aqualung

wed was a fun day. i woke up early and went to the american consulate almost outside of berlin. or it might be outside, but still accessible from the u-bahn. when i came from underground to the street, i did not know which way to go. i picked a direction and started walking. up in the distance i saw a long line of people and two german police officers. "ah ha! i bet i have found the consulate," i said to myself. i cross the street and sure enough see an american flag behind a heavily gated building.

i walked up and looked at the people in line. "you don't look american to me," i thought. i was not excited to stand behind all of these people and then i saw the sign "american citizens stand here." no one was standing there - zaz! so i go up the stairs and this guard says "american?" and i said "yeah" and waved my passport. he motions me to the security gate. it was an oddly proud moment when i got to walk past everyone. i will say that i am not often "proud" to be an american but at that moment, i was proud to get in the special door.

my purpose for going to the consulate was so that i could get some extra pages put into my passport. when in london, i discovered i only had two squares left in my book - agh! so i hoofed it to the consulate to get the extra pages sewn in. it was cool and now my passport is extra thick and i look super important.

after that, i booked it to class stopping to get some monseiur vuong glasnuddlesalat on my way. class was fine - normal. after the end of the day, the israeli diplomat in my class said to me, "danielle, how do you find this class? are you bored?" and i was like, "eh, if it were harder, i would work harder. it's not, so i'm fine." a general reflection of my non-working mode at the moment. so we go talk to our teacher, sandra, after everyone had left.

the thing with the new class is that we are all in such different levels. there are 3 people who speak very well and ask questions in german. i think i am probably right behind them in my level. then there are those who are good - going along normally and then there are those who have
no.
idea.
what is going on.

one of the chinese girls in my class should be in the pre-level 1 class (we are in the level 2 class) and so she is horribly lost and i feel badly for her. but the israeli diplomat had a good point - being in a group with the people of her level is actually detrimental to our learning. and we're paying enough that we should be able to move forward quickly. sandra agreed and said its hard for her, too because she has to try and explain things to those who don't understand. to make a long story short - i think we might do some different group work today or something...

anyway, after that i was going to go to a lecture on movies in berlin, but i was late, so i didnt go. i ran a few errands and then... dum dum dum...

i went to a bikram yoga class! oh man it was tough. it was 90 min in a 105 degree room (40.5 for your celsius lovers). !! if you dont know me very well, i should maybe explain that (while, yes, 105 is hot for anyone) being born in one of the coldest states in the US, i have very thick skin. or maybe its thin. i guess i dont know. what it means is that my boiling temperature is like 80 degrees BUT my freezing is like 0. i am much more happy with the cold and the snow. so within about 5 min, i was wiping my face of sweat. others were just starting to prespire. anyway, it was a very long class and i keep thinking "please, don't pass out. just don't pass out. don't pass out in class. pass out later." well, i never did pass out, but i wasn't able to do all of the poses. it was good. there were 4 or 5 of us who were knew (the class was in english, i should explain) and there were some people in the class who were sooo flexible and good and just crazy looking. it was almost inspiring and then i was like, "wait. you just look unnatural. the body is not supposed to go that way."

i went with granola girl and after that we stopped at a bar for some smoothies. i stunk, so i didn't stay long. came home and watched some diggnation - so fun. good day. guten tage. or gut tag. ich weiss nicht (i don't know).