2024.12.15

Another Two-week update

I'm not the greatest at keeping up with this. Either that, or I have too much going on. Regardless!

Different Day, Different Study Spot

This was a challenge given to me by mama for various reasons that was mostly followed.

Sunday -- Was the day of the issuance of the challenge and I just stayed in my room

The view out my Window

Monday -- I was starting off easy and just chilled in the AYF office. It wasn't super productive, though, due to the "Advent Events" (see next heading)

AYF Office, with the freshly added Snowflakes (see below)

Tuesday -- I went to the math building to do some math homework. No picutre, sorry. Was late at night and I didn't want to get too many people in the shot.

Wednesday -- Before my Betriebssysteme class, I did some work in that classroom. Maybe. In my notes, I marked it as a cheat day, so the picutre I have may have been preemptive and no work was actuall done there...

This room is called the µ-Saal, which when pronounced in German, is a homophone for the word 'plight'. It's partner hall is Schick-Saal, homophone 'destiny' or 'fate'

Thursday -- Back to the easier side of things; I studied in the classroom my Alpadia class happens in.

Alpadia Clasroom

Friday and Saturday kinda fell apart because, as much as you would think I have time during the week (I do), I also very much don't. That mostly is my fault, however...

I did attempt to study in the Universitätsbibliothek (Uni Library), but there was a lone to get in and I didn't really want to deal with that many people, even if it was quiet.

AYF Advent Events

Starting in December, every Monday and Thursday AYF is holding fun little events leading up to Christmas. Here are the ones so far:

Snowflakes!

That Monday where I attempted to study in the AYF office, there was a snowflake making event. Some of my creations are on the windows in the photo. It was a lot of fun :)

Paper trees

I, unfortunately, was doing work during the paper tree event, but people did learn how to make them!

Cookies!

I was at the cookie event -- it was just normal frosted sugar cookies, but there was a competition for "Best Decorated". I didn't participate, I just wanted some cookies goddammit. For those curious, these were the entrants:

Cookies 1, 2, and 4 all won (second, second, and first respectively), but there were two other second place finalists and I don't remmber who...

Candels!

Ulli then bought wicks and sheets of beeswax to make candles out of! I haven't lit mine yet (the one time I tried, the matches I knew existed didn't take against the very worn out strike sheet attached to the side of the jar. I'll upload a picture here when I have one, though.

Adventskaffee

This isn't one of the Monday-Thursday events in rotation, but Pia hosted a small christmas party in her apartment that included a white elephant gift exchange. I wasn't planning on participating, forgot about that part when I arrived and was suddenly super concerned I had forgotten a gift, but since Ulli brought extras just in case, I had to participate. I ended up with 'Crispy Balls' (whoppers, but high in protein and without sugar. So, Muscle Bro Whoppers), and this pumpkin man.

I have no idea what to do with it.

Other

FreiSpiel

Right before the Adventskafee event, I went to FreiSpiel (finally), the popular game store in Freiburg. It is a dual Store-And-Café, so in addition to selling games, you can also pay an hourly fee and play any of their games on a wall, as well as order coffee. It's pretty neat. I got myself some real dice (I didn't quite realize how important they were) and a German-language copy of Das Schwarze Auge, or The Dark Eye, the role-playing game out of Germany that I have an English copy of the rules for. Somehow, they didn't have any dice bags, however.

Other things of note: There was no BattleTech stuff, only 40k, but there was a lot of Magic, including a life-size plastic model of Chandra in the window. I attempted to get a picture, but the light from outside reflecting off the window pane made her impossible to see.

Weihnachtsgans

On December 4th, the Freiburg-Madison Gesellschaft invited four Madison students to a free, traditionalish German Christmas dinner at their president's very fancy restaruant. (I remembered the order the silverware was used in, don't worry). There was Knödel, which (despite what Leo says, are not dumplings), some sort of red cabbage sauce, we had mille-fuille for dessert, and I forget what the appetiser was. All of it was pretty tasty, including the main course: the Weihnachtsgans, or Christmas Goose. I found it a bit dry, though; but I doubt that was the fault of the kitchen staff.

One of the people there was the leader of the Carl-Schurz-Haus, an organization that connects Germans to American culture, and who run the Inside America program. She brought her daughter along, who is in second grade-ish, and I and another AYFer played "Mensch ärgert sich nicht", a game that is basically Aggrivation but with slightly different rules. For those of you unfamiliar with Aggrivation, it is (accoring to Wikipedia) a variant of Pachisi and apparently plays like Sorry!. Mensch ärgert sich nicht (literally 'People don't get angry') is almost identical to Aggrivation, however.

Tram News

Network Shift

As of Today, Sunday the 15th of December, the tram lines have adjusted! Line 3, previously running between Haid and Vauban, and line 4, prevously running between Zähringen and Messe, have switched two of their endpoints. Now Line 3 runs between Haid and Zähringen (shame -- I liked the three) and Line 4 runs betweenVauban and Messe -- that'll be nice, since I live in Vauban and have a class out by the Freiburger Messe.

Disruptions

There were two notable disruptions of the tram network, and then also a disruption of auto traffic that I saw on the trams once. First, something (no idea what) broke in the rail line, but was fixed enough that I got to class. Was a little concerning, since other AYFers were late to a different one of their classes and I was nervous I wouldn't make it to one of my classes on time.

Later on in the week, there was a pro-Free Syria protest that stopped basically every tram line for a while. Was interesting.

Finally, a car managed to rear end another one so hard, the poor car that got hit was at a 30 degree angle to the ground, resting on the first. No one looked like they got hurt, though. Just a rather interesting sight.

The Cat

On Thursday I got some Döner for dinner due to various reasons, and on the way back on of the cats in Vauban came up to me. I knew it wanted my food, but it was very soothing to pet it and barely hear it purr. It did get a little bite, but nothing significant. Hence, my announcement of Cats Superior.

Whamageddon

At the Cookie-decorating event, there was a Christmas playlist on in the background, and I ended up loosing Whamageddon. For those of you who don't know what the hell that is, the goal is to go all of December without once hearing Wham!'s "Last Christmas." I'm not super upset by the loss, but it's now a minor goal I will forever have.

Up Next: I Just Lost the Game

St. Nikolaus

I saw St. Nick on the tram platform the other day. I think it may have been a student on some dare or doing some costume party because there was a suspiciously backpack-shaped hump under his cloak. The children in the area were all very excited.