Andrea Packwood

03 August 2015

When All Else Fails, We Have Dublin

Dublin -- 

"Dream me a city where I can be myself, where brewery hops drift on the morning breeze, and a tin whistle swells your soul.Where the rain sparks the cobbles, laughter surrounds, and a nation's woes are solved from a barstool. Where ales grow taller, and old friends become new. Where conversations start as the day ends. Dream me a city and I'll show you Dublin and you will feel at home"

Dublin is a city that you immediately connect with. It's beautiful, welcoming, and filled with life. Even checking into our hostel proved to be a fun experience. In Dublin we visited decided to skip the typical Jameson or Guinness tour and took an opportunity to see the Irish Whiskey Museum, where we learned the history and process of making Irish whiskey, and that the Gaelic name for whiskey, Uisce Beatha, translates to "water of life". We also became certified whiskey tasters, diploma and all. Live traditional Irish music, as well and fantastic renditions of American and English rock, pour out of every pub and the city smells like the fresh flowers that hang on nearly every lamp post. Ireland is covered in history, and Dublin has been front and center to it all. Our hostel was a block away from the General Post Office, where the 1916 Easter Rising, a rebellion against the British crown in which most if not all Irish involved were executed for treason, and was only a 10 minute walk to the castle. Now, the Ireland State office sits on top of the medieval castle ruins but, parts of it are still visible if you go underground as well as the, now, underground river which citizens excited during Viking and medieval times were thrown into, causing over 20,000 human skulls to be found there in the 1980s. Sam and I got incredibly lucky on this trip, the completely adorable Irish man working at the front desk bumped us from a 12 person to a 6 for free and we ended up with 4 very friendly roommates for the second night in Dublin. 3 guys from Germany and 1 guy from Florida who stuck the night out with us hoping pub to pub, sampling pints and live music all night long. Discovering I really don't like Guinness, but everyone loves a blonde ale, and that George Ezra songs are only improved when the violin is involved. One thing that I specifically loved about Dublin is how incredibly friendly the people were. Everyone is so open and ready to strike up a conversation with you, and they do it in an accent I could listen to for days at a time. We ate breakfast at a traditional pub, of course I had to have the traditional Irish breakfast. The waiter put it on the table and said "this will fill you till next week", and he wasn't kidding. Turns out, black pudding is actually quite delicious, once you put it out of your mind you're eating blood sausage. Obviously communicating with everyone was very easy since Ireland is an Irish speaking country, and everyone seemed excited to speak to us, and they had a genuine friendliness and interest. Unlike in the states where you can't always tell if someone is fake or friendly, every person seemed to be putting forward their genuine face. We wondered around and found St. Patrick's cathedral and, while I don't know how I feel about having to pay to enter religious buildings, was well worth the ticket in. It's beautiful and set up in a way that doesn't make you feel frightened of the religious aspect. They have included a large war memorial inside, not to any particular person or conflict, but for any person affected by any war, which I think is a good use of space for such an important building. Just walking around the city you feel at home, because for a big city it's actually rather small. Everything felt completely familiar even though I had never been before, which made My experience in Dublin comfortably unique.

 

