so today we got up and listened to a lecture from a french professor that teaches centre students in strasbourg. he had a lot of interesting things to say about the alsace region and the alsatian. the region has gone back and forth between german and french rule five times now in the past couple hundred years which makes for a slightly chaotic and painful history.
after we heard from him, we were free for a few hours so we got lunch at a little creperie and then rented our bikes for the next week. we then went on a boat ride on the ill river that surrounds strasbourg. it was pretty hysterical (very touristy), but also informative. one of the brown fellows accidentally listened to the childrens commentary the entire ride instead of the normal one. lol.
after the boat ride, a large group of us (15 to be exact), took a little bike ride over to kehl, germany. contrary to popular belief, the ride was not 25 minutes, but rather a nice, refreshing hour long ride. there was a little bit of confusion about how to get there but we eventually made it to the cute little town and had a nice dinner and a delicious ice cream. there was a surprising lack of signage at the border of the country. also the ride back was much better in terms of timing, but we had a minor mishap (poor sindhu) at the beginning of the ride. we all made it back in one piece though which was good.
we have to be up pretty early tomorrow morning for the bus to struthoff concentration camp. can’t believe its already august and especially cant believe we only have four more days here in strasbourg! almost time for interlaken and barcelona adventures!!!
much love,
han
hans travel blog 