Back Home?!?

Don’t worry! I won’t start an annoying monologue about what is home – especially because many of you guys already had to discuss this with me at one point or another ;-) For now, I limit myself to a small report about what I’ve been doing in Germany (and of course Italy) so far since I left Cincinnati on a rainy Friday…
Well, first of all: I didn’t leave. Thunderstorms in New York didn’t allow the plane take off in Cincinnati. After hours and hours on the runway, the captain decided to return to the gate. My connecting flight from New York to Berlin would have taken off at the same time…consequently, nothing left but changing flights. Finally, a Delta-plane took me to Paris. Wouldn’t have been so bad – if I had not proudly worn my ITALIA-jacket which earned me some mean comments from the French security-guys. Luckily, I could prove that I was German (at least according to my passport) so that they made me pass the security check. I wasn’t really sorry – though, if I had known my changed destination before, I would have chosen something else to wear. I promise, my dear Frenchies! ;-)
Anyway, my dad and my sister picked me up at the airport since they were the only ones who knew when I would arrive. For the rest of the family and friends this was a well-kept secret to create a well-celebrated surprise. Actually, everybody in Germany could have guessed that I had arrived: After weeks and weeks of super-hot and dry weather, it had started raining this very Saturday. How this is possible? That’s the way things happen in my life…no alternative explanation possible and needed ;-)
After having cuddled around with my family, I went to bed. Somehow, though, I must have had forgotten my sleep somewhere on the plane. For the next couple of days I had, for the first time in my life, a terrible jetlag. Of course, my sleeping-schedule seems weird to people anyway, but falling asleep at 8 am and getting up at about 4 pm isn’t even normal to me. After 3 or 4 days I managed to sleep the whole night (sounds like a mum being proud of her new-born child who finally sleeps all night… ;-) – YEAH!

Since my friends Tini and Markus were supposed to get married on the following Saturday (August 5th), I had to speed up some preparations that I had promised to make. Besides making arrangements for the present, together with some friends we thought of some entertaining games for the party. Actually, preparations went on until some hours before the wedding – but everything was worth it. The wedding and the party went great and, I guess, everybody had a lot of fun. And, Betsy: Of course, I had some drinks for you, too! Still angry I couldn’t be with you for your birthday???

The second week in Germany consisted of travelling from one of Germany extremities to the next – from Usedom via Berlin to Bavaria ;-) I had two phantastic days camping close to the beach of the Baltic Sea on Usedom with a lot of sun – finally. But unfortunately, I had to leave to go to Berlin (What a great new station!!!) because of the renewal of my visa. I guess, that was an important enough reason, but annoying since my interview in the embassy was over after not even 30 seconds: “Oh, so you have been in the US this passed year. Has anything changed for you? No? Alright, here you are. You can go now. Everything is okay.” At least, this gave me enough time to see a friend of mine in Berlin who – what a surprise – had gotten a baby this last year. No, not really a surprise because it seems to be a very good time for people around me to settle down at last, i.e. to get married or have a baby - or both. As you can imagine all this makes a person like me nervous like hell. Let’s just hope that I don’t get mixed up with these kind of ideas ;-) Anybody out there willing to join my support-group?
My journey continued to the very south of Germany. I met up with some friends from AFS in Nuernberg. Together we spent four awesome days sightseeing in Nuernberg, eating their famous Bratwuerste, and visiting some of the excellent museums and exhibitions – one of them called: “What is German?” Again, I won’t bore you with many more details about this, but especially among us AFS-people this exhibition initiated many discussions and thoughts. When talking about German values, however, I, again, had to realize that my German heritage must have been cancelled by some Italian roots ;-) But this comes to no surprise for most of you either...

Back home, Christmas had come. I’m not kidding! Since I had missed my mum’s great Christmas duck, we repeated the Christmas dinner on a hot August-day. Some days later, my grandma anticipated this year’s Christmas dinner. Not only was that extremely cute of them, but also very very delicious. Also, I went to see friends in Rostock, the city where my home university is. And again: I ran directly into preparations for some friends’ wedding. AAAAAAAAAAAAAH! At least, they, too, realized the difficulties – even though they worried more about their dancing than about more fundamental questions...

Well, right now, I finally arrived in Catania – VIVA LA SICILIA! It had been two years by now that I had not come back because my exams and the departure to Cincinnati had cancelled all Italy-plans last year ;-( Consequently, I really really had to come back this year, even though it will be only for one week. I can hardly describe my feelings on the trip since I was totally nervous about how it would be to be back, whether I would be able to recover my Italian after this year in Cincinnati and how my friends from Catania would be. Turns out: everything down here is (of course) still amazingly great! Christian picked me up from the airport and brought me home where we had delicious Sicilian pizze before we went out to Acitrezza, to the beach where everybody meets up during hot summer nights. YEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSS! I’m back here – and you can’t imagine how right that feels! Bellissimo! Today we went to the daily market of Catania where I could finally buy my Catania-shirt and therefore celebrate myself that Catania will play in the Italian Serie A this year. Then: my first Italian lunch. La mamma had prepared great stuff – but I had to admit that my stomach wasn’t used anymore to those dimensions. After the pasta I couldn’t go for all the other delicious things anymore – too bad. Especially because I will have to enjoy this week of Italian cuisine before going back to Cincinnati…no offense, but there is nothing like Italian food anywhere in this world. I, therefore, go to have dinner right now and let you guys alone with an immense desire for real pasta, pizza e gelato! ;-)