An Update

So life is fabulous, although not being in Germany feels like there is a huge chunk missing from my life. I've done alright adjusting and handling the reverse cultural shock. Thank goodness for the invention of Skype. I chat weekly with my lovely host family. I miss them so much. The hardest things in adjusting back to USA life were to remember to always speak English (since nobody understands German around here) and to get used to eating American food. I have adapted and kept so many German cultural things in my style of life...biggest one is eating the European style with the fork in left hand and knife in right hand. Also, I am constantly cooking German meals with recipes from Heidi's kitchen.

So, I'm currently in Provo, Utah attending Brigham Young University. As of now, I'm planning to major in Neuroscience and minor in Harp Performance... we'll see where that takes me. I started my new job this past Monday, and I start classes this coming Monday. I am very excited to begin the next adventurous chapter of my life.

The reason why ich bin dicker geworden

(this post is especially for my Papa...)

Essen (Food) in Deutschland

The typical breakfast on Saturday or Sunday.

Heidi cooks some pretty amazing food. Here are some of my favorites:

Zuericher Geschnizltes
(no idea how to translate that, but it is chicken and onions in a very tasty sauce.)

Pfiferling Spagatti
(chicken and mushroom sauce)

One of my very favorites: Kaiserschmarn
(comparable to something like pancakes covered in powdered
sugar and eaten with applesauce)

Spätzle mit Huhnchen und Piltz
(Spätzle with chicken and mushrooms. Spätzle are typical egg noodles served as a side in Germany)

Spargel Sauce mit Kartoffeln
(White asparagus sauce served over potatoes...)

Eier, Kartoffeln, und Spinat
(Sunnyside-up Egg over Potatoes and Spinach)

Now to those typical foods:

Bratwurst
Check out the huge long wurst in the tiny brötchen....so normal

Currywurst und Pommes

Leberknödel Suppe
(took me a while to get used to....didn't realize until last month that Leber=Liver. No wonders I didn't like it particularly.)

Döner
I love these things. So good.

Käse (Cheese!!!) - Heidi discovered in the first two months that I love different types of cheeses. And let me tell you, they have quite the assortment of cheeses here in Germany. DELICIOUS!



And of course:

German ice-cream

Spagatti Eis

So that was just a little overview of the types of foods I normally eat here in Germany. It's going to be weird having to eat American food again.

A Day at a Time - Part 7

Saturday

Well, this post ends my week-long "day at a time" posts. This week was pretty typical. Life is always interesting.

Today was a pretty chill day. I practiced harp, worked on some homework, and baked some delicious snickerdoodles and chocolate chip cookies.
Later in the afternoon, I headed to my church for a baptism of a Russian girl who is working as an Au pair (nanny) here in Germany. That was pretty awesome.

After that I met with some friends from school and went bowling. Es hat so viel Spaß gemacht! (It was so much fun!)

A Day at a Time - Part 6

Friday

School was awesome. I love my Fridays!!! (especially since I'm finished with school at 10am).

I had one hour of Music, we analyzed a piece by Beethoven.

Then 2 hours of Sport, where we played floor hockey. Now That is something I can play, and love doing! It was so much fun, but I was really tired afterward and ended up sleeping 2 hours after school.

Later I made chocolate chip cookies. Trying to be resourceful and creative, I used some chocolate from my ginormous Easter bunny. However, about 10 minutes after I was finished with the cookies, Heidi came running into the living room (with her worried face) and asked me what finger I had lost. I was momentarily confused until she told me there was a unusual red/pink color in the cookies. Haha....some of bunny chocolate was colorful. Below is a picture of the Easter Bunny.

What I tripped over on Easter Day Morning
(silly host family - leaving things at my bedroom door)

A Day at a Time - Part 5

My school is so pretty!!!

Thursday

...my longest day of school.

2 hours Religion
2 hours Mathe
1 hour Geschichte
2 hours Musik

Reli - Vortrag (presentation) about another capital sin: Neid/Eifersucht (Envy/Jealousy). Apparently it's a little hard to distinguish between the two German terms. So I was given the assignment for next Tuesday to explain the difference of the terms (in English).

Mathe - really long and sort of pointless. Our teacher got so excited with something or other and went off on a crazy tangent. He not only lost me, but the entire class. Nobody could understand what he was talking about.

Geschichte - More about a Sweden war and then analyzing pictures/drawings. I paid better attention this time.

Musik - was very different. Our teachers (they are team teaching) directed us into the orchestra room, instead of our normal room. There was orange juice and fruit for us, and we were directed to sit down. We were going to have a paino concert. So after we were quiet, our teacher walked in, sat down and began, or we thought he was. He closed the piano lid, and just sat there. It was hilarious to watch the kids reactions. I knew what was going on...
After a minute, he opened the piano lid, waited a few seconds and closed it again. Some kids burst out laughing, but were quickly quieted by the glare from the other teacher. After about two minutes, he once again opened and closed the paino lid. Finally after a few more minutes he opened the piano lid, stood up and bowed. He had just ''performed'' a piece titled Four Minutes, Thirty-three Seconds, by John Cage. I knew what was going on because I had just read up yesterday on John Cage in preparation for my Vortrag. It was hilarious. We then talked about this experimental piece and whether it was really music or not. Then I gave my presentation over John Cage.

