Hello Everyone! I know it has been forever since I have made a post. I apologize for that but things have been really crazy for me the last few weeks and to top things off, my computer crashed and doesn't seem to want to revive itself! Anyway I moved into my new room on Dec. 1st with the help of some of my teachers and a friend of mine. It is really nice and my roommates are very friendly. It now only takes me about 5-10 minutes to get to the city center and I bought a bike which I can ride to school. For those of you wishing to have my new address for the holidays here it is:
Vanessa Plumly
Holtenauerstr. 92
24105 Kiel, Germany
New Telephone Number: 0431-5789879
A recap of the last few weeks...I have been doing a lot of travelling around to christmas markets in the area. I have been to Lübeck's and Husum's and of course Kiel's. For those of you who don't knwo what a christmas market is, you are definitely missing out. There are a bunch of christmas decorated booths set up that sell all sorts of fattening foods from Bratwurst to Crepes to candied nuts and Lebkuchen. There are also booths that sell actual items such as hand stritched scarves and hats or craft items. There is something for everyone. Oh yeah and the most popular part of the Christmas markets is the Glühwein. It is a hot red wine served in the winter months in Germany.
Last weekend, I went to visit Svenni & family in Crailsheim for her and Sören's birthday. They had a huge party with around 40 guests and I got to meet a lot of her family, which was very nice. It was crazy to see her after 6 months, but we just picked up where we left off. Big and little sis. I will get to see her and the family again during christmas break, which is next Friday! WOW! Time flies when you are having fun. I can hardly believe that I have been here almost four months already. On my way back from Svenni's place, I had to switch trains in Nürnberg so I decided to use this opportunity to see the city and its famous christmas market. The city is very medieval and the Christmas market was huge!
This coming weekend all of the assistants in the area are planning a huge christmas feast and on Sunday we are going to do a "Glühwein Tour" of the rest of the x mas markets here in Schleswig-Holstein! I have tons of new pictures, so I will try to add a few at some point.
Friday, December 14, 2007
Friday, November 23, 2007
Thanksgiving
Well, since yesterday was Thanksgiving, I thought it would be appropriate for me to do an entry on the things that I am thankful for:
-the people who read this blog so I know I'm not just doing it for nothing!!
-family who have always stood behind me and believed in me
-my parents who have supported me in everything I have ever done and allowed me to pursue my dreams even if that means at their cost! : )
-my host family with whom I felt at home with from the very start and who have opened their home, lives, and hearts to me
-friends from all over the world who no matter how long it's been since you have seen them things are still the same as they were before, in addition, those who are willing to travel the many miles to visit me here
-the friendliness/kindness of strangers
-this entire opportunity
-everyone who made this opportunity possible- you know who you are- at least I hope
-the willingness of everyone here to help me, to make my time here worth while and to go out of their way for me
-my students who make me smile and who are eager to learn from me
-my college education and my mentors at Bethany, without which I would not have been here or have had the opportunities that I have had
-anyone who has ever helped me out in a time of need, I'm pretty sure that is everyone who is reading this, and I hope that I will have one day be able to return the favor
THANKS!!!!!!!!!
-the people who read this blog so I know I'm not just doing it for nothing!!
-family who have always stood behind me and believed in me
-my parents who have supported me in everything I have ever done and allowed me to pursue my dreams even if that means at their cost! : )
-my host family with whom I felt at home with from the very start and who have opened their home, lives, and hearts to me
-friends from all over the world who no matter how long it's been since you have seen them things are still the same as they were before, in addition, those who are willing to travel the many miles to visit me here
-the friendliness/kindness of strangers
-this entire opportunity
-everyone who made this opportunity possible- you know who you are- at least I hope
-the willingness of everyone here to help me, to make my time here worth while and to go out of their way for me
-my students who make me smile and who are eager to learn from me
-my college education and my mentors at Bethany, without which I would not have been here or have had the opportunities that I have had
-anyone who has ever helped me out in a time of need, I'm pretty sure that is everyone who is reading this, and I hope that I will have one day be able to return the favor
THANKS!!!!!!!!!
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Visit from Home
On Monday, I started aerobics. Let’s just say that everyone knew that I hadn’t been there before. I didn’t know where I was supposed to go and a lot of other things in addition to this, but it is fun. I also found out on Sunday night that my school was having an Orchester concert in the “Schloss” in Kiel. Just a little heads up for those of you who don’t know what a Schloss is. It is a palace or castle, however, one would not recognize the “Schloss” in Kiel as such because it looks nothing like a palace or castle. This is besides the point, but I do find it funny. Anyway the concert was to take place in the concert hall of the “Schloss” and the tickets are originally 10 Euro, but all staff members receive two free tickets and so I invited Dierdre the Canadian assistant in Kiel to come along with me to my student’s concert. It was actually very nice. They started out with classical composers the first half and the second half was modern music from famous films such as Pirates of the Carribean and Harry Potter. All of the students even those not participating were required to go to the concert so I saw a lot of them there.
Tuesday I started my trampoline gymnastics class at the university. It is tons of fun and I get to be around people my age! I have jumped around on a trampoline before and can do flips and such, but I have never learned the actual way you are supposed to do it according to competition and Olympic rules. This is what we do in the class. There are certain ways you have to jump and certain ways to move your arms. This is really interesting to learn and it is a workout at the same time!!
Wednesday…can’t really remember anything special about this day.
Thursday I got lucky and didn’t have school because they had an in-service day. This worked out really well because Dr. Menz (Harald) was in Germany and had planned to come and visit this weekend. He arrived on Thursday on one of the only trains that was driving (most didn’t run because of the strike). I picked him up from the main station and took him to his guesthouse. Then I gave him the grand tour of Kiel. It was really nice to be able to show someone from home around the city that has become my home and will be my home for another 7 months. It’s even better when the person is interested in what your doing. It was funny to see some of the things that struck him as odd about the city that I now find normal after three months, for example the accent and dialect spoken here and the huge cruise ships that come into the harbor. I don’t know if I have said this before, but Kiel is not much of a tourist city. The only things that attract tourists are the beaches in the surrounding area, so there wasn’t a whole lot to show him. We spent the afternoon walking along the harbor, through the old part of the city (this isn’t much), and through one of the parks. We also saw some seals being fed at the aquarium. Then we found a café and spent a lot of time talking about his Namibian/German research and my job here. In the evening we went out for Chinese.
Friday I had school as usual and later I met Harald again. He said that he had to “see the sea” while he was here, so we had planned to take the bus to Schilksee and to walk from there along the coast to Strande. The bus ride itself takes about about an hour from the city so after this we were ready for dinner and he happened to see a Baltic restaurant called “Dubrovnik” –the name of a city in Croatia. We decided to give this a try and it turned out to be a good choice. I had a meal called Satarasch, which is rice with a cooked meat, eggs, and fresh veggies in a spicy sauce. It was delicious. Harald had Cevapcici with rice. After dinner we went out for a drink at Mango’s for his birthday. I won’t say how old he is because he is also reading this blog : )
On the weekend, we traveled to Bremen. On Saturday we left our luggage at the station and then went on a tour of the city. I had been there once before with my friends Kathrin and Miriam, but to be honest I didn’t remember much about how the city looked because we saw it at night. Bremen is a beautiful city with lots of interesting architecture and it is also a harbor city. It was part of the Hanseatic League in the North. After taking pictures and seeing everything, we found a café so that we could unfreeze ourselves…I am not kidding! It was so cold there. We then went to get our bags at the station and checked into our hotel rooms. We decided to make dinner cheap and went to a store at the station (we walked around for about 45 minutes and didn’t find a single supermarket! This puzzled us…) where we bought bread rolls, lunch meat, cheese, nectarines and yogurt.
On Sunday we took the train to Bremerhaven. Harald had wanted to go to the German Emigration Museum. This was also a good choice. It was really interesting and was mainly over the emigration to the U.S. because that is where the largest number of Germans have emigrated. It reminded us of the Holocaust museum in a lot of ways because they had rebuilt ship rooms and such to make it look like it had back in the day. There was an overwhelming amount of information and you could even trace your ancestry at the end if you had the names. After the museum, we walked to the harbor to photograph a large four mast ship. An old woman informed us that you could go on board and look around free of charge, so we did. It turns out the ship belongs to the Russian Navy and there were some quite good looking Sailors on board! Don’t worry, I also looked at the ship J I had never been on such a ship, so this was fun. After the tour of the ship, it was once again time to find a café. I don’t know what it is about when you are looking for something you never find it and when you aren’t, you stumble upon it. So once again we were walking for at least half an hour before we found a café that was open. Keep in mind it is also Sunday, which usually means that most things are closed. After almost giving up we ran into an open café. Later we headed back to Bremen and found a cheap but nice restaurant called Casablanca where we ate dinner (of course along the way we found the supermarket we had been searching for the day before).
On Monday we grabbed breakfast at a Baker and headed back into the old city center of Bremen and walked around the area called “Schnoor.” This means ‘chain’ in Plattdeutsch, the northern German dialect. It is called this because it is a part of the town where all the houses were built on top of each other and they are really small. It was really beautiful. Then we checked out of our rooms and headed back to the station to catch our trains. Harald headed to the Duesseldorf airport to leave for Namibia and I headed back to Kiel on a delayed train. I was really glad that he took the time to come visit me. It was great to be able to share my experience here with him and to find out what’s going on at home. In addition, it was nice to leave Kiel and travel somewhere new. I haven't gotten to do this too much since I have been here so it broke up the monotony.
Tuesday I started my trampoline gymnastics class at the university. It is tons of fun and I get to be around people my age! I have jumped around on a trampoline before and can do flips and such, but I have never learned the actual way you are supposed to do it according to competition and Olympic rules. This is what we do in the class. There are certain ways you have to jump and certain ways to move your arms. This is really interesting to learn and it is a workout at the same time!!
Wednesday…can’t really remember anything special about this day.
Thursday I got lucky and didn’t have school because they had an in-service day. This worked out really well because Dr. Menz (Harald) was in Germany and had planned to come and visit this weekend. He arrived on Thursday on one of the only trains that was driving (most didn’t run because of the strike). I picked him up from the main station and took him to his guesthouse. Then I gave him the grand tour of Kiel. It was really nice to be able to show someone from home around the city that has become my home and will be my home for another 7 months. It’s even better when the person is interested in what your doing. It was funny to see some of the things that struck him as odd about the city that I now find normal after three months, for example the accent and dialect spoken here and the huge cruise ships that come into the harbor. I don’t know if I have said this before, but Kiel is not much of a tourist city. The only things that attract tourists are the beaches in the surrounding area, so there wasn’t a whole lot to show him. We spent the afternoon walking along the harbor, through the old part of the city (this isn’t much), and through one of the parks. We also saw some seals being fed at the aquarium. Then we found a café and spent a lot of time talking about his Namibian/German research and my job here. In the evening we went out for Chinese.
Friday I had school as usual and later I met Harald again. He said that he had to “see the sea” while he was here, so we had planned to take the bus to Schilksee and to walk from there along the coast to Strande. The bus ride itself takes about about an hour from the city so after this we were ready for dinner and he happened to see a Baltic restaurant called “Dubrovnik” –the name of a city in Croatia. We decided to give this a try and it turned out to be a good choice. I had a meal called Satarasch, which is rice with a cooked meat, eggs, and fresh veggies in a spicy sauce. It was delicious. Harald had Cevapcici with rice. After dinner we went out for a drink at Mango’s for his birthday. I won’t say how old he is because he is also reading this blog : )
On the weekend, we traveled to Bremen. On Saturday we left our luggage at the station and then went on a tour of the city. I had been there once before with my friends Kathrin and Miriam, but to be honest I didn’t remember much about how the city looked because we saw it at night. Bremen is a beautiful city with lots of interesting architecture and it is also a harbor city. It was part of the Hanseatic League in the North. After taking pictures and seeing everything, we found a café so that we could unfreeze ourselves…I am not kidding! It was so cold there. We then went to get our bags at the station and checked into our hotel rooms. We decided to make dinner cheap and went to a store at the station (we walked around for about 45 minutes and didn’t find a single supermarket! This puzzled us…) where we bought bread rolls, lunch meat, cheese, nectarines and yogurt.
On Sunday we took the train to Bremerhaven. Harald had wanted to go to the German Emigration Museum. This was also a good choice. It was really interesting and was mainly over the emigration to the U.S. because that is where the largest number of Germans have emigrated. It reminded us of the Holocaust museum in a lot of ways because they had rebuilt ship rooms and such to make it look like it had back in the day. There was an overwhelming amount of information and you could even trace your ancestry at the end if you had the names. After the museum, we walked to the harbor to photograph a large four mast ship. An old woman informed us that you could go on board and look around free of charge, so we did. It turns out the ship belongs to the Russian Navy and there were some quite good looking Sailors on board! Don’t worry, I also looked at the ship J I had never been on such a ship, so this was fun. After the tour of the ship, it was once again time to find a café. I don’t know what it is about when you are looking for something you never find it and when you aren’t, you stumble upon it. So once again we were walking for at least half an hour before we found a café that was open. Keep in mind it is also Sunday, which usually means that most things are closed. After almost giving up we ran into an open café. Later we headed back to Bremen and found a cheap but nice restaurant called Casablanca where we ate dinner (of course along the way we found the supermarket we had been searching for the day before).
