Innside Premium Hotel Dusseldorf Airport Ratingen

Tip # 1: When riding a night train always bring an alarm clock. Even though the conductor will wake you 30 mins before your arrival city if your like me it can take you 30 mins to get your backpack on! Arrived at 7am and not much to do since sights don't open until 9am and I couldn't check into my hotel until 10am. Luckily I found a store (kind of like a Walgreens) and was able to spray on some perfume. After a long night on the train I'm sure I was a ...

... pretty tough for everyone, especially yesterday. I have said goodbye to all of my friends. Tara has left for her host family, Santiago has left to his host family, Trevor went to visit his fiance and son before flying home today. I think that Rafael from Chile might still be around but he is travelling around seeing Karneval all weekend in Düsseldorf and Köln.

I went on Thursday ...

... in my head. I didn't buy the program because it cost nearly as much as my ticket and I couldn't justify it. (The last week of a holiday u want to live like a rich man, but must live like a poor man). There was a beautiful song which I am sure was about a woman on her wedding day. I really wanted a copy! We went to the stall where they were selling the CDs but because it was all brand new music, they hadn't recorded it yet. Gretel (from Cuba/Sth Africa) bought a CD ...

... to myself, a lot of my classmates asked questions and got involved in the discussion.

After class I went back to the Hotel. Tara had said that she had had a craving for Potato salad all week, so we decided that we would eat some for dinner. Trevor and I went to buy some more potatoes and then we got to work cooking it. We were working within a pretty tight timeframe because we were going to see the Ballet that night. As it ended up happening dinner was a shambles ...

... from Berlin via Hamburg in 2 weeks, which I may consider doing if it is not too expensive... We'll see.

So, not much has happened since my last email. I went on an excursion to the old Synagogue in Essen. I have a photo of it from my first day in Essen. I called it the Dome Kirche! Whoops. I should have called it the Dome Synagogue! Oh well.

I have bought a couple of tickets for some culture in the coming weeks. I am seeing the ...

... everyone about what had happened to us last night, so Rafael wore a suit, Martin wore a suit jacket and we tried to dress up as best we could to make ourselves presentable. Ironically, there were hundreds of kids, families, school excursions and the like at the Opera, and only a few oldies.

They tried to 'modernise' it a bit, so that it was more like a dream than a reality. The Prince wasn't in a wood, he was in bed and ...

... But I still went. From Essen we had to catch an incredibly cramped bus to Duisburg and then from there we had to wait for over 30 mins for a train to Düsseldorf. Whilst there we walked to the Altstadt, that I have visited previously, took a stroll along the Rhein and had some lunch. Then we found a map and decided to walk to a park where we saw heaps of squirrels (they are so cute) and a playground with some pretty cool equipment. I went on the ...

... the north coast along the sea quite fiercly, winds of up to 150km are blowing across the country. Planes cannot land, train stations have been closed, trees have falled on cars and houses...

Silence fell over the crowd... " Was soll wir tuen?" We were so bored...

It was decided that a party should be had in the cellar, to celebrate the fact that we were all safe. So we went downstairs, played South American music, danced, drank wine ...

Hi guys,
Don"t know if u have heard or not, but Germany is in the middle of a hurricane. 150km winds and severe warnings from the government to stay indoors. It was supposed to hit Essen really hard and we were all sent home from uni early and told to stay indoors. I really wanted to go online today to talk to u all like I said I would. Sorry guys!! I"ve just borrowed Tara"s laptop now. Mum, if u read this, send me a text message when u wake up so I can ...

... before I go to class. I can do it Thursday, but Friday I have a politics class starting earlier than usual, so my next time online will be Monday. I hope to chat with some of u...
So u want to know what I've been up to the last couple of days?
Nothing too crazy...
Monday I went to the movies to see 'Mein Fuhrer', a comedy about Hitler, made by Germans. I'm sure that u are all interested about how it was. Well ...