03 August 2015

Over the Canals and through the Coffee Shops

Amsterdam -- What can I say about Amsterdam that hasn't been said a million times? This city is one in a million. So incredibly unique and beautiful, it's almost unfair to all other countries that they don't have an Amsterdam. Amsterdam is the most open city I have ever stepped foot in which made it impossible not to love. As soon as you step out of the main train station, and I'm not exaggerating, you are hit in the face with the aroma of Amsterdam, marijuana and pancakes. This probably has something to do with the fact that the city center and the red light district are pretty much one in the same. Amsterdam is world famous for having coffee shops and prostitution, and this is clear when you're in the more touristy areas. You can stay here and have a damn good time I'm sure, but you'll miss out on the importance of the city. I can't stress enough how beautiful and eclectic the city is. First thing we ran into in the city center was a novelty condom store, right next to a fetish shop. I thought about how cool it is that this culture is so open, that would never happen in the U.S., well the majority of the U.S. If sex, drugs, and techno isn't your thing, Amsterdam has an incredibly rich history and culture to discover. We wondered around and found the cheese museum, with free samples I might add, right next to the Tulip museum. Which as educational and interesting as it was, couldn't help but make us laugh. Especially when Ben's first remark in the building was, "huh, I don't know what a tulip is". These two places were right across the canal from the Anne Frank house, which I didn't get to tour. I did get my fix for culture. I knew coming into the Amsterdam trip that if I didn't have the chance to visit the Rijksmuseum, the national art museum, then my trip wouldn't have been all it could. I was wondering the art museum soaking in hundreds of years of Dutch culture, when I peaked in a room and immediately recognized the massive painting in front of me, above all the images of Dutch imperialism and transcendentalism, was the just awe inspiring Rembrandt room. I don't know much about art, but I know what I like and that's Rembrandt and Van Gogh, two incredibly different artists, both beautiful in their own way. It was amazing to see. Every corner of the city had something new and different to offer while still seeming just incredibly Dutch. You were well aware that you were in The Netherlands at every corner even though you heard quite a lot of English floating around you. I had no trouble communicating with anyone around me, because everyone was so friendly. People around you would strike up conversations, which does not happen much, at least in my experience, in Germany. I loved how friendly everyone seemed to be. It made the entire city seem even more welcoming than it already did.

03 August 2015

London: A City of Lies

London -- London is where I learned I had been lied to my entire life. I was shown and told so many things about London and England in general and almost none of them were true. The touristy parts of the city were honestly underwhelming, compared to how I have always pictured them. The biggest disappointment was that media told me that I would be able to mess with a queens guard. It's in all the shows and movies, the characters go up and mess with them because they are supposedly not allowed to move. Well, I'll never know if they can move because they are far away from the public behind the tall, thick front gates of Buckingham palace. Even the British museum, the building that houses all the things from around the world that England has claimed for themselves, the building that houses the Rosetta Stone, one of the most if not the most important pieces in our understanding of ancient Egyptian culture, just felt like an overcrowded neon sign shouting at us how far the empire once stretched. Ironically, in the country that is essentially responsible for the existence of my own, with a common language and a common sense of self, I spent the most time discussing cultural differences. Not a big difference between the English people and myself, but just an over arching sense of difference. Not that I didn't feel comfortable, London felt a lot like San Francisco, but things, one in particular I'll point out, that ore just outstandingly different from the U.S. Let's start with the glaringly obviously one. They drive on the opposite side of the road in England. Yes, I saw this when I was in Dublin already so it wasn't that big of a deal, but in London I found out that the left side of the road mentality extends past driving. On escalators and staircases you go to the left, even when you pass someone on the street you're expected to go left. This was something that took a little while to get used to, and even when I was used to it it still felt wrong. Once you get past looking at Big Ben and Buckingham palace, London is actually a pretty cool city. You have a ton of street art and street performers, and just massive open air marts filled with food carts, trucks, and shops. And I love a good food truck. We even found a German deli with Thüringer Bratwurst, and felt as if we had found home. London is amazing once you find the parts where the people actually live. And you'll know, because you can hear them laughing before you see them. It was so wonderful to see something so familiar to home. Just loud, friendly, sarcastic people in groups on the street or sharp dressed individuals keeping to themselves. This was comforting to see once again, just like everywhere I've been, that people are people.

 

02 August 2015

Friends in Far Places

Wondering through the park in 

Bamburg with my friend Samuel. 