On Monday we grabbed breakfast at a Baker and headed back into the old city center of Bremen and walked around the area called “Schnoor.” This means ‘chain’ in Plattdeutsch, the northern German dialect. It is called this because it is a part of the town where all the houses were built on top of each other and they are really small. It was really beautiful. Then we checked out of our rooms and headed back to the station to catch our trains. Harald headed to the Duesseldorf airport to leave for Namibia and I headed back to Kiel on a delayed train. I was really glad that he took the time to come visit me. It was great to be able to share my experience here with him and to find out what’s going on at home. In addition, it was nice to leave Kiel and travel somewhere new. I haven't gotten to do this too much since I have been here so it broke up the monotony.
October 29th-November 11th
Last week, I was invited by the head of English to come with her and her 11th grade class on their trip to Prague. Yeah, the schools here don’t just take trips to the next largest city, they actually go to other countries! I would almost venture to say that the Germans are the most traveled of all people in the world, but the Chinese probably top them. Traveling and vacations are very important to most Germans and many save up specifically for this reason. So anyway to get back to the point, she asked me if I had ever been to Prague and I told her that I hadn’t and she said I could come along if I wanted. Unfortunately, I think I will have to pay 320 Euro (she doesn’t know if they will be able to get a discount for me since they already have 2 chaperones), but I still think it is worth it because this includes our hotel and all activities and maybe even meals. So of course I agreed to go. Everyone who knows me knows that I wouldn’t turn down any offer to travel somewhere.
I was also able to finally find an apartment in Kiel so now I will be moving into the city and be closer to everything. I will be living with two students at the university. I think that they both study Geophysics. I know not necessarily my cup of tea, but they are really nice. The boy is from Belgium and the girl is German so I will still be making use of my German skills, even though I won’t be living with my host family anymore. The room is actually quite large and I don’t know how I am going to fill it or make it look homey, but I will do my best. All of the teachers at my school were kind enough to collect furniture and gather up things like bedding and towels and dishes for me so that I don’t have to waste money buying these. This is an extremely big help. It is always amazing how helpful everyone here is with everything.
I am excited about the move because right now, where my host family lives, I am a half an hour bus ride from the city and about the same from my school. This isn’t that bad in terms of Kiel because the city and its surrounding areas are huge, but it can also be a pain when someone calls you and wants to do something. Thankfully, my host mom usually drives me to school in the mornings so that it only takes about 10-15 minutes instead of 30. It is definitely going to be more convenient for me to live in Kiel, but I will miss my host family a lot. I’ve gotten really attached to them and will be sad to leave, but I already promised them I would be around to visit. Now I’ll actually have to cook for myself and do my own laundry… I did cook Chili this week for my host family. I think it turned out really good and they enjoyed it too. They hadn’t eaten it for a while themselves.
This week, I taught a lesson on Australia, which was pretty funny, since I don’t know that much about it. Who would’ve thought, even I can learn from this whole experience!? It was interesting, what the teacher said after the lesson. She said that different kids participate when I teach the class than when she does. I’m not really sure why this is because she is still in the classroom with me, but I found this to be a good thing. I also taught a lesson on American patriotism. The class that I prepared this lesson for is a 12th grade class and I do an hour of conversation with them. I find this really fun because the students are eager to participate and the class is very well behaved, which is not that easy to come by here. Anyway, I try to come up with creative ways of introducing the subject material and then we discuss it and I ask opinion questions, so that everyone has something to say. For this lesson, I printed out an American flag and hung it up. After everyone was in the classroom, I told them to stand and recite the Pledge of Allegiance and I actually did this. They had all looked at me like I was completely wacko, but it was a good way to get their attention. I explained to them that this is how every day at school started for me and then we continued the lesson from there by discussing this and other patriotic habits of Americans. One thing about the lesson caught me completely off guard. My teacher that I was with asked the class if they had ever seen the German flag being hoisted and no one in the entire class of 20 or so had seen this! I couldn’t believe it because this is something that every American has seen and numerous amounts of times. This just goes to show that nationalism/patriotism and Germany don’t go hand in hand. I personally think it is quite sad that they can’t be proud of their country because of their past. Perhaps this will slowly change over the course of the future, but most Germans are afraid to fly a flag or would find it extremely awkward to sing the national anthem. The only time this was the norm, was when the world cup was here in the summer of ’06. All of this fear of appearing over patriotic because of a past that is over 60 years old, has caused the exact opposite result for the German people. Perhaps I should look at this as a positive thing. I, myself, hate seeing hundreds of flags flying around in the U.S. It seems like every two feet you take you run into one. I think there is a point when plenty becomes too many and the meaning of the flag seems to be lost because it isn’t anything special. I’m not hating on people who fly American flags, to each his own. This is just a personal opinion.
I finally signed up for sports at the university and got a pass for the fitness center there so I can go to aerobic classes. My friend Aenne, who studies English and Spanish for Secondary school invited me to go with her to do aerobics two or three times a week. I am also going to start a trampoline gymnastics course on Tuesday nights, which sounds like fun. The university is really close to where I will be moving and isn’t too far from the school where I teach.
The other teaching assistants and I went to Husum (where my host dad is from, it’s on the North Sea side of Schleswig-Holstein) on Friday night and the whole thing turned out to be quite an adventure. Unfortunately is was dark when we got there so I didn’t get to see much of the city and will have to go back at some point. We had been invited to dinner at one of the British assistant’s places and were planning to leave with the last train around midnight. We ended up missing our train because the line was changed and replaced with a bus and we didn’t know about this until we saw a small sign hanging in the station that notified people of this change. We headed back to Alex’s and had to sleep on the floor for 2 hours and then we came back to catch the bus at 4:00 in the morning. We were the only people on it until the next stop where one other person got on. At the end station we had to catch the train to Kiel and we arrived in Kiel around 6 a.m. I had to wait another half an hour on my bus and was freezing. It is already around 0 degrees C here at night and during the day, so it is cold. Once I got my bus and got home it was already 7 in the morning and my host mom was already awake and working on the computer. She was shocked to see me because I had told her I was staying at Dierdre’s for the night (my original plan, but it was now pointless to do that) and so I had to explain the story to her of how we missed the train which was actually a bus. She just laughed and told me to go to bed.
On Saturday Dierdre had the assistants over for Kraft dinner and a movie (Canadian Bacon, what else?) and on Sunday Ifinally signed my lease for my apartment.
I was also able to finally find an apartment in Kiel so now I will be moving into the city and be closer to everything. I will be living with two students at the university. I think that they both study Geophysics. I know not necessarily my cup of tea, but they are really nice. The boy is from Belgium and the girl is German so I will still be making use of my German skills, even though I won’t be living with my host family anymore. The room is actually quite large and I don’t know how I am going to fill it or make it look homey, but I will do my best. All of the teachers at my school were kind enough to collect furniture and gather up things like bedding and towels and dishes for me so that I don’t have to waste money buying these. This is an extremely big help. It is always amazing how helpful everyone here is with everything.
I am excited about the move because right now, where my host family lives, I am a half an hour bus ride from the city and about the same from my school. This isn’t that bad in terms of Kiel because the city and its surrounding areas are huge, but it can also be a pain when someone calls you and wants to do something. Thankfully, my host mom usually drives me to school in the mornings so that it only takes about 10-15 minutes instead of 30. It is definitely going to be more convenient for me to live in Kiel, but I will miss my host family a lot. I’ve gotten really attached to them and will be sad to leave, but I already promised them I would be around to visit. Now I’ll actually have to cook for myself and do my own laundry… I did cook Chili this week for my host family. I think it turned out really good and they enjoyed it too. They hadn’t eaten it for a while themselves.
This week, I taught a lesson on Australia, which was pretty funny, since I don’t know that much about it. Who would’ve thought, even I can learn from this whole experience!? It was interesting, what the teacher said after the lesson. She said that different kids participate when I teach the class than when she does. I’m not really sure why this is because she is still in the classroom with me, but I found this to be a good thing. I also taught a lesson on American patriotism. The class that I prepared this lesson for is a 12th grade class and I do an hour of conversation with them. I find this really fun because the students are eager to participate and the class is very well behaved, which is not that easy to come by here. Anyway, I try to come up with creative ways of introducing the subject material and then we discuss it and I ask opinion questions, so that everyone has something to say. For this lesson, I printed out an American flag and hung it up. After everyone was in the classroom, I told them to stand and recite the Pledge of Allegiance and I actually did this. They had all looked at me like I was completely wacko, but it was a good way to get their attention. I explained to them that this is how every day at school started for me and then we continued the lesson from there by discussing this and other patriotic habits of Americans. One thing about the lesson caught me completely off guard. My teacher that I was with asked the class if they had ever seen the German flag being hoisted and no one in the entire class of 20 or so had seen this! I couldn’t believe it because this is something that every American has seen and numerous amounts of times. This just goes to show that nationalism/patriotism and Germany don’t go hand in hand. I personally think it is quite sad that they can’t be proud of their country because of their past. Perhaps this will slowly change over the course of the future, but most Germans are afraid to fly a flag or would find it extremely awkward to sing the national anthem. The only time this was the norm, was when the world cup was here in the summer of ’06. All of this fear of appearing over patriotic because of a past that is over 60 years old, has caused the exact opposite result for the German people. Perhaps I should look at this as a positive thing. I, myself, hate seeing hundreds of flags flying around in the U.S. It seems like every two feet you take you run into one. I think there is a point when plenty becomes too many and the meaning of the flag seems to be lost because it isn’t anything special. I’m not hating on people who fly American flags, to each his own. This is just a personal opinion.
I finally signed up for sports at the university and got a pass for the fitness center there so I can go to aerobic classes. My friend Aenne, who studies English and Spanish for Secondary school invited me to go with her to do aerobics two or three times a week. I am also going to start a trampoline gymnastics course on Tuesday nights, which sounds like fun. The university is really close to where I will be moving and isn’t too far from the school where I teach.
The other teaching assistants and I went to Husum (where my host dad is from, it’s on the North Sea side of Schleswig-Holstein) on Friday night and the whole thing turned out to be quite an adventure. Unfortunately is was dark when we got there so I didn’t get to see much of the city and will have to go back at some point. We had been invited to dinner at one of the British assistant’s places and were planning to leave with the last train around midnight. We ended up missing our train because the line was changed and replaced with a bus and we didn’t know about this until we saw a small sign hanging in the station that notified people of this change. We headed back to Alex’s and had to sleep on the floor for 2 hours and then we came back to catch the bus at 4:00 in the morning. We were the only people on it until the next stop where one other person got on. At the end station we had to catch the train to Kiel and we arrived in Kiel around 6 a.m. I had to wait another half an hour on my bus and was freezing. It is already around 0 degrees C here at night and during the day, so it is cold. Once I got my bus and got home it was already 7 in the morning and my host mom was already awake and working on the computer. She was shocked to see me because I had told her I was staying at Dierdre’s for the night (my original plan, but it was now pointless to do that) and so I had to explain the story to her of how we missed the train which was actually a bus. She just laughed and told me to go to bed.
On Saturday Dierdre had the assistants over for Kraft dinner and a movie (Canadian Bacon, what else?) and on Sunday Ifinally signed my lease for my apartment.
Saturday, November 3, 2007
Croatia: A Cultural Learning Experience
I think you will soon understand why I chose to entitle this entry the way I did.
I’m sorry that this entry is so long, but there is so much that I have to write. I promise it will be worth it for you to read it all! Enjoy!
Why Croatia? Most Americans would be taken aback if you told them you spent your fall break in Croatia. They would question the reasoning behind this decision and say “you are in Europe and you chose to go to Croatia instead of flying to London or Paris or Rome! Are you crazy!” The Germans would say, “You went to Croatia and didn’t go to the coast?! What was the point of going?” Well, maybe I am crazy, but not for this reason. (I personally prefer to think of myself as someone who likes to be different, I’m not a big fan of following the crowd, I’ll stick to my path…it’s much better!) I would say to these people that my trip was worth every penny to me and I can’t wait to go back! The people who ask these kinds of questions, don’t see the worth in a cultural trip, a trip of learning about people and meeting people. It is in doing this that one can really experience a country to its fullest. The buildings in a country-made by the people-, the food of a country-also made by the people-, ah yes, and the people of a country, also made by the people! Maybe it is my love of people and interaction with people that made this trip so attractive to me. Perhaps it was also the reunion of friends after two years that also made the trip special. If it hadn’t been for them I may have never had the opportunity to have this unique and individual experience and I am glad that they made it possible. What I saw and experienced in Croatia was much more unforgettable and impressive than any coastline could be. The warmth with which I was welcomed, the generosity of everyone I met and the families of my friends, and simple yet touching moments such as a drawing given to me by a little Croatian girl. These are the things that count in life. These are the moments we remember most of all, they are moments that are shared and spent with other people.
Language: Bok! That means hello in Croatian. This is one of numerous words that I learned while in Croatia. The language is difficult for foreigners to actually learn because there are so many different cases, but it is possible to pick up on phrases, as I learned. I probably learned around 30 or so words and could understand more if I saw them written on the TV screen. In Croatia, TV isn’t synchronized like here in Germany and so all English, Spanish, and German stations are in these languages with subtitles and it is therefore very easy for children to learn languages. One of the boys in a class that I visited with my friend had learned German from watching TV. When I heard him speak I was completely stunned. This is definitely an advantage for these children.
