Woodchucks!

The sun was shining, the fresh bread was set out for breakfast, and my cold had magically disappeared in the night! I knew it was going to be a great day exactly then. Today, instead of letting Lucas go to table tennis on his own, we (Ulf and I) went with him. I thought I was ok at table tennis, but my self esteem was shot with a bullet, and then then my pride throw into a ditch when I saw these guys play. I have never seen anything like it before. There was a break, so Ulf took me to a place in Essen that was gorgeous. In the turn of the century, Essen was almost completely owned by the Krupp corporation, a major steel manufacturer, and also vehicle and weapons maker too. They bought a piece of land in Essen, and began to build a area for their workers to live in. They made it extremely beautifull and fancy. But after two world wars of producing weapons for the losing side, they ended up almost broke, but gave the project over to the city. It was finished, and you now have to wait for over seven years, just to rent a room out. ( By the way, the Krupp foundation is still working, after over 100 years of working. ) after touring me around this oasis of beauty, Ulf took me too his work place, the university. He's the head of the virology department, so he showed me around the lab. It was super cool! He showed me all around the different machines, and rooms, and finally, the animal room. First off, there was the mouse room. I walked in and was shocked. There had to be over six hundred mice there. It was crazy awesome. Then, Ulf said there was another animall species he wanted to show me, but deliberatlly kept it a secret. I thought at first there might be primates, or rats, or something else, but I was shocked to see... North American Woodchucks!
why would they have woodchucks there? The answer is amazing. They are one of the only animal species that can have hepatitis b. ( the others are mostly birds, and I don't think it would be a good idea to keep a great blue heron in a cage all day.) so they take woodchucks that are already infected, and will test there different new vaccines! How cool is that! We came back from the lab, picked up Lucas and Anton, and took off for some Chinese food. It was the first time I've ever had breaded bananas and pineapple. It was really good. ( but not German.) it was a great day today!