Frankfurt am Main & Bamberg, Bavaria, Germany -- Two of my close friends live in Germany and since I'm in the country for two months, I picked a week to visit them both. First stop was Frankfurt am Main. Dominik lives and works in Frankfurt and was nice enough to open up his apartment to me for a second time since I've been in Europe. Frankfurt is the financial capital of not only Germany, but the whole of the European Union. The city is incredibly modern and without a doubt has the tallest skyline in all of Germany. The city was pretty much obliterated during the Second World War, so it was rebuilt in a very westernized style, with skyscrapers, metal, and glass. I loved the contrast between Frankfurt and other cities I've been to mainly because it looks like any big American City, but still feels very German, maybe it felt like that because I was being taken around by a German. Even with the city so modernized, there was still buildings remaining from before the war in just unexpected places. For instance, you walk a few blocks from my friends apartment, surrounded by your average apartment building, and you come across this huge, old tower just sitting in the middle of an intersection surrounded by bars and restaurants. The contrast was striking, yet at the same time so incredibly commonplace in Germany, you see an interesting mix of old and new in all cities here. Of course, being in the city I was made to sample local favorites, like Apfelwein, which I endorse wholeheartedly. From Frankfurt I hopped a train to Bamberg. In case you don't know, Bamberg is a small city in the Franconia region of the German state of Bavaria. Bamberg, in contrast to Frankfurt but similar to Erfurt, is exactly what Disney told me Germany would look like. A beautiful castle in the hills, large citadel, and cathedral all built in exactly the style Americans think the entirety of Germany looks like.

Wondering the old section of Frankfurt Am Main 

with my friend Dominik. 

Once my friend finally met me at the train station, he took me to all the touristy Bamberg sites, as well as some places with his friends, all leading up to a rooftop BBQ with his fellow MUNnners (what I like to call people who engage in Model United Nations). I was forced to eat regional food like Kloß, which is a ball of sticky yeast, and yes it tastes exactly how it sounds, and the strangest beer I've ever had. Smoked beer which has a taste equivalent to day old bacon. Despite food and beer I just "had to try", Bamberg was fantastic, while it doesn't have the big city feel of Frankfurt which I love, it is quaint and very beautiful. And even though it's love lock bridge is not nearly as impressive as Frankfurt's, it was still a strangely romantic city at night. Now, both of these cities had interesting cultural differences, Bamberg is in Bavaria so the accent they speak in was hard for me to understand. My German isn't very good, but in Frankfurt I could at least clearly here the words they were speaking, besides that, Bamberg was much more laid back than Frankfurt. Like I said, Frankfurt is a big city so even though it's very populated, I feel like I saw more people out and about in Bamberg. People also seemed to be in less of a hurry in Bamberg, while in Frankfurt they all seemed to have somewhere urgent to be. Either way, I enjoyed both of these cities immensely not only because I crave new experiences and these places were just different enough for me to enjoy them, but because I had the chance to see friends I hadn't seen in a while, which shaped my over all experience in both Bamberg and Frankfurt. That being said I think I'm more partial to Frankfurt, which might have something to do with the friend who lives there or that Apfelwein is far better than smoked beer.

01 August 2015

Adventures in Brussels

Brussels -- We decided that a great idea for one of our free weeks would be a “Beer, and Brats” tour of Germany. We would try and hit all the major cities nearby. First stop, Frankfurt then Cologne, Dusseldorf, and round it off strong with Hamburg. The plan was off to a fantastic start; we spent a fun night at a close friend of mine in Frankfurt and were well rested for the week that would follow. Well, the Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof is where our real adventure began. Four of the group successful managed to catch the train to Cologne, while three of the group, myself included, missed the train waiting for a bagel. No problem, trains run every 2o minutes or so, so we hopped on the next one to catch the others. Now, long train rides, no matter how beautiful the German country side is, can become incredibly boring, so while on the train I happened to pick up the trains travel itinerary which told me that the final destination was Brussels, Belgium. So without a second guess the three of us jumped at the opportunity to head to Belgium. We stopped in Cologne to regroup with the others and after a very unimpressive bratwurst; we hopped a train to Brussels. After a relatively long train ride north, we had arrived. Brussels is a beautiful city with incredibly friendly, nice people, and apparently Eurostar thought the same thing. The British Train service happened to have started their strike the same day we arrived in Brussels and nearly all the employees decided to stay in the city. This caused us to run all over the city of Brussels for almost 3 hours looking for anywhere to stay. Thank god, around 1 am we found this in a hotel over a Chinese food restaurant. Finally we could rest easy and enjoy the city that we spontaneously decided to visit. Brussels is fantastica city and has adventure down every street. The one rule we learned in Brussels is always trust an alley. At the end of most alleys you’ll find a great hidden pub, every single one with its own style and feeling inside. It goes without saying that in Belgium I had the most amazing waffles I’ve ever had in my life and fries that changed the fry game in my life forever. Despite being surrounded by such beautiful architecture, diverse cultural identities and fruity beer, my favorite part of the city was its interesting dedication to the idea of equality. You may have heard of the famous fountain with a statue of a little boy peeing into it, well in Brussels they have also added a fountain in another part of the city of a little girl peeing. All in the name of equality, and I absolutely loved that. Brussels had an interesting aura if you will, it felt free and almost idealized. People just came off as happy and content with their way of life in the bustling city center, and conveniently for us most everyone spoke English so communication was a breeze. Even after all the hassles we had in making it to Brussels, my only regret is not having spent more time there, I did see and experience much of the city center, but there is always more to see and do it a city as interesting as this one.

