I'm sad that my exchange student friends are leaving soon, I can't believe they're going already. When I was on exchange here two years ago I remember how bad the thought of leaving was.
Here are a few miscellaneous things I haven't written about on here:
In May my two housemates and I had a lovely long weekend in Anger, a small town in Bavaria near Salzburg. We stayed at German Anna's family home, explored the area (Bechtesgaden, Bad Reichenhall, the beautiful Königssee), saw the Maibaum being set up by men in lederhosen and ate and drank extremely well. On the very cold and drizzly Sunday morning Anna and I got up early, ate a lot (me at least) and set off to run in the Salzburg half marathon. I wasn't quite as trained as when I ran it two years ago and I had somehow hurt my foot running the week prior, so I wasn't even sure that I'd be able to complete the distance. Luckily a few Nurofen and some Voltaren cream did the trick and it ended up being a really nice (and wet) run and I finished in 1:44, a minute slower than last time but totally okay with me.
A few weeks ago Matthias and I cycled Bielerhöhe Pass. I went on a pretty intense hike the day before and probably psyched myself up too much for the ride - the big climb ended up being much more doable than expected. When we got there the road was still closed for winter but we decided to try it anyway, and ended up having the whole pass to ourselves. So good. It was crazy to be cycling so high up (2032m above sea level) with so much snow and such vivid turquoise blue dams.
I feel very lucky that I get to spend another year in this beautiful part of the world.
