This morning started off with me getting a couple extra hours of sleep. Then I left to go shop for groceries. I may or may not have mentioned this before, but German stores, including grocery stores, do not provide bags for free. This prompts one to bring reusable bags while shopping. Additionally, stores do sell bags, usually for 10 or 20 Euro cents. Not expensive, but if one were to buy bags every single time one went shopping, it would add up.
As I was on the bus this morning, I remembered something that I should have put in my post from two days ago. As I was on my way home Thursday, two men in street clothes entered the bus and asked to see everyone’s bus pass. The way the public busses work is that one can get on and off at will, without having to swipe or show the bus driver their pass, but if the undercover officers happen to get on the bus, ask to see one’s pass, and one does not have it, then one is in for a 40 Euro fine. Those people who do not have long-term bus passes receive a pass ticket when they pay for the ride.
In some ways, this system is far more efficient than some I have seen in the United States. In San Luis Obispo, for instance, when entering the bus, everyone must go through the same door and either swipe their pass or pay for the ride. This can create a large backlog of people trying to get onto the bus.
Another fact of interest from grocery shopping…apples are very small here. I do not know if this is on account of the growing conditions here, but I have not seen any apples that are any larger than tennis balls. This is in stark contrast to the huge apples one can find in grocery stores in California, at least.
This afternoon, I worked on the computer of one of the girls in the program. It was a fun experience, since she is from Canada, and thus her keyboard is a French-Canadian layout, instead of like the traditional US layout. Then came some reading on verb conjugation for German class.
This evening, I went with a few people from my program, of the few that had chosen not to leave for the weekend, to go to a local Bistro and watch the FC Bayern vs Leverkusen match. What promised to be an exciting match, with Bayern scoring in the first five minutes, and then again at the 20-something minute mark ended up being less-than-exciting as the second half seemed to be full of Bayern playing keep-away with the ball but not really trying to score. Toward the end of the game, Bayern scored a third point on a penalty shot, which was the most excitement that had been had the entire match.
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