weihnachten- christmas

Christmas in Germany

They have 3 days of xmas:

1. Xmas eve (heilige abend)

on this day most families chill at home with extended family all day and have a big dinner and then they exchange presents unlike in america. My host mothers family came over. We also had to sing around the tree. like legit stood around it and sang "Oh Tannenbaum" (oh xmas tree) then did presents. The kids here well atleast my 9 year old host brother, doesnt believe in any kind of santa claus or st nick, he know the parents do the presents and we watched them put the presents under the tree.

2. Xmas day 1 (Weihnachten Tag 1)

visit or do more things with the other side of the family or more family. We went to Holland to my host dads family. We had spare ribs. And played this game with dice which we also played xmas eve. the person with the highest number from 3 die wins a small prize and keep going around until the presents are gone and then you trade.

3. Xmas day 2 (Weihnachten Tag 2)

more more family except this day is completely unnecessary to also be christmas because we didnt do anything special at all

picturesss

our christmas tree here and my street!

SCHNEE (snow!) :D

today we attempted rugby in gym class.

i got SUPER excited and starting explaining it to all the girls and then the teacher comes over and is like i have nooo idea what kind of rugby that is...

then throws a soccer ball to the boys and they run around in chaos falling over the floor.

so then i was extremely disappointed.

im reading the first harry potter in german :)

i have this philosophy class that i have to take and we took a test last week. it was on like john locke and something about souls and bodies being together? and simple and complex ideas.

so i knew exactly that much about the theme. guess what i got?

a 2 ! which is like a B plus.

well i actually got a 5 (like a D ish) but the teacher was like GREAT JOB! and was like you can have a 2 instead because of how hard it is for you. and i completely wrote crap for the whole thing in my developing german and didnt even do half of it. so i was excited

IT SNOWED TODAY! for the first timeeeeeee ! and it collected on the streets after only 30 minutes! it was sooo great. but it was -5 degrees Celsius

i also went to see "küss den frosch" aka kiss the frog. the new disney animated film with a princess that kisses a frog and also becomes one. and i went with a group of guys and girls and we the girls all went to the bathroom first then met the guys in the theater and i walk in and like totally had a culture wow. they were all just sitting there with a beer and i first started to be like what are you doing?! and then remembered that you can buy beer here everywhere including the movies.

we have our xmas tree and its already decorated :)

my last day of school is next tuesday then i have break until the 6th of jan!

then im doing a work experience at the elementary school (grades 1-4) on my street for 2 and a half weeks :)

its December !

1. dora teaches english here, not spanish

2. spongebobs voice is almost annoying here

3. some germans eat pizza and dip it in ketchup but laugh when i put extra ketchup on my hambuger

4. i feel like advent calendars are soo much more common here

5. american candies are SO sweet to them and they split up a package of pop tarts (two like pieces) into sixths and ate one piece ahhaha.

6. germans dont stand in lines. ever. everything is pushing and its not rude

7. they all use like old fashioned heat radiators . like the white things that are in every room

8. not sure if i told about the blinds? all the houses have intense blinds and when its light outside they are open and when its dark you close them. but they shut completely so absolutely no light coms through. and theres a band that is as long as the window on the side of it inside that you pull or loosen to open and close them.

9. i think almost every town has a christmas market with a bunch of old people selling waffles, mushrooms, and little christmas crafts and stuff. its so cute

10. toast and nutella is the best thing ever to start a day with.

11. it hasnt snowed one bit here yet, but has rained almost every day

12. i went to this demonstration protesting this like airplane thing in m town and was on tv

13. in physics class after someone forgets their calculator 2 times, they have to bake cake and bring it in for all of us.

public transportation

i wanted to tell my story of how i rode the train alone again to the afs camp.

so i got on the right train and rode for 30 min then i had to switch trains and the train ended up going about 5 miles an hour so we were 20 minutes late to the train station and so i had 2 MINUTES to find and get on the next right train.

so i jump off the train once the doors open and like bugged out and looked all around for the right track, decided its not here so i should go up. last second in the corner of mz eye i see the sign for the right track right before i was going to go up the stairs. so i run over to the sign and i have to take an elevator . get in the elevator the doors dont close quickly enough . decide the stairs will be faster. run out of the elevator. run up then stairs see the sign that says my track is down another set of stairs. run down the stairs. find the track. get on the train.

success.

opps.

so i doubting anyone from the like 4 people that read this before are ever going to check this again but im going to write for older me when ill want to read it later in life.

ok!