My friends were quite impressed with the Croatian knowledge that I acquired, while there. Whenever I heard a word repeated a lot, I would ask what it meant. Some words are similar to English and some if heard are understood right away. Others have absolutely no connection and are completely foreign. From my observations, Croatians generally speak loudly and if one didn’t know this, one would probably assume that they argue a lot based on the intensity of the language. My host mom here in Germany found it interesting that my friends from Croatia and I conversed in German, although this is not the mother tongue of any of us. Usually there is one native speaker, when one speaks a language, but we have always spoken to each other in German, among us this is considered a third language. Unfortunately with their family’s it wasn’t as simple. My one friend’s family spoke Croatian and German to me and we understood each other through context. My other friend’s family spoke English, German, and Croatian with me. This was a totally interesting situation to be in. I don’t know that I have ever been in a situation, where I was with a person I could not communicate with at all. Even when my friend was gone and I was with her grandma during the day who only speaks Croatian, I still felt that we were able to communicate to each other even though I was speaking German and she was speaking Croatian! Body language conveys a lot of meaning to the receiver.
Country and Landscape: The flight was only an hour and a half from Germany. My friend Sara, one of the two friends from Croatia that I made in Heidelberg, and her father were at the airport to pick me up. I flew to Zagreb, which is the capital of Croatia, but one wouldn’t realize this from the size of the Airport. The only flights that come into this airport are with very small and cheap airline companies. I flew with German wings, because they fly from Hamburg. I would say this is the smallest airport I have ever been too but nothing tops the airport that Maike and I flew to in Venice to visit Andrea. I think there were only 2-4 gates there. Zagreb had 20. My first impression of Croatia was a bit blurred because I hadn’t seen my friend for 2 years and we spent the car ride catching up with each other, but I did manage to take in some of the scenery on our way to Varaždin. The countryside is absolutely beautiful and we drove through the mountains. Baroque churches and block houses adorn the countryside. The leaves on the trees were just starting to change and this added to the beauty. I recognized right away that Croatia is a country of farming and living off the land. Lots of corn and cabbage and vineyards were to be seen en route to Varaždin. This added to the patchwork quilt of fall colors of the land and made it even more attractive to me. Right outside of the city that my friends live in, many people gather their crops and sell them in front of their houses on the main road.
Food: Food is very important in Croatia. One of the most important things is that a guest be offered food so that they are not hungry. I of course never even had the chance to be hungry. Instead, I thought I might explode from eating too much. I was constantly offered some sort of food, cake, cookie, or chocolate or candy. Typical deserts are a type of cream puff, lots of pastries, and layered cakes. I’m not complaining; it was all absolutely delicious! I gained four pounds while being in Croatia!! Crazy, I know! Lunch. Lunch in Croatia is not at all like lunch in the U.S. It is more like dinner and then some. First a soup is served with bread. Usually this is a type of noodle soup or dumpling soup and then there is a large main course also served with a salad of some sort and then usually a desert. The first meal I had in Croatia, was typical of the northern region. We had some sort of fried dough served with baked chicken. Other traditional meals that I had while in Croatia were Sarma, this is a meat filled cabbage with broth that is served with mashed potatoes, all types of schnitzel, all sorts of potatoes, and eggs, scrambled and fried. Sara and I often went to a café called Sax. This is one of her favorite cafés and she goes there usually once a day for cappuccino. We were there approximately 10 times in 12 days while I was there. It has a nice atmosphere and of course the coffee is good. She knows all of the people who work there and most of the people who go there. Sometimes she even gets free drinks because she goes there so often.
School: Both of my Croatian friends studied Elementary Education with a concentration in German. They were the best in their class which is why they got to go to Germany. There are not as many exchange opportunities in Croatia to go abroad, which makes me appreciate the quality of study at Bethany and in the U.S. in general. This, however, does not mean that the quality of education in Croatia is lacking. Standards are very high for those wishing to attend a University and requirements must be met for every area of study. I had the opportunity to go to school with my friends and introduce myself to their students. I went to five schools total. My one friend, Sara, works at three different schools (the schools that she works at are mainly in the countryside and therefore do not have enough students to require a full time position for a German teacher), the other friend, Goga, has a constant position, and the fifth school was the school of a friend of their that I also went one day with. This was not only a very educational experience but also a very rewarding experience for both me and the students at these schools. The faculty and staff of all the schools welcomed me warmheartedly and attempted to speak what little bit of German or English that they could muster after long years of not speaking either. I wish I could have taken a picture of every child’s face as I told them that I was from America. They asked more than once if I really was from the U.S. Their jaws hit the floor and then as most children and younger students are, they became shy and chattered amongst each other. Their eyes, however, never strayed from me and if they did, they were likely to look back within a few seconds. I felt like the main attraction at a zoo, but it was adorable the way the children acted. I believe one of the teachers I met used the expression “you are something exotic to them. They don’t realize Americans are just normal people like us. To them you are something out of a TV.” Of course this is the truth for most Croatian children. America is and will probably remain to most of its inhabitants a foreign land that is unreachable. I am probably the closest interaction most of them will ever have in their lives with America. The older students were very shy when it came to asking questions. The most frequently asked questions were are you married and do you have kids! I had to laugh at these. But I also understand why they chose to ask these questions.
Family: Family and children are the most important things in Croatian culture. Dinner or our so-called lunch is held at home and the whole family is usually there to sit down and eat together. In the U.S. this hardly happens. I respect this from the Croatian culture. Although they don’t work tons of hours during the week like Americans and therefore don’t make as much money, it is a sacrifice they are willing to make in order to spend time with one another. Material possessions and money carry less worth than family and time together. It makes me question the American way of living. You work yourself to death trying to give your children everything you can yet you don’t have as much time with your family. Luckily for me, this wasn’t the case, but for many others it is. Sylvia, one of the teachers, at a school I went to explained to me why not very many Croatians move abroad, work abroad, or study abroad. They would simply become homesick she said.
Hosts. The Croatians from what I gathered while there are proud to be hosts and as hosts want to make sure that their guests are always satisfied. It’s not rude to leave food on your plate if you don’t like it or can’t eat it all. Tee, coffee, juice, and water are always offered. Even when I went to the schools, I was asked if I liked the school, if I felt comfortable, and was also offered food and drinks without cost. Throughout my stay, Sara bought me all different types of specialty chocolates and cookies for me to try. At the end of my stay, Goga and her family had gave me a bag full of gifts. I had not expected this at all. It was a complete surprise. Her grandmother hand stitches and she had made me a pillow case with an angel on it. I also received a small angel figurine from her mother. There was also a sort of hanging plaque made of wood with a print of the castle of Varazdin and an angel on it. These were not the only gifts. In addition, I received earrings and a t-shirt from Goga’s sister, a large box of specialty chocolates, and Kiki’s (a type of bon-bon similar to starburst) from Goga. The reason for the gifts involving angels is that they are a symbol of the city of Varazdin. This is because it is a baroque city.
Tradition. Sara dances in a Folk dance group in Varazdin. There is more than one in the city and there are many of these in the country. Each region has specific traditional clothing, music, songs and dances and the groups meet to practice these. They have numerous people ranging in age who play the traditional instruments, one example is the mandolin. The groups travel and perform all over Europe and don’t have to pay to do this because they make money from the performances and sell items pertaining to Croatia. The costumes they were are hand made and very intricate and they perform a variety of dances from regions all over Croatia, not just theirs. I got to attend their practices and tape a few clips there. And just by chance, Sara’s group happened to have a performance in the Varazdin Theater while I was there! We snuck in the back without paying and watched the first two performances. Her group was second and I taped the performance. They did an amazing job and the emotion that they put into this made the whole experience very powerful. I haven’t ever seen anything like it.
Nationalism & Pride. Croatians are very proud of their country. They support Croatian companies and products and take pride in this. My friends told me that the remnants of war are still present in southern parts of the country. Luckily, I was in the North and didn’t have to experience seeing that. For those reading this who don’t know much of the history of Croatia, it was formerly Yugoslavia and was split in the 90’s basically because of differences in language and ethnicity. I’m not sure it would have been something I would have wanted to see. The Croats are very hostile when it comes to Bosnia and Serbia and have all the reason to be so since their land was destroyed and their people killed by the Serbs. They told me that they would never travel through these countries and that they would rather drive a longer distance to get somewhere.
I hope you enjoyed my entry on Croatia and were able to learn something from it!
I’m sorry that this entry is so long, but there is so much that I have to write. I promise it will be worth it for you to read it all! Enjoy!
Why Croatia? Most Americans would be taken aback if you told them you spent your fall break in Croatia. They would question the reasoning behind this decision and say “you are in Europe and you chose to go to Croatia instead of flying to London or Paris or Rome! Are you crazy!” The Germans would say, “You went to Croatia and didn’t go to the coast?! What was the point of going?” Well, maybe I am crazy, but not for this reason. (I personally prefer to think of myself as someone who likes to be different, I’m not a big fan of following the crowd, I’ll stick to my path…it’s much better!) I would say to these people that my trip was worth every penny to me and I can’t wait to go back! The people who ask these kinds of questions, don’t see the worth in a cultural trip, a trip of learning about people and meeting people. It is in doing this that one can really experience a country to its fullest. The buildings in a country-made by the people-, the food of a country-also made by the people-, ah yes, and the people of a country, also made by the people! Maybe it is my love of people and interaction with people that made this trip so attractive to me. Perhaps it was also the reunion of friends after two years that also made the trip special. If it hadn’t been for them I may have never had the opportunity to have this unique and individual experience and I am glad that they made it possible. What I saw and experienced in Croatia was much more unforgettable and impressive than any coastline could be. The warmth with which I was welcomed, the generosity of everyone I met and the families of my friends, and simple yet touching moments such as a drawing given to me by a little Croatian girl. These are the things that count in life. These are the moments we remember most of all, they are moments that are shared and spent with other people.
Language: Bok! That means hello in Croatian. This is one of numerous words that I learned while in Croatia. The language is difficult for foreigners to actually learn because there are so many different cases, but it is possible to pick up on phrases, as I learned. I probably learned around 30 or so words and could understand more if I saw them written on the TV screen. In Croatia, TV isn’t synchronized like here in Germany and so all English, Spanish, and German stations are in these languages with subtitles and it is therefore very easy for children to learn languages. One of the boys in a class that I visited with my friend had learned German from watching TV. When I heard him speak I was completely stunned. This is definitely an advantage for these children.
My friends were quite impressed with the Croatian knowledge that I acquired, while there. Whenever I heard a word repeated a lot, I would ask what it meant. Some words are similar to English and some if heard are understood right away. Others have absolutely no connection and are completely foreign. From my observations, Croatians generally speak loudly and if one didn’t know this, one would probably assume that they argue a lot based on the intensity of the language. My host mom here in Germany found it interesting that my friends from Croatia and I conversed in German, although this is not the mother tongue of any of us. Usually there is one native speaker, when one speaks a language, but we have always spoken to each other in German, among us this is considered a third language. Unfortunately with their family’s it wasn’t as simple. My one friend’s family spoke Croatian and German to me and we understood each other through context. My other friend’s family spoke English, German, and Croatian with me. This was a totally interesting situation to be in. I don’t know that I have ever been in a situation, where I was with a person I could not communicate with at all. Even when my friend was gone and I was with her grandma during the day who only speaks Croatian, I still felt that we were able to communicate to each other even though I was speaking German and she was speaking Croatian! Body language conveys a lot of meaning to the receiver.
Country and Landscape: The flight was only an hour and a half from Germany. My friend Sara, one of the two friends from Croatia that I made in Heidelberg, and her father were at the airport to pick me up. I flew to Zagreb, which is the capital of Croatia, but one wouldn’t realize this from the size of the Airport. The only flights that come into this airport are with very small and cheap airline companies. I flew with German wings, because they fly from Hamburg. I would say this is the smallest airport I have ever been too but nothing tops the airport that Maike and I flew to in Venice to visit Andrea. I think there were only 2-4 gates there. Zagreb had 20. My first impression of Croatia was a bit blurred because I hadn’t seen my friend for 2 years and we spent the car ride catching up with each other, but I did manage to take in some of the scenery on our way to Varaždin. The countryside is absolutely beautiful and we drove through the mountains. Baroque churches and block houses adorn the countryside. The leaves on the trees were just starting to change and this added to the beauty. I recognized right away that Croatia is a country of farming and living off the land. Lots of corn and cabbage and vineyards were to be seen en route to Varaždin. This added to the patchwork quilt of fall colors of the land and made it even more attractive to me. Right outside of the city that my friends live in, many people gather their crops and sell them in front of their houses on the main road.
