The eco-friendly light in the bathroom takes seven seconds to turn on. The front door lock needs to click twice before it will open. There’s no grocery shopping on Sunday because all stores are closed. These are the things I learned in week one of starting a new chapter in Osnabrück.

Every time I move, it’s the same thing in a different city. I suppose I should be used to it by now. Each city and apartment has its own quirks and setbacks and it takes me a while to feel like I belong there.

In my first week in Osnabrück, I sat outside our apartment for ten minutes after realizing, with growing frustration and embarrassment, I had no idea how to get the front door unlocked. I eventually gave up and got some exercise in walking around downtown until it was time for my fiance to return from the gym. Sigh. But by the next day, I was a pro at it. Okay, not quite. I still struggle with which way to turn the key every time I go to lock the door, but at least I’m getting in and out of the apartment on my own now. Baby steps.

This is the first time I have lived in a city’s downtown. I grew up in a suburb in Central New York. I’ve lived in an apartment complex down the road from the Reynolds plantation in Winston-Salem. I spent a year in an apartment right off a busy strip mall street in Pittsburgh, then in a shockingly inexpensive apartment tucked in-between McMansions in a nice neighborhood north of Pittsburgh. But I’ve never before lived in a place where I can walk out my door and walk right into a bakery, a restaurant, or a host of niche clothing stores.

It’s pretty in a way I’ve never experienced before. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve found things I’ve loved and admired in every place I’ve lived. But I’ve never seen this before. I walk down cobblestone streets past vendors putting out small orange trees and lavender hoping to entice shoppers inside. At lunch time, people flock to the restaurants in the square to eat out under bright yellow umbrellas in the summer sun. And the ice cream. There are so many ice cream places. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen one on every corner, and each one has dozens of people stopping by for a small cone of Eis or Gelato. I’m tempted to stop at each one I pass (each time I pass too), and have already had my fair share of flavors like tiramisu, blood orange and good old classic vanilla.

Church steeples are like lighthouses for me in the city. I look for the squared off corners and pointed green steeple of St. Katherine’s when I need to head to the REVE supermarket. I have to stop and admire the beauty and power of St. Mary’s Church framing the Marktplatz before I rush into the city library for a speaking German class. Dom St. Peter peeks through the trees for our walk down the tree-lined path along the Hasse River.

Winding away from each of those meeting places of worship are quiet streets with brightly colored buildings, like something out of a fairytale. It’s a sight I’ve seen replicated in the mountain tourist town of Gatlinburg, Tennessee, or in parts of Disney World as visitors approach Cinderella’s castle. But this is authentic, and as I walk around I wonder if the other people I pass on the street are caught off guard by the timbered buildings and scents of fresh-baked goods like I am. I like to hope that this isn’t a feeling that will fade quickly as I get used to living here.

I’m eager to share my favorite places in Osnabrück, but first I have to figure out where they are. Right now, the whole city seems new and different. It would be an injustice to throw up the five top spots tourists should visit if they want to stop by on a train ride from Amsterdam to Berlin. Right now, I still feel like a stranger in the city, so instead I plan on sharing the places I love as I fall in love with them. Maybe, someone reading along will fall in love with their stories too.

Tschüss!