Gummy bears - bouncing here and there and everywhere

Guten tag from Germany! Unfortunately, that is about all the German that Chris and I know. This has meant that when we shifted trains from Italy to Switzerland and Germany, we often grazie'd when we should have danke'd and si'ed when we should have ja'd. This also meant that when we went to school with Jenny, we were wonderfully impressed with her English class (who were reading and discussing post-colonial literature) but were horrible unimpressive in her German class.
Germany has been excellent. Jenny brought us to a local market where we were enthusiastically propositioned by a man who sold organic bread. He would pitch to Jenny and then wait, nodding, while she had to translate the wonders of his loaves to us. These loaves of bread apparently are like a miracle from heaven itself and could have had Chris and I speaking in tongues (which, considered, would have been very useful) had we eaten more. At least, that is what we are pretty certain the man explained.
After this, we went back to school with Jenny and then went onto to Heidelberg. Heidelberg was beautiful and delicious. They actually had a store that was entirely focused on gummy bears. And when we say focused on gummy bears, that means that all they sold was gummy bears. In the entire store. You would think that with such a small line of products it would be hard to have an entire store devoted to it. Try making a store that only sells pencils and see how you do. The gummy bear store seemed to do well though. Perhaps people worked up an appetite from walking up to the Heidelberg castle. To get to the castle you have to walk up 314 stairs, and then to get back down you have to walk down, can you guess? Yep, aforementioned 314 stairs. 600+ stairs gives your stomach the rumblies. That only gummy bears can satisfy.
I lied before about the gummy bear store. They sell more than just gummy bears. They also sell tiny gummy bears. Gummy fruit. Gummy Mice. Gummy bottles. And even gummy sausages. Though they weren't the sausages that you would think are unique to Germany. Use your imagination.
The castle did have a giant barrel too. It fit almost 200,000 liters. That sounds much more impressive than using USA terms. Pfft 53,000 gallons.
The other tasty thing that Germany has (aside from gummy items) was rolls made out of the same dough that they make pretzels out of. Yum.
Another interesting thing they had in Heidelberg was a store that sold all of these authentic German items. Lots of Christmas items. In Germany, they really love Christmas. And trust me, this store wasn't touristy at all. 100% authentic. You can ask Jenny when she comes to America; she will confirm all I have said about this store.

The Heidelberg Castle:


Walking into the castle (very shaky -- Action is not our forte)


And the gummy bear store...