-im living now with my friend for the rest of the year!

-my keyboard is now german

-i can understand lots in school

-i got a 3 on my math test!!!

-germans use a grading system from 1-6 , 1 being the best

-thanksgiving is next week and time is zoomingg but im going to miss seeing the family and going black friday shopping :( but theres always next year!

-i went to another afs program last weekend, we just did lots of workshops again, but germans were also there that want to do an exchange next year and like 2/3 want to go to america haha

-met an australian and it was so cool to hear the accent

-i like black licorice now

-i ate fish and it wasnt horrible

-i take the bus to school now everyday

but by bus i mean public transportation because germany doesnt have school school buses

-im allowed to play in basketball games starting next week

-the purpleness has calmed down a little

-it rains almost everyday no exaggeration

-germans love facebook games like happy aquarium, farmville and random stuff

-theyre like 4 girls with uggs in my school now

-we have little like trailer class rooms for extra and they are called "containers" and i found that funny

-im working on convincing the germans we dont eat mcdonalds everyday

-"angepissed" means pissed in german and they also say "gechillt" as in chill

-did i mention that the meals here are the following:

1. breakfast: bread

2. lunch: pasta or potatoes

3. dinner: bread

quick

oldest house/building in osnabrück:my bike :

things are great! im understanding lots more in school

we took a politics test and i think i got one question right!

but theres only like 6-8 questions like short answer type.

random

-fenni also speaks platt deutsch a dialect and my host grandparents speak it always

-i'm going to osnabrück again tomorrow for the day after school

-my class in known as the "schwinne grippe" class in my school because we have 2 definite cases and a most likely third and an additional 6 people sick haha

-my bball team is playing a boys soccer team who thinks they can play bball too like next week or so

-they eat 5 gum here too

-they have special french frie eating mini fork things here that are SO useful

-kids here say "eeeeeeee" instead of "ewww" and i tried teaching them ew and they cannot say it at all haha

time is flyingggg

ok so im riding home with a boy from my class just like every day adn then we come up to the intersection and the little red bike is there so we cant cross so we stop and my bike is a little high so i hop down like usual. ten seconds later i fall over with my bike. i have no idea how it happened. but good news is that only 4 other people saw. plus every car that was passing. but it was extremely embarrassing but im not hurt mom, dont worry. :)

ok so now i should probably write what ive been doing for the past week.

my host family and i flew to Vienna, Austria last friday until sunday! it is the most beautiful city ive ever seen.

also apperently Sacher Hotel is world known but i didnt know it but we ate Sacher Torte s in the Sacher hotel cafe and its like this chocolate cake with jam in it made form some weird fruit i think and then its covered in like hard chocolate. but it was okay ahha.

and we went to Stefansdom which is a huge church in vienna and its awesome

we also went to Sisi's castle

and i ate my first spätzle for the year!

and visited the big ferris wheel taht i think vienna is also kinda known for? but it just seemed like a regular one to me.

we were outside the Spanish riding school for horses

and lastly we went to the hundertwasser house which was awesome im not sure i have the whole story correct but an artist designed / made this cafe on a corner and its with a bunch of bright colors and wacky shapes and stuff.

so school:

-failed a math test ahha

-failed a physics test but got 1 question right and beat another kid in my class by one point!

-took an egnlish test adn didnt get it back yet

-got 16/38 or so points on a german quiz!

-eaten 2 kinder happy hippos and they are great

-got an art drawing back and didnt understand what teacher said but i understood at the end he said good drawing. so i guess it was decent. now were drawing people but only with dots like copying a picture and its kinda fun but after 10 minutes not.

so im meeting with another exchange student on friday and saturday im going to brunch for fennis mothers bday and sunday baking chocolate chip cookies with friends!

also 8 kids from my class are out sick :O

and its like a joke here too people saying "Schwinne Grippe!" aka swine flu

so yeah but im healthy!

and still have basketball thats fun but im not good haha im not allowed to play in the games cause im an auslander (foreigner) but thats ok cause i dont know any rules.

also in my town there was like a fair for 4 days which was really cute like full out rides and everything.

ok yeah so things are great here!

