Friday, June 4, 2010

Frankfurt!

Hi everyone! I landed in Frankfurt this morning around 6:40am Germany time. I have been up for over 24 hours now so I'm feeling stretched pretty thin, but I wanted to get this all down before I sleep and forget anything.


I flew in on Air India, which was great! The food was really good and I met a girl named Aisha! She is from Chicago but will be studying in India, so we felt just the same way about leaving our families.  Both of us had crying parents and friends at our departures.  She was about my age, and we got to sit alone in a 2 person row so that made it easier for us to chat.





We watched the sun rise over Europe, which was beautiful.








Once landing in Frankfurt, I met a friend of mine who was a foreign exchange student at my high school my senior year.  His name is is Christian, and he lives right here in Frankfurt, so he offered to give me a tour of the city and take me to some interesting sights.

We walked around town seeing many different shops (Bakeries, Leather goods shops, Watch stores, and book stores).













One of the most interesting things about Frankfurt is how it integrates new buildings with the old ones. This is a tower that was the only part standing after WWII of a castle in this area.  As you can see, Frankfurt continued to grow up around it.














Frankfurt is known for its banks and commerce. This is the building that makes the decisions about the current worth of the Euro (some of you may even notice the Euro in the emblem which is also a cross with the symbol for the European Union.)  This can vary day by day, even hour by hour.  It needs a constant watch, and this is where people do it.









This is just me on top of a building that gives you a view of many skyscrapers (Wolkenkratzer) that make Frankfurt a headquarters of business.











Now for some sleep! Tomorrow Christian and I are going to the Frankfurt Zoo, possibly a museum, and also Frankfurt University!

Bis spater!