The past few weeks I wasn't really sure if it was truely winter time. The sky was always grey, the ground a dirty brown, and the trees dead and ominous. But in the past week it has snowed a total of THREE times which totals up to a whole 1/2 cm or so. I guess that means that the most wonderful time of the year is here! (I'm so jealous of you people in Madison! The snowball fight at Bascom Hill was on the news here!!!)
Last week wasn't anything out of the ordinary. I had a bunch of free hours in school because a ton of teachers were randomly gone- so that was really cool. On friday night I went to a house party with my host brother and got to practice a lot of german there! (while most people go to parties for the sole purpose of have fun- I go there with the mindset of practicing my german... I'm weird like that). It was a really good time. There wasn't a HUGE amount of people there so it wasn't too overwhelming and I actually knew a lot of people there from other parties so it was cool to catch up. It got a little hard to talk with people after someone turned on a fog machine- I couldn't see anything more that was more than a foot away!
So this week was reallly busy. On monday my guestmother and I had a Rotary Christmas dinner with my host rotary club. Before we ate we went to this Evangelical church in the near and sat through a short service made special for us. It was weird. The man had this costume on with this ridiculous looking fluffy white thing around his neck that made him look like a peacock- turns out he became a rotarian that night. After the strange service we went to a resaurant and ate delicious 4 course meal. It was really cool to see how much German I learned since the first meeting. The first meeting I casually said who I was and dreaded anyone asking questions because I had no idea what anyone was saying. The second I chimed in here and there with facts about me, and my life here in Berlin. And this meeting I had a good 30 minute conversation with this nice woman sitting next to me- complete with questions, comments, stories, and even a little bit of humor here and there.
Tuesday was a really cool day. For school I watched a film in German class the first hour. Then had 2 hours free- in which I sat in the "cafeteria" (cafeteria doesn't do this place justice- it is like a café, and has amazing food! Everything from fresh sandwhiches to coffee, to sweet breads- it is amazing!) My englisch class sat there together and just hung out and chatted. It was really nice to just talk together in German and answer/ask questions about life and culture and traditions. The next two hours I watched Matrix in Religion class and discussed the Philosophy incorporated with the film... that was interesting! The last two hours I had Basik Englisch and we watched a Britisch film called "How to Be" that was really difficult to understand even for me!!! (The accents were so sharp) Halfway through we switched movies because it was so BAD! We then watched Finding Forester.
After school, I hung out with a friend after school. We ate, chatted with her family in German- than went Christmas shopping. I must say that the girls here in Germany are a lot easier to make friends with than the guys. I feel like a lot of the guys here are kind of immature- laughing all the time about stupid jokes, making fun of how people talk, laugh, dress, or look, and basking in their "coolness." (of course not all of them). I understand the girls a lot better and we seem to be on the same wavelength as far as maturity goes. They also are way quicker to invite me places so hey- I have no problem with that! Anyways, I ended up getting a few things for the host famly. It's a little bit tough to find things for them because I don't really know what they want, but I did my best and now am DONE with christmas shopping. (can I just add how annoying it is that everything in Europe is so expensive... I am now completely broke woo!)
Wednesday I had another normal day at school! A girl from my school invited me to go to another Rotary Christmas dinner so I gladly accepted and around dinner time met up with her and another friend from school at a tennis club in the Grunewald- area. (took me one hour to get there because I had to take 2 different buses... they were slow) When I got there I greeted people with my stylish rotary blazer (which, might I add, is getting very FULL). Heikki, the exchange student from Finland, also was there so that was a really plesant suprise. The program was a little boring but nice nonetheless. A string trio played, old white people gave speeches, we all ate, and talked!
Today was the last full school day before Christmas break. Tomorrow we have the first hour or two of school than we have a church service, then we become our report cards. I'm really eager to see how they will turn out. I have absolutely no idea what teachers will give me for the classes in which I do not understand! (aka- physik, history, german, biologie, religion). We'll see! I'll let you know how it turns out!
I'm really excited for these umcoming 2 months. I have 2 weeks of Christmas break. My Oma is driving here tomorrow and I believe on Monday we are driving down to Dresden to visit Christmas markets. Other than that, nothing big is really planned which is very nice. I'm hoping to be able to relax, hang out with friends and family, practice german, and have fun! Christmas and New Years should be really interesting! I don't really know what to expect... going in with an open mind.
After break comes my Sozialpraktikum- I will be helping society socially for 1 month, 6 hours a day, instead of going to school! It is now confirmed that I will be helping in an after school type place, where children come to play and do homework. I'm really excited to get started with that! It should be fun and hopefully the little youngesters will help me learn German! (I won't be able to use Englisch because they do now know how to speak it). After my Sozialpraktikum comes 1 week of Winter break, in which I believe I will be going to Austria with my family to go skiing. If all of that works out It should be really, really, really exciting! I've never skiied on real mountain before!
