Through the Looking Glass

I leave for Berlin in just a little over 30 minutes, and I'm actually packed on time! This whole "living out of a backpack" ordeal is getting to be less of an ordeal and more of a normal thing. I'm going to be gone until late Sunday, though, so you won't get any more posts until next week.
By the way, my personal Deus Ex Machina bought me a laptop so ya'll can continue to enjoy my insights. Thank you Dad, Grandmom and Graddaddy Hopper! You saved my tail end this time. The old Toshiba's still got a little umph in her, but I spend more time booting it up and fighting with it than I do actually using it. Like I said, you saved my tail.
Today in Humanities we dove right into Freud's Civilization and its discontents. Tiffany and I are of like opinion on our dear Dr. Freud, but he did contribute enough to so many different facets of 20th century life that we are oblidged to at least acknowledge his influence. Still, it brought a grin to my face when Tiff responded to Freud's attack on the Golden Rule (which he deems as against man's nature and plainly counterproductive to the individual) by pointing out that for the betterment of society one must first act as the catalyst of goodwill, even if it is not personally advantageous. She didn't actually say it in class (for fear of a long drawn out discussion on the matter), but she still shared it later.
But you probably don't want to hear our opinions on the "master" of psychoanalysis, do you? This is, after all, our travel blog. And, though we are here primary as students, its through travel that we're learning the most. I have to say, though, I'm learning quite a bit here in my room as well. The German students are agast at the thought of having to pay a dime of tuition, and Sophie (our french roommate) only pays about $300 a year. This is only a sample of the long conversations that have taken place around the kitchen table for the last three nights now. Bavarian is starting to come together a little bit clearer now. It is a lot like southern english in that it takes the native language and stretches it out into different vowel sounds. It does not drawl, but it definitely reshapes. I imagine my German teachers back in the states will have quite a time with me when I look at them and say "Gross gut," or some similar Bavarian phrase.
Culture is so much more than the history we're studying in class. I feel like I spend every period soaking in why this was built, or how some group conquered another, but the transformations that have trickled down to the present from those little events is so strange to see. Tommy and Martl last night stood by the map of Europe pointing out the lines of the Second and Third Reichs, before France "expanded east" (what we would call taking back what was theirs). They talked about the Saarland, a place where French and German have mixed to create a dialect and subculture, and also a point of conflict. They joked about how many French people think Germany borders Russia and how they have all the beaches in Europe worth seeing. It's very strange, in this time of German-French friendship (as the histories call it) to see the past through this present lens. It's not the way we've been shown it in the states, which is why I'm so fascinated by it. Not that it's "right" (whatever that means for history), but it's different. A difference that is not so disturbing now as it once may have been.
Yes, not all journeys are by land. Perhaps the best really aren't.