Hamburg!

so i went to Hamburg for the weekend with my host family! we walked all through the town and saw the rathaus and the harbor (largest in europe) and it was BEAUTIFUL.

also i brought the wrong adapter so i cant charge my camera so yeah the pictures will come later i took them on host brothers camera.

ok yeah so then we went to THE most delicious restaurant ever. they serve tastings of everything! so you sit and they keep bringing more things to eat and its so gooooddd. everything was incredible. also fenni and i took the u-bahn (like a subway) back to go back to the hotel and then we had to take a bus to get completely back to the hotel and we took the wrong one after asking two people that said it was right adn then we didnt have any more time so we ended up just going back into the city for dinner ahha but that was an adventure :)

then the next day we went into the city again and walked around and then went to a planetarium!

so that was awesome.

i'm going to Vienna from friday til sunday this weekend!!!

more stufffff

oh also its freezing here. it was 32 degrees F the other day, today is nice its 51 but its windyy. theres frost on the ground every morning! i found out today that germans also check the radio for school closings or late openings when it snows so im excited for that but apparently it doesnt snow here often, but its going to be superr coldd. it snowed in south germany this week!

also i forgot to say that in münster there were street performers like in NYC and they were like the frozen ones that dont move and then like old fashioned dressed people doing weird things but like for money. and there were hobos and i was shocked at first because my town is super small i just realized after going to münster and they are def no homeless people on the streets here.

also i saw the rathaus (town capital building? like main important building of the town i forget what that is in english) and that was soo pretty and a cathedral so that was reallyy really cool and theres a clock that is superr old too.

also in münster i finally saw people wearing uggs! and a store that sold them! so im wearing mine now because i miss wearing uggs jeans and hoodies everyday haha.

and its starting to ger dark here at 630 already and they have a fall back time like we do in the us for the clocks so cool.

i start back up with basketball training and school next week!

Zug und Essen (train and food)

so yesterday i went to Münster! i met up with another exchange student from NY :)

i took the train all by myself and that was fine on the way there but then we walked the wrond way trying to get back to the train station and had to run and that was very stressful then we couldnt figure out if that was the right train and the people i asked didnt know either so i just decided to get on and then it was SO full so i searched for a seat for like 5 minutes then found one and worried the whole time if it was right.

then it was and fenni was there to pick me up and it all was good.

also last night we had steak. ti was the thickest steak ive ever seen in my life. and it was a little different from steak at home. also we ate it with ketchup. and drank tea with it..

this weekend im going to hamburg with my whole host family! were going to a planetarium on sunday :) so cool.

Alles

heres a picture of a bridge in the town:

its perfectly normal german students to snap their fingers in the air in place of raising a hand at the teacher. everytime someone does this i like get scared for them and then they get called on and nothing happens

also i went shoppppping and now i actually have some clothes besides t shirts

oh and i went to another party and its was lots of fun!

and were going to hamburg next weeekeeendd!

oh i also went jean shopping with my host dad (horst). for him. hahahha that was hilarious.

he asked me what was "in" light or dark jeans ahaha. he like kept coming out of the dressing room and idk hes just funny haha.

also i knew this from my trip before, but you bring a basket/carrier thing to the grocery to put your stuff in because otherwise you have to pay for plastic bags.

and i think everyone? but atleast my family goes to the food store everyday to get what they need for that day instead of like once a week or two weeks like we usually do at home.

apparently i don't look american to everyone here? because a kid last night thought i was from

france haha.

oh and heres a picture of the church in the center of the in city here!

been gone a month!

that month was so fastt.

yesterday i ate a döner! (picture)

and saw the ugly truth in german!

i understood like half of it :)

Tuesday & Wednesday

ok so tuesday i gardened with fenni for a bit and went to holland to look for a picture for the living room but didnt find one. then i went to a small party at a friend's boyfriend's house and that was fun. it was like in a renovated barn kinda thing. also i had a bite of a mcdonalds cheeseburger here and its much better than mcdonalds at home haha from what i remember i havent had mcdonalds burger in like 3 years. ok so that was fun. i rode my bike to meet with the girls and it was raininggg and dark but it was all good.

