Arrival in Germany

Almost every exchange student would have flown straight into the country where his/her partner university is situated, and would avoid as many transits as possible because it would be very common for them to have many pieces of luggage.

Well, that’s not me!
I wished I could, but unfortunately there is no direct flight from Singapore to Israel.
I could choose to transit only in HK or Bangkok, but the air fare was not cheap.
Since I am entitled to staff family travel benefits offered by Cathay Pacific, my parents and I decided to make use of it.

I arrived in Frankfurt, Germany early in the morning around 6am, landed in a time zone that is 6 hours behind Singapore/HK. Nope, I did not change to another flight on the same day to go to Israel, and that’s because I did not want to reach Israel in the middle of their Sabbath (or Shabat in Hebrew, which is Saturday), when there won’t be any public transportation until late evening. Instead, I contacted Stephanie, a Malaysian friend whom I have known in Singapore more than 3 years ago and currently studies in Germany, and asked if she could host me for 3 days, until my scheduled flight in the evening on Sunday.

My God is such an amazing God, and like what my church friends have prayed for me before I left Singapore, He protected me and watched over me all the time. I got the opportunity to know 2 German passengers on the airplane, and one of them offered to stay with me for close to 3 hours, showed me around the Frankfurt Airport and taught me how to get back to the airport by train. The best part was that he offered to drive me to the Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof (which means Central Train Station), where I would meet Stephanie another 4 hours later. As a result, I saved the trouble to bring all my stuff onto their S-Bahn (which is the subway train), and needed not to buy the train ticket! Yay!

I met Stephanie around 2:40pm and she brought me around Frankfurt. Compared to the heat in Singapore and the warmth in HK, Frankfurt is certainly a contrast with a temperature of around 11-17 deg C, and I had to wear my thick winter jacket, which became especially helpful after the sunset. There aren’t many things to see in Frankfurt though, but the short tour around the city was enough to satisfy my desire to see something different outside Singapore and HK. Had a really really great hot chocolate from Godiva. I am not going to miss the Godiva chocolates once I am back in Singapore next year! Haha! The day ended with a train journey to Dueren, a small town near the city of Cologne and where Stephanie and another 2 of her friends stay. By the time I reached their apartment I was so exhausted… I mean, my October 6 was 30-hour long, thanks to the time difference!


This is the huge European Union logo situated somewhere in Frankfurt.


This is Stephanie, my host for the 3 days in Germany. =)


The Godiva Hot Chocolate. The best hot drink for the cool temperature in Frankfurt!


Dinner at "Paulaner am Dom". 


At Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof. This was the IC train from Frankfurt to Cologne, and we still had to change to another train from Cologne to Dueren. Yawnz...