Düsseldorf.

Lets back track a bit.

I woke up to this.

So, Friday was our big excursion day to Dusseldorf.  I was pretty excited, mostly because I was curious about the place where we were originally supposed to living before things were changed up.  Needless to say, it was pretty awesome.  In general, it had a "bigger city feel" than Bonn does, and some of the architecture there was really awesome.

We cruised around the city for hours, led by our two professors.  We hit up a student Art Show, and most of the work there was either unimpressive or just plain weird.  I came out of it feeling much better about the quality of my work.

Sweet Sculpture.

Then we visited Blue Byte Studios, which is a small videogame development company stationed in Germany.  They are now owned by big dogs Ubisoft and put out games like The Settlers and Far Cry.  It was awesome to see a place where everyone is at their computer throwing video games together and behaving much like we do when we have been cooped up in studio for extended periods of time.

In the evening, Matt, Justin, Virginia, Weecho, Chris, Jack, and myself stuck around in the city.  We took some time to figure out the basic transportation system pattern, and then took a tram to the Youth Hostel on the other side of town.  After the short half-hour ride, we arrive with smiles only to be told that the hostel was totally full.  Figures.  So we decided to stay up all night and take an early train home instead of getting any actual sleep.  Smart cookies.  We had dinner at the local Hooters, and getting to eat a hamburger was a true blessing.  Good stuff.

Later than night, we went to a dance club our Professor recommended to us called "Stone".  They played only rock music, and it was awesome.  We hung out for at least 4 hours there, until it was time to catch the 3am train to Cologne.  We managed to make that without any trouble.  After arriving in Cologne, we hit up the Burger King inside.  Big disappointment.  They didn't have any food other than a handful of chicken nuggets.  But the drunk guys singing 80's rock out loud made up for it.  We caught our train back, but not after running like maniacs when they decided to announce that the train platform had changed.  So, one minute before the train arrives, we hear a German dude over the speakerphone.  People start rushing across the tracks, and others begin to quickly collect their stuff.  We caught on eventually as to what was going on, and sprinted across the train station to the correct platform.  It was funny.  

We chilled inside the train for the half-hour ride, and two stops before we made it home, a few train employees started to come down the aisles asking for tickets.  We freaked because we didn't actually have any for this ride.  Being the clever kooks that we are, we decided to run off the train at one of the stops it made and just barely avoided the ticket ladies.  Fewf!  We avoided an ugly 4o Euro fee.

Then, all 7 of us made the 10 minute walk over to Matt's house to wait for the next train to come in.  It was late, so his entire hos family was already asleep.  He quietly opened the door, and we all snuck in REALLY QUIETLY all the way through the kitchen, up the really creaky stairs, and into his room.  The entire time this was happening, his host dad was snoring SO LOUD. It was so hard to not burst out laughing, but at the same time, his snores hid the small creaks made by those darn stairs.  Once we got into the room, we all just sat around in a daze, tired from the day that never seemed end.  Weecho and Justin sat on Matt's bed, while the rest of us just sprawled around the room.  We had an hour to blow, and we didn't know what to do other than just sit there.  About 40 minutes into our wait,  we hear the loudest noise ever.  Matt's bed broke! It was the funniest thing to ever happen.  Ever.  I look over, and Weecho and Justin are both still sitting on the mattress, which sunk down to the floor, where there are pieces of wood from where the bed gave out.  The snores stopped.  It was amazing.

Then, when the time came, everyone snuck back downstairs and walked back over to the train.  What a night.