And that kids, is how Deutschland won the World Cup in 2014

I couldn't resist the title, but in all seriousness, GERMANY WON THE WORLD CUP!!! Being in Germany so far has been an amazing experience, but being here during the World Cup was a dream come true. And to make it even better, I was able to be here in Germany when they won their 4th World Cup! As much as I will never forget a lot of the things I have seen and done here in Germany, the fact that I can say I was in the Country that won will be something I will tell for the rest of my life.

 

 

 To top all of this experience off, who happens to score the winning World Cup goal for Germany? Why its number 19, Mario Götze, which I had been saying all World Cup needed to be playing more. So you could say that I picked the right player on my jersey before i went to Germany.

Here is a picture of what the main city in Stuttgart looked like after they won the world cup, lets just say this is one of the more tamer pictures I took, meaning there were people standing on street lights and lighting off fireworks in crowds of people. Either way, Berlin was even crazier I am sure. Unfortunately, when we went to the main city after the game to see how crazy it was we missed the last train back to the University which ran at 1 in the morning, so what did we do? Did you guess wait till 5 in the morning in the subway system until the first train came around? Because that is what we did.... trust me that was a long night.

Well, that is pretty much it from me for this, my adventures will start to be slowing down as I get closer to flying back to the States, and working in the lab to get my research done. It is hard to believe that I am less then a month away from heading back. Until next time!

Jonathan Stahl

Berlin, Köln, and Frankfurt

What a busy two weeks it has been. Sorry for the length of time it has taken me to post another blog entry but as you can imagine with the German National team making it to the final World Cup game (which I will be watching tonight, Go DEUTSCHLAND!, sorry Racheal) to working in the lab I have barely had time to write. But no worries I am still doing well and have a lot to share.

So starting off, Berlin.

I know not the normal Berlin picture, but I mean there is a lot of cool buildings in berlin. In fact, this is on top of the Berliner Dom, or the Berlin Cathedral. It is an amazing building, luckily, thanks to the United States and other countries funding it, Russia decided to rebuild it instead of tearing it down after World War 2. Next on the list, the Victory Tower, which also has a very interesting story. It was originally built after Germany defeated France before WWI, well when France/Napoleon went on their little conquer spree they didn't want Germany to have it because it embarrassed France, so they relocated it to France. After some time, Germany wanted it back and demanded France returned it, so it has been moved a lot.

Of course I went and saw the Berlin Gate, along with the Berlin Palace and the Reichstag. However, in order to take a tour of the Reichstag you have to make reservations.... 3 weeks in advance. So instead of going in I have some nice pictures from the outside.

This is going to be a long post, okay so if you want to see other pictures they are all on my Facebook under Berlin. I also went to the Olympic Stadium in Berlin which was cool to see.

Köln,
Moving on, Berlin was all last week or July 5 to July 7th, so fast forward to this weekend and we have both Köln and Frankfurt. I must say both are very nice cities, Frankfurt of course being one of the biggest cities in Germany. I didn't spend a lot of time in Köln mostly because I was only wanting to see the Dom, the Bridge, the Rhine, and the Roman Museum. And luckily, they were all right next to each other.

You are welcome to make this your new desktop wallpaper if you would like. It is a pretty awesome picture, not to toot my own horn or anything.

Frankfurt,
So as some of you may know Frankfurt is known for its airport along with some very impressive skyscrapers, Goethe's House, and the Opera House. But what is the first thing I do when I get to Frankfurt? If you guessed went to Chipotle, congratulations you have won bragging rights to knowing me better than others. Besides it being a bit more pricy then in the States, it was something that I can't wait to get back to in the States. As I was leaving the mall that Chipotle was in I got to take a free ride in the Audi E-Tron, which is Audi's new car coming out soon that runs on either full electricity, or a hybrid of both electricity and gas. I learned two things from this experience, first being that if I had the money to buy the car I would because I didn't even notice much of difference when it was running on electricity and the hybrid (well done Audi). But secondly, because while running on electricity we went 170km/h on the autobahn mind you. Which for you standard unit people, is about 106 mph. So what I am saying is, the E-Tron is a huge step for both Audi and German cars in general, running on electricity is becoming more and more of a reality.

Luckily, I took the second day I was in Frankfurt to site see and even though I have yet to go on top of the Empire State Building, being at the top of the Main Tower in Frankfurt is one beautiful thing to see.

Well, now that I have pretty much wrote two weekends worth of Germany into one post I think I am going to stop here. There is so much more I would love to talk about so if you have any questions about the blog posts, or the bazillion pictures I have put on Facebook, don't hesitate to send me a message. Now as most of you know, tonight is the Final World Cup game between Germany and Argentina. Me and my friends here are ready to cheer Germany on to hopefully their 4th World Cup Victory.

Until Next Time,

Jonathan Stahl