Friday, July 31

Today we spent the entire day in Gotha. Our first appointment of the day (actually, it was the only appointment) was with one of the oldest map making companies in Germany. The presentation was really informative. I really enjoyed seeing two copies of the Almanac de Gotha, which is a book that lists the European royal families and their lineages. We saw an older copy that was printed in Gotha, which was very cool. The book stopped being produced at the end of World War II, largely due to the fact that Gotha was in the former East Germany and the Soviets frowned upon the idea of royal families and monarchies. It began being published again in the 1990’s, but this time in London. We got to go to the map production rooms and watch cartographers at work. This really interested me because I was very interested in one time of becoming a cartographer. Before we left we were given a gift by the company, which was a very cool pocket atlas. This atlas is very different in that each country is labeled in its own language. For example, the United States is labeled in English, Germany in German, the Netherlands in Dutch, etc.
We then took a walking tour of Gotha. What I thought was a small town was in fact much larger. It was a beautiful day for a walk though! I had a bratwurst for lunch and an ice cream cone, which gave me just enough energy to make it through the rest of the tour, which involved much uphill walking. We stopped by the Rathaus, which is found in every large town. It’s the city hall, and is not pronounced “rat house” although it definitely looks like it should be! Near every rathaus, or in its basement, is a restaurant called the ratskellar. This particular day, a very alternative couple got married and was standing out in the square in front of the rathaus having pictures taken when they noticed us star9ing at them. So, they started waving at us, and let us take their picture. Very fun! From there it was off to climb the hill up to the Schloss Friedentstein. Schloss Friedenstein is a palace, and the largest example of Early Baroque palaces in Europe. It was built all at the same time, which gives it some major continuity. We were able to tour the palace, and see some of its refurbished rooms. For some of the rooms we were required to put on these really large oversized slippers over our shoes. I couldn’t take a picture as picture were not allowed inside the palace without buying a press pass, so you are going to have to take my word on just how funny these were!!
I was definitely feeling a nap at this point, and as we were done for the day officially and we didn’t have to meet up for dinner until 7, I thought a quick nap would be nice. I slept for maybe 30 minutes, and it may have been the single best thing I have done on the trip so far! When I woke up, I had a little epiphany that was brought on by nothing in particular. I suddenly realized while looking up at the ceiling that 20 years ago looking up at that ceiling would have been impossible. Since Gotha was an East German city, you or I would not have been allowed there. All of a sudden it made Gotha that much more interesting, and I was definitely ready to head back out and explore some more. One of the things that I noticed in Gotha was that very few people spoke English, so communicating was very interesting. Luckily I can ask how to get to a bathroom if I need one (not that I can understand any directions they might give me), but my shopping skills are pretty horrible. I can however look at things for a long time. It seemed to me that a lot of people were a little wary of us. Maybe we scared them! Or, maybe it is simply because we were American, and it was pretty obvious that not a lot of English-speakers make it into the area. In fact, when getting ready to order the second ice cream cone of the day (with all of the walking I did, I deserve it!), the waiter asked us to wait, went to the back, and sent out someone who spoke a little English. Perhaps it was easier on everyone, but still pretty interesting to watch.
After looking around, it was then time to head to dinner, which was at the same restaurant where we had pizza the night before. Dinner tonight had an Italian theme, and this time I stayed away from the wine and drank apfel schörle instead. That drink is a mix of sparkling mineral water and apple juice, and is VERY good and light. In fact, I have had many of those so far on the trip. Dinner tonight was a bowl of baked onion soup (not French onion – it was prepared a little differently) and a baked pasta dish of stuffed tortellini, crabmeat, cream sauce, cheese, and some shrimp scampi. The shrimp were a little disturbing because they still had their heads on. Of course, this became a perfect opportunity to play with my food. It helps me take the sting out of my food still looking like it did when it was alive. Tonight was the last dinner with Monika and Wolfgang, who will be leaving us tomorrow when we leave to go to Frankfurt. They have been so much fun to be with, and very informative and very tolerant of our questions. We gave them parting gifts of German wine and American wine. We all drank a shot of limoncello at the end (limoncello is a very sweet, very powerful lemon-flavored liquor) to mark the end of our first week in Hamburg. It was a very enjoyable day!