Amazing America (2/3)

This post is intended to report about the events during my two weeks stay in the U.S. with my girlfriend. :)

Update: 15/08/2009

Hey folks,

before I'm flying back to Sweden in less than 12 hours I want to use a bit of my spare time to report about the events happened at the other part of the world (about a month ago). I have to apologize for not writing earlier, but I was really busy preparing for a joint future with my Hannah. But that's yet another story.

So in a nutshell:

I arrived in Chicago where my angel picked me up from O'Hare after an overall flight time of 12 hours. I was exhausted and since I had taken my flu from Sweden to the States my overall feeling was not so good. However, the appearance of Hannah at the airport even before I picked up my luggage was a bit like a drug. And yes, I am addicted to her. After a welcome-hug we took my bags and left for the subway together with her friend Anna. After the arrival at our hotel, the Wit in the theatre district in Chicago, I just changed and I probably would have fallen asleep, though we were hungry and so we decided to get some dinner first. After having some nice and quite exclusive food: steak tartar, baked mushrooms and salmon in addition to two desserts which we got for only one payment, we fell asleep and tried to recover from our long journey. The next day was devoted to the exploration of Chicago; after a power brunch at some pastery we went to see the Sears Tower, Millenium Park and Navy Pier. The latter however we just saw from the lakeside since I was not really in favour of doing some attractions such as giant wheel, car scooter or rollercoaster. Instead we decided to take a nice and very calm walk along the waterfront before leaving to pay the museum of science and industry a visit. It was amazing, though the display of U-505, the Nazi uboot which has been captured by the Allied during WW2 was kind of strange for me. It was a bit overwhelming and presenting America as the white angel fighting against black devil Nazi-Germany was a bit too exaggerated. I will probably upload some of my pictures to Flickr or something else, so stay tuned to see the photos I have taken while being in the States. Later this day we started our 3 hours drive to Indie. On our way down there we stopped in West Lafayette, close to Purdue, Hannah's university and got some nice sandwhiches for dinner. We got a bit distracted and bond by a nearby thunderstorm: one of the architypes in the Midwest. Unfortunately I failed miserably trying to capture the lightning, so there are no pictures from that event. Later this night we finally made our way to Hannah's parents house in Indianapolis. They live in a suburb about 30 minutes from downtown but her dad is working directly in downtown. After some short small-talk we went to bed and immediately passed out.

After a two-day intermission in order to recover from the flight, we were about to take of for Washington D.C. Hannah's family was planning to go on vacation and they took me with them. Unfortunately her dad had to work during vacation, thus only the two of us, Hannahs mom and her brother, Brian went to see D.C.. It is simply too much to write about every little detail of our trip to Washington. So, briefly spoken we explored the area around our hotel in old town Alexandria, 30 minutes train ride from downtown, but part of Virginia during the first day. On our exploration we encountered some glass-musicians, visited the torpedo-factory, a artists centre and attended to a little ghost-story tour of ancient Alexandria. On the second day we checked out four of the Smithonian museums, visited the National Archives after staying in line for 2 hours and had some nice lunch in a food-corner in the American-Indian museum. Later we went to visit Hannah's aunt Debbie and uncle Mike (her dad's brother). There we had the first time a true American barbecue. It was very nice especially since Debbie revealed that she has German ancestors. It was a great sign of Virginia hospitality and we spent almost all night there before Debbie took us back to our hotel. Early the next morning Debbie picked us up yet another time to take us to Mt. Vernon, the former residence of George Washington. Visiting Washington-Mannor was quite impressive and after my trip my overall opinion about American polititians has significantly changed. Afterwards Debbie dropped us at Arlington national cemetary, where we paid a visit to the JFK tomb and the tomb of the unknown soldier (including a change of guards, impressive but a bit too much for me as a European who never had to serve in the army nor that I have ever seen that much display of the military. ). We topped all our previous visits and trips in D.C. with an overall ride along all important monuments, including the Washington Memorial, the Thomas Jefferson Memorial, the FDR-Memorial and many more. Close to exhaustion we made our way back to the hotel where we passed out yet another time.

After flying back to Indie, we had another short break. On the first day Hannah and me prepared some German Schnitzel with some really nice green beans and impressed her family with our cooking skills. On the second day, we visited her grandparents in West Lafayette and Hannah showed me her university. The first American university I've ever been so far. Finally she showed me her new residence area where she is counting every day backwards until we meet again.

On Saturday morning we left for the big family reunion in a state park in Kentucky. The way down there was a bit similar to our roadtrip to Dalarna and the landscape was as forrestry and hilly as in Sweden, just a bit bigger. We shared our cabin together with Hannah's aunt Sharon and her two sons and in a result Hannah and me slept on an air-mattress in the living room. However, since we had the room for ourselves, we had more privacy than it would have been when sleeping in the same room as her parents. During a one and a half-day intercourse I got introduced to all of Hannah's living cousins, aunts, uncles and other relatives which brought me to the conclusion that I'm aiming to do the same with her when she is coming to visit me over Christmas. Besides talking to a lot of very charming people, we encountered a severe thunderstorm and tornado warning toghether with a spate of rain pouring down while we were sitting under a shelter and trying to celebrate the reunion. Prior to the sitting we went tubing and I literally passed out on the boat after being on the tube for about 5 minutes but Hannah did much better than me. Additionally we showed her relatives how to play KUUB, a game we learned back in Sweden. One of the final events on the reunion was the horse-race. A game where children play jockeys and the adults place bets on the participants and I was a jockey too... Surprisingly I won the run when I was a jockey. On our way back to Indie we stopped on sunday afternoon at a restaurant where you can get a 1-inch thick steak together with a lot of other food and a delicious pie desert. Fed up from this lunch we made our way back to Indianapolis and after arriving there we realized that the fireworks intended to be fired on 4th of July had been postponed because of severe rain on the 4th of July, to sunday evening. After a quick decision we drove into town, got some dinner at a pasta-place and watched a very nice fireworks (although without sound) from the office of Hannah's dad, the second tallest skyscraper in downtown area.

The last two days we managed to spend together, just the two of us. We paid a visit to the Indianapolis Zoo, visited the King-Tut-exhibit in the children's museum and did a bit of shopping (thanks to the strong conversion-rate of the Euro). Sadly on wednesday I had to say goodbye and we had one last hug and kiss which now have to last for quite a bit - until Christmas, until we will be together again.