After school, I came home and later watched a horse film with Laura and Heidi.
Later, I went to Metro (German version of Costco) with Dieter, Laura and Matthias. There I bought a few gifts for my USA family (can't believe I only have 34 days left!!!). :D

A Day at a Time - Part 4

Wednesday

Nulltestunde Englisch gefällt mir gar nichts. (I don't really like having early morning English class). We worked more on the group advertisement project.
After English, I had two free hours. I used to start school on Wednesdays at 10am, but then they had to go and change the schedules for some reason or other, and my English class ended up as zero period on Wednesday. Blah.

During my two free hours I spent part of the time with Heidi in the horse stables, and then the rest of my time in the Bibliotek reading a book.

Then finally I had class again, but my the hardest class, Geschichte (history). We talked about a war between Sweden and Germany, or something like that. I'm not exactly sure cause I zoned out a few times, and that's really bad, because I have to concentrate or else I'm completely lost since of the German language.

After Geschichte, we had lunch - fish sticks and salad. It was alright, but it tasted too much like American food.

Then off to Chemie class. A girl gave a presentation over some chemical that is giftig (poisonous). It was interesting, but long.

After school, I worked on a Musikprojekt with a friend. We have to give a presentation over John Cage (I, the American, got assigned this cause he's an American componist - what a concidence) on Thursday in class.

A little later, I headed to church for the Young Single Adult activity, which was amazing! We had a scavenger hunt game around the church building. Special shout out to Anya: Thanks for all your help in planning it!!!

Our YSA group has activities every Wednesday, and since me being the YSA Representative, I'm in charge of each activity and making sure that people go.

Yep that was pretty much it for my day...

I love this picture of Samy. She's such a sweet dog!

A Day at a Time - Part 3

Tuesday

I had only 3 hours of classes. One hour of German, one hours of Math, two free hours, and one hour of Religion. In German I continued working on that book project. Math was ridiculous, we're talking about Statical stuff that I learned in 9th grade.

Then during the two free hours I went with my friend, Tabita, to a Eyeglass place in downtown Bad Honnef, which was about a 15 minute bikeride from school. (She had to get her glasses fixed because they were bent from getting slammed in the face by a ball in Sport class.) After that we went back to my house to eat lunch and do some homework. A little later, we headed back to school.

In my Religion class we listened to a presentation about one of the seven deadly sins: Anger. I really like my Religion class, it's so interesting.

Then after school, all I have to say is Sport Project! Blah.... I finally finished it late at night, but it took up my entire afternoon and evening... then I fell into bed, exhausted.

A Day at a Time - Part 2

Monday

I really do love Mondays. A fresh start to a new school week. It really helps that I start my days out with two hours of English class. :D I love that part. Today in English class, we talked about advertisements and how to analyze them. Then we were given an assignment to work in groups to design and advertise a product. My group was excited to have me....the native speaker.

After English we had our Breakfast Pause. Today was a little different. Instead of going to the cafeteria to pick up our brotchen, we had to go to the gym where we had an assembly in honor of the Schloss Hagerhof Girls Basketball Team. This past weekend they won the championship....during the entire season they haven't lost a game. Pretty good (but that's also why Schloss Hagerhof is well-known as a sport school). Anyways, back to the assembly....nothing like American high schools. Although it was the most school spirit I've seen here in Germany, it was hardly any "real" school spirit. I really don't know how to explain it, but hey, I'll just leave it at that our normal Breakfast Pause was changed....we did get our brotchen after the assembly, but then we had to hurry to class.

My next class was German. We are currently reading "Die Physiker" and doing a project over the book. I've spent lots of time reading and rereading the book in order to understand what's going on. Now that I have adequate understanding, I'm working on the project, but am not very far. I'll have to finish that up this weekend...

After the two hours of German class, I went to the Bibliothek (library) for the afternoon pause before lunch. There I read a Jane Austin book, Northanger Abbey, which I happened to find in the school library (yeah, it's in English, shame on me...but I have to reward myself after working so hard with that book for my German class).

Then finally it was lunch time! Yummy noodles with a creamy white sauce.

After lunch, I had a free hour, which I used to read another 100 pages of Jane Austin. Then around 2pm I headed to my Chemie (Chemistry) class. Start of class we were told that we wouldn't be doing "speed-dating" but instead "speed-learning". We were given a packet of information about alcohol, split into small groups, and then had to prepare presentations about our information. Then the last 30 minutes of class, we presented what we learned. It was quite interesting.

After school, I went home and crashed in my bed. For some reason or other, I'm so exhausted!!! Then I woke up, did my homework, made Kaiserschmarrn (delicious!) with Heidi, helped around the house, spent time doing lots of nothings, then went to bed. Pretty exciting, