i went to ERFURT

This has been a great week. i went to Erfurt, where there was a ferris wheel constructed in my honor!


On top of that slight exaggeration, there was REAL awesomeness. For the first time ever, my immediate family gathered...IN GERMANY. Here's a picture of the other three, chillin' in front of a gate at a crazy fort/waterwell in Erfurt. My dad pointed out that we were all wearing jeans and black shirts about four times, because he thought we weren't really paying attention to him. We probably weren't.


The impetus for this epic gathering was a Zappa Plays Zappa concert, for which my brother is a keyboardist/trumpeter/melodica-ist. My parents currently reside in Spain, so they made the trip over to visit and see the show (i haven't seen them since May!). This was just another day at the office for my brother, but for me, it was a ripping-rad concert that turned my ballsack into jello exactly six times. Here's the band taking a bow at the end of the show to the vigorous applause of a medium-sized audience (500?). Sorry for the crappy picture--that's just what happens sometimes.


After the show, my dad and brother were ready to party.



So, we befriended some locals who were at the concert and they took us to a great pub in Erfurt where the ceiling was lined with old glam-rock records and Bee-Gees lunchboxes. Here's a large portion of the Zappa Plays Zappa band with their new friends Andre (back right) and Andre's dad (back left). Sorry about somebody else's arm in the shot--we were all drinking a fair amount of beer. ;)



There was a huge poster of a Frank Zappa crappa on the door to the bar's toilet. It was rather humorous, seeing as we'd just come from a two and a half hour concert of Frank Zappa's music... Anyway, here's my brother miming dropping a deuce.



My parents and I came back to Berlin this morning (my brother is off to finish the tour, but he'll be back for more hijinks on the 15th!). We saw some sights. Here's a picture of my mom and dad contemplating the Berlin wall.


We all had a really hard time fathoming what Berlin life must have been like before the country unified and the wall came down. My dad eventually came to this conclusion.



My parents are leaving tomorrow, and i'm sad to see them go. I'm really glad we got to spend this time together--it was truly a very special week for me--i just hope they had as much fun as i did!

adios amigos!