then today i gardened again with fenni then went to the super market and bought food which included smacks! cereal except here its called Honey something i forget but fenni was like this isnt healthy and she tried it and was like this is so sweet! wooow. as in like bad wow. hahha whatever i had that for dinner with yogurt and fruit and raisins. now im meeting the girls and we are taking the bus to a town called Lingen to go to the movies :)

First day of Break :)

today i went to the super market with fenni and i knew before that germans turn in their empty water bottles for money so we go into this little place and theres this sweet machine that you stick the bottles in and it like scans them with birght flashes and then sucks them into it it was soo sweet. then we got all the ingrdients for a salad. and it was the best. (well not better than yours mom) but it was goood. that was the first time i had a big salad here. then on our way out we stopped at the bakery (next door) to get bread to go with our salad and then i saw a sign under something that said "Amerikaner". which means american. so then i pointed it out to fenni and she was like oh you can try it! and so we went home ate a great salad then i ate the amerikaner and it was pretty good but not better than the berliner (another cake thing) i had last week.

also you have to go to the post office here to mail stuff and fenni was schocked that we have trucks that pick up our recycling stuff.

i also feel extremely successful because i met all the girls in the city. first off im riding and i get over this one bridge then cant for the life of me remember which way to go so then i called fenni and she clarified and so then im going for awhile then i come across the bridge im supposed to take and its kaputt (broken). and i cant read the signs because they had weird words. so i go where the other people are going which is right for like 5 minutes and that was no correct at all so i turn around and go back and take the other choice which was right again but under another bridge(there are a ton of bridges in my town)and go for like 10 minutes riding and that was reallyyy wrong. so i call lea but she didnt answer

so i ride back to the broken bridge and see the sign has an arrow saying to go back where i originally came from. so i go and then see these little girls go over a tiny bridge and follow them and went through this little alley way and then found my way through the city to the ice cafe where i met everyone!

then we went into the super market to show me all the yummy german candy and i found these raspberry/blackberry little thingers that are SOSO good. (mom and dad the things that i always get in the poconos in penny candy that are red and black and gummi in the middle)

yeah and brought the german equivalent of scor/heath bars. so GREAT.

THEN i had to order a book for my sprachcurs

(language course) and i did that successfully AND bought Winn-Dixie in german to read ! :)

another GREAT stop.

after that we were walking around a shop and i remembered i needed toothpaste so i bought that!

and finally! i had to go to the post office because of forementioned (is that a word?) reasons germans dont have mailboxes (well we don't).

so yeah we went there and lea helped me but i successfully mailed letter and handed in something for fenni. so yay!

this is the longest post ever sorry.

if you're still reading, i then made my way back to the house by myself in the rain and it was a good day.

Sonntag

ok the the oktober fest was hilarious. it was like 30 people tops drinking huge beers and a couple people in traditional lederhosen and derndels. it was like on one corner the cutest thing ever. and a blow up jumpy thing for kids hahaa it was great. moon bounce!

then i slept over Saskia's house (hey saskia :) hahah).

then today i went to my host oma (grandmom) and opas (grandfather) house for coffee and cake.

also the bike riding is getting old already haha just because its so windyy here haha.

but now i have fall break from school and language course and basketball for 2 weeks!

Samstag (Saturday)

im going to holland again with a friend today :)

then to small oktoberfest !

also germans use a ton of smileys when talking on the computer.

quick

1. im going to a small oktoberfest tomorrow in the next city over

2. you can never ever get sick of chocolate

3. i miss hot sauce so much

4. i can now itch my nose successfully while riding my bike without hitting anything

pictures

Geburtstag(birthday)

ok so my birthday was great! the girls in my class baked a cake for me and the entire calss sang happy birthday and we ate th ecake dure breaks haha and germans hug the birthday person. every single person. it was so weird haha they all lined up but it was cute. then i had gym adn we played hockey and that was fun.

so then after school 5 girls from my class came over for cake and candy and champagne and that was a ton of fun they made me a survial kit for germany :)

also we were sitting there eating and stuff and all of a sudden we hear a thud and look and A BIRD FLEW INTO THE GLASS DOOR.