Food: Food is very important in Croatia. One of the most important things is that a guest be offered food so that they are not hungry. I of course never even had the chance to be hungry. Instead, I thought I might explode from eating too much. I was constantly offered some sort of food, cake, cookie, or chocolate or candy. Typical deserts are a type of cream puff, lots of pastries, and layered cakes. I’m not complaining; it was all absolutely delicious! I gained four pounds while being in Croatia!! Crazy, I know! Lunch. Lunch in Croatia is not at all like lunch in the U.S. It is more like dinner and then some. First a soup is served with bread. Usually this is a type of noodle soup or dumpling soup and then there is a large main course also served with a salad of some sort and then usually a desert. The first meal I had in Croatia, was typical of the northern region. We had some sort of fried dough served with baked chicken. Other traditional meals that I had while in Croatia were Sarma, this is a meat filled cabbage with broth that is served with mashed potatoes, all types of schnitzel, all sorts of potatoes, and eggs, scrambled and fried. Sara and I often went to a café called Sax. This is one of her favorite cafés and she goes there usually once a day for cappuccino. We were there approximately 10 times in 12 days while I was there. It has a nice atmosphere and of course the coffee is good. She knows all of the people who work there and most of the people who go there. Sometimes she even gets free drinks because she goes there so often.
School: Both of my Croatian friends studied Elementary Education with a concentration in German. They were the best in their class which is why they got to go to Germany. There are not as many exchange opportunities in Croatia to go abroad, which makes me appreciate the quality of study at Bethany and in the U.S. in general. This, however, does not mean that the quality of education in Croatia is lacking. Standards are very high for those wishing to attend a University and requirements must be met for every area of study. I had the opportunity to go to school with my friends and introduce myself to their students. I went to five schools total. My one friend, Sara, works at three different schools (the schools that she works at are mainly in the countryside and therefore do not have enough students to require a full time position for a German teacher), the other friend, Goga, has a constant position, and the fifth school was the school of a friend of their that I also went one day with. This was not only a very educational experience but also a very rewarding experience for both me and the students at these schools. The faculty and staff of all the schools welcomed me warmheartedly and attempted to speak what little bit of German or English that they could muster after long years of not speaking either. I wish I could have taken a picture of every child’s face as I told them that I was from America. They asked more than once if I really was from the U.S. Their jaws hit the floor and then as most children and younger students are, they became shy and chattered amongst each other. Their eyes, however, never strayed from me and if they did, they were likely to look back within a few seconds. I felt like the main attraction at a zoo, but it was adorable the way the children acted. I believe one of the teachers I met used the expression “you are something exotic to them. They don’t realize Americans are just normal people like us. To them you are something out of a TV.” Of course this is the truth for most Croatian children. America is and will probably remain to most of its inhabitants a foreign land that is unreachable. I am probably the closest interaction most of them will ever have in their lives with America. The older students were very shy when it came to asking questions. The most frequently asked questions were are you married and do you have kids! I had to laugh at these. But I also understand why they chose to ask these questions.
Family: Family and children are the most important things in Croatian culture. Dinner or our so-called lunch is held at home and the whole family is usually there to sit down and eat together. In the U.S. this hardly happens. I respect this from the Croatian culture. Although they don’t work tons of hours during the week like Americans and therefore don’t make as much money, it is a sacrifice they are willing to make in order to spend time with one another. Material possessions and money carry less worth than family and time together. It makes me question the American way of living. You work yourself to death trying to give your children everything you can yet you don’t have as much time with your family. Luckily for me, this wasn’t the case, but for many others it is. Sylvia, one of the teachers, at a school I went to explained to me why not very many Croatians move abroad, work abroad, or study abroad. They would simply become homesick she said.
Hosts. The Croatians from what I gathered while there are proud to be hosts and as hosts want to make sure that their guests are always satisfied. It’s not rude to leave food on your plate if you don’t like it or can’t eat it all. Tee, coffee, juice, and water are always offered. Even when I went to the schools, I was asked if I liked the school, if I felt comfortable, and was also offered food and drinks without cost. Throughout my stay, Sara bought me all different types of specialty chocolates and cookies for me to try. At the end of my stay, Goga and her family had gave me a bag full of gifts. I had not expected this at all. It was a complete surprise. Her grandmother hand stitches and she had made me a pillow case with an angel on it. I also received a small angel figurine from her mother. There was also a sort of hanging plaque made of wood with a print of the castle of Varazdin and an angel on it. These were not the only gifts. In addition, I received earrings and a t-shirt from Goga’s sister, a large box of specialty chocolates, and Kiki’s (a type of bon-bon similar to starburst) from Goga. The reason for the gifts involving angels is that they are a symbol of the city of Varazdin. This is because it is a baroque city.
Tradition. Sara dances in a Folk dance group in Varazdin. There is more than one in the city and there are many of these in the country. Each region has specific traditional clothing, music, songs and dances and the groups meet to practice these. They have numerous people ranging in age who play the traditional instruments, one example is the mandolin. The groups travel and perform all over Europe and don’t have to pay to do this because they make money from the performances and sell items pertaining to Croatia. The costumes they were are hand made and very intricate and they perform a variety of dances from regions all over Croatia, not just theirs. I got to attend their practices and tape a few clips there. And just by chance, Sara’s group happened to have a performance in the Varazdin Theater while I was there! We snuck in the back without paying and watched the first two performances. Her group was second and I taped the performance. They did an amazing job and the emotion that they put into this made the whole experience very powerful. I haven’t ever seen anything like it.
Nationalism & Pride. Croatians are very proud of their country. They support Croatian companies and products and take pride in this. My friends told me that the remnants of war are still present in southern parts of the country. Luckily, I was in the North and didn’t have to experience seeing that. For those reading this who don’t know much of the history of Croatia, it was formerly Yugoslavia and was split in the 90’s basically because of differences in language and ethnicity. I’m not sure it would have been something I would have wanted to see. The Croats are very hostile when it comes to Bosnia and Serbia and have all the reason to be so since their land was destroyed and their people killed by the Serbs. They told me that they would never travel through these countries and that they would rather drive a longer distance to get somewhere.
I hope you enjoyed my entry on Croatia and were able to learn something from it!
Monday, October 29, 2007
Finally!
For the week of Oct. 7-15.
I know I haven’t written in a while and I apologize. I haven’t had the chance until now. The last three weeks have been crazy. I will give you a brief overview (ok as brief as possible) of three weeks ago and then my next entry will be about my two weeks that I just spent in Croatia. Pretend like you are reading this 3 weeks ago!
My week started out with making pumpkin pies on Monday. As you know I have Mondays free and I had my family send me pumpkin pie mix from home so that I could make them for my host family. The pie mix made two pies and I ended up taking the 2nd one with me to school on Tuesday. My first dilemma was in making the crust. I had to substitute a baking butter for Crisco, which I thought would cause the pies to burn, but it ended up working out really well. The pie was absolutely delicious and my host family thought so too. They couldn’t come up with a taste that resembled pumpkin. I told them it is a taste of its own. They hadn’t ever had it either. All of my colleagues seemed to like the pie too. They hadn’t ever had it either. One of my teachers bragged to her class about how good it was. I wasn’t at school the whole day on Tuesday because I went on a field trip with Mr. Meyer, but they said as soon as I left, the pie was cut and vanished. Everyone complimented me on Wednesday and I was glad that they enjoyed the taste of an American specialty. Pumpkin is not really very popular in Europe. I think it is probably just an American and Canadian thing. I enjoy exchanging American culture with my German colleagues and it is nice that we can both learn something new at the same time.
On Wednesday, I was once again traveling around with Mr. Meyer. Our students were doing internships at different businesses in Kiel (this is a requirement for school and they do this for 2 weeks) and so we had to visit four of them to make sure things were going well and to thank the companies/businesses for allowing the students to be there. This was very interesting for me since we have nothing like this in the U.S. The students are allowed to choose where they do the internship and the company or business has to agree. We went to 2 Kindergartens (here they are like preschools), a company that sells apartments, and then the most interesting of all, the Canal Island. The Canal Island is exactly that, an island that lies in the middle of the North-Baltic Sea Canal. Only people with special permission or people who pay to take a tour are allowed on the island besides the people who work there. Our student took us as VIPs into the museum and showed us the development and a model of the canal.
On Thursday I was invited to go with a 12th grade German class to the Thalia Theater in Hamburg to see Maria Stuart by Schiller. Of course I agreed to go. We left around 5 in the evening and returned at midnight. The drama was modernized, which I am not a huge fan of and was performed on a rotating stage. Nonetheless, it was interesting to see and the theater itself was impressive. This was a very nice evening and I must admit that the students were very well-behaved.
On Friday morning, the first two hours I was to have my very first self-prepared classes as a teaching assistant. I was allowed to choose the topic and went with Stereotypes for the first hour and American school for the second. I think both were very successful. My 8th graders had never heard of the word ‘stereotype’ so my lesson was very productive and they managed to learn exactly what I had wanted them to. I had them perform “freeze frames” (acting out a scenario without movement) filling in the blank of “All Americans ” It was interesting to see what the students came up with and how the others interpreted what they were acting out. One group chose to complete the sentence with “All Americans drive big cars” and one student interpreted it as “All Americans have Chauffeurs!” I found this hysterical and so did the actual teacher of the class. Another funny one was “All Americans have guns” and a student interpreted it as “All Americans are criminals.” This almost brought me to tears from laughter! I asked the kids if they thought I was a criminal and they all laughed. I told them it wouldn’t be possible for me to be here if that were the case!! We then discussed whether or not stereotypes are good or bad and where they come from. Keep in mind this is 8th grade and we did this all in English. Yeah, German schools are way more advanced in foreign languages than the U.S. We are lucky if we start a language in the 8th grade. Anyway I could rant for hours about that.
I think the kids also enjoyed the second lesson I taught. I brought in two yearbooks, one from my high school and one from Bethany and let the students look at them. They soon started playing a game of who could find the most pictures of me! I couldn’t help but laugh. My teacher said, “I didn’t know you were a cheerleader.” and then I had to go on the defensive end of “cheerleading as a sport” and the stereotypes of jocks and cheerleaders. I like to think of myself as breaking down stereotypes : )This was a good connection to my first lesson. After they looked at my yearbooks, we discussed some of the differences in American schools and German schools and things such as sports, clubs, prom, and homecoming.
On Friday, I had a short day and was allowed to leave early to pick up my friend Helen, who I lived with at the Fulbright Orientation. She teaches in Satrup, a village of 300 or so people and traveled to Kiel by bus, a 3 hour ride because the trains were striking AGAIN. She stayed until Sunday and I gave her the grand tour of Kiel. I took her to Laboe and to Schilksee where the ’72 water Olympics were held. Friday night we met the teaching assistant crew for Chinese…mmm.
On Saturday Helen and I were invited to Canadian Thanksgiving dinner (FYI held in October) hosted by my friend Dierdre from Nova Scotia. Dierdre is very sarcastic and likes to make fun of the U.S. She claims that Canadian Thanksgiving was first and that Americans copied and made their own date. Does anyone know the reality behind this? I don’t. Anyway there were around 20 people there. Twelve of us were teaching assistants and Helen and I were the only Americans. The rest were from Canada, Great Britain, Scotland and Ireland, quite a crowd if I may say so. We all prepared dinner together in D’s apartment. We had an assembly line going. People were peeling carrots and potatoes, while others were making pie, and a few people were cooking. Of course the girl from Ireland ended up eating the rest of the potatoes. I guess some stereotypes you just can’t avoid!! She was also juggling gourds if this tells you anything about my friends here.
On Sunday we went walking on the beach with my host mom and grandma. Oh yeah and I forgot to mention that we took a bus tour of the countryside by accident. Apparently there are two buses with the same exact number that stop at my bus stop and they go to two different places. We wanted to take the one to Schilksee but ended up in the middle of nowhere in the countryside. We knew we made a mistake when it was the last bus stop and we were the only people left on the bus. We got a good laugh out of this and I asked the bus driver about how to get where we wanted to go. He didn’t even have a clue! We rode the bus back to my stop and 2 minutes later we were sitting in the same number bus but arrived at the destination we originally wanted…yeah sometimes the bus system in Germany can be complicated...I still don’t understand what happened there!
I know I haven’t written in a while and I apologize. I haven’t had the chance until now. The last three weeks have been crazy. I will give you a brief overview (ok as brief as possible) of three weeks ago and then my next entry will be about my two weeks that I just spent in Croatia. Pretend like you are reading this 3 weeks ago!
My week started out with making pumpkin pies on Monday. As you know I have Mondays free and I had my family send me pumpkin pie mix from home so that I could make them for my host family. The pie mix made two pies and I ended up taking the 2nd one with me to school on Tuesday. My first dilemma was in making the crust. I had to substitute a baking butter for Crisco, which I thought would cause the pies to burn, but it ended up working out really well. The pie was absolutely delicious and my host family thought so too. They couldn’t come up with a taste that resembled pumpkin. I told them it is a taste of its own. They hadn’t ever had it either. All of my colleagues seemed to like the pie too. They hadn’t ever had it either. One of my teachers bragged to her class about how good it was. I wasn’t at school the whole day on Tuesday because I went on a field trip with Mr. Meyer, but they said as soon as I left, the pie was cut and vanished. Everyone complimented me on Wednesday and I was glad that they enjoyed the taste of an American specialty. Pumpkin is not really very popular in Europe. I think it is probably just an American and Canadian thing. I enjoy exchanging American culture with my German colleagues and it is nice that we can both learn something new at the same time.
On Wednesday, I was once again traveling around with Mr. Meyer. Our students were doing internships at different businesses in Kiel (this is a requirement for school and they do this for 2 weeks) and so we had to visit four of them to make sure things were going well and to thank the companies/businesses for allowing the students to be there. This was very interesting for me since we have nothing like this in the U.S. The students are allowed to choose where they do the internship and the company or business has to agree. We went to 2 Kindergartens (here they are like preschools), a company that sells apartments, and then the most interesting of all, the Canal Island. The Canal Island is exactly that, an island that lies in the middle of the North-Baltic Sea Canal. Only people with special permission or people who pay to take a tour are allowed on the island besides the people who work there. Our student took us as VIPs into the museum and showed us the development and a model of the canal.
On Thursday I was invited to go with a 12th grade German class to the Thalia Theater in Hamburg to see Maria Stuart by Schiller. Of course I agreed to go. We left around 5 in the evening and returned at midnight. The drama was modernized, which I am not a huge fan of and was performed on a rotating stage. Nonetheless, it was interesting to see and the theater itself was impressive. This was a very nice evening and I must admit that the students were very well-behaved.
On Friday morning, the first two hours I was to have my very first self-prepared classes as a teaching assistant. I was allowed to choose the topic and went with Stereotypes for the first hour and American school for the second. I think both were very successful. My 8th graders had never heard of the word ‘stereotype’ so my lesson was very productive and they managed to learn exactly what I had wanted them to. I had them perform “freeze frames” (acting out a scenario without movement) filling in the blank of “All Americans ” It was interesting to see what the students came up with and how the others interpreted what they were acting out. One group chose to complete the sentence with “All Americans drive big cars” and one student interpreted it as “All Americans have Chauffeurs!” I found this hysterical and so did the actual teacher of the class. Another funny one was “All Americans have guns” and a student interpreted it as “All Americans are criminals.” This almost brought me to tears from laughter! I asked the kids if they thought I was a criminal and they all laughed. I told them it wouldn’t be possible for me to be here if that were the case!! We then discussed whether or not stereotypes are good or bad and where they come from. Keep in mind this is 8th grade and we did this all in English. Yeah, German schools are way more advanced in foreign languages than the U.S. We are lucky if we start a language in the 8th grade. Anyway I could rant for hours about that.
I think the kids also enjoyed the second lesson I taught. I brought in two yearbooks, one from my high school and one from Bethany and let the students look at them. They soon started playing a game of who could find the most pictures of me! I couldn’t help but laugh. My teacher said, “I didn’t know you were a cheerleader.” and then I had to go on the defensive end of “cheerleading as a sport” and the stereotypes of jocks and cheerleaders. I like to think of myself as breaking down stereotypes : )This was a good connection to my first lesson. After they looked at my yearbooks, we discussed some of the differences in American schools and German schools and things such as sports, clubs, prom, and homecoming.
On Friday, I had a short day and was allowed to leave early to pick up my friend Helen, who I lived with at the Fulbright Orientation. She teaches in Satrup, a village of 300 or so people and traveled to Kiel by bus, a 3 hour ride because the trains were striking AGAIN. She stayed until Sunday and I gave her the grand tour of Kiel. I took her to Laboe and to Schilksee where the ’72 water Olympics were held. Friday night we met the teaching assistant crew for Chinese…mmm.
On Saturday Helen and I were invited to Canadian Thanksgiving dinner (FYI held in October) hosted by my friend Dierdre from Nova Scotia. Dierdre is very sarcastic and likes to make fun of the U.S. She claims that Canadian Thanksgiving was first and that Americans copied and made their own date. Does anyone know the reality behind this? I don’t. Anyway there were around 20 people there. Twelve of us were teaching assistants and Helen and I were the only Americans. The rest were from Canada, Great Britain, Scotland and Ireland, quite a crowd if I may say so. We all prepared dinner together in D’s apartment. We had an assembly line going. People were peeling carrots and potatoes, while others were making pie, and a few people were cooking. Of course the girl from Ireland ended up eating the rest of the potatoes. I guess some stereotypes you just can’t avoid!! She was also juggling gourds if this tells you anything about my friends here.
On Sunday we went walking on the beach with my host mom and grandma. Oh yeah and I forgot to mention that we took a bus tour of the countryside by accident. Apparently there are two buses with the same exact number that stop at my bus stop and they go to two different places. We wanted to take the one to Schilksee but ended up in the middle of nowhere in the countryside. We knew we made a mistake when it was the last bus stop and we were the only people left on the bus. We got a good laugh out of this and I asked the bus driver about how to get where we wanted to go. He didn’t even have a clue! We rode the bus back to my stop and 2 minutes later we were sitting in the same number bus but arrived at the destination we originally wanted…yeah sometimes the bus system in Germany can be complicated...I still don’t understand what happened there!
Saturday, October 6, 2007
Fun Fact
So they took a picture of us at the consulate and I wasn't sure what it was for. Check it out if you want. Thought it was kind of cool.
http://hamburg.usconsulate.gov/
http://hamburg.usconsulate.gov/hamburg/meetus2008.html
http://hamburg.usconsulate.gov/
http://hamburg.usconsulate.gov/hamburg/meetus2008.html
Wednesday, October 3, 2007
Tag der deutschen Einheit!
Hello Everyone! Sorry I haven't written in a while! I thought since today is a holiday in Germany and I have the day off I would write what has been happening the past week or so. FYI the holiday today is German Unification day, so the day East and West were formally reunited into one country. This will be pretty long...so here goes.
As you all probably have seen in the news, the Euro hit an all time high this past month. It is trading at approximately 1.42 to the dollar, which is bad news for me since I have yet to get my paycheck...but will be good once I get paid!
Last week I actually got to take over a few of my classes and pretty much teach on my own. I was really nervous, but it was fun and my teachers seemed impressed with the way it went! I was excited to hear that. Slowly I am being integrated into the classroom and the students are getting used to seeing me around. The topic in 13th grade right now is the 2nd Amendment, the right to bear arms, the death penalty, and violence in the U.S. Sometimes I start to think that the only thing the students learn about the U.S. are the worst things. But looking at reality, there are a lot of things that need to be changed in the U.S. The students of course think that the 2nd Amendment is out of date and were shocked to learn that it comes after the rights of an individual. They couldn't believe that something like that would be seen as so important. They believe that the right to have a weapon is a vicious circle. I myself agree, however, many Americans feel that this is the only way they will be safe. In Germany guns are illegal for citizens to possess and the crime rate is MUCH lower than in the U.S.
On the weekend I was invited out to dinner with the head of our English dept. at the school, with whom I work very closely. First we met at her place and watched the Hamburg Soccer team play to victory (she is a huge soccer fan and they have a basement set up like a movie theater with a projector and big screen!!!) Then we went out to El Greco, a very nice Greek restaurant, where we met up with her sister, who really wanted to meet me and two of her friends. They are all in their thirties, but are a lot of fun. After dinner we went to a student bar called "Trotzdem." This was a very nice evening.
On Sunday, my hostmom, grandma and I went into the city to the Pottery market. This is once a year and there were so many amazing pottery pieces! If I had had a million dollars, I would have bought it all!
Monday, I went to Hamburg to the U.S. Consulate to meet with the director of the program "Meet US," in which I will be taking part. It is the outreach program for schools who do not have teaching assistants and want to have Americans come to speak to their students. I will be paid to do this and I think it will be a lot of fun. When I first got to the consulate, I felt like I was entering a prison with all the police and gates, but once I got inside it was much better. The director of the program gave us a tour of the building and told us that the 1st consulate general in Hamburg was a man from Scotland. I thought this was an interesting fact. There were 7 of us total who arrived for the meeting. Three of us are Fulbright teaching assistants and the other 4 are exchange students at high schools in the area.
Today, since we have the day off, my host mom, grandma and I went to Schilksee to walk around. The olympic games were held there in 1972. Sailing and such took place there. It is a beautiful day here so it was perfect for walking along the coast. A lot of fisherman were out today, my host dad included!
I'm starting to get used to Kiel and am better at finding my way around. I wanted to share some of the things that make Kiel and the surrounding area special or things that I now associate with it:
Horse Riding
Fields/farms/animals
Sailing/fishing
Handball (Kiel has the best Handball team in all of Europe, maybe I will get to watch a game!)
houses with straw roofs (in the outside villages)
Plattdeutsch--- Wat is dat? (a German dialect spoken here)
Wind energy
Beaches (sometimes you have to pay to enter certain areas of the beach...this is because they keep them very clean)
Strandkoerber (wicker seats that are rented out on the beach for people to sit in)
As you all probably have seen in the news, the Euro hit an all time high this past month. It is trading at approximately 1.42 to the dollar, which is bad news for me since I have yet to get my paycheck...but will be good once I get paid!
Last week I actually got to take over a few of my classes and pretty much teach on my own. I was really nervous, but it was fun and my teachers seemed impressed with the way it went! I was excited to hear that. Slowly I am being integrated into the classroom and the students are getting used to seeing me around. The topic in 13th grade right now is the 2nd Amendment, the right to bear arms, the death penalty, and violence in the U.S. Sometimes I start to think that the only thing the students learn about the U.S. are the worst things. But looking at reality, there are a lot of things that need to be changed in the U.S. The students of course think that the 2nd Amendment is out of date and were shocked to learn that it comes after the rights of an individual. They couldn't believe that something like that would be seen as so important. They believe that the right to have a weapon is a vicious circle. I myself agree, however, many Americans feel that this is the only way they will be safe. In Germany guns are illegal for citizens to possess and the crime rate is MUCH lower than in the U.S.
On the weekend I was invited out to dinner with the head of our English dept. at the school, with whom I work very closely. First we met at her place and watched the Hamburg Soccer team play to victory (she is a huge soccer fan and they have a basement set up like a movie theater with a projector and big screen!!!) Then we went out to El Greco, a very nice Greek restaurant, where we met up with her sister, who really wanted to meet me and two of her friends. They are all in their thirties, but are a lot of fun. After dinner we went to a student bar called "Trotzdem." This was a very nice evening.
On Sunday, my hostmom, grandma and I went into the city to the Pottery market. This is once a year and there were so many amazing pottery pieces! If I had had a million dollars, I would have bought it all!
Monday, I went to Hamburg to the U.S. Consulate to meet with the director of the program "Meet US," in which I will be taking part. It is the outreach program for schools who do not have teaching assistants and want to have Americans come to speak to their students. I will be paid to do this and I think it will be a lot of fun. When I first got to the consulate, I felt like I was entering a prison with all the police and gates, but once I got inside it was much better. The director of the program gave us a tour of the building and told us that the 1st consulate general in Hamburg was a man from Scotland. I thought this was an interesting fact. There were 7 of us total who arrived for the meeting. Three of us are Fulbright teaching assistants and the other 4 are exchange students at high schools in the area.
Today, since we have the day off, my host mom, grandma and I went to Schilksee to walk around. The olympic games were held there in 1972. Sailing and such took place there. It is a beautiful day here so it was perfect for walking along the coast. A lot of fisherman were out today, my host dad included!
I'm starting to get used to Kiel and am better at finding my way around. I wanted to share some of the things that make Kiel and the surrounding area special or things that I now associate with it:
Horse Riding
Fields/farms/animals
Sailing/fishing
Handball (Kiel has the best Handball team in all of Europe, maybe I will get to watch a game!)
houses with straw roofs (in the outside villages)
Plattdeutsch--- Wat is dat? (a German dialect spoken here)
Wind energy
Beaches (sometimes you have to pay to enter certain areas of the beach...this is because they keep them very clean)
Strandkoerber (wicker seats that are rented out on the beach for people to sit in)
Sunday, September 23, 2007
New adventures and the smell of the sea!
Moin Moin from Kiel! For those of you reading this who don’t know what that means, it is the standard greeting here in the north. It is similar to Good Morning, but you can say it all day long. It’s little things like that, that separate the North from the South here in Germany. One thing I was really excited about though was to find out that there are Laugenbrezeln/broetchen in the North, even if they don’t taste quite as good as they do in the South!
Wow, I can’t believe that I have been here for almost a month now! It seems to me as if I just arrived a few days ago. Last weekend I met up with Ryan (Scotland) and Diedre (Canada), who are also teaching assistants in Kiel. We went to Subway (they didn’t have much money) and then spent the rest of the night wandering around the city looking for places where the younger crowds gather and searching for Kieler night life. We found plenty of bars and a few discos. To our surprise, we even stumbled upon the small but still present red light district of Kiel! We had a nice evening together which was mostly spent getting to know one another. I was the experienced one having been here much longer than them. They just arrived the week before last week and therefore are just getting started. I am constantly reminded of how good I have it to be living with a family who won’t let me pay for anything and to have a bed to sleep in. Ryan was living in a youth hostel for three days, but finally found an apartment. The only thing is, is that the apartment isn’t furnished and therefore he is sleeping on a foam pad on the floor. Lots of TA’s I have met here have had a similar start. I’m thankful I didn’t have to do that.
