Halloween

Thursday was just a long day of classes basically. And then after classes we spent another hour sitting through this guest lecture on Iraq. Apparently IES (my program sponsor) is trying to start a program at the University of Duhok in Iraq. So they were just doing a little training and such at our facility in Freiburg. They had very thick accents, so we had to try really hard to concentrate, especially because it was at the end of a long week. Thursday night I went down to the Müdem bar (that's the student bar that's like 100 feet from my flat) with Drew, Emily, and Panda. We just had a few beers and chatted and such. But it was extremely crowded because it was a Thursday and school is back in session, so there are a lot more students living in the flats now. So we left at like 23.00 or so.

I spent most of Friday working on my term paper for Regions in the EU. I'm still not quite done with this draft. But it's not due until Thursday. So I have some time still. And I meant to get started on my policy statement for my political science seminar, but she never really told us what we were supposed to do for that paper, so I'll have to wait until she discusses in class on Tuesday. She's a bit...forgetful sometimes.

On Friday night, a bunch of us from the IES EU Program went to a Halloween party at Berliner Allee (another set of student flats), but the party was sort of sponsored by people from the IES Freiburg program. I went as a beach boy. So swim trunks, sandals, towel, and sunglasses. I thought it would be kind of a lame costume, but it was not bad actually. Anyway, it was basically a clubbin' type atmosphere at this party. The music was questionable at times, but good at other times. This is my new favorite German song:



I spent more time on Saturday working on my term paper for Regions in the EU. But then the internet quit working for a few hours in my flat. So I didn't get much done during that time. I did go out for a haircut though. That was interesting. It was a little difficult to explain how to cut my hair in German, but I managed. And I think it looks fine. Although it was kind of a rip-off. That exchange rate is killing me.

Last night there was a party in Vauban. It was at the flat of some people in our program. Naturally it was also a costume party. This time I went as a biker. I borrowed some clothes from one of Drew's roommates. There were some awesome costumes though. We had the Marshall Plan (yes, that was a costume), a crack addict, an elephant, etc. It was good. There were also a fair number of Germans there. They don't really understand the concept of costumes very well though. Basically all of them just put a lot of dark eye make-up on to make them look a little scary, and that was it. Pretty lame. So we taught them a thing or two about real costumes. And we ended up walking home when the party was over because the trams quit running at 0.30. And that was like a good 40 minute walk or so I think.

Today, I'm once again doing homework for most of the day. I have a midterm tomorrow in my environmental policy class. And then I still have tons of reading to do and homework assignments to complete. So I have a lot to get done this week, but then on Thursday night we leave for Rome. We're taking the night train there. And then Madrid and Barcelona after Rome. I'm not sure, but I'm assuming we're flying to Spain from Italy. Hopefully I'll be able to update again before leaving on that field trip.