 

31 July 2015

Intercultural Adaptation Theory

Erfurt, Thuringia, Germany -- In communication studies, intercultural adaption theory organizes how we adapt into different cultures. You have 4 clearly defined steps, the first being the (1) honeymoon stage, followed by (2) culture shock, then (3) cultural adjustment, finally followed by (4) adaptation. I would love to consider myself a 3, I feel like I have been able to adapt to my surroundings while understanding the incredibly subtle cultural differences between the states and Germany. The only problem with considering myself a 3 is that it implies I had to suffer a culture shock. Which I honestly didn't experience. The theory implies that conflict is inherently necessary for a person to adapt to another culture, but I don't think that is always true. Yes, there were small things that you notice, like the lack of small talk in Germany, or the differences in the service industry, but I don't at all consider those to be a culture shock, let alone a conflict. Plus who really enjoys small talk anyway? So as much as I would like to consider myself at a 3, a place where I am working towards cultural adaption through changing some of my incredibly American habits, like how loud I am in bars or how I should actually follow jaywalking laws, does the theory allow me to move past the first "honeymoon" stage? I think that I am completely over the simple excitement of being in a new place, and I can pinpoint the exact moment I transitioned from stage 1 to stage 3, in my mind skipping stage 2. It was on the walk to our very first class. I just slide smoothly into the fact that Erfurt was my home for the summer, and since it was home I treated it as such. I find myself very easily relating the the German students I meet, and find it very easy to fit into what they see as appropriate standards. Hell, I even went on a date with a fellow German student, and it was just as nerve racking as any date I've been on in the U.S. I honestly feel like I fit in rather well to the German culture, because it really isn't drastically different from how I was raised. Just like the my generalized version of German culture, my parents expected me to be independent, timely, and responsible for my own actions. No, I wouldn't have been allowed to travel on public trams alone at 9, but maybe that was only because we didn't have a very reliable public transport system. The argument could be made that I haven't experienced stage 2 because I'm not putting myself into an environment without Americans enough. I don't think that's the case at all. I have made an effort to visit the friends I have who are German and interact with their social groups which, despite the language barrier, was relatively easy for me to do. In my mind, I am floating in stage 3, but if we view assign the need for conflict to occur before adaption, then I am still waiting for my culture shock conflict to lift me out of 1.

