Tage 2 & 3: die Elbe, Eis und Hamburger

So I am writing this again in the wee hours of the morning as I'm still not quite over my jetlag and Am waking around 4 am most days. I missed yesterday blogging in fact, because I completely and totally passed out before I had the chance to even make it to dinner that evening and although I woke up a few times, I was able to quickly get myself back to sleep.

Host sisters, the girls, Herr Blume & I in front of the main building.

So Day 2 for the girls they went to their first day of classes with their host sisters. I know a few of them had English and German classes, and anything that was being taught in German mostly went over their heads. As they were doing that I was brought on a walking tour of the school grounds. Herr Blume gave me a wonderful history of the school which sadly I can't remember much of. After my tour we went and had breakfast in the cafeteria. During breakfast they serve rolls, bread, (toast for the students),  along with a variety of cold cuts and cheeses. They also have some vegetables and fruits on the end, and some yogurts, jams, and musli (cereal/granola cereal). This is a very typical German breakfast spread. I ate with the teachers and then the girls came in with the other students during their first break of the day. They told me about their classes and how they had heard their teachers talking about fairytales in German class, but they have no idea what the story was.

After breakfast the girls when back to class and then after that class the school had lunch. We have been given a special table that the girls and their host sisters and I all sit at with Herr Blume.  The lunch they served for our first day was a very traditional southern german meal. We had Leberkäse, sauerkraut, and mashed potatoes. The principal whilst we were all eating gave out the announcements and also announced the girls and the school welcomed us.

After lunch Herr Blume gave the girls and their host sisters a tour of the grounds. However this was only after I brought the girls back to my apartment to get them some warmer clothing. Several of them were not dressed properly for the weather and I figured letting them get a cold walking in the cold rainy weather on the first day would not be a good way to start, so to the parents of the girls if you see them in clothing you never bought for them in the pictures this is why.

Once the girls had their tour we got into the school van with Herr Blume and took a trip to see the Elbe. I think at this point the girls were pretty exhausted by their jet lag, because for the rest of our time together they just looked exhausted.

When we got to the river Herr Blume explained that this used to be the boarder between East and West Germany during the Cold War and that the land on the other side of the river had still not developed and recovered from this period.  This is because during the Cold War there was a 3 mile buffer to the boarder and all of the land was cleared with the exception of a few homes and watch towers for the boarder guards' usage.

The girls and their host sister tried skipping rocks and watched the ferry that is still in operation today, because they have yet to rebuild the bridge that stood there before the Cold War.

Spaghetti Eis

We ended our days excursion with a sweet treat at an Eis Café. Eis being the German word for ice cream. This was most definitely the highlight of the day as the girls got to try something they have learned about for YEARS in their German classes, Spaghetti Eis. Spaghetti Eis is an ice cream sundae where they make the sundae look like a plate of spaghetti. This is done by pressing the ice cream through a press in a similar fashion to the way play doh spaghetti is made. It is then topped with a strawberry syrup sauce, and shaved white chocolate to mimic the tomato sauce and parmesan on real spaghetti. The girls all ordered one and all loved it. MANY pictures of this historic moment were taken. ;) I personally went for one of my favorites the Haselnuss Becher which is a sundae with hazelnuts. Typically it is covered in Ferrero Roche and chocolate sauce as well, but this one was all about the hazelnuts and was also quite delicious.

Haselnuss Eisbecher

After ice cream we drove back to the school and the girls were picked up by their host families.






Tag 3: Hamburg

Today was a pretty cool day. We began as usual with the girls going to class with their host sister, and then having breakfast together. I sat with the girls in the student area, which I think was strange for the actual students at the school, but since I know the girls and not the other teachers I prefer it. That and it gives me a chance to confer with the girls during the day and see what they are up to and if anything needs to be adjusted in their schedules. Today there was a definite need for adjustment after the first period for the girls as Jessica had Chemistry in the morning and was slotted for Biology in the afternoon. This in German is of course a little intense and so I let her and Kat tag along with Anna and Grace to their Math Class which Herr Blume was teaching. While they were in class learning about the Quadratic Equation and factorials, I sat and continued breakfasting with the other teachers who did not have a class that period. I enjoyed being able to talk with them a bit and learn a little more about the school culture here in Germany.

Once class was over Herr Blume and the girls came to get me from the teacher's lounge where I had been discussing with another teacher au pairing as her niece is leaving for Chicago in a few weeks to au pair, and we loaded up in the van to Hamburg. As with every trip thus far in the van the girls' jet lag catches up with them and they all passed out for the majority of the hour long ride to the city. Once in the city we began our day at the Elbe Tunnel. This tunnel is used to this day for day workers in the shipyards and harbors to get to work, however during the work day it is mostly filled with tourists who wish to see the tunnel itself and the view of Hamburg from across the river. Whilst visiting this area Herr Blume gave us a little of the history of the area and explained how due to a high trade industry that Hamburg is home to the most millionaires on the European continent.

