I'm never leaving. EVER.

Well it's been a crazy couple of days trying to get life set up here in Berlin but I think I'm almost there and would like to catch you up.

Wednesday, we went and bought our German cell phones which was stressful. Cell phone plans stress me out in English, imagine doing it in German. But we went to Alexanderplatz to purchase the phones which gave us the chance to see the world clock and the Fernsehturm. We went back to fill out our visa information which made us all feel pretty important and official. The only down part about it is that we had to give our passports up for 3 weeks which makes us all a little nervous! Kalen, Sarah, and I snuck a quick trip to the Brandenburg gate before we met our mentors.Later that evening we went to an Indian restaurant with the whole program and then to the Prater Bier Garten which is the oldest in Berlin.

Thursday we sat in orientation sessions for much of the day learning all about safety in Berlin. We took a lunch break to this cute little restaurant down the street (with blankets on the couches outside) but later found out that it was super tourist when I waiter refused to speak to us in German and reminded us that we should tip him (which is not hte way German restaurants work!) After a miserable trip to the grocery store, Perry, Dan, and I wen to the Nationalgalerie Museum because all the museums on Museum Island are free on Thursday nights! The collection was wonderful and we even got to some Monet and Renoir! We met up with some other people to grab a drink before we called it a night right down the street from my apartment!

We started Friday with our German placement test which decides which section of the intensive German class we'll be in for the next 3 weeks. I'm a little bit nervous about it but am hoping that I did OK. We headed to "!2 Apostel," a restaurant right by Museum Island, for lunch and then went on a Stadtrundfahrt (bus tour) of Berlin. We saw nearly everything there is to see in the city and also got a feel for the lay of the land. After coming back home I met up with a couple people for a stroll through the Turkische Markt in my neighborhood which was unbelievable. Don't worry I'll be headed back there when it opens again on Tuesday. To finish of the night we did a Kneipentour (pub crawl) with our Humboldt University student mentors which was a lot of fun and a great way to get to know some people better.