Seminar II: BMW

January 17, 2012

We had a whole day at BMW, meeting with various people from the company and getting a tour of the factory and the museum. In the end, I was actually a little BMW-ed-out, but I got to see the famed on-ramp where you can drive your brand new car straight to the autobahn and the BMW sense of style definitely lent itself to some fun pictures...

Bike racks outside of the BMW headquarters...can you smell the irony?

The famed on-ramp. They move your car directly from the factory across the street to a spot below this stage and when you arrive your car is raised up to you (talk about showmanship!). Then a BMW representative explains all the details of your car while you drool over your new purchase. When you're ready to go, you hop into the car and vroom vroom down that ramp and straight onto the street. The wildest thing is that this service includes shipping. You can take a road trip around the autobahns of Germany and then drop the car off at a harbor somewhere to be shipped to wherever you live. I'll let you make your own judgements about that...

Watching the luxury of it all...

This is "BMW Individual" for people who want to custom-design their car to match...their living room and piano?

The BMW Museum

Walking back across the street from the museum

They pull that little blue car out every hour or so and drive it around their exhibition hall. A particular favorite with the children's birthday parties (I kid you not, there was a children's birthday party there)

BMW-style office decor

And of course, a picture of something we ate that day. Lemon cream and raspberry ice cream tart with a toasted marshmallow top

Seminar II: Geothermal Energy

January 16, 2012

Literally the best part of all seminars are getting to visit factories and production sites. We've been to a Bosch factory (their robots are SO COOL), the BMW car factory, the Festo exhibition rooms, a winery, and this geothermal energy plant and I still get excited every time. All that was missing was a visit to a gummi bear factory (I'm look at you, Haribo, this is unacceptable!).

Our Gelsenkirchen swag...that's right, Gelsenkirchen has its own merchandise.

Seminar II: Winter Country Casual

January 15, 2012

For our mid-year review we had a half-day retreat at some castle in some town outside of Munich. Dress code? Winter Country Casual. Someone (hint: this girl!) wore a green blazer with brown boots. You could have brought me my horse and called out the foxhounds and I would have been totally prepared!

Seminar II: München

January 14, 2012

After the Ruhrgebiet and Frankfurt, we flew to Bayern to discuss cars, energy, and conservative politics. On our free day in the city, I came across the "Schäfflertanz", a traditional dance of the beer and liquor barrel producers. The tradition has been traced back to the 1700s in Munich, but spread throughout Bavaria in the 1800s. Legend has it that the dance was first performed after a plague epidemic to reassure the public that it was safe again to be out on the streets and bring social life back to normal. Regardless of origin, watching members of a guild related to beer dancing was a fitting start to my week in Munich...

Viktualienmarkt is a permanent market in the middle of the city that has developed in a bit of foodie gathering place. The stalls offer traditional and unique products, and the soup stand there makes a killer bowl of soup! If you're ever in the city on a cold day, I recommend stopping by for a bowl of soup and hearty bread...

Yes, that's right, they have a hunting and fishing museum. You can even buy some souvenirs in their museum gift shop...like little model guns and hunting dog figurines...

Too cool for school.

Cold outside? Come inside for some Kaffee and Kuchen!