Bambergesque

Germany! Land of Bratwurst, Bach and Bayern. I arrived yesterday afternoon and am visiting my cousin Andy, the only person I have trouble keeping up with while walking. Our voices and manner of speech are so similar our closest family members can't tell them apart - proven once again yesterday when our grandmother from Quito asked me on the phone what I was planning to do with Dani.

The trip yesterday was comfortable. A woman sitting next to me on the train from Vienna to Nürnberg provided the first jaw-dropper of the day: while I was absorbed in a Finnish crossword puzzle, she casually asked me whether I was learning Finnish. (What does this say about my crossword solving skills). I was really impressed she recognised the language (maybe it was the many dots....:)!! As I was putting her in the right frame of things, she told me about a relative of hers who studies in Helsinki. He's a conductor I have worked with a couple of times. She flipped out of her mind but I kept my cool - after all, it's just a minor coincidence.

Nürnberg Hauptbahnhof is a railway station like any other in Germany but it holds a familiar atmosphere for me because I have been there quite often. As I was thinking about this, I realised the last time I was in Germany was three years ago, which I consider to be a lot of time. On the train to Bamberg, two teenage girls opposite me were totally absorbed with their nails and high school gossip. As we passed Fürth, yet another place I hold in dear memory for the jokes I used to make about the name of the place with a friend, I noticed the station platform hadn't changed at all since we were killing time with a group of comrades by taking whacky pictures there in 2002. I arrived in Bamberg just in time for a downpoar.

Today, my cousin left in the morning for his theatre project and I passed the time visiting shops (including one where, three years ago, I bought a box of cds which played a decisive role in making me realise what I wanted to become) and taking in the ambiance of this university town, which is a lot smaller than Graz. I also got my train ticket back home, the agent helpfully letting me know it would have cost a lot less had I bought it yesterday.