Hey Everyone,

All the guys have returned to the states, but there are still so many days that haven't been blogged yet. This is due to the drastically increasing gas prices (not really, it just felt like the right thing to say), so please bare with us for just a day or two more and you will be bombarded with the experiences the rest of the guys are too afraid to tell you in person. For now, here are a few teasers.

A few notes on the images above:

- I had to throw in the picture of Bill acting all emo.

- The last three pics are part of a new series i'm developing, Men of Glee.

- Yes, Markus is a beast and we'll have an amazing impersonation of him up as soon as we can figure out who recorded it.

- Bill stayed an extra week with Brad and Jesse, so forgive me for any grammar mistakes :)

Cheers!

Hey Mrs. Nesnidal,

Bill is really looking over my shoulder right now. It is not a lie. This post is dedicated to our avid blog viewers who continually return to this site, only to be faced with a very outdated blog. This post is going to make up for every night lost to accidentally falling asleep and having no access to free wi-fi. Who's ever heard of 10 EUR for 30 minutes of wi-fi?

Well, anyways, I'll be starting way way back to make up for lost time. This will follows a similar format as those awkward conversations with friends you haven't seen since high school...and it's your 40 year anniversary. The only difference is that it's only been a week, and people have been really bugging me to update the blog (Bill Nesnidal).

Let's start off with November 7th, 1986. I was born. Fast forward 21 years and here we are at O'hare airport waiting for everyone to arrive at 2:30 PM.

Funny story: A few of the guys packed 25 lbs. over while David Lello packed only 18 lbs. worth of clothes. David is also staying an extra two weeks in Europe.

Pray for him.

We finally made it into the terminal area where we had to wait for our flight leaving at 5:50PM. Once we were in the air, I realized that my fear of flying was actually a fear of motion sickness. How do you mix those up and how did you find out? Well, I took some Dramamine to knock myself out, but ended up not sleeping and actually loving the turbulence. Thank you, Dramamine!

Nine hours later with the sun constantly following us, we arrived in Munich, Germany at 9:45 AM unprepared for a full day of touring concentration camps. Mind you, half the group couldn't sleep on the flight (myself included), and we had a ridiculous day planned for the sole purpose of exhausting us, so that we'd fall asleep and be wide awake for the next day. Pretty lame, but it was still a great experience.

First stop: Dachau

Dachau was the first Nazi-Germany concentration camp. As soon as we arrived, we were fortunate enough to attend the final half of a memorial service dedicated to the Italian survivors of the camp. While walking around, it was hard not to relive a fraction of the hardship experienced by the prisoners of the camp.

"Arbeit Macht Frei" translates "Work Makes You Free"

Following after, for lunch, we ate at the English Gardens.

Thereafter, we headed out to tour the Nimphemburg Palace, where we observed some amazing baroque architechture in its original form. The property used to be completely private, but now is partially opened up to the public.

Here's a "green" image for those of you who are "green". "Green" as in energy efficient :)

It's been a long blog. Here's a lightener.

Our two bodyguard-like tour guides. These guys are beasts!

Once we finished our tour of the Nimphemburg Palace, we headed to the town square and walked a lot. We also saw some great things and blah blah. You'll see.

I originally thought this was the coolest church ever, but then I realized they sold watches. EDIT: Bill Nesnidal - "It's the clock tower".

A little bit of humor. Go ILLINI! even though I've never been to a sporting event. Thanks, Bill.

On the way home, we were bombarded by a bunch of soccer fans following a Munich victory! What an end to such a long 48 hour day...and a very long blog. Please post comments. Thanks!

***PHOTO TALK***

The same image turned black and white takes away distracting colors and brings out a different emotion that may have not been noticed otherwise.

Vote for O'bama.

So, after speaking with Colin on MANY occasions, I've learned that he and his friend have a relationship built on the many culinary experiences they share with each other. Within the last few days, we've decided to make it our mission to venture to every unique/hole-in-the-wall/craziest/popular/regionally specific restaurant we run into during our tour. So far, we've been truly fortunate to have some amazing dishes and through this blog, we hope to share these sensations with you. To begin with, Colin and I visited Steinterrasse, and here is a "taste" of what we had. Colin will elaborate more on this later :)

P.S. Colin is our very professional Teaching Assistant. I will be posting very embarrassing photos of him in upcoming posts :) Enjoy!

Hey Everyone,

Your favorite blogger speaking. Well, I apologize for the lack of blogs and promise you that there will be a barrage of material coming at you rather soon. Here are a few images to hold you over.






By the way...that's Paul France playing lumberjack :)

Mark Paik

Hallo from Salzburg!

We've been in Salzburg for almost two full days now, and we are currently enjoying a well-deserved day off. After arriving in Salzburg yesterday morning, we had a quick warm-up and then went straight to mass. We sang during and after mass at the beautiful Salzburg Dom. The OG's also got a chance to work their vocal chords in front of an extremely appreciative audience. We were all very well received, and even heard someone exclaim, "beautiful!" during the mass! We sang various selections from our repetoire including Alleluia, All That Hath Life and Breath, Prayer of The Children, and In That Great Gettin' Up Mornin'. The Dom itself played with our sound in such a way that I almost fell over numerous times after hearing the reverberations. It was truly an amaying experience.

After a great performance, we had some lunch and took a guided tour of Salzburg. Despite the drizzling rain, our tour guide led us through the old town portion of Salzburg. We got to take a tram to the top of Hohensalzburg, the fortress that overlooks Salzburg. Here we were welcomed with a breath-taking view of all of Salzburg, including the Dom where we had just finished singing. The tour took us past several landmarks from The Sound of Music, and ended with a tour of the house that Mozart grew up in. The house (more like an apartment, really) has been turned into a museum, and was recently redecorated by an American named Robert Wilson. Some of us were a little bit confused with his artistic choices, but overall, it was exciting to see how Mozart had lived. The day ended with another superb dinner at a local restaurant.

All in all the day was amaying, if not exhausting as well. We're looking forward to journeying to Lucerne, Switzerland tomorrow, and spending some time with the Swiss Alps. Hopefully we will get some pictures up soon. Until next time, auf wiedersehen!

Guten Morgen from Munich!

Glee Club has been running around Munich and various parts of Germany for the past two days. So far we have had the rare opportunity to sing in the singersall of Neuschwanstein (please excuse the bad spelling!) and the prime location of our first concert: Saint Boniface Abbey. In addition to our singing, we've also done our fair share of sight-seeing. We have already been to the concentration camp at Dachau, the English Gardens in Munich, Nymphenburg, Neuschwanstein, and, of course, beautiful downtown Munich.

So far our tour guides have been wacky and informative, and we having the time of our lives! We will be heading to Salzburg this morning in order to sing during a Sunday morning mass, followed by plenty of sight-seeing. We've been hard at work taking pictures and video of our destinations and performances along the way, and hopefully we will be able to share them with you soon. We have set up a Flickr account, as well as channel on YouTube: GleeTV, which we will update with pictures and video of our tour.

Until next time, auf wiedersehen!

So, why make a blog? Well, since its coinage in 1997, the "weblog" format of open source communication has been used by every demographic and for a variety of purposes. From its earliest uses for personal blogging, the blog has taken on an entirely new form and purpose as of late. Today, corporate websites have opted for the blog as a means of keeping their clients/customers up to date with interesting and floor-hitting news. Wedding photographers have begun to move their portfolios and business operations to the blog, and the youth are still using it to communicate their "Top 10 Favorite Things...Ever" responses and opinions on how life just so unfair.

Labels: breaking of the proverbial "ice"