30 July 2015

Berlin, My New Favorite City

Berlin -- I have known for a very long time that Berlin was a city I wanted to visit, but after the week we spent there I think I would enjoy living there for a few years if not more. The city was amazing, so large and small all at the same time. It didn’t matter what part of the city you ended up in, you always found something beautiful or wild or indescribable. The city was full of life at all hours every day I was there. Since Berlin is an incredibly international city, it was very easy to get around and communicate because everyone spoke English. Honestly, Berlin felt like home. I love cities, I thrive in the fast environment and crowded streets. If I was to compare my weeklong experience in Berlin to my 2 months in Erfurt I would say the only difference, for me, was the language barrier and the speed of life. In Erfurt, I have become accustomed to using the German I know around town, when order food, asking questions or buying groceries. In Berlin all that went away. I spent a week with People from everywhere and anywhere who would eagerly and exclusively, well once they discovered my completely American accent, speak English with me. In Erfurt everything runs on a slower pace, and I don't mean that timeliness isn't important, because it is, but that people take there time with everything they do. Eating out, walking, even having casual conversations. Berlin, like any big city had more urgency involved with everything that was happening around us. And I loved it, don't get me wrong I love Erfurt, and I love everything about it. It's beautiful and the people are kind. It also looks exactly like Disney told me Germany would look, but there was something special about Berlin. It's a city with just so much diversity that wears its history on its sleeve. From the Church's with no roofs or steeples, to the buildings with bullet holes, Berlin was a mix of what it had endured and what it hopes to experience, which is a completely exciting feeling for a city to have. Walking up the steps of a Berlin subway stop was always an adventure no matter where you ended up. Even when we got lost at 2am on the train, we always found a beautiful new area to explore, but my favorite discovery in Berlin was at the abandoned airport. When I first heard "abandoned airport" I immediately pictured decrepit old ruins of the soviet hayday, but in typical Berlin fashion it turned out to be a hipster paradise. The old airport had been repurposed as a city park, with skateboarding on the runway, a large community garden, tents, football players, and of course free live music. The community didn't let the airport fall into ruin like we have in the U.S., but made the most out of the space. And it was an amazing space complete with hippies, children, and cats on leashes. A little outside the city is an old abandoned US Air Force spy station, which was in operation during the Cold War and for a bit after it had ended for the purpose of spying on east Berlin, and well as the new united german republic. It has since been taken over by what I would like to call capitalist hipsters, and is now covered in some of the coolest graffiti I've seen in my life. The concept is so completely Berlin, repurpose a building in the name of art and freedom of speech. This would be the only bad experience of my time in Berlin, and it isn't that anything bad happened it was just a plethora of personal problems. So for starters this is how I learned to ride a bike, on horse trails, up a mountain for 45 minutes, clearly it would put anyone in a bad mood. Then we get to the tower to see locked gates, and a sign saying that they have tours of the abandoned, tagged up, capitalist hipster paradise for the lovely price of €8. I will never understand how a group of artists who pretty much kept use of the structure through squatting, would want to up charge people to see a bunch of graffiti. Now, even if the journey to it wasn't my favorite, and the expensive tour confused me, it was still an incredibly cool place with amazing views of the city and surrounding forests, and a cool connection to Cold War history. The city never stopped surprising me and I'm sure that I could visit it time and time again and never see the same thing twice.

12 July 2015

From West to East

Erfurt, Thuringia, Germany -- Germany and The United States are very similar countries and the people are very similar. Since being in Germany I’ve made it a point to ask some Germans around us, what they think of when they think of a stereotypical “American”. Not surprisingly, they all have fairly similar answers and they always include loud and friendly. I think that’s mostly positive. When I first met the German SPICE students, the first thing that struck me was how quiet they were. All the American SPICE students came in laughing loudly and talking to each other across the room, almost yelling really, not obnoxiously just that’s how we all communicate. The German SPICE students took a while to warm up to us, honestly it was a bit intimidating to be around students who were, what I thought at least, a bit shy. I was just not used to it, and I thought that maybe I would accidently offend them or cause them to just not want to warm up to me. I’m very glad that wasn’t the case, because as I’ve learned they are incredibly friendly and open people which I love. Now the people in Erfurt who I have interacted with in passing, I clearly haven’t had the opportunity for them to open up with me, but the German friends I’ve made are just so similar to me after you get over that initial hurdle of my attempted American small talk which, by the way, Germans are not into. Even though I don’t have an immediate connection with the people around me, I have noticed some interesting cultural qualities that the people of Erfurt possess. The most prominent one for me is the way they follow basic city laws. Not big laws, but things like jaywalking. It isn’t something that people do in Erfurt. I am used to Morgantown, WV where no one ever uses the crosswalk. In Erfurt, even if there is no cars in sight, people seem to wait the extra 2 minutes for the little green man in a hat to give them the O.K. to cross the incredibly narrow road. Another, big cultural difference that I have had an interesting time adjusting to is how going out to a restaurant transforms from a simple 30 minute trip to a 3 hour session where you see the server maybe once every 20 minutes, and only if you are ordering or being served. No small talk, no refills, and forget about that painfully awkward moment where the serer asks how the meal is right after you just shoved an entire slice of pizza in your mouth. Going out to eat is sort of a cultural event here, you spend a few hours catching up with the friends you brought, not caring about the next place you’re supposed to be which, I now find completely enjoyable. I like that a simple act of eating is transformed into a bonding experience between the people around you. The third, and my personal favorite cultural trait of the German people, is how dog friendly everything is. You can bring your dog almost anywhere and everywhere and it’s completely acceptable. I am constantly surrounded by people casually walking their best friend through the city streets, into stores, and to the outdoor patios at restaurants. The only downside to this is you really can’t pet them. People here don’t really ask to pet someone’s dog which is a real letdown when you see the fluffiest Bernese Mountain Dog in existence walk past you. Germans and Americans are pretty similar people I’ve found and that has really made the transition to living here for a few months much smoother.

