Arrival

After a mostly uneventful 32 hours or so of transit from Sydney, I arrived safely in Konstanz along with another student from UTS, Michael. We flew with Thai Airways via Bangkok. 9 Hours from Sydney to Thailand. 9 Hours of waiting in Thailand in the airport. 12 Hours to Switzerland and then about 2 hours to wait for our train and travel north over the border to Konstanz.

The weather is quite cold and the sky has been with the exception of this afternoon, completely overcast over the last few days. I have slowly been settling in here and it has been good meeting people here. What struck me in terms of the view from my apartment was a hill in the distance with some kind of monument on the top so I went for a walk one morning to check it out. It is called Bismarckturm. (Bismarck Tower). It is a monument to Otto von Bismarck, a key figure in unification of the states into what became modern day Germany in the late 1800s.

This morning Michael and I had breakfast with another Australian friend here in Konstanz and then went for a wander through the Old town and at the start, having only walked a block casually strolled across the border into Switzerland. Unlike the others, I am not in the main part of town, so I never noticed how extremely close they are to the Swiss border.

Another notable observation was the Cathedral in Konstanz. For such a small place, it is such an enormous building and stands out in the city skyline. Apparently there is also much history involving Konstanz and the Catholic Church, in particular the Western Schism and the Council of Konstanz.

Speaking of History, Count Ferdinand von Zepplin comes from Konstanz.