Monday my host dad and I took a trip to Rendsburg to get my Visa/living allowance. This time I didn’t have to wait hours on end like I did in Heidelberg! I was completely shocked! There must be more foreigners living in Heidelberg than around here. However, if I would have had to go to Kiel to get it, I probably would have had to wait longer, but since the town I am living in belongs to a different county, I got to take the short way out. Tuesday it was back to school, but halfway through the day, I was asked by a history teacher at my school, if I would like to join him and his class on a Jewish tour of Kiel. His class just finished the topic of WWII and he likes to plan trips that coincide with the material in the classroom. This was an interesting 2 hour tour of Kiel concentrating on places where Jews have lived and memorials that have been erected for those who were killed during the Holocaust. I think it is always good to make history a bit more personal, so that students can actually understand how real the situation was even if it did occur in the past. I then attended one of the History teacher’s fifth grade classes on Friday and the students thought that I was a new student! Yeah, go figure! I’m hoping it is the height thing… They thought it was “really cool” though that I am from the U.S. and that they could understand me when I introduced myself in English.
Also on Friday I was shown around the University by one of my teachers. It is fairly large in comparison to Heidelberg’s or perhaps it just appears this way because the buildings are all concentrated together. Friday night I went out with the History teacher “Lars” and some of his friends with whom he had studied in Kiel. They were all very nice and want to show me around the state I am in! Lars has his PhD and it is weird for me and probably most Americans to think that he teachers grades 5-13. I talked to my host family about this and they said that most Germans who get their PhD don’t necessarily intend on teaching at the University level and many just do it for their interest in research, not to move up in any chain. I found that quite interesting. I also found out that professors and teachers make about the same amount of money. That is, there isn’t much of a pay difference between working at a high school and working at a college. I thought in the U.S. this would be unacceptable, but then I remembered what some of my professors at Bethany make and well it is the same if not lower than high school teacher salaries…
Yesterday, Saturday, my host mom, grandma and I took a trip to Eckernfoerde, which is a small city close to Kiel. Its architecture is older and it is very beautiful. Not that Kiel isn’t! In the evening, last night, I met up with the other teaching assistants again and we went to dinner at an Asian restaurant. It was delicious. Then we went to the movies to watch Spiderman 3 in German. The theater we went to is like the theaters back in the day, old fashioned, with a balcony and a curtain that hangs in front of the screen. It is only one room and it only cost 2 Euro to watch the movie. It reminded me of the old theater that Barnesville used to have. I remember we took a field trip there once. That is what it looked like. After the movie we went to the “Kieler Brauerei” where total chaos had broken loose. My family informed me that it is always that wild there. It was funny though to watch the people (men, mind you) dancing on tables. I felt like we were at Oktoberfest, which by the way starts this week…not that I will be able to go, but just food for thought.
Today, well every Sunday, we have a huge breakfast with boiled eggs and a variety of delicious breads…mmm. After breakfast we (Host mom, grandma, and I) headed to Strande, a small town outside of where we live. There we walked for miles through fields, past old farming houses that have been renovated, and along the Baltic Sea coast. The weather is beautiful today! Something we haven’t experienced too often since I have been here. The smell of the water and sand was refreshing. My family is trying to show me as much as possible and I continue to be spoiled, since their only daughter is in Australia.
Wow, I can’t believe that I have been here for almost a month now! It seems to me as if I just arrived a few days ago. Last weekend I met up with Ryan (Scotland) and Diedre (Canada), who are also teaching assistants in Kiel. We went to Subway (they didn’t have much money) and then spent the rest of the night wandering around the city looking for places where the younger crowds gather and searching for Kieler night life. We found plenty of bars and a few discos. To our surprise, we even stumbled upon the small but still present red light district of Kiel! We had a nice evening together which was mostly spent getting to know one another. I was the experienced one having been here much longer than them. They just arrived the week before last week and therefore are just getting started. I am constantly reminded of how good I have it to be living with a family who won’t let me pay for anything and to have a bed to sleep in. Ryan was living in a youth hostel for three days, but finally found an apartment. The only thing is, is that the apartment isn’t furnished and therefore he is sleeping on a foam pad on the floor. Lots of TA’s I have met here have had a similar start. I’m thankful I didn’t have to do that.
Monday my host dad and I took a trip to Rendsburg to get my Visa/living allowance. This time I didn’t have to wait hours on end like I did in Heidelberg! I was completely shocked! There must be more foreigners living in Heidelberg than around here. However, if I would have had to go to Kiel to get it, I probably would have had to wait longer, but since the town I am living in belongs to a different county, I got to take the short way out. Tuesday it was back to school, but halfway through the day, I was asked by a history teacher at my school, if I would like to join him and his class on a Jewish tour of Kiel. His class just finished the topic of WWII and he likes to plan trips that coincide with the material in the classroom. This was an interesting 2 hour tour of Kiel concentrating on places where Jews have lived and memorials that have been erected for those who were killed during the Holocaust. I think it is always good to make history a bit more personal, so that students can actually understand how real the situation was even if it did occur in the past. I then attended one of the History teacher’s fifth grade classes on Friday and the students thought that I was a new student! Yeah, go figure! I’m hoping it is the height thing… They thought it was “really cool” though that I am from the U.S. and that they could understand me when I introduced myself in English.
Also on Friday I was shown around the University by one of my teachers. It is fairly large in comparison to Heidelberg’s or perhaps it just appears this way because the buildings are all concentrated together. Friday night I went out with the History teacher “Lars” and some of his friends with whom he had studied in Kiel. They were all very nice and want to show me around the state I am in! Lars has his PhD and it is weird for me and probably most Americans to think that he teachers grades 5-13. I talked to my host family about this and they said that most Germans who get their PhD don’t necessarily intend on teaching at the University level and many just do it for their interest in research, not to move up in any chain. I found that quite interesting. I also found out that professors and teachers make about the same amount of money. That is, there isn’t much of a pay difference between working at a high school and working at a college. I thought in the U.S. this would be unacceptable, but then I remembered what some of my professors at Bethany make and well it is the same if not lower than high school teacher salaries…
Yesterday, Saturday, my host mom, grandma and I took a trip to Eckernfoerde, which is a small city close to Kiel. Its architecture is older and it is very beautiful. Not that Kiel isn’t! In the evening, last night, I met up with the other teaching assistants again and we went to dinner at an Asian restaurant. It was delicious. Then we went to the movies to watch Spiderman 3 in German. The theater we went to is like the theaters back in the day, old fashioned, with a balcony and a curtain that hangs in front of the screen. It is only one room and it only cost 2 Euro to watch the movie. It reminded me of the old theater that Barnesville used to have. I remember we took a field trip there once. That is what it looked like. After the movie we went to the “Kieler Brauerei” where total chaos had broken loose. My family informed me that it is always that wild there. It was funny though to watch the people (men, mind you) dancing on tables. I felt like we were at Oktoberfest, which by the way starts this week…not that I will be able to go, but just food for thought.
Today, well every Sunday, we have a huge breakfast with boiled eggs and a variety of delicious breads…mmm. After breakfast we (Host mom, grandma, and I) headed to Strande, a small town outside of where we live. There we walked for miles through fields, past old farming houses that have been renovated, and along the Baltic Sea coast. The weather is beautiful today! Something we haven’t experienced too often since I have been here. The smell of the water and sand was refreshing. My family is trying to show me as much as possible and I continue to be spoiled, since their only daughter is in Australia.
Saturday, September 15, 2007
Settling in
Well it’s the weekend. I made it through my first week at the school! I am starting to get adjusted and am slowly learning people’s names, that is the names of my collegues. I am just starting on learning the names of my students. To make this clearer, I don’t just teach one individual class, I teach about 8 different classes and so it will take a while to learn all of their names, if that is even possible! The reason I am teaching so many different classes is because all of the teachers want to make use of me as a native speaker, which I think says a lot for the school and its teachers. All of the teachers that I am working with, eight total, are extremely nice and have gone out of their way to make me feel comfortable. I will be able to teach sections of lessons and whole lessons soon, which is exciting and scary at the same time!
In most of the classes, I was introduced to the students and then they were allowed to ask me questions. Of course you can imagine some of the questions they asked. The typical “How old are you?” and “Where are you from?” and then the most important questions, for example “Do you speak German?” and “Do you like Bush?” Some students asked for the cultural differences between America and Germany, which I always find hard to explain. There are so many that I had to pick out a few of the larger (in my eyes) differences for example school, lifestyle, environment and such. In one class, Herr Meyer assigned a homework assignment about me. He told the kids to write a short article from the information I gave them about myself for the yearbook! This should be interesting....Overall the kids seemed impressed with what I had to tell them and were very interested. Their English skills are also very good. Of course they should be good because they have had as many years of English as I have of German and many of my students have already spent half a year to a year abroad in an English-speaking country. Studying abroad is very popular for high school age students.
Thursday I went out to lunch with two of my colleagues. We planned to have movie nights once a week at Andrea’s place, which will be fun. Yesterday it rained most of the day so my host mom, grandma and I stayed in and watched a movie. Today grandma and I woke up early and went into the city to try to finish my paperwork for my bank account. I should have an account by Wednesday so I finally get my money, which is important for survival. Then we went onto the top floor of a department store and out onto the parking lot to watch the brand new cruise ship from Norway coming into the harbor. There is a huge celebration in the city today and 30,000 people are expected to be there. People were coming in herds on their bikes into the city and we watched it all from above. We had a great view. The Norwegian Band Aha is also playing a live concert this afternoon, which I will unfortunately miss. I had planned to go to it with Ryan from Scotland and a few other teaching assistants who are living in Kiel, but instead we are all going out for dinner together later this evening. I haven’t actually met any of them yet, but have been in contact with them through email. It will be a good start to meeting younger people here and will give me someone to do things with.
A few days ago I finally booked my flight to Croatia for fall break! I will be there for 12 days total visiting my two friends I met in Heidelberg. I’m really excited to see them again and for them to show me around their country! I told them that one day I would come visit them in Croatia and now I am really doing it. It’s hard to believe! In addition, I already have a trip scheduled for October 8th to a school in Bremen through the US Consulate. I will be talking to two groups of students for approximately an hour about immigration and the American Dream. I think this is such a huge topic that it will be hard to condense into an hour, but at least I have a lot of material with which I can work. Well that is my update for this week!
In most of the classes, I was introduced to the students and then they were allowed to ask me questions. Of course you can imagine some of the questions they asked. The typical “How old are you?” and “Where are you from?” and then the most important questions, for example “Do you speak German?” and “Do you like Bush?” Some students asked for the cultural differences between America and Germany, which I always find hard to explain. There are so many that I had to pick out a few of the larger (in my eyes) differences for example school, lifestyle, environment and such. In one class, Herr Meyer assigned a homework assignment about me. He told the kids to write a short article from the information I gave them about myself for the yearbook! This should be interesting....Overall the kids seemed impressed with what I had to tell them and were very interested. Their English skills are also very good. Of course they should be good because they have had as many years of English as I have of German and many of my students have already spent half a year to a year abroad in an English-speaking country. Studying abroad is very popular for high school age students.
Thursday I went out to lunch with two of my colleagues. We planned to have movie nights once a week at Andrea’s place, which will be fun. Yesterday it rained most of the day so my host mom, grandma and I stayed in and watched a movie. Today grandma and I woke up early and went into the city to try to finish my paperwork for my bank account. I should have an account by Wednesday so I finally get my money, which is important for survival. Then we went onto the top floor of a department store and out onto the parking lot to watch the brand new cruise ship from Norway coming into the harbor. There is a huge celebration in the city today and 30,000 people are expected to be there. People were coming in herds on their bikes into the city and we watched it all from above. We had a great view. The Norwegian Band Aha is also playing a live concert this afternoon, which I will unfortunately miss. I had planned to go to it with Ryan from Scotland and a few other teaching assistants who are living in Kiel, but instead we are all going out for dinner together later this evening. I haven’t actually met any of them yet, but have been in contact with them through email. It will be a good start to meeting younger people here and will give me someone to do things with.
A few days ago I finally booked my flight to Croatia for fall break! I will be there for 12 days total visiting my two friends I met in Heidelberg. I’m really excited to see them again and for them to show me around their country! I told them that one day I would come visit them in Croatia and now I am really doing it. It’s hard to believe! In addition, I already have a trip scheduled for October 8th to a school in Bremen through the US Consulate. I will be talking to two groups of students for approximately an hour about immigration and the American Dream. I think this is such a huge topic that it will be hard to condense into an hour, but at least I have a lot of material with which I can work. Well that is my update for this week!
Monday, September 10, 2007
Last Day of Orientation/New Start at School
Our last day of orientation made me really excited to get started at my school. We had a special meeting for the 20 students who are participating in the Diversity Initiative Program. We discussed integration in the German School systems, mainly its successes and faults. This was really interesting for me and now I have 20 contacts, which I can use for my research, if they are willing to help me out. I also once again discovered how small the world is. At lunch I sat with a kid who was from the Seattle area, I believe. He kept telling me that I looked really familiar to him, but he just couldn't place where he had seen me before. I told him that I didn't think I had seen him until then, but he kept insisting that he had. We bagan discussing our study abroad semesters and stumbled upon the connection. He and I both studied abroad fall semester of '05. He was in Freiburg, where I did my Goethe Institut language course and where I met and became friends with his roommate, Yeka from Venezuela. I had went over to Yeka's one evening for dinner and he saw me then. Completely crazy, I know! The fact that he even remembered blows my mind, but we had a good laugh about this. (Yeka, if you are reading this let me know!)
