So, I just took his bucket and started filling it.  With innocent intentions, I promise.  But then, Nina started shouting "Lauf!  Run!" and his eyes got big as he considered the possibility that he'd just handed his weapon to his opponent.  He took off running, and I was left laughing, holding 2 watering cans full of water.

I hadn't really expected to get in a water fight.  After all, I was a guest at my friend's mother's house for her annual Pentecost brunch.  I was expecting food, and staid, placid conversation.  Which is how the day had started.  But when your German conversational level is about equivalent to that of a 2 year olds (and that's being generous) conversation doesn't get you very far in a setting where 90% of the people present are speaking German (actually, a lot of them were probably speaking Bavarian).

And so, what started accidentally when the 3 year old somehow got control of the hose and squirted water our way, escalated quickly. Soon all the guests under 14 at the brunch were running around screaming and tossing water at each other, and Nina and I weren't far behind in joining the melee.  Half an hour later, wet and still laughing, looking for a safe spot in the sun to start drying off, we started wondering how to tame the monsters we'd created.  "I'm not playing now" I told the 3 year old, in German.  He looked at me dubiously, and tossed water on me anyway, then dashed off, just in case.  It took awhile, but eventually confiscated watering cans plus a limited supply of water left in the bucket they were refilling from slowed things down. We discovered Mikko, who had disappeared when all the water throwing craziness had started, in  the drum circle tent.  It seemed a good place to escape the winding down water battle, plus, it's another activity that requires minimal linguistic competence, so there we stayed, pounding out rhythms on the drums until peace and order were restored.