Month of Madness

It is fairly safe to say I have a lot to look forward to during the next four weeks. First, I have two weeks off of school for Spring/Easter holidays. This week in school could also count as part of the break too, due to the majority of the class and all of my friends being in Italy for a weeklong exchange. So we poor students left over have nothing else to do but watch films. But I can get over the fact that I’m not lying on a beach on the Mediterranean because in the second week of break I will be flying with Zoe to the UK, and meeting up with the one and only Mary Kelly Spross! My hardest decision right now would probably have to be choosing between being more excited to go to London or to see my old ma. I think the combination will make for an extraordinary week. We will spend a few days in London, taking in my favorite city and checking out a few possible universities for me, because no possibility should be out of the question! Then we’ll head up for Edinburgh for a night, and finish the trip out again in London. The best part is that this would never have been possible if I wasn’t already on this continent for the year; that’s fate, my friends.

The following week, right after I arrive back in Deutschland, I am set up to do a career study/apprenticeship at the global lens and optics company Carl Zeiss. I am incredibly grateful to receive this opportunity, since I have a spot in the international business/affairs office, it will be a great experience to take with me later in life. Every student in the state of Baden-Württemberg has to take part of this ‘BOGY’ week and apply to a company of his or her interest, and the father of a friend of mine who works there helped me find a spot.

To top it all off, the Sunday after my ‘BOGY’, I will leave with my French class on a train bound to Nîmes, France for a weeklong student exchange. It is only a slight problem that since I’ve been in Germany my German has gotten really good, not my French. If anything, my French has gone terribly downhill. I can promise that it will be humorous, because I am probably more comfortable speaking German at the moment than I am speaking both French and English, and I do not know how many foreign languages my host family will be able to understand, but somehow I believe we will work it all out. Nothing is too out of the question for me anymore. They just might be slightly confused when an American comes into their home trying to speak German. It is guaranteed to be a memorable time, especially considering there’s only very few who get lucky enough to be a double-exchange student/exchange student on exchange/ whatever it would be called.

So, things are turning out pretty well. Das Leben ist schön.

A Short History Lesson

BERLIN, BABY!

I was lucky enough to start off my November in one of the cultural meccas of Europe, the capitol of Germany.

I have to say that I learned a lot more on our trip than I had expected too. Our journey started off with a serious of connecting train rides up to the city. On one hand, it happened to be snowing, which was pretty uncommon for that time of the year, and the scenery was spectacular and something I will hopefully never forget.  There was also a lack of seating on the train, (which actually seems to occur more than often on the Deutsche Bahn system) so we got pretty cozy with our neighbors, and made some interesting conversation. On the other hand, it seemed almost somberly, riding through what was formerly known as The German Democratic Republic, or East Germany.  It was like another country, belonging more in East Europe than West.  I guess that I hadn’t learned much about the Cold War, or even the situation in Germany until this trip. It has been about 23 years since the unification of the German states, but the mark of the GDR is still here, for one example, in the architecture. As soon as we left Bavaria, and started to travel through Thüringen and Sachsen, the buildings started to become more conformed and monotonous.  The same goes to show in Berlin. From the top of the Fernsehturm, the west has a look like any old European city, but the east side stands in stark contrast with white concrete block structures.

What I find to be the most astounding, is that the communistic state of Germany was not in the distant past like almost all history we learn about, but in fact was happening in the time of my parents childhood in America; or to be even more relative, the childhood of all adults in Germany today. I cannot even begin to try to imagine what that life was like.  Everyone here must have a story to tell.

Anyways, we had more than enough time to do all types of touristic things in Berlin, including:

-The Brandenburg Gate

-The Crossing light men, or Ampelmänchen, because in East Berlin they are different than anywhere else in the world.

-The amount of Russian influence in the town, I found that to be pretty cool

-Charlottenberg, where we stayed thanks to relatives of the König family.

-And Mr. Joachim Gauck, the Federal President of Germany, who never receives any credit thanks to Angie Merckel, but he does, in fact, stand in the highest position of the German Government. He is also a great guy, from my understandings.

-Mr. Righter, my 9^th grade history teacher, (and Maddi for reminding me) for teaching us that we are still living in a post-Cold War society.

Berlin had a great vibe, and I enjoyed it a lot more than I though I would, considering I didn’t know too much about the city from the start. Although I am sorry to report that there isn’t much to do on Halloween night up there.

Small Gallery below:

Jewish Memorial

East

West

Iconic

Oktober: Part 1

This month has been quite a busy one, for sure! We started out the month like every one in Germany should, with a visit to Oktoberfest and some sweet Bavarian hospitality!

We had three days off of school in early October, which was the perfect time to make a visit to my personal favorite city in Germany- Munich.

My host mom drove Zoe, her sister Prisca, and I to the city, where we would spend the two nights with their cousin and her husband and son in their apartment. The four of us spent the day mostly at Oktoberfest, and then in the late afternoon we grabbed some food in the English Gardens, the best Biergarten/place to sunbathe right in the center of town.

