Erste Tag

First Ariport:
It's lambert. What else is there to say besides "it sucked"? Lambert is actually really crappy- there's no good cheap food. I got a pizza right before boarding but I didn't have time to eat it. I just stuffed it in my backpack.



First flight: St. Louis to Dallas
Duration: Two Hours
Aircraft: S80
Fun Rating: 3 of 10
General Comments: After being like "Dude, I'm on an airplane," I was like "Dude, this is really tiny." It was- I had my violin as a carry-on so my backback had to go under the seat in front of me. It didn't fit, so it ended up under my feet instead. Then I spilled a ginger ale on it. Sat next to Christian and Chris- Chris played pokemon, played on a DS, and watched House of Flying Daggers on his laptop. I sat and looked out the window, then I ate my pizza. It was good.



Second Airport
Dallas Fort-Worth. Go Cowboys!
We were only here for twenty minutes or so- enough to go to the bathroom, or, in (what's that kid's name) case, buy a "Don't Mess With Texas T-shirt". This airport was signifigantly nicer, even if on the side of the McDonald's Ronald Mcdonald was riding on a horse and wearing a cowboy hat.


Second Flight
Duration: 9 hours
Aircraft: Boeing 777
Fun Rating:1 of 10
I had a bit more room on this flight- the attendant took my violin and put it in thier bunk area. I also got a pillow and a blanket. I sat next to Angie. It was comfterable for about ten minutes. Being on an airplane for nine hours was the single most plesant expierence of my life. I watched a really crappy movie ("The Spiderwick Chronicles"), tried to go to sleep, then got woken up for dinner. This was the worst part- I think that airplane chicken was the worst thing I've ever eaten. That bumps Del Taco to second. After that, I watched Casablanca, but it cut the movie off right before the end. Rick and the French guy were just walking out into the fog towards where the airplane took off. I've never seen it before. Then I realized I had six hours left and I had run out of watchable movies. It was downhill from there.


Third Airport:
Frankfurt am Mein. After taxing past the extravagent Luftansa terminals, we arrived at the American one. Which had no boarding ramps- we had to use a rolling staircase and then we were bussed into the terminal. That was no problem except for the old Indian woman who coundn't make it down the stairs. There was also nothing inside the terminal but unfinished drywall. As we went through passport control, sombody couldn't find thier passport, so we waited for an hour while they were tortured by ze Germans (actually, they were searching the airplane, but that took an hour). We got everybodys bags and went to the bus- an hour and a half late.


First Bus Ride
Fun Rating: -1 of 10
This was really miserable. We were stuck in traffic for SEVEN hours. One stop, and we had to pay to use the bathroom. Problem: everybody had bills. We wandered around, bought some cheap items, and paid 50 Euro cents to use a toilet. Then we got back on the bus. I actually went to sleep, but it was miserably uncomfeterable. Not to mention that I hadn't slept in twenty-four hours. We finally got to Hamburg (the traffic jam was caused by a single lane closure right before we needed to get off- it streached a good quarter of the way across the entire country).

Castle Count: 1

BMW Count:100,000



Arrival: Akward. To say the least. Max's mom and his two brothers (and him, of course) were there to pick me up. We drove back to his house, but we'll have to take the bus to school tommrow. Everybody in his family is really nice. We looked at my meine welt book (Pearce#s photography was complimented, then ate dinner (a steak with potatoes and salad- it was quite good). We then played some card games, messed around on Max's computer (which is cool- we were playing with 3DS MAX), played some music, and then I went to bed. I haven't give the gifts yet, as I don't have wrapping paper or gift bags.


Now that the shock of having to speak German is wearing off, I'm actually not to bad off. After the transportation issues, things have gone perfectlz. Except this german kezboard. I alwazs tzpe a z when I trz to write a y.

More about the house and Hamburg tommrow.