it was one of the funniest things ive like ever seen ever. it was exactly like a commercial for windex and so there was the bird laying there. ill upload a picture. so yeah that was hilarious

also i got a house like ump suit, bike basket, tank top, and a purple sweater from my host family!

don't worry Fenni didn't know before that i hated purple but it came up the day before my bday and she was like ohhhh.. you hate purplee..? haha so we're going to exchange it.

yeah so then i had speaking course and its boring and 2 and half hours long but i learn like 3 wrods from it . but it will get bettter its really funny because its all adults and me and this chinese kid that goes to my school and the adults always answer out loud out of turn adn get angry at the person who didnt know the answer and like scream the answer at them.

Montag

the bbq was fun last night! the family who's house we were at re hilarious they have the cutest dog. oh its the same family with the farm and the 100 cows. a baby cow was born there before we got there nbd to them haha :)

school was fine today we got out a period early because our history teacher wasn't there!

i start speaking courses in my town tonight every monday and wednesday from 7-9:30.

but before that im meeting Saskia (play basketball with her and she's in my class) in the town to shop.

oh also the other kids from the program and i have a youtube channel you can search "amikinder" and thats it on youtube. a group of kids who went on this exchange did it last year and now we're continuing it.

Holland!

church in the city in Holland

these are also in /nordhorn too just to happened to photograph on same trip.

saturday morning

so i got up around 915 this morning and fenni too so she asked if i could finish making the tea and put it out with spoons and cups while she goes to get brötchen. (the most delicious oval spheres of bread ever.) so im like ok i can do that

so i go downstairs and find the kettle and it already has some tea with the bags in it but its cold so i think for like 10 minutes staring at it not knowing whether to pour it out, add to it, or heat it up.

then comes the problem of HOW to do any of those. i chose to ignore it and boil a new thing of tea. so i get out a pot and put water in it and put on the stove and thinking i made a safe decision.

then i find the teas and i have no clue which one to make.

so then fenni comes in and turns out not only was i cooking the water with the stove cover on the like heat circle but theres a special easy machine that heats the water for the tea. so now i know haha.

last night was really fun at pier99! and my friends made me a schülervz (kinda like german version of facebook) and ICQ what they use to chat so that was exciting.

i could eat brötchen every day all day with butter and marmelade its SO good.

ok going to holland!! :) with Alina and Annabel girls from my class to go shopping :D!

ich liebe ihr Mutti und Vati

forgot

i am also participating in the converse and skinny jean look that everyone wears so i think i look stupid and weird but i fit in that way haha ok also its cold here and my school sells twix and these things called happy hippos and they are so cute they are little hippos of chocolate and like cookie.

we have fall break after next weeeeek ! :)

Freitag nachmittag (friday afternoon)

so something else i noticed

everyone.wears.purple.every.day.

like seriously half my class every day has purple on including all the boys and teachers its insanee.

also they all wear skinny jeans and not sure if i said that the girls wear like little heels to school? they do.

i tried a math test today i understood half the directions on it :) hhaah i couldnt do any of the problems but whateverr.

tonight im going out to dinner with the girls from my class to a place called pier 99

its like 8 minutes on bike from my house

and tomorrow holland! for shopping! adn then basketball team is having a get together tomorrow night that i may or may not be going to.

Dienstag 22.09.09 Tuesday 9/22/09

success with bike today no crashes just a honk once because i cant take my hand off the steering thing to signal that im moving but whatever.

basketball was fun! im really bad but the girls are nice there were only 5 at practice and 10 on the team ahah.

tomorrow im going to a friends house to ride her horse with her! and another friend from my class.

ethiks today was weirrrrrrrrd.

the teacher was like ok were going to the computer room so we go down like 6 flights of stairs no joke my school has 6 levels i think

and so then i walk in the room and hes like ok you sit here ( in front of the class at the teachers computer) and im like okayyy?? so i sit and one of my friends in that class (diff. class because we change for ethics) comes with me to translate if necessary ahha.

so then he types in this web address and hes like ok go.

and it was like this thing where you talk to a robot online. and we were supposed to (i think) figure out if it was a computer or a person from USA. so i asked its favorite color and it said transparent.