Life is good. I'm enjoying myself immensely! I'm still learning a ton about the language and myself. Some days are really tough and I just want to crawl into a ball and cry... but most of the time my spirits are high. I wish everyone in Madison, Wisconsin, The United States, and wherever else you readers may be- Fröhliche Weihnachten und ein gutes Neues Jahr! Frohe Feiertage :)
Last week wasn't anything out of the ordinary. I had a bunch of free hours in school because a ton of teachers were randomly gone- so that was really cool. On friday night I went to a house party with my host brother and got to practice a lot of german there! (while most people go to parties for the sole purpose of have fun- I go there with the mindset of practicing my german... I'm weird like that). It was a really good time. There wasn't a HUGE amount of people there so it wasn't too overwhelming and I actually knew a lot of people there from other parties so it was cool to catch up. It got a little hard to talk with people after someone turned on a fog machine- I couldn't see anything more that was more than a foot away!
So this week was reallly busy. On monday my guestmother and I had a Rotary Christmas dinner with my host rotary club. Before we ate we went to this Evangelical church in the near and sat through a short service made special for us. It was weird. The man had this costume on with this ridiculous looking fluffy white thing around his neck that made him look like a peacock- turns out he became a rotarian that night. After the strange service we went to a resaurant and ate delicious 4 course meal. It was really cool to see how much German I learned since the first meeting. The first meeting I casually said who I was and dreaded anyone asking questions because I had no idea what anyone was saying. The second I chimed in here and there with facts about me, and my life here in Berlin. And this meeting I had a good 30 minute conversation with this nice woman sitting next to me- complete with questions, comments, stories, and even a little bit of humor here and there.
Tuesday was a really cool day. For school I watched a film in German class the first hour. Then had 2 hours free- in which I sat in the "cafeteria" (cafeteria doesn't do this place justice- it is like a café, and has amazing food! Everything from fresh sandwhiches to coffee, to sweet breads- it is amazing!) My englisch class sat there together and just hung out and chatted. It was really nice to just talk together in German and answer/ask questions about life and culture and traditions. The next two hours I watched Matrix in Religion class and discussed the Philosophy incorporated with the film... that was interesting! The last two hours I had Basik Englisch and we watched a Britisch film called "How to Be" that was really difficult to understand even for me!!! (The accents were so sharp) Halfway through we switched movies because it was so BAD! We then watched Finding Forester.
After school, I hung out with a friend after school. We ate, chatted with her family in German- than went Christmas shopping. I must say that the girls here in Germany are a lot easier to make friends with than the guys. I feel like a lot of the guys here are kind of immature- laughing all the time about stupid jokes, making fun of how people talk, laugh, dress, or look, and basking in their "coolness." (of course not all of them). I understand the girls a lot better and we seem to be on the same wavelength as far as maturity goes. They also are way quicker to invite me places so hey- I have no problem with that! Anyways, I ended up getting a few things for the host famly. It's a little bit tough to find things for them because I don't really know what they want, but I did my best and now am DONE with christmas shopping. (can I just add how annoying it is that everything in Europe is so expensive... I am now completely broke woo!)
Wednesday I had another normal day at school! A girl from my school invited me to go to another Rotary Christmas dinner so I gladly accepted and around dinner time met up with her and another friend from school at a tennis club in the Grunewald- area. (took me one hour to get there because I had to take 2 different buses... they were slow) When I got there I greeted people with my stylish rotary blazer (which, might I add, is getting very FULL). Heikki, the exchange student from Finland, also was there so that was a really plesant suprise. The program was a little boring but nice nonetheless. A string trio played, old white people gave speeches, we all ate, and talked!
Today was the last full school day before Christmas break. Tomorrow we have the first hour or two of school than we have a church service, then we become our report cards. I'm really eager to see how they will turn out. I have absolutely no idea what teachers will give me for the classes in which I do not understand! (aka- physik, history, german, biologie, religion). We'll see! I'll let you know how it turns out!
I'm really excited for these umcoming 2 months. I have 2 weeks of Christmas break. My Oma is driving here tomorrow and I believe on Monday we are driving down to Dresden to visit Christmas markets. Other than that, nothing big is really planned which is very nice. I'm hoping to be able to relax, hang out with friends and family, practice german, and have fun! Christmas and New Years should be really interesting! I don't really know what to expect... going in with an open mind.
After break comes my Sozialpraktikum- I will be helping society socially for 1 month, 6 hours a day, instead of going to school! It is now confirmed that I will be helping in an after school type place, where children come to play and do homework. I'm really excited to get started with that! It should be fun and hopefully the little youngesters will help me learn German! (I won't be able to use Englisch because they do now know how to speak it). After my Sozialpraktikum comes 1 week of Winter break, in which I believe I will be going to Austria with my family to go skiing. If all of that works out It should be really, really, really exciting! I've never skiied on real mountain before!
Life is good. I'm enjoying myself immensely! I'm still learning a ton about the language and myself. Some days are really tough and I just want to crawl into a ball and cry... but most of the time my spirits are high. I wish everyone in Madison, Wisconsin, The United States, and wherever else you readers may be- Fröhliche Weihnachten und ein gutes Neues Jahr! Frohe Feiertage :)
omg! molls and i JUST watched finding forrester :) what a coincidence!!
ben..... me and lydia are going to punch you because we despise your blogging... it's too good. Too good.... you better watch your back come July... 7th? Grand Rapids... I'm taking you to the camo room! MUHAHAHAH