June 4th                                                                                                            Lübeck, Germany

Many people decided to travel home today. Some people though stayed in Berlin or in Germany to explore. I was one of those who decided to stay longer in Germany. I decided to go to Lübeck because I have some family friends up there. Lübeck, is a small city and is about an hour east of Hamburg. I really wanted to see my family friends, Katthy, Torge, Regina, and Franci who I have not seen since August. So, I decided to leave on the evening of June 3rd.  I arrived at Lübeck at 2230 and Katthy picked me up from Lübeck Hbf. After our greetings and conversation in the car, she dropped me off at Franci and Torge's house where I am staying until the 7th. To piece it all together for you, as a reader, Regina is the mother of Franci and Katthy. Franci and Torge are husband and wife and have a child named Nea. Our family has known them for almost 10 years now. Our relationship started when Katthy worked for my family as an Au pair. On the morning of the 4th, Franci and I picked up Regina at her place then went to the city to do some chores that needed to get done. Some chores include doctor appointment, groceries, food for breakfast, gifts for another family's child. We did these tasks with the Nea, who is a 2-year-old girl. Franci went to her doctor's appointment as Regina and I picked up some food for breakfast. She asked what I wanted for breakfast and I said that I wanted whatever the normal breakfast was for her family. I did this to better understand a more typical household German breakfast. We had breakfast at Katthy's apartment, which was a bit odd because she was not there. Their usual breakfast involves bread, cream cheese, butter, ham or turkey, and jam. You usually cut the slice of bread then add the cream cheese or butter followed by either meat or jam, sometimes cheese. We stayed at the apartment for a bit playing with Nea. She makes me think about how simple life was and how fun certain things are in life. Just as shaking your head is funny to a two-year-old. Afterward, we did some shopping for groceries and at a Toys-R-Us. After doing some shopping with Fanci, Regina, and Nea, we drove to Katthy's work and they dropped me off there. I helped Katthy at work by doing some labeling for certain packages. She works for a company that does event planning and deals with the contract in regards to the vendor and companies. After experiencing her work environment, we decided to have fun and go boat paddling. Boat paddling is where two people paddle the boat by using their feet (as if you are riding a bike). We did that for about an hour before we went to her apartment and made some dinner. We had noodles, mushrooms, broccoli, tomato, and fish. Afterward, she drove me back to Franci and Torge's house where we talked with Torge's family for a little bit before we called it a night.  Overall I had a fun day experiencing more of a typical German lifestyle on what they eat, but also how they interact with themselves and to me. 

A picture of Lübeck 

Katthy (as shown) boat 

paddling with me.