Over 4,000 miles away, my dad is celebrating his birthday today by watching my brother graduate from college.  It hurt to miss two events on this one day, but two companies, SGL and BMW, would help take my mind off of it.

I couldn’t bring myself to eat my sausage and cheese sandwich today, not after eating such high-quality wurst yesterday.  Instead, I kept it simple by eating a bowl of cereal before getting on the bus to visit SGL with our group.  SGL is an interesting company; they seem to have the resources and facilities to succeed, but they have lost money each of the past couple years and were actually finalizing the sales of one of their core businesses, steel, when we were there.  Now, they are known as “the carbon company,” and they specialize in making carbon fiber and carbon fiber products.  After the presentation and the tour on which we saw KUKA robots and a long production line, the company was kind enough to provide lunch for us.  I had lasagna, something that I would compare to pasta salad, and perhaps the most carbonated water yet.  Needless to say, the meal was much appreciated and also enjoyed.  SGL may be losing money, but their treatment of guests was incredible.

We left SGL and immediately went to the University, where a representative from BMW came to speak to us about their company.  We learned about BMW’s future in electric and self-driving cars.  Like yesterday at KUKA, I was amazed to find out that such things would be possible in my lifetime.  After the presentation, the four of us in the KUKA group relocated to a room in the same building to meet the other half of our group to work on our presentation.  We did this for awhile before splitting off for dinner.  Two of us felt the desire to get American food, so we went to a restaurant called Capitol.  I ordered a burger unlike anything I expected to eat in Germany.

Cereal, lasagna, and a burger.  This was too much like home today.  Tomorrow I will go back to eating German food.