Herr Blume then drove us around for a while trying to find a restaurant to get lunch near the harbor, but parking was a little crazy so he gave up and we headed down town. After a little walking he introduced the girls and I to Moenckebergstrasse which a locals shopping street in Hamburg. I explained to the girls that this is kind of like their mall, but instead of a singular building and a roof it was a street and a few side streets with similar shops to our mall. I also restarted a game with the girls that I introduced in the Copenhagen airport to pass the time and get the girls a little more active and communicative. Whenever they see an American brand store or advertisement whomever sees it first and calls it out gets a point. Herr Blume gave me an hour with the girls to go shopping and said he would meet us afterward. We began by walking the street and went into one store Promod which is akin to express or zara at home.


The girls soon had seen all they needed to of the store and told me that they were hungry and wanted to sit down at a restaurant. So we sat and got some fish at a restaurant on the street name Daniel Wischer. The girls each split a vareity plate of 3 different battered fishes and fries and I got Fisch Frikadellen, which are essentially fishcakes with a side of warm german potato salad.  When we finished it was time to go meet up with Herr Blume. Jessica had expressed her desire earlier in the day to eat a Hamburger in Hamburg and said it was imperative that

The girls eating their hamburgers in Hamburg. :)

we do so, so Herr Blume as sweet as he is, found a burger place not far from where we were whilst we were shopping and eating. The girls were all stuffed however and so when we got to the burger place they decided to split one burger into 4 quarters and we took video and pictures of them. They cooks and staff found this extraordinarily amusing.

Herr Blume bought us doughnuts.

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Once we fulfilled Jessica's burger needs we headed off towards the older portion of the city that houses the Rathaus, stock exchange, exclusive multimillionaire banks, and the posh expensive shopping street ( Think Champs-Élysées in Paris). We went and saw the waterfront and Rathaus and then continued on to beautiful park downtown and also as a treat from Herr Blume got some dunkin doughnuts. I also pointed out to the girls a statue of one of my favorite German writers Gotthold Ephraim Lessing. I explained the story of one of his most famous works "Nathan der Weise" (Nathan the Wise) and how important it was for it's time. I told them of one of the parables in the book that Nathan tells a Sheik that gives the moral that no religion is better or more important than the others and that we do not know truly which way is right, but that we should all go on living in the best way we know how and be good and kind to others. I personally cried the first time I read this story and was very happy to share a little piece of this with the girls. 

Statue of Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

Once we had seen as much  of the city as our feet could handle walking we took the train back with Herr Blume to the car and started our trip home. The girls again passed out as they do on every car trip. Once we were home The host families began showing up to pick up each of the girls, however before all of them left the girls and I decided that we would have a sleepover in my apartment for tomorrow night. In my apartment I have 2 other rooms beside my own and 3 extra beds. Herr Blume has sad he will work on getting an extra bed for one of the other rooms as well. The girls are very excited to have a girls night in with one another and to order in some pizza and do facial masks :). It should be a lot of fun.

OK well that's all for today lovelies!

Tschüss!

Kathleen

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

Germany Trip 2k15!

This summer I'm escorting an amazing group of students for a two week cultural exchange trip in Germany. I will post about our adventures for the benefit of our families and friends back home. 

Meine Erste Post im Deutschland! (my first post in Germany)

OK, so I have been a bit negligent with my postings, but hey I have been a busy girl :) In the three days I have been here I have done sooo much! It feels like I have been here a long time already! So I guess I will start with the flight. I sat next to this old, but nice Bulgarian man. He could not speak a word of English, but his grand son who was sitting in front of him was able to help when I couldn't understand what he needed. I had wanted to sleep, but unfortunately when the Bulgarian man slept he moved a lot and his elbows kept hitting me in the stomach... I got about 45 minutes total on the plane. On the plane I flew over Ireland, England, and Brussels before entering Germany. It was really awesome! When we landed I got off the plane and actually went on to the runway. From there we took a shuttle to area where we went through passport control. I sat next to this nice old woman on the shuttle who I wish I had stuck with the whole way. I instead followed these other American teenagers who seemed to be going to the same place I needed but then I realized they were headed for a connecting flight. Thank God I noticed it when I did or I would have gone the completely wrong way. I asked a lady at Auskunft (information) where I could get my luggage and she pointed me in the right direction. Once I got to baggage claim I saw the old woman I sat next to on the shuttle pulling my bag off the belt and looking at it to see if it was hers. I told her that it was mine and she was excited to see that she had helped. I waited a few minutes with her and helped her find her bag on the belt. Hers was much heavier so I am glad I could help her. After that I thought I was going to need to go through a lot more customs, but I just kind of walked through. On the other side, I immediately saw Karin Wohnig, (the mother of my uncle) and waved. She and Co (? I have no idea how to spell his nick name, but his true name is Andre). He can speak English pretty well. Anyway we went to the car and drove the hour and a half to Landenhausen. The drive was absolutely beautiful! There are a lot of fields of yellow flowers called "raps" that they use for car, food, and animal oil (and no i have no idea why animals need oil). The flowers up close look like ragweed... i wonder if that would work better for Americans than corn? although allergies would go nut :-P Anyway we first stopped in a small town called Lauterbach, so we could get lunch. They had wanted to bring me to a German restaurant but we were too late, so we went to a Greek restaurant instead. I found it hilarious that the first thing the waitress did was bring us a shot of licorice schnapps. Co didn't drink his because he was driving so he offered it to me. The shot was good, but I didn't want to right off the bat look like I am some sort of wild child who drinks shots all day, but when I refused the second his mom downed it! Ordering lunch was funny because I thought I had ordered a gyro and instead I ordered a HUGE plate of meats! As I have learned over the past few days in Germany portion size is not small! That is a definite myth (or at least in the small towns). The mom and the grandma keep trying to make me eat more and more! After lunch we went directly to their house in Landenhausen. It is one of the coolest houses I have ever seen! It is seriously straight out of the forties!!! I mean it has some modern touches tv, computer, etc., but she doesn't own a washing machine or a dishwasher. One of the refrigerators is as big as the one I have at school for the dorms, and the other is only a little bit bigger. they don't really use the first one only the second. Everything else is kept cool in the basement. The decor is truly retro, but I find it chic it in its own way. They live at the top of the highest hill in Landenhausen and the view is truly magnificent. You can see for miles & miles!!! I unfortunately forgot the cord for my Camera so until I either find one or get home there won't be any pictures. I then took a nap... that went well much longer than I meant it to. When I woke up I found Karin with a small meal ready for me in the "wintergarten" or what we would call a sun room. We talked (with some difficulty) about the house and the animals that were running around outside the house (dear, birds, etc.). Then I met the next door neighbor, "oncle Hans". He was Marco's (my uncle, sue's husband) English teacher. It's funny he has an extreme British accent. He came over to watch the soccer game with Adolf (Karin's husband) I cannot remember the team's name right now but they won :) ... After the game we all went to bed where I slept until about 6 am.

