Munich

Welcome to Europe. We flew into Munich last Friday the 10th and have been dutifully relaxing, sightseeing, and hanging out with Jon for one solid week. This is my first time in Germany and Kane's first time in Europe altogether. So, we had (and still have) a few things to get used to. Let's start with the basics:

• They speak German here. This was something I had obviously known in an abstract way beforehand, but not really thought about. We were in Australia before; tons of new stuff to get used to but you can always ask someone about it. Now we're sort of on our own when we're not with Jon. Menus, road signs, tram ticket machines - all in German. Though most people secretly speak English, it's embarrassing to ask them to. We're getting by but it's an interesting, and often frustrating change.
• They drive on the right. Hallelujah! Well, sort of. We, obviously, have been conditioned by years of driving in the US to think on the right side of the road. We had only minor problems in Australia, but some things really are just ingrained. Other things, however, we've only experienced while driving in Australia. Example: roundabouts. I am not used to going counterclockwise in a roundabout. This is odd. We are dealing with it.
• It's summertime in the northern hemisphere. The sun rises at...some early time in the morning before I'm awake. It gets dark after 9pm. It's warm and, often, sunny. This is what I'm talking about.

And for some smaller points that are thought provoking and sometimes baffling:

• They do not serve tap water at restaurants. Not as a norm at least. If you ask for water you get disgusting bubbly water. Everyone else drinks beer, soda or juice. It's ridiculous.
• They do not keep their milk refrigerated at the grocery store. In the store aisles, milk comes in little 1 liter boxes which are not refrigerated. Nothing is wrong with this, the milk is boiled or whatever and then sealed, but it's still odd at first.
• People don't smile here. You know when you walk down the street and make eye contact with a stranger and you each give a little half smile to indicate that you are mutually friendly people even though you don't know each other? They don't do that here. Sometimes they stare sans smile (love the alliteration, don't you) but rarely a smirking stranger for no reason.
• There are very strict noise laws. In Munich, you cannot be loud or disruptive, even in your own home (provided that it disturbs others), after 10pm (till 6am) or on Sundays. This includes loud music, mowing your lawn, hammering, and possibly even running your washing machine. It does not seem to include the heinously loud and frequent police sirens reminiscent of the Nazi era. Those can go anytime they want.

Other than taking in the oddities that make Munich the place it is, we've been sightseeing rather dedicatedly. At least for us. Here's a rundown of what we've seen so far:

Saturday - Gay Pride Parade. They know how to queer it up here.
Sunday - Tollwood Festival. I don't know what it was a festival for, but there were adequate amounts of people, beer, stalls of food, and nick knacks. It was good.
Monday - Walking Tour. Free walking tour of Munich with a little bit of history and a lot of standing in the sun. Got to see a bit of the city though.
Tuesday - Nymphenburg Palace. Big mansion from the 1600s. Pretty nice.
Wednesday - Day at Jon's house to plan and book our next week of travel around south Germany. Also bought a GPS.
Thursday - Pick up the car and tour at Dachau Concentration Camp. Acquired the car with no problems, Dachau was interesting.
Friday - Neuschwanstein Castle and Hohenschwangau Castle. The first one is the really famous German castle that the Disney castle was based on. They were both nice but I had expected more for some reason. No idea how to pronounce the latter.
Saturday (today) - Deutsches Museum. Apparently it's huge and very in depth...unleash the nerds!

And that's been our stay so far; here are the pics that made the cut. We're having a nice time and the weather has been warm and sunny for most of the time, though it decided to start raining yesterday and today. We leave tomorrow (Sunday) for our five day road trip around south Germany and return to Munich next Friday.