So I must say, I have never seen with my eyes so much Lederhosen and so many Dirndles. And when I say this, I mean we were literally the ones who looked out of place in our jeans and tee shirts. I’ve never experienced that before, for sure! Nonetheless, the vibes from the people there were great. Everyone was in a good mood, and It was really just a big fair, with massive ‘Beer tents’, or more like warehouses filled with people laughing and chugging pints, and this was all around eleven o’clock in the morning, mind you. On a lower note, there was a guy here or there getting sick, and one man even passed out in the crowd. And I’m sorry to report I didn’t take too crazy with the rest of the Germans or anything like that, not when the families were still visiting, at least. 😉

The next day was just Zoe, Prisca, and I, and we took to the touristic sights. I have to admit I was reminiscing a little of the last time I was there with family. We went through the Viktualienmarkt, old churches, and payed a euro to climb up the steps of the old Rathaus (town hall) to get 360 views of the mountains and cityscape. We spent the rest of the day in the shopping district, which I have to say is pretty impressive. We even got the chance to stop in a department store where the hot item on the shelves was traditional-wear, a.k.a Dirndls. Not being able to pass up such a wonderful opportunity, we stopped to try some on. I admit the dress was comely and comfortable, and I would have happily bought it if it didn’t cost upward of €100!  That evening it started to rain, and as we were waiting for our tram ride back to the flat I saw something that will probably never leave my mind… I just wish I were quick enough to snap a picture. It was right out of a dream–an old man with a protruding waistline and full-out lederhosen matched with a Bavarian cap riding happily on his bicycle in the pitch black and pouring rain, holding an umbrella. It was one of those moments when I wanted to question what my life is, and how the heck did I end up where I am, but I wouldn’t want to change a thing for the world.

On our final day in München we headed to one of the castles in the suburbs to have a look around. We make great use of the public transportation, with the S-Bahn’s and U-Bahn’s here in Europe, but don’t ask me how they work because even in English I can’t read an underground route. We didn’t end up staying too long since it we hadn’t planned on making the day out of it, plus we were lugging around our baggage for the train ride home that night. We were then off to my favorite museum–BMW world! Ever since we were in Germany four years ago, I’ve had a soft spot for BMW’s; they’re definitely my top pick. J It was fun there, I’m still a tad bummed I didn’t get to test drive anything though. We walked across then to the Olympic park, and spent the rest of the day back in the English Gardens watching the surfers and relaxing. I tried some Maroni, or chestnuts since as far as I know there are no chestnut trees in America, so why not? All I can say is that they’re best left of the pretty trees than to be roasted and eaten.

Lost in Translation

I still haven’t figured out if this is a good or bad thing yet, but because of the language barrier, I can never seem to keep up with the conversation, usually resulting in me not knowing what we’re going to do for the day until we are actually doing it.

For example:  Last Friday I went with my host sisters to their diving practice, expecting to swim laps/watch them dive, but I ended up instead joining right in with them as the instructor very politely tried to show me what to do, even though I understood about 5% of what he was actually saying. Fun, no? Well I actually really did enjoy it, and I’m going to join in with my host sisters and practice twice a week. It ended up that Zoe forgot to tell her coach that I was American, and didn’t understand most diving terms until the end of the first practice, so I must’ve seemed pretty slow… whoops!

Also one morning last week, after eating breakfast, my host mom told me to pack a bag, and we were going canoeing for the day with the girl’s swim team. No problem! It ended up being pretty fun, except I felt petty bad that I couldn’t understand any of the directions being given. But we made it, and then we went rock climbing after a few hours on the water, and had an enjoyable picnic in a park, munchin on fresh picked apples off of the trees.

The next day we went into town, shopping around and walking through the fresh foods market set up in the streets weekly, and stopped at an outdoor café for cappachinos/hot coco/tea. It was my picture-perfect European moment, watching the locals walk through the cobblestone streets while we sat relaxing and conversing. It was pretty surreal, thinking of what I would be doing if I were back home. (Which would be just getting up and ready for school, ick!)

Last weekend we hosted a grill-out in our cute little backyard/garden, which if I heard right, my 18 year old host brother completely remade earlier in the summer. It was really fun, and lots of the neighbours came out to eat delicious German potato salad, brats, and loads of bread.  After it got dark out, Zoe and I joined in with the younger kids to play on the trampoline and numerous rounds of Königfrei, or as I understood it, manhunt.

We also had a bonfire, and did something that I found very strange: Instead of roasting marshmallows and making s’mores, we put a sort of pizza-dough on sticks, and roasted them til they tasted like freshly baked pizza dough, mmmm. I’m tellin you, these Germans sure know how to do bread right! (I’ve got to stay really careful around all these delicious foods!)

At the moment I am reading none other than The Magic Tree House series, (for 1st-2nd graders) but auf Deutsch, Das Magische Baumhaus, of course. I find it pretty crazy that I actually read what I’m reading now 10 years ago, but this time in another language. And the reason for such a silly choice in books, is that I can understand it! Probably not the typical choice in reading for someone in High School, though. I just find it crazy, that the same book in English is probably sitting either on my or my sisters bookshelf at home. Weird. Film-wise, every night at 20.15 (8:15 p.m.) there is the prime-time feature on TV, and we’ve been watching an assortment of shows, German produced, and American, with voices dubbed over. My two most memorable include Friendship!, about two Germans from former East Germany travel across America; very humourous; and Lost in Translation with Bill Murray and Scarlett Johannson, which I found incredibly relatable. (As I watched it in German with Japanese and actually didn’t understand much of it at all, so maybe I’m completely off.)

My first official day of German school was Monday, and everything went well! I’m starting a new post now, or more likely after I translate all of my homework…

Oh! Other exciting news: During our fall break over here we will be heading up to Berlin! Woot woot!!