Eating Lunch With Ducks

Spring has sprung in Germany! The weather has been beautiful since we arrived in Halle and has been getting warmer and warmer everyday. This week though, we have gotten our first taste of rain and it won’t seem to let up. Despite the rain, Audry and I are still having a nice time and getting a lot of work done.

Our time in Halle is now halfway over; I can’t believe it! It is now time to start thinking about how to wrap up our ideas and finish carrying them out. This has been a lot harder than I anticipated. In Athens I am so used to having countless materials at my disposal, and tons of people to rely on to show me how to use those materials. This is not quite the case here at the Burg.
There aren’t the same types of chemicals and materials available for glazing and finishing pieces that I would like. Because of this I need to break out of my normal routine of “a quick trip to Lowe’s” and start using my brain to figure out how to alter my presentation to fit with my ideas. This is what I am struggling with at the moment and Audry and I have been really putting our heads together to figure out other ways I can display my piece. So yet again it is back to the drawing board, and although this is hard for me to come to terms with, I know that every time I have to start again, I get closer to what I really want to achieve in the end.



















Other than the studio Audry and I are still getting to meet new people almost everyday. Our new friends Jetta (pronounced: Yetta) invited Audry and I to parties on Friday and Saturday night. We made lots of new friends, but especially with Jetta’s two friends Basti and Bjorn who invited us to their flat before the party on Saturday night. They were very shy to speak in English with us at first, but after they had a glass of wine they REALLY wanted to talk about American television, especially The Simpson’s and Married with Children. It was really funny!
The aftermath of our night out with Basti and Bjorn.

Our new friend Bella arrived on Sunday from Berlin. She is staying in Audry’s flat for the week because she has to go to school for the week in a town very close to Halle. When she arrived the three of us went to a café where we sat and talked and got the most amazing hot chocolate I have ever tasted in my entire life. It pretty much tasted like someone melted a chocolate bar into a mug (and probably had the same amount of calories). When we returned from eating our dessert, Audry and I cooked dinner and we watched Christmas Vacation, one of my favorite movies, which I thought was a perfectly acceptable movie choice… an American Christmas movie being watched in Germany in the spring. Audry and Bella were both a little hesitant, but I think in the end they both enjoyed it, I know I did.

Also this weekend I finally got a chance to call my sisters Amanda and Katie. I have not gotten a chance to talk to them much since I have been here and it has been very weird for me to go such a long period of time without talking to them. It has been hard to be away from all of my friends and family for so many weeks, but if I could move them all here, I think I would stay here forever.



The little ducky that ate lunch with Audry and I this week!


One of the sculptures in the courtyard of the Burg


More art in the courtyard.


A cute little doggy that was being carried around in a cart behind a bike. Giant man eating dogs seem to be quite common in Germany!