After we left orientation we arrived back at Koeln's main station and I caught my train back to Kiel, where my hostparents were waiting for me. I went almost directly to bed when we got home because I had to get up for my first actual day at my school. On Friday, I arrived at 9:30 at my school and the department head of English was there waiting for me. She gave me a short tour of the school and introduced me to many of my new colleagues. Lots of new faces to remember and foreign names to top it off! Then I was invited to the Headmaster's office for coffe and a short discussion about my duties at the school. This went smoothly and he too complimented me on my German skills. I was floating on cloud 9. After this meeting, I attended two classes with the teachers that I will be spending the most of my time with and who are responsible for me, Andrea and Katja. The first class were 13th graders, yes they have 13 grades at the college prepatory schools, which means that the students are very close to my age. Three girls gave a presentation on California because they had all been there in the past year. Their English was pretty much error free, so I am looking forward to working with this class because they are at such a high level. Next I went to a 10th grade class. Their language skills were obviously not as strong as the previously class but they seemed excited that a native speaker from America was in their class. They are now referring to me as their walking dictionary, which could become hard if they ask me a word in German and I don't know the English equivalent. Anyway, for the first week or so I will just be observing my classes to get a feel for the students and their abilities. Once I am comfortable with them then I will start teaching. One difference that I already noticed was how talkative the students are. They talked during the entire lesson and it was mostly not about the topic. Maybe I just never noticed this in High School in the U.S. but it seems that the students here are less respectful and don't pay as much attention. I guess I will see in the next year. It will definitely be challenging at times, but I hope that I can share my culture and language with my students and make it interesting.
I now have a rough outline of a schedule and have Mondays free, which is nice if I want to travel to visit people on the weekends. Friday evening my host family and I went out for dinner and a drink in the city with some of their friends. Thomas runs a travel agency and he and his girlfriend want to show me around a little bit. I think this is a very nice offer and will of course take them up on it. It continues to amaze me how everyone here is willing to go out of their way to show me a good time, y family, my school, my family's friends. In northern Germany the people tend to be referred to as quiet and zuruckhaltend, which is a term that means that they hold back a bit. But there is a saying that once a Northerner gets to know and becomes your friend, you will be friends for life. I can already see the truth in this.
One more thing I want to comment on that struck me as odd at first, is how quickly the people here have allowed me to speak informally with them and use their first names. I had expected otherwise. My colleagues are much more laid back than I suspected they would be and pretty much everyone I have met thus far except my boss has told me to speak informally with them. Gramatically this makes things much easier for me, as I am not very used to speaking formally in German and this does not exist in English.
As for spare time, I doubt that I will have much of that. I plan to register at the University and hopefully be able to take a class or two, in addition to my research. Also, I signed up for the U.S. consulate program called Meet US. This is a program that allows teaching assistants to volunteer to travel to schools in their area and meet with students who have no teaching assistants and would otherwise not meet Americans. You get to talk to them for a few hours and they ask you questions. I think this is a good way to promote America positively and perhaps I can show German school children that there are people in the U.S. who are interested in countries and languages other than their own.
After we left orientation we arrived back at Koeln's main station and I caught my train back to Kiel, where my hostparents were waiting for me. I went almost directly to bed when we got home because I had to get up for my first actual day at my school. On Friday, I arrived at 9:30 at my school and the department head of English was there waiting for me. She gave me a short tour of the school and introduced me to many of my new colleagues. Lots of new faces to remember and foreign names to top it off! Then I was invited to the Headmaster's office for coffe and a short discussion about my duties at the school. This went smoothly and he too complimented me on my German skills. I was floating on cloud 9. After this meeting, I attended two classes with the teachers that I will be spending the most of my time with and who are responsible for me, Andrea and Katja. The first class were 13th graders, yes they have 13 grades at the college prepatory schools, which means that the students are very close to my age. Three girls gave a presentation on California because they had all been there in the past year. Their English was pretty much error free, so I am looking forward to working with this class because they are at such a high level. Next I went to a 10th grade class. Their language skills were obviously not as strong as the previously class but they seemed excited that a native speaker from America was in their class. They are now referring to me as their walking dictionary, which could become hard if they ask me a word in German and I don't know the English equivalent. Anyway, for the first week or so I will just be observing my classes to get a feel for the students and their abilities. Once I am comfortable with them then I will start teaching. One difference that I already noticed was how talkative the students are. They talked during the entire lesson and it was mostly not about the topic. Maybe I just never noticed this in High School in the U.S. but it seems that the students here are less respectful and don't pay as much attention. I guess I will see in the next year. It will definitely be challenging at times, but I hope that I can share my culture and language with my students and make it interesting.
I now have a rough outline of a schedule and have Mondays free, which is nice if I want to travel to visit people on the weekends. Friday evening my host family and I went out for dinner and a drink in the city with some of their friends. Thomas runs a travel agency and he and his girlfriend want to show me around a little bit. I think this is a very nice offer and will of course take them up on it. It continues to amaze me how everyone here is willing to go out of their way to show me a good time, y family, my school, my family's friends. In northern Germany the people tend to be referred to as quiet and zuruckhaltend, which is a term that means that they hold back a bit. But there is a saying that once a Northerner gets to know and becomes your friend, you will be friends for life. I can already see the truth in this.
One more thing I want to comment on that struck me as odd at first, is how quickly the people here have allowed me to speak informally with them and use their first names. I had expected otherwise. My colleagues are much more laid back than I suspected they would be and pretty much everyone I have met thus far except my boss has told me to speak informally with them. Gramatically this makes things much easier for me, as I am not very used to speaking formally in German and this does not exist in English.
As for spare time, I doubt that I will have much of that. I plan to register at the University and hopefully be able to take a class or two, in addition to my research. Also, I signed up for the U.S. consulate program called Meet US. This is a program that allows teaching assistants to volunteer to travel to schools in their area and meet with students who have no teaching assistants and would otherwise not meet Americans. You get to talk to them for a few hours and they ask you questions. I think this is a good way to promote America positively and perhaps I can show German school children that there are people in the U.S. who are interested in countries and languages other than their own.
Tuesday, September 4, 2007
September 4, 2007
Yesterday Silke Helge and I ate breakfast at 6:30 am and then they dropped me off at the trainstation to catch the train at 8:21 to Hamburg where I switched to get on my train to Koeln. Once I got to the station in Koeln (the ride was around 5 hours) I tried to find the other fulbrighters. They were outside sitting on the steps of the Koelner Dom (Cologne Cathedral). There wouldn’t have been enough space for us all in the station…Luggage was piled up along the steps and total we were 180 students from English speaking countries and there are three rounds that come through orientation. One group was last week, we are this week and the last one comes next week. 150 of the 180 are Americans and the rest are a mixture of Australians, Canadians, New Zealanders and British. So you can only imagine what a sight it was with all of us in the city. After waiting what seemed like hours and meeting a bunch of new and interesting people, we got on the buses that brought us to Haus Altenberg, where our actual orientation is taking place. It is an old monastery that has been turned into a place where students come for special meetings such as ours. It is solely used for this purpose, but there is a cathedral where the village people (not a pun) can come.
After arriving at Haus Altenberg we were immediately assigned to our rooms. This was done according to states where we are placed. I am living with Helen from Chillicothe, Ohio, who went to OU and Rebecca from Atlanta, Georgia. They are stationed about an hour and 2 and ½ hours respectively from me. Helen is living in a small village about 10 kilometers from Denmark so I might have to go visit her and we can cross the border together. I have been hanging out with my roommates most of the time because we are also in working groups with the people from our states but I have also met a wide variety of other people. Most are very interesting. The first person I actually met in Koeln was Stephanie, who is going to Munich. She’s is really sweet, so maybe if I get the chance to head south I will stop by and visit her. Of course the percentage of guys to girls ration is very good for the boys and not so good for the girls, but the guys that I have met thus far have been very nice. It’s amazing to see how many Americans actually study German. When you are a German major, you think you are one among maybe 20 in the country but it is nice to know there are more people than that, who find the language important in the states. Most people here know someone else here who either went to school with them or near them. Of course no one hear knows where Bethany College is so I try to explain it to them.
We have had sessions most of the time so I haven’t had much time for anything else. The socializing comes at dinner or after all of the sessions come to an end. Today we divided up into groups to do simulated lessons. There are two really strong personalities in my group so they argued the whole time (believe it or not, that does not include me), but we came up with a lesson plan despite the fact that I wanted to strangle the one girl. After the sessions Helen and I went wandering around the village checking out the creek, woods, etc. We are literally in the middle of nowhere. The cows even thought we were coming to feed them and took off full speed running at us. Well that is all for now. I'll right again at the end of orientation!
Yesterday Silke Helge and I ate breakfast at 6:30 am and then they dropped me off at the trainstation to catch the train at 8:21 to Hamburg where I switched to get on my train to Koeln. Once I got to the station in Koeln (the ride was around 5 hours) I tried to find the other fulbrighters. They were outside sitting on the steps of the Koelner Dom (Cologne Cathedral). There wouldn’t have been enough space for us all in the station…Luggage was piled up along the steps and total we were 180 students from English speaking countries and there are three rounds that come through orientation. One group was last week, we are this week and the last one comes next week. 150 of the 180 are Americans and the rest are a mixture of Australians, Canadians, New Zealanders and British. So you can only imagine what a sight it was with all of us in the city. After waiting what seemed like hours and meeting a bunch of new and interesting people, we got on the buses that brought us to Haus Altenberg, where our actual orientation is taking place. It is an old monastery that has been turned into a place where students come for special meetings such as ours. It is solely used for this purpose, but there is a cathedral where the village people (not a pun) can come.
After arriving at Haus Altenberg we were immediately assigned to our rooms. This was done according to states where we are placed. I am living with Helen from Chillicothe, Ohio, who went to OU and Rebecca from Atlanta, Georgia. They are stationed about an hour and 2 and ½ hours respectively from me. Helen is living in a small village about 10 kilometers from Denmark so I might have to go visit her and we can cross the border together. I have been hanging out with my roommates most of the time because we are also in working groups with the people from our states but I have also met a wide variety of other people. Most are very interesting. The first person I actually met in Koeln was Stephanie, who is going to Munich. She’s is really sweet, so maybe if I get the chance to head south I will stop by and visit her. Of course the percentage of guys to girls ration is very good for the boys and not so good for the girls, but the guys that I have met thus far have been very nice. It’s amazing to see how many Americans actually study German. When you are a German major, you think you are one among maybe 20 in the country but it is nice to know there are more people than that, who find the language important in the states. Most people here know someone else here who either went to school with them or near them. Of course no one hear knows where Bethany College is so I try to explain it to them.
We have had sessions most of the time so I haven’t had much time for anything else. The socializing comes at dinner or after all of the sessions come to an end. Today we divided up into groups to do simulated lessons. There are two really strong personalities in my group so they argued the whole time (believe it or not, that does not include me), but we came up with a lesson plan despite the fact that I wanted to strangle the one girl. After the sessions Helen and I went wandering around the village checking out the creek, woods, etc. We are literally in the middle of nowhere. The cows even thought we were coming to feed them and took off full speed running at us. Well that is all for now. I'll right again at the end of orientation!
The next few days
On Friday I went out to dinner with the two teachers that I will be working with most of the time, Katja and Andrea. They are lots of fun and again I have to admit that I am very lucky to have landed in Kiel with all of these great people. We had a great time and it was like we had known each other for a long time! I am excited that I will be working with such nice colleagues and am confident that they will be helpful with everything. They told me that on next Friday, my first day in the school, I can just sit and watch them and they will show me around. So no stress, we are taking everything pretty slow, which I find to be good. They are letting me decide which age level I want to work with, which I can’t decide because I have only taught some language labs at Bethany and teaching experience with other age levels, I lack. I guess I will just go where they need me.
My colleagues also signed me up for student housing through the university and I will find out in October if I will receive a room. If not, then I am thinking about possibly staying with my host family. Although it is not directly in the city, which I would prefer, it is nice to have someone to constantly talk to when I want and like I said before they are just very wonderful people in general. Last night we had a dish from India for dinner, which was delicious. After dinner, I spent the next few hours showing them pictures from my hometown, family, Bethany and much more. We had interesting and hilarious conversations the rest of the night.
The weather remains rainy and is a bit of a downer but this will hopefully be better next week. Silke, my host mother, said that if the weather is better next weekend that we can go to Denmark!! See what I mean, when I say they are amazing! It’s like I am really their kid and they want to show me everything. Today we had a large breakfast with lots of delicious German broetchen! Mmmm…nothing beats German bread. After breakfast we went into the heart of Kiel and I took a few pictures even though the weather was not so beautiful. Then we went to see the ships entering the Nord-Ostsee Kanal (North-Baltic Sea Canal). If I understood correctly, this canal is the most important in the world and the number of ships that go through it yearly is higher than anywhere else. It was created by Kaiser Wilhelm for military purposes and it is very practical because the ships do not have to go north to get around Scandinavia, they can simply use the canal, which shortens the length of travel. Currently one of the locks is damaged because a boat drove into it, so they are working to fix it. Right now everywhere in Kiel is a construction site. Lots of roads are closed for repairs in every direction.
