June 6, 2009

I am finally caught up on my entries, so they will start to get longer now ;).

Today was only a half day for us! We had class in the morning (Global Business Strategy) and a presentation by a former IBIer who now lives in Germany. He was actually born in Thailand (?) under German parents who were missionaries there. He then went to Messiah for college, graduated and eventually wound up working for Bosch in Germany. Talk about a man with no true nationality! It was fascinating to hear some incite into the German culture, especially dealing with work. The Germans are heavily unionized and work 35 hours a week. What is really interesting was that the Germans care more for the whole than the individual. So, when a company is doing well, rather than just fire the poor performing employees to save money, everyone in the firm will take a hit in hours to keep the corporation a float. I think it is kind of impressive. After the presentation that ended at noon we had the rest of the day free. I got some of my laundry done, it cost me 6.90 euro! I also got some homework done, it was overcast all day which helped me to stay focused. That night we ate at Pizza Hut, it was really good but not the same kind of pizza they offer in the States. Later in the night the city had some fireworks, which they only display the first Saturday of June and September (lucky us!). It was cool; they seemed to be recreating the attack on the castle, so they shot off a few at first from the bridge, and then used some flares all around the castle to imitate the entire castle being on fire. Beyond that, there was nothing special about the fireworks – Damascus does just as good. We saw a bachelorette party walking around, drunk off their minds and dressed up in ladybug outfits, so Billy, Dave, and I got our picture with them. It was nice to have a break. Tomorrow we have church then we visit the castle!