DAY 2
At about 11 Ralph (Marco's middle brother) came and dropped off Nele (his 8 month old daughter) at with us. We went on a little tour of Landenhausen with her in the stoller and then to Oma's for lunch, where we had fish and potato salad (more like potatoes au gratin with dil). On the tour I got to see a lot of animals and the cemetery where I saw the graves of several generations in their family. Then we went to the church which dates back to the 1600's. Everyone in their family had been baptized and confirmed there. When we got to the Oma's I met her and Opa. They are both very sweet people. We all played with Nele on the floor. She loves to roll on her stomach and then back again. After lunch we went back to the house, which was a feat, because Nele was crying and I had to rock her back and forth in the stroller. Also I said earlier they live at the top of the highest hill in Landenhausen. Pushing a stroller up that is a bit difficult! Then we all took a nap again mine was too long... this jet lag is not agreeing with me. I ate dinner again with the mom and then Ralph his girlfriend (?) and their other child Jonas came and we played soccer and colored for about an hour. Jonas is a kid with a lot of energy! He is really cute though. I couldn't understand a word he was saying! He is only three so neither of us are very good at German :-p ... It is now about 1 in the morning here and I am getting VERY tired so I am going to go ahead to sleep more to come tomorrow!

Gift for the Wohnigs

A digital picture frame! Seriously, I am so excited to give this to them! They are housing me for free for three weeks, and refuse any sort of reimbursement. I am going to load a bunch of pictures of their grandson/my cousin Noah and my Aunt Sue and Uncle Marco onto it. Pictures say a thousand words in English or German! :-D

If you are family looking at this, don't tell them ;-)

Where am I going?

This summer I will be staying with my Aunt Sue's In-Laws, the Wohnigs, in a little German village called Landenhausen for 3 weeks. That's about an hour northeast of Frankfurt. I am so excited about this trip! I will be meeting up with a friend of my Aunt's in Fulda named Katja, who has this adorable 2 year old little girl. Hopefully I will also be meeting up with my cousin Julia and go to Berlin with her! So these are my plans so far for Germany.

After this big trip I am going to Chicago! I am going to be a nanny for my Aunt Sue. I am going to be helping her out with my adorable cousin Noah and the soon to be baby Wohnig all summer. I will be speaking almost entirely in German so that Noah becomes bilingual. His daddy already speaks to him solely in German, so I would just be another German voice. :)

Anyway those are my plans for the summer!

Dates:
Germany: May 5th- 27th

Chicago: June 3rd- August 13th4


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Above was my first trip to Germany. I have since gone back to Germany and completed a 6-week course in Berlin with the FUBiS Program. It was an amazing trip and is one of the most special and life changing events in my life. I now having done both of these trips still yearn for more Germany. I am returning to Berlin this summer to do another course with the FUBiS Program. However this time I will be taking classes for 6 hours M-F, instead of M,W,F like last trip. I also will be staying for the second summer session this time and will be in Berlin for 11 weeks.

I think that this trip will be possibly even more amazing than either of the first two. Since I am going alone, I will have an amazing freedom that I had a small taste of when I went backpacking over a weekend during my last Germany trip. I can do exactly as I wish, when I wish to do it! ... as long as it is not during class hours ;). I can't wait to get there and begin my new adventure!