My computer works!

Just thought I'd let you know in case you were losing sleep over it... I took it to a very friendly Brittish man with his own computer repair buisness and he plugged it in with a German power cord and it worked just fine. So I bought the cord and all seems to be going well so far.

I finally got all my pics up from Oktoberfest and Caroline's Visit!

Today I didn't do much at all and it's been wonderful. This may be the first day I didn't have to go to school or go into the city center for anything... it's nice. Living in the tourist capital of Germany can be exahsting. Everytime I get of the U-bahn at Marienplatz it's the same thing. Hundreds of tourist snapping photos, carrying around shopping bags, drinking coffe and beer. Bustle bustle, rush rush, crowded streets and crowded subways. I'm begining to miss the suburbs...


I did have to go register my new address today, which involved some waiting in line for a long time in a big government office, but it wasn't too strenuous. As an American I feel very strange having to register my address with the state. Every time anyone moves here they have to go and register again. It makes sense, to know where people live, but still, it's a pain and why do they need to know anyway? There are so many little things here that make me realize just how deep set my American mentality. Privacy, competition and capitalism, convenience, consumerism.... oh America! There are other things that I've noticed while talking to my students. In one of the discussion groups we were trying to come up with a debate topic and someone suggested drinking age. I thought that sounded good so I asked them to list a few pros and cons, but when I asked for the pros of having a higher drinking age, say 21, they just gave me blank stares. Granted, they are all 14 or 15 and looking forward to drinking legally at 16, but still, clearly there are enough pros to a higher drinking age that the whole of the united states has it set at 21. I think it's stupid too, but it occured to me that such law would never even occur to germans. I think a discussion of Abortion rights would lead to a similar dead end. In the US Abortion is always sure to be a hot debate topic, but it would never even occur to German students that the government could or would ban abortions. It's out of the question entirely. So the government has a right to know your address, but when it comes to drinking and abortions you're on your own. Sounds like a fair trade to me. Meanwhile I'm running out of controversial political issues to discuss!

Gute Nacht!