This week has been yet another string of examples of things which I will in no way have time to do in final year. Yesterday we went to the Freibad (outdoor swimming pool) for the best part of an afternoon, and although we were good and brought some work with us, the sun made everyone feel pretty lazy. I’m enjoying the weather now my Rudolph nose has almost disappeared (now it’s pink rather than bright red).

On Friday night I gave Scotland and myself a bad reputation by drinking a lot of whisky and orange juice (it really does work, even if it sounds like a bad idea) at a friend’s 21st birthday. Saturday was intended to be quieter, as in theory I’m studying for my first oral exam next week. The fear of said exam has been looming over me for a while now – my lecturer is an 84-year-old legend who’s mentioned the anthropology of hip-hop in at least every second class, but he’s partially deaf and despite having near-perfect English, doesn’t seem too happy with my Scottish/ my friend’s Irish accents, even if we’re speaking German. It’s sure not to be a winning combination, and this combined with knowing that I’ve not understood important parts of the lecture/ general nerves associated with having to speak in German for half an hour about a pretty specific aspect of the law means that I’m pretty scared. After a few hours of Rechtsanthopologie, I hung around with my corridor for a bit, knocked back a few beers, listened to the relationship dramas of my neighbour and went to bed at midnight.

My family is coming to visit tomorrow, so at least that should take my mind off things. I’m looking forward to showing my war-nerd dad some ex-Nazi buildings and taking my mum to Salzburg. Slightly apprehensive of bringing them up to my part of town – it’s known locally as ‘the ghetto’, I heard what sounded terribly like gunshots a few weeks ago, and the police presence on a Friday night seems higher than the rest of Munich combined. I’m sure they’ll come to love it as I have – there’s always happy children playing in the fountain, views of Allianz Arena and the H&M that’s been slowly but surely destroying my ERASMUS grant.

The best venue for gigs in Munich, according to general consensus/ my experiences of the 2 concerts I’ve been to here, is the Muffathalle in the east of the city. I went to see Death Cab for Cutie on Sunday with a few friends and most of Munich’s high-school children/Twi-hards and it was pretty awesome. I can definitely recommend the venue, and the support act (The Head and the Heart).

I’ve not seen my parents and brother for 2 months now, and although the time has flown by I’ve missed them and am slowly reaching little-kid-at-Christmas levels of excitement. Hopefully some of this will make going home easier, as I haven’t seen a lot of friends from Scotland for even longer, but for now I’m just going to tidy my room (they’ll complain if I don’t despite the fact that they’re staying in a hotel) and hope the family loves Munich as much as I do.