sat feb 18: So the next morning I don't know how but I managed to wake up at like 8:30 am, even before my alarm went off! So I decided to do some sightseeing before another manic night ensued. I wanted to take lance but he was on the terrace, behind a locked door so I went shuffling around in svens room looking for a key, I didn't find it but it woke him up and so he got it and unlocked the terrace. He didn't look so pleased about being woken up so early and was wondering what I was doin up! So hopefully he went back to sleep after that. So anyway i was off, I rode to the cathedral to maybe do a guided tour and finish the last parts I didnt get to see the day prior. But it was already closed and it was not even 10 am! So I went back to the tourist info and she said the cathedral opens at 6 am and closes at 9 am during carnival! I would imagine that at 6 am there would be stupidly drunk people running rampant on the street then, so perhaps having church doors open isn't the best idea, but hey whatever works for them (at least by 9 all the drunk people would be fast asleep but I guess they don't see it that way). So I checked my leaflet that said which museums were open and a shame that the carnival one wasn't, so I went to the stadtmuseum which was nearby. It had an audio guide that corresponded to the exhibits, and also in English, which was great, and the temp exhibition was separate so you didn't have to pay for it if you didn't want to, a nice change from the Netherlands! The lady at the desk said it was all in German anyway. So I went around seeing artifacts and paintings and religious stuff from colognes history from the middle ages to now. Ww2 memorabilia in there as well. So I spent a bit of time in there, learnt about this specific family that made a brand of chocolate in cologne in the early 20th cent (so kinda like sunlight soap made in port sunlight) so after reading about it I wanted to try it. So in the early afternoon I was still at the museum and I texted sven asking if he needed any help setting up for the party he and his house mates were throwing that night. He said yes and to show up around 3. So I finished the museum, and as I left I asked the guy at the desk where I can find that brand of chocolate and he told me the names of a few department stores and their locations. So I was riding around the pedestrianized main area and went to one of those dep stores, they sold chocolate but not that specific brand I read about. And I think this happened the day before but when I was in that pedestrianized area some man came up to me and was one of these annoying charities that pester people on the street for money, so I just said I don't speak German and he walked away. As opposed to when Mayke and I got stopped by some cancer charity in maastrict and the guy spoke dutch and I said I don't speak it and he said in fluent English"ok ill speak in English then!" So yeah anyway I continued to ride around, found an aldi, that was closed. And I couldnt find anywhere else that sold that chocolate so I gave up and was just about to head to svens when I saw this little performance going on on the street that drew a big crowd. Musicians banging drums and playing pipes and the rest of it, in carnival costumes of course! So I watched that for a bit, I wanted to continue hanging around outside and see what other street performances were going on, but I felt debted to sven for letting me stay, so I left and rode to his. On the way though i stopped off at a netto and bought a 35c bar of chocolate! Wasn't the cologne brand, but I was just craving chocolate by that point. Cologne has a chocolate museum but that was closed :-( :-( oh well, just means I need to revisit! So I arrived at svens and helped make streamers out of ribbon. I was trying to curl them with scissors but I was terrible at it. I preferred to clean than to decorate but the place was mostly clean by the time I arrived. So my job was to make these streamers and blow balloons and place them around the house. I really was a bit crap at that! But in the end I dont think anyone cared! I tried to hang balloons from the low part of the ceiling with scotch tape but it wasn't sticking so sven did something magical and got them to stick. He pretty much fixed my bad decorations into decorating the way he wanted and I thought, why did I come back to help again? Lol so in no time it got dark, we had some dinner and then I showered in his housemate Michaels bathroom when he wasn't there. But when I got out I saw Michael in his room so I think he was a bit shocked to see a stunning girl in a towel walk out of his bathroom! (I knew he was there cause I heard him shuffling around) . His English was very bad, as was Daniels, the other housemate. So yeah conversations didn't really get anywhere, unless sven was interpretor. So after a bit, we got our costumes on and his friends started coming. And this seems like an opportune moment to end it here so I will cut it off for the night!
