Since returning to Germany from my visit back to the United States in April, I have been busy every week with school. I came back from break on April 10, with my classes starting less than a week later on the 16th. If you have read my earlier blog posts regarding my classes, school has been very stressful for me this semester — but it’s also been an opportunity for growth.
I had not had a break from school since it started, and the stress was actually affecting my health and well being. I decided a vacation away from school for a weekend was what I needed to get myself motivated again.
“It reminded me a little bit of San Diego in a way. That reminded me of the fact that I will be returning to the United States at the end of next month. It made me excited, but also a little sad.”
My friends and I were originally planning on taking a trip to Venice, but we ended up finding cheap flights to an island called Mallorca in Spain. The tickets were 20€ each way, and this trip took place during the middle of the summer (isn’t that insane!?).
Once we decided on Mallorca, I started looking up things to do on the island for the four days that we would visit. I asked some of my German friends about what they would recommend, and their answers surprised me. They said Mallorca was a very popular German party destination, and it turns out that our hotel was right in the heart of the German party life. I was thinking the last place I would hear so much German would be Mallorca, but man was I in for a surprise!
We arrived in Mallorca on Friday night and it turned out to be one of the most interesting nights of the whole trip. It was 11 p.m. when we started to walk around the town where we were staying, and the whole area was completely busy. It almost seemed like a Las Vegas type of city, where the life of the city took place at night. This really intrigued me.
The beaches were full of people, the bars completely full, and people everywhere are selling merchandise for a profit.
As we kept walking, we started to approach the area known as “Ballermann.” This area is the famous street where all the Germans go to party; Various beer halls and German clubs appear everywhere along with many German restaurants selling German food (most noticeably currywurst).
I was only hearing German being spoken, all the signs were in German and all the beer halls were playing Schlager music (German party music is my best explanation of it). A few times my friends and I checked Google Maps just to be sure we were actually in Spain.
This part of Mallorca is definitely something that I will not forget.
While in Mallorca my main goal was to be able to chill before the finals season began. Much of my time during the day was spent doing exactly that. From going to the beach and laying on lounge chairs, to swimming in the pool on the rooftop of my hotel, Mallorca really was my remedy. The area itself looked like it came from a postcard; It was incredibly beautiful and almost didn’t seem real. The turquoise water, with the long strand of the beach and mountains in the background on the other side of the island felt like it was a world away from my study abroad home of Ulm.
It reminded me a little bit of San Diego in a way. That reminded me of the fact that I will be returning to the United States at the end of next month. It made me excited, but also a little sad.
This was my first vacation where I got to spend time with good friends, and while thinking about home I realized that I will actually have to leave in a month. I don’t think I’m ready as much as I would like to think. I’m going to miss so much here in Europe: my new friends, the way of life, the ease of traveling — but most of all the land I can now call my second home, Germany.
Maybe this is the reason Mallorca holds a special place in my heart, because I grew to love German culture and I was completely surrounded by it in there. It was a stark reminder of what I have done for the year while also being an escape from the world of stress.
Thanks to my friends Lizzie, Coral and Anton that made this one of the best trips I’ve taken all year. I can’t wait until we can reminisce about these memories.
Brandon Einstoss is an applied mathematics and German junior. He is studying in Tubingen and Ulm, Germany, for a full academic year
The global experience, as told by SDSU students 
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