so i told the teacher it was a computer. then the class proceeded to watch me chat with this silly robot for the period and translate what we were saying it was soo weird. then we went back up and read some text about some guy and theories on cause and effect.

yeah so today was actually really fun also we didnt have an english teacher today so my class rode our bikes into the city and ate at "kochlöffel" a fast food restaurant. i ordered all by myself :)

yeah so now i have to attempt math more because we have a test friday but im only going to "try" it. that should be fun haha.

oh also i wanted to say that girls here like some have a diamond on their tooth like you have your two big front teeth then on the next one they have it. so i told them about grillz like rappers and they thought it was hilarious. i also taught them the word poser the other day. haha they use that now.

montag

alright more about my life here

we watch tv about every night but its kinda boring for me but i do it for a little anyway because i like to spend time with them. we have watched who wants to be a millionaire twice haha

so fenni and i ate dinner and we each had two eggs in front of us like hard boiled and in germany or my family at least they cut the egg in half to eat it. instead of like cracking all around it and then peeling the shell off then with a spoon we ate our eggs haah weird.

oh also german fire places are sweet and look so high tech and intense.

i start basketball tomorrow! its in the next town over. there are 10 girls on the team and my classmate says they are all bad but im not sure i believe her haha.

so in english the other day we were listening to a passage about a girl with a working experience at an aquarium and she talked about how she "is in charge of the sea horses now! and she takes care of them every day, but has to be careful with the water temperature because they die quickly!" so the whole concept of seahorses and then dying made me giggle and then they others didn't understand because they didn't catch all of it look at me so that makes me laguh more and i had to explain afterwards to them about the dying seahorses.

im also addicted to chocolate now

i rode by myself to school and back today! without getting lost. but on my street starting off i have trouble going straight when i first get on so i fell into this fence on the other side of the street and like didnt fall to the ground but off the bike and caught the fence and its like 7 in the morning or whatever so this girl is like down the street a little and totally saw me fall hahah i was so embarrassed and i passed her and like she was just staring at me.

then i took a wrong turn but realized right away and turned around so that was all good.

so then after school i make it through the town all fine and dandy and then i have to like cross this high way kind of thing but its not THAT busy and cars always stop for bikes so no problem but there was this girl that unexpectedly turned where i was going across the street and so i was thrown off and i was also trying not to hit the car so i end up swerving onto the wrong side of the road. ( it is a circle/loop road thing and in the middle there are plants but its like surrounded by a curb. and bikes just ride on this nice little path across but that is in a circle too to the right of the car circle)so i swerve in order to avoid crashing with girl and car and ride up on this huge curb and back down and i like bounce and it was so embarrassing because it was in the middle of the loop of the highway! everyone around me saw because after school everyone is going home in cars and bikes. yeah.

so also in school:

we talked about media in english class it was stupid and basically all we accomplished was that no one goes to ballets or art galleries in their free time.

were learning about WW11 in history which is sweet because i love my teacher she is crazy but is an english teacher too so she talks to me.

oh also every single one of my teachers has the most horrific handwriting which makes translating notes even harder haha i write down all the options of the word that it could say then figure out which one is actually a word later.

i still sleep after school every day ahah. but also today i went with fenni to check on her stuff she sells at this vacation place she makes bags scarves shoe things and egg lamps with holes and puts them in a little glass closet thing in the foyer of the place.

she makes them with her friend, so we visited her friend after and she lives on a farm with 100 cows! and there was a baby cow who was 2 days old!!!!! cutest thing ever. and then that family invited us to go to a wine festival on saturday.

i learned a german saying elephant running in german though and its when a truck passes another truck on the autobahn haha.

oh also i have a hard time making european 1s that look likes upside down Vs and if you have a decimal its 1,54 instead of 1.54 which is like the hardest habit for me to break haha. ok thats all.

