Tag 1: der Reisetag

Day 1 -Die Reise

Well today I began the trip with 4 amazing high school girls to Dahlem, Germany. It began with us all meeting at the airport 2 hours before our 5:30 flight out of Dulles. We got to the SAS ticket counter and MAN was that line long, but we got to the gate with enough time to stop by Starbucks  as per Jessica's tradition.

Everything was working perfectly until we got on the tarmac and we got stuck there for 45 minutes. A storm was coming through and we were stuck behind another plane who was being rerouted due the storm. Unfortunately by the time they had figured out the new route for the plane ahead of us, our plane needed a reroute to get out of the city. Finally after 45 minutes we were in the air, but within the first 15 minutes we hit the storm. Normally turbulence doesn't phase me. I have flown often enough that I know to expect it and that the plane is perfectly under control. However this turbulence was the WORST turbulence that I have ever experienced. We had several sudden and prolonged altitude drops that forced me to brace myself on the seat in front of me in order to not smash into it. Thankfully after a few minutes the intensity stopped and the captain explained that we had gone through a storm cloud that we couldn't get around, but that all was well.

The flight itself was OK, but it was definitely one of my more physically uncomfortable flights that I've taken overseas. SAS seems to have narrowed their seats by several inches since the last time I flew with them, and they have also decided that only one non-alcoholic drink is free during the flight. They later explained when I asked that hot tea, coffee, and water were still cost free the juice and sodas were the only non-alcoholics that were limited.  The girls and I were all split up, but I think the seat arrangements actually worked out really well. 3 of them are in the same German class together and are very good friends and the other is a year older and from another high school in the county. I was on my own a row ahead of two of the girls and then the 2 others were a few rows back from that.

Once we actually landed we realized how much the delay in Washington had impacted our trip. Our flight out of Copenhagen to Hamburg only allowed for a 45 minute layover and given our 45 minute delay we missed our flight. The transfer desk quickly sorted out our issues, but told us that regretfully the only other flight to Hamburg today was at 2pm. It was 8 am at the time. So the girls and I settled in for a day in the lovely Copenhagen Airport. We had thought maybe we could go out and explore the city, but decided getting a taxi and spending money all over the city wasn't really what we wanted to do. Plus the airline gave us 2 vouchers for food worth €10 each. Unfortunately in Copenhagen that doesn't translate to much food, but we were able to get some Starbucks coffees and I got a ready to go pasta in a container for lunch.

The delay turned out to actually be quite a blessing in disguise. The girls and I ended up spending the day together getting to know one another and bonding as a group. We had fun swapping stories, and I teased the girls for their sport-like boy watching. 15 year olds are absolutely hysterical to watch scoping out boys. They had little code names like my friends and I used to for each different individual or group of attractive males they found. My favorite being, "The Herd" which referred to a young soccer team that the girls saw outside of a café. As we were waiting at our gate the girls and I were sitting at separate tables for a few minutes and Anna turned around once and said to me, "I'm pretending like I'm talking to you so I can look at the boys behind you." I told her I would take a picture so they could scope out the boys a little longer. The picture is below :P

The exhausted girls scoping out boys (and making silly faces).

Once we were finally in Hamburg Jay our point person here in German was waiting with a sign at the exit. He drove us home in one of the school's vans and although He and I had a wonderful chat about the differences in schools in Germany and America the girls all passed out for a much needed nap on the way to Marienau. The host families were excitedly waiting for the girls at the school when we arrived and were promptly swept off and taken to their new homes for the next 2 weeks. Jay then took me on a tour of the school and brought me to my extraordinarily large 2 level apartment where I will be staying, which has a beautiful view of the forest from my living room.

My Living Room

He then dropped me off to get dinner in the school cafeteria (this is a boarding school and the dinners are quite nice), where I met several of the staff members and had a wonderful meal with them. After dinner I retreated to my apartment and after about 30 minutes of sorting through my things and then discovering my American Netflix account now works in Germany without a proxy server,  and that this account essentially to my delight switched to a German account and all the shows have German dubbing, I passed out watching Clueless in German.  I woke a few hour later changed out of my day clothes and slept again until 3 am which leads us to now when I am sitting in my room at an absurd our blogging the minute details of our trip whilst watching Arrested Development in German.

Here's to a wonderful 2 weeks in one of my favorite countries in the world.

Tschüss!

Kathleen