Tomorrow I leave for my orientation in Cologne and I have to leave early to make sure I catch the train because we are not sure if I will have delays because of the construction.
Orientation is four days and is held in an old monastery in a small city called Altenberg that is about 30 minutes outside of Cologne. All hundred and some assistants from the U.S. are meeting in the train station, where the buses will then take us to the castle. Needless to say this should be interesting and I am already wondering what exactly we will do for three days.
One more interesting thing I would like to add that has nothing to do with orientation but that I find wild, is that Silke’s grandmother is still alive. She is 101 years old. I have never met a person that old…close…but not quite that old. When I met her she opened her eyes to see who I was, but she doesn’t talk. She sits in a chair until 4 in which she usually sleeps the day away and then she goes to bed to sleep more. It isn’t really much of a life. She doesn’t move much at all and she has to be spoon fed. My host grandmother who takes care of her says that she thinks she was forgotten by God, which is kind of sad but in a way seems to be true. Anyway, that’s all for now. My next entry will cover orientation, where hopefully I will meet more interesting people and maybe I will find out that there is someone placed in a location near me in Schleswig-Holstein. Until then…much love!
My colleagues also signed me up for student housing through the university and I will find out in October if I will receive a room. If not, then I am thinking about possibly staying with my host family. Although it is not directly in the city, which I would prefer, it is nice to have someone to constantly talk to when I want and like I said before they are just very wonderful people in general. Last night we had a dish from India for dinner, which was delicious. After dinner, I spent the next few hours showing them pictures from my hometown, family, Bethany and much more. We had interesting and hilarious conversations the rest of the night.
The weather remains rainy and is a bit of a downer but this will hopefully be better next week. Silke, my host mother, said that if the weather is better next weekend that we can go to Denmark!! See what I mean, when I say they are amazing! It’s like I am really their kid and they want to show me everything. Today we had a large breakfast with lots of delicious German broetchen! Mmmm…nothing beats German bread. After breakfast we went into the heart of Kiel and I took a few pictures even though the weather was not so beautiful. Then we went to see the ships entering the Nord-Ostsee Kanal (North-Baltic Sea Canal). If I understood correctly, this canal is the most important in the world and the number of ships that go through it yearly is higher than anywhere else. It was created by Kaiser Wilhelm for military purposes and it is very practical because the ships do not have to go north to get around Scandinavia, they can simply use the canal, which shortens the length of travel. Currently one of the locks is damaged because a boat drove into it, so they are working to fix it. Right now everywhere in Kiel is a construction site. Lots of roads are closed for repairs in every direction.
Tomorrow I leave for my orientation in Cologne and I have to leave early to make sure I catch the train because we are not sure if I will have delays because of the construction.
Orientation is four days and is held in an old monastery in a small city called Altenberg that is about 30 minutes outside of Cologne. All hundred and some assistants from the U.S. are meeting in the train station, where the buses will then take us to the castle. Needless to say this should be interesting and I am already wondering what exactly we will do for three days.
One more interesting thing I would like to add that has nothing to do with orientation but that I find wild, is that Silke’s grandmother is still alive. She is 101 years old. I have never met a person that old…close…but not quite that old. When I met her she opened her eyes to see who I was, but she doesn’t talk. She sits in a chair until 4 in which she usually sleeps the day away and then she goes to bed to sleep more. It isn’t really much of a life. She doesn’t move much at all and she has to be spoon fed. My host grandmother who takes care of her says that she thinks she was forgotten by God, which is kind of sad but in a way seems to be true. Anyway, that’s all for now. My next entry will cover orientation, where hopefully I will meet more interesting people and maybe I will find out that there is someone placed in a location near me in Schleswig-Holstein. Until then…much love!
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Flights and First day
After a short but difficult goodbye with my family, I boarded the plane to Chicago, my first destination after Pittsburgh. I know it makes absolutely no sense to fly an hour in the opposite direction and then fly back that way, but it was simply cheaper.
Some interesting things happened on my flights. The first one to Chicago, I sat next to John, a very good looking 21 year old from California, who just joined the army in September as a paratrooper. We spent the beginning of the flight talking about this and he showed me a video he took while skydiving. It looked amazing. Maybe some day I will have the guts to do that. Yeah right. Then I found out he was going to Germany too because he is being deployed in Mannheim for 2 years. He asked me twenty questions because he has never traveled abroad, so I did my best to help him out and calm him down.
After arriving in Chicago we went to the food court to grab some lunch. Then we headed back to our departure gate for the flight to Frankfurt. We didn’t have seats too close to each other so we planned to meet again outside the plane to exchange contact info. Meanwhile I was sitting beside two Germans, who I didn’t speak to right away. The conversation between us didn’t start until the end of the flight and when it finally did, I found out that the couple was from Loerrach, where I had done my three week internship in Germany 2 years ago. Yes there’s more. They know the woman I stayed with while I was there! The woman on the plane…strangely enough we never exchanged names…said that she was going to call Birgit and let her know she met me on a plane coming from the U.S. So it’s definitely a small world when randomly you are sitting in an airplane next to someone who happens to have connections to you even though they are from another country. It turns out this woman is a teacher also, so we spent the rest of the flight talking about what I am doing here in Germany.
After getting off the plane, I met back up with John and helped him get to passport control and find his luggage. From there one of the German military men took him under his wing and helped him figure out how to get to Mannheim. We exchanged emails and I went on my merry way to check in for my transfer flight to Hamburg, which I would have to wait approximately 7 hours for. You can only imagine how hard it was to keep myself awake after hours of no sleep on the uncomfortable plane ride prior, but it all worked out and after paying 50 Euro for my extra luggage, which I hadn’t planned on having to do, I made it to Hamburg airport, where my host family was waiting right outside the baggage claim with German and American flags in hand. I couldn’t have missed them. I also couldn’t have predicted what they would look like they do. They are both very young. The wife more so than the husband. I would guess early 40’s but they haven’t told me how old they are. Anyway, we drove the hour back to Kiel and stopped in the actual city on the way to where they live in a suburb called Altenholz. The buildings are all fairly new that I could see- keep in mind I haven’t been to the old part of the city-but they informed me that most of Kiel had been destroyed in WWII. Even if the architecture is somewhat lacking, the view of the coast is beautiful and there are tons of bike trails, which make me excited.
We came back to the house where everything was already in place for me. I have my own room, wireless internet, a separate phone line, and a TV and the best thing is, is that they don’t want me to pay them a dime! Crazy, I know. I can already tell that I am going to enjoy myself here and that my family treats me like a queen. I really couldn’t ask for a better situation right now. It is amazing…these people didn’t even know me. They just found out about me through the school and decided they would let me live in their Apartment since their daughter is in Australia. Hospitality is one thing I can say that every German I have ever stayed with has never failed to give me. Dinner was cold cuts, cheeses, and breads. The typical “Abendbrot” in the North, but was of course good. My host grandma came over for dinner with us and was very excited to meet me. We might head into town together tomorrow afternoon, but first things first I have to get some sleep.
A side note on the weather. It is only like 60 degrees here and I showed up in capris and a t-shirt! Yeah, it’s cool already, but my family says that it only snowed one day last year so hopefully I won’t have to worry about that!
Some interesting things happened on my flights. The first one to Chicago, I sat next to John, a very good looking 21 year old from California, who just joined the army in September as a paratrooper. We spent the beginning of the flight talking about this and he showed me a video he took while skydiving. It looked amazing. Maybe some day I will have the guts to do that. Yeah right. Then I found out he was going to Germany too because he is being deployed in Mannheim for 2 years. He asked me twenty questions because he has never traveled abroad, so I did my best to help him out and calm him down.
After arriving in Chicago we went to the food court to grab some lunch. Then we headed back to our departure gate for the flight to Frankfurt. We didn’t have seats too close to each other so we planned to meet again outside the plane to exchange contact info. Meanwhile I was sitting beside two Germans, who I didn’t speak to right away. The conversation between us didn’t start until the end of the flight and when it finally did, I found out that the couple was from Loerrach, where I had done my three week internship in Germany 2 years ago. Yes there’s more. They know the woman I stayed with while I was there! The woman on the plane…strangely enough we never exchanged names…said that she was going to call Birgit and let her know she met me on a plane coming from the U.S. So it’s definitely a small world when randomly you are sitting in an airplane next to someone who happens to have connections to you even though they are from another country. It turns out this woman is a teacher also, so we spent the rest of the flight talking about what I am doing here in Germany.
After getting off the plane, I met back up with John and helped him get to passport control and find his luggage. From there one of the German military men took him under his wing and helped him figure out how to get to Mannheim. We exchanged emails and I went on my merry way to check in for my transfer flight to Hamburg, which I would have to wait approximately 7 hours for. You can only imagine how hard it was to keep myself awake after hours of no sleep on the uncomfortable plane ride prior, but it all worked out and after paying 50 Euro for my extra luggage, which I hadn’t planned on having to do, I made it to Hamburg airport, where my host family was waiting right outside the baggage claim with German and American flags in hand. I couldn’t have missed them. I also couldn’t have predicted what they would look like they do. They are both very young. The wife more so than the husband. I would guess early 40’s but they haven’t told me how old they are. Anyway, we drove the hour back to Kiel and stopped in the actual city on the way to where they live in a suburb called Altenholz. The buildings are all fairly new that I could see- keep in mind I haven’t been to the old part of the city-but they informed me that most of Kiel had been destroyed in WWII. Even if the architecture is somewhat lacking, the view of the coast is beautiful and there are tons of bike trails, which make me excited.
We came back to the house where everything was already in place for me. I have my own room, wireless internet, a separate phone line, and a TV and the best thing is, is that they don’t want me to pay them a dime! Crazy, I know. I can already tell that I am going to enjoy myself here and that my family treats me like a queen. I really couldn’t ask for a better situation right now. It is amazing…these people didn’t even know me. They just found out about me through the school and decided they would let me live in their Apartment since their daughter is in Australia. Hospitality is one thing I can say that every German I have ever stayed with has never failed to give me. Dinner was cold cuts, cheeses, and breads. The typical “Abendbrot” in the North, but was of course good. My host grandma came over for dinner with us and was very excited to meet me. We might head into town together tomorrow afternoon, but first things first I have to get some sleep.
A side note on the weather. It is only like 60 degrees here and I showed up in capris and a t-shirt! Yeah, it’s cool already, but my family says that it only snowed one day last year so hopefully I won’t have to worry about that!
Saturday, August 25, 2007
Address and phone #
My address:
Regenbrook 1
24161 AltenholzGermany
My telephone number:
011-494315926183
Regenbrook 1
24161 AltenholzGermany
My telephone number:
011-494315926183
Thursday, August 23, 2007
August 24, 2007
Many of you may not know that I have been placed in Northern Germany. Kiel to be exact. It is located in the much historically disputed and trouble-causing Schleswig Holstein that was formerly part of Denmark. This means that I am of course very close to Denmark and for you beach lovers, it has many beaches since it is on the Baltic coast. In addition, it is a large harbor city and the capital of the state.
Here is the website for my school if anyone would like to check it out. Of course it is in German, but if you click on "Neu am EBG" on the left side (it is under Start) then you can see pictures of the school at which I will be working. Because of the research I proposed to do on Turkish Immigrant Youth, I was placed at a school with a fairly high immigrant population. This is perfect for me as I will get to observe first-hand how well the students are integrated and hopefully be able to interview them.
www.ebg-kiel.de/
My school is a Gymnasium, which means that it is the highest level of high school you can attend in Germany. For those of you who don't know much about the German system, it is broken down into four different types of high schools. There is the Hauptschule, Realschule and Gymnasium, and the Gesamtschule which is a combination of the three previously mentioned. Most of the time, only the students who attend the Gymnasium can proceed on to college, but there are exceptions if you meet certain standards and can prove yourself. Which school you will attend is decided around the age of ten. Yes, I said ten. And the person who usually decides this is a teacher of the student. So basically they determine whether your kid is smart or not at a very young age, nevermind the fact that they still have plenty of time to grow and learn. The Germans love structure, so I doubt this will ever change. I myself as you can already tell am skeptical that this hasty decision is a good thing. I believe it does not allow enough room for children to reach their potential or motivate them in any way. If they are told that they will be attending the Hauptschule then they will mostly assume that this is their destiny and will live with whatever jobs are thrown their way, not caring to advance because they have been labeled 'stupid.' When you are told something long enough, you are likely to believe it. I feel that the students who are placed into the lower level high schools do exactly this.
Anyway to continue, the Hauptschule is like a vocational school training its students in a technical skill so that they can enter the work force after grade 9 (most students enter technical training following this under apprenticeships. The Realschule goes until grade 10 and therefore lies somewhere in between and the Gymnasium usually goes up to grade 13. At the end of the 13th year the students at the Gymnasium will take a very important test which will determine what subjects they will be allowed to pursue at the college level. Preparation is long and arduous and the outcomes can be disastrous if a student fails to achieve a certain percentage in a field they are interested in.
So the system is flawed just like anywhere else, but perhaps in different ways. One thing's for sure the German education system knows what they are doing in terms of World Language studies. Most students will learn
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