Osnabrück

so went to osnabrück with afs this weekend and it was okay met people from all over: bolivia, honduras, china, japan, dominican republic, italy, switzerland, russia, thailand, ecuador and places it was sweet. and i also felt really smart because the most common spoken language was english and whenever someone couldn't think of a word they would ask me or a girl from texas. oh yeah she was the only other from usa. but then we did a bunch of workshops all day and ate the exact same thing legitimately same thing for breakfast lunch and dinner.

yes, bread. bread with cheese and meat. sweet.

but it was good bread so it was ok.

yeah so also things i noticed here i forgot to mention

-boys dress up every day like its picture day its adorable

-they style their hair also adorable

-german teens eat at school all day long: chocolate and bread

-the teachers wear jeans! like all week

-they have parties every weekend

-they really do ride their bikes everywhere

-they dress up for school in cute outfits everyday but wear it two days in a row like a lot of people will wear the same blouse with like a high belt thing? sorry for the poor fashion language arden and the next day like wear a different belt with the same blouse

-if they use binders in school its one huge one with everything in it, otherwise these folders with like idk how to explain but you hole punch papers with two holes on the side of the paper but like halfway and they go in the folders

-i think most families eat lunch when you get home from school

yeah and theres like a billion eiscafes in the city here and i went to one today adn you sit down like a restaurant and you order these intricate ice cream dishes and they bring it to you!

and its really cute and good. oh eiscafe=ice cream place

im starting to get known as the american as i meet more people in the town haha.

oh there are little paths EVERYWHERE for bikes its great nice and smooth.

oh and the town has the cute little ground like cobble stone i think its called and theres a ton of stores of every type and restaurants but shops are closed on sundays.

food/donnerstag

someone brought it to my attention that i haven't mentioned food very much. its not all meat. people show know that germans eat bread all day long. mostly with cheese.

in the mornings i have bread with strawberry jam and a cup of tea

at school i have bread with jam and butter and apples and sometimes a granola bar thing and then usually buy cheesebread "käsebrötchen"?

and then i come home and have a small lunch once it was pasta thing with chicken, another time tomato salad.

then dinner we've had hamburgers and fries, toast with cheese and ham and peaches ahhah, went out to an italian restaurant and got pizza, oh and potatoes and pasta and goulash? beef stuff. so yeah its really good for the most part.

oh and theatre yesterday was pointless for me because she would tell us to act out something but i didnt understand her so i didnt do it. but e had to get in groups and make a skit but only one person talked while others acted so i "got in a fight with a girl" for our skit. yeah silly.

politics was boring because after 15 minutes of not knowing any words my mind shut down .

i understood most of math today!!

Mittwoch

today i didn't do gym but watched and they did gymnastics it was crazy they had the little trampolines and a wall thing and big mats they ran and flipped so their hands were on the wall and flipped it was so easy for them ahhaha. im glad they are starting hockey for next week when i play. ok so i got a cell phone today! haha oh and i have friends officially! they stopped by while roller blading at my house to hang out yay haha. they told me after my birthday we can go to the disco and they will take me to the stuff they are doing on the weekends but this weekend i have orientation with afs (program) which i'm kind of excited for? but i might be the only american and in that case i'm not. plus they told me to bring slippers. so that sounds promising.

i get can get like halfway to school by myself now its a 20 minute bike ride. tomorrow will be the 2nd time i attempt it, but with my host mom so i dont get lost. and tomorrow i get to find my class room by myself! im pretty confident. hahah. oh and i get out a period early because no french.

oh tonight we went to an italian restaurant (my host family's favorite) and i got pizza. oh also before that i got my first ice cream here. it was snickers and delicious.

then every night we watch tv drink tea and eat chocolate its great.

oh i posted pictures of my room on facebook!

schedule

so here's my german schedule for school:

monday

english

geography

art

art

physics

history

tuesday

go in late because im not taking french haha

history

german

math

english

religion

religion (ethics)

wednesday

gym

gym

english

geography

theater

theater (yes, acting in a foreign language. ill let you know how that one goes)

thursday

math

math

politics

politics

biology

physics

chemisty

friday

german

german

chemistry

math

biology

there are weird breaks in between some classes. and you go and like buy cheese bread and candy and yogurt? at this stand thing haha.

and some of the students are the school nurse from what i understand they carry around a cell phone and it rings when someone needs them haha.

but i like that i get out early some days like 130 i think? but today i got out at like 320 so LAME.

and im dreading thursdays because math is hard haha we are doing like exponents im pretty sure but i finally could do the easy problems after about 20 minutes today and didn't have time to attempt the harder ones. but that teacher like gave up explaining to me haha because i couldn't understand what he was telling me but its all good cause i take turns asking my classmates how to do it.

yeah and then 2 hours of politics. no.

and biology i have yet to have sooo hopefully fun and physics as i think i said is straight up impossible but im trying. because you can only translate some words but the equations and graphs don't work. oh then chemistry i hope isn't too hard but just being wishful.

again, i rocked english today did a role play in front of the class so they could hear english. and i really like that teacher

german we are doing regular and irregular clauses? and wishes and i kind of understand that because we did wishes and possibly the others in german (thanks frau D!)

yeah ethics the teacher was annoying and like after i told him i didn't speak a ton of german started like speaking super fast with big words like 7 different times at me and i had no clue what was going on.. but he gave out a reading on a philosopher i think and we were supposed to read it and summarize it so of course i had to translate the whole thing first so then i had the girl next to me ask if i had to do it and he was like hwefs uhh you can you should no you dont so i decided that was a no. haha then we watched irobot.

Erste Tage in Schule

ok so first day of school. i got up at 630 and got ready and everything and fenni drove me to school then i met my english teacher and Lea (host family's niece). so then i met all of her friends that are in our class. for those of you who don't know german classes are like elem. school where you stay with them. but we move for physics art and we have breaks for random times in between classes. so in english it was great i taught my class how to say curious and they thought i was like the smartest. and then we got in groups and had to write a letter as an employer and i wrote it haha. btu that was really fun. so then i had geography and i got 4 words out of that: export,import, coffee, tractor. yeah. ahha and then i had art and drew this horrible picture but the teacher is weird and it didnt matter at all. physics is impossible i learned the words speed and something else i forget. but most of the teachers are nice. then i had history. yeah so school was okay it will get better. some friends i met invited me to go shopping in the netherlands sometime.

here!

'i'm here! its my first day. the plane ride was looooooonnnnnnggg. and then we had to wait forever for a train and then get off and on to another train adn then finalllyy at like 9 o clock german time i got to Osnabrück station where my host family picked me up! it was awkward adn weird at first and we drove an hour to our house. then we ate hamburgers and drank champagne hahah. the burgers had a lot of stuff on them not sure what i think cucumbers instead of pickles? but they eat superrrrr fast so i they were like ohhh..you're not done yett.. haah but it was ok. i showered and went to bed. my bed is SO comfy. i slept until 1230 in the afternoon german time! ahha but steffen left at like 9 to his boarding school. i had bread and nutella for breakfast then my classmate Lea (host family's niece) visited with her parents and my host mom spilled orange juice haha. but that was neat. i think im sopposed to wear shoes in the house? but i cant wear sneakers because of these mad blisters i have on my heels from shoes in DC so i put my flip flops on but they told me my feet are cold haha so i showed them my blisters and Lea's mom is a nurse so they left adn we rode our bikes ( i did well) to their house so there she put some tape stuff on them ahah then we rode into town adn it was soooo nice and fun. the weather is PERFECT here. they use these keys that pop out of the bike instead of locks so that it only works with the key in it. its really cool. yeah so then we drove out of town by the lake and stopped at a restaurant for drinks then rode back home by the zoo! haha. my host dad said sometimes the monkeys wake them up in the mornings :). it rained in the morning here but now its cool and a little windy. ok ill write another time when more happens. loving it so far! i have english first period tomorrow hooray! my family says my german is very good and i understand a lot. i'm still really tired. islept in until 1230 afternoon here haha but they didnt mind. so its all good here!

DC pictures

retry.

DC

September 10, 2009 by Rachel!

ok so orientation is better than i thought it would be. we went to dept. of state today which was pretty boring and visited lincoln memorial and Vietnam and WWII. Meet with Jim Gerlach briefly to promote AFS and to thank him. And we went to the German Embassy. they gave us free lanyards and pins so it was okay we watched a movie thing then got lectured. dinner was at a german place it was also okay. tomorrow we’re in the hotel all day so its whatever it will be fun.

just found out Steffen will be able to come with my host parents to pick me up Saturday night in Osnabrück train station. so .

the hotel is really nice.

ok bye.