4 July, 2014

A Study in German Conflict Resolution

View from the Bamberg cathedral. Bamberg is a small
city in the German state of Bavaria.

Bamburg, Bavaria, Germany -- In communication studies there is a theory called face negotiation theory, which describes how people of different cultures relate to each other during a conflict, whether they are concerned with saving their own face, an other's face, or both faces. Throughout my travels here I haven't actual come across any sort of conflict, it's been an extremely positive experience so far. But, recently when visiting a close friend in Bamberg, Germany, I told a few of his friends about my roommate situation in Erfurt, and how my roommates don't seem to want to talk to me, and that I assume it's just they are shy, or busy and that it wasn't a huge issue for me. One of the German guys listening to me said that I should confront them and ask them why they are not friendly toward me. I was taken back, this is such a confrontational approach to the situation. To avoid conflict, I would employed mutual face concern to protect both parties, but in his opinion I should use self- face concern and inform them that they have made me slightly uncomfortable, risking their feelings in order to make the situation better for myself. Clearly, I will be using the mutual face concern technique to avoid any kind of awkwardness or conflict between us. The culture that this guy grew up in has made him more concerned with openness and honesty when there is even such a minor issue as this, and that is a drastic difference for me.

25 June 2015

Communication Accommodation Theory

With our new local friends at the Krämerbrükenfest. 

Düsseldorf -- Throughout our first few weeks in Germany it has become clear that the rumors that "everyone speaks English" are absolutely false. Yes a large portion of Germans speak English, but anyone from the older generation or from outside a major city may have limited knowledge or no knowledge at all of the English language. I am lucky enough to have some experience in the German language, but it has still become sort of a struggle to fully communicate with the people around me, especially the locals of Erfurt. I've noticed that if the Germans we meet know English, they will only speak English with us, and if we attempt to speak German, they are either pleasantly surprised or just really want us to continue to speak English. What's more interesting is communicating with people who know no English what so ever. Ordering food becomes an event where I must speak the German I know and point at  items I want or gesture at how many I need. You get a strange feeling of success from actually ordering your food correctly. Proud of yourself from ordering "einmal Pommes". A few of us when to a big open air event with a few of the American and German friends we have made and discovered that by far the easiest way to communicate what you need is to simply be able to pronounce the German words correctly. As long as you have that down, you can do anything in this country. In communication studies there is an idea about code switching. Code switching is when someone changes how they communicate to fit your communication style. That is something you encounter every single day in the city of Erfurt, and it makes it easy to communicate when you're willing, or others are willing to code switch.

28 May 2015

Introduction

Riverside, Calif. -- Hey everyone, my name is Andrea Packwood and I am a 21 year old senior from Riverside, California. I am a Political Science and International Studies major attending West Virginia University. I have been abroad a few times before and it has caused me to develop a strong desire to experience the world and I am fortunate enough to have the opportunity to continue my world travels this summer through the SPICE program in Germany. The chance to immerse myself in cultures different from my own is a passion of mine and I cannot wait for all the adventures and knowledge that will come for myself and my fellow SPICEers in this nine week program. I know that nine weeks will offer many challenges and stresses, but I am very excited to face these and have amazing stories to tell when I return back to WVU.