Day Five: Dang, That's A Lot of Sausages

This morning we took a 3 hour drive to Lear Cooperation's factory. Lear is a company that makes accessories for cars, like the seat belts and seats. They also do a lot with the electricity part of the vehicle. The first thing I noticed about the meeting room we were all brought to was that every 3 seats there was a collection of glass bottles on a napkin, with 3 glasses in front of them.  We had to pour the drinks into glasses. This time, it made sense because they were big bottles, but I still can't get over how much dishware is gone through in Germany.

We watched a presentation about their business tactics, as well as their new wind shield technology.   They also showed us their board of directors, none of which were women. Lucie and I made jokes about raising our hands and asking if that was on purpose because we were both pretty angry about it. It wasn't until we were touring the factory itself that we saw any women.

The presentation also opened my eyes to how unprofessional some people are. There were two main presenters and one of them kept interrupting the other, competing with him, even if he knew nothing about the subject at hand. It was awkward for all of us in the audience to watch because their was clear tension.

We then took a tour of the factory, and were given lab coats and these funky foot straps that grounded us. The foot straps had to be touching skin so that our electric charge was equal to zero and we didn't mess any of their electrical work up. As we entered, our charges were each individually tested by touching a metal pad to ensure we were alright to enter.

Sophia showing off her fancy footwear

We got very stylish lab coats

We first watched circuit boards being made, which my Calculus Based Physics 2 prepared me for. I thought it was really cool that I understood the application of resistors and capacitors (more than I have to for a test, at least). The man who showed us this part was very soft spoken so it was hard to follow, so I spent most of the time just watching the machines.

After, we went to the light area where we learned about the head light that adjusts based on how much reflection is hitting the windshield (there are sensors in the windshield).

My favorite part was then the audio tour. There was a room with 27 speakers (not super accurate because I didn't want to look too stupid pointing at them and counting aloud). The group was directed to all sit facing one direction, toward the speakers. We listened to Hotel California and a song by Melody Gardot, and the sound quality was nothing like anything I've ever heard. It was such a rich sound that rang through my whole body, not because I was standing too close to the speakers like at a concert, but because the quality was that high. There was also a room with no sound reflection (no echo)... if you stuck your head in the single window of the room and screamed, there was nothing back--just silence. It was so bizarre. We also saw a car that they were testing the audio system of and another car that we got to sit inside and listen to the audio system (we listened to Michael Bublé).

In addition to the lack of women in authority positions on Lear's board, something else that really bothered me was something one of the tour guides told us. He said that in a few years, they are going to replace the manual labor with robots, and someone in the group asked if people would lose their jobs, to which the man politely basically said yes. It bothered me even more considering that if there were any women working at Lear, they were were the manual labor who would lose their jobs.

We had a surprisingly good lunch at Lear... I had apfelschorle for the first time, which is essentially fizzy apple juice. It doesn't sound good, but you'd be surprised. There was also chicken soup and a roll with cheese and meat. Continuing on with the diet of meat, bread, and cheese, I guess. We then left to take a tour of the city of Nuremberg (afterall, we drove 3 hours to get there). 

Our tour guide was a fairly elderly lady who we had trouble keeping up with because she walked so fast; it didn't help that we were taking pictures the whole time either... Nuremberg was mostly destroyed during WWII, so most of what we saw was rebuilt in the 50's. The tour guide said that Nuremberg is known for it's sausages and for it's toys. They are also very proud of Albrecht Dürer, a famous artist who was born there (alive in the 1400's). My favorite thing that he did was sketch this picture of a rhinoceros, based solely on a written description. He had never seen a rhino before but was able to pull this off:

One of the many museums dedicated to Albrecht Durer

One of the toy stores in the central part of Nuremberg

The first thing we did was try their gingerbread, which is different than the gingerbread that we're used to during the American holidays. It was squishier and softer than what we're used to, and it had a weird edible white side... still not sure what that was for...

The weather was not amazing, but at least it wasn't horrible. Here are some pictures from the tour of Nuremberg:

  

For dinner, we went to a very touristy traditional Bavarian food restaurant. They served us several different kinds of sausages, one being the kind that Nuremberg is famous for, Rostbratwurst. The tour guide told us that Nuremberg produces 1.2 billion sausages (a day, I think)!!! WHAT? That's insane.

The entrance to the restaurant

When we sat down, there was bread and mustard sitting in a basket so everyone was like "ooo appetizers" so we all spread the mustard on the bread and ate it straight. I thought it was a weird snack, but I went with it since some German students ate it with us. Still haven't clarified but in retrospect, we're pretty sure it was meant for the sausages. Who eats straight bread and mustard? People who have no idea how Bavarian food works... Anyway, I tried my best to finish all of my meal (I'm not defeated by food very often), but there was so much meat and I just couldn't do it. So I fed Sam the rest of mine.

The 3 hour ride home was one of my favorite things to happen. We sang songs in the back of the bus and hung out with the German students the entire time. It was bonding to the extreme. We all went to a club that night that was in a building that used to be a warehouse/factory, so it was a huge area with a balcony you could walk on and see into the dance floor.

Veronica's Struggle of the Day:
I think I'm spreading my bad luck to everyone I've been hanging out with. I barely came across one today. Except during dinner, I was cutting my sausage and half of it somehow flung across the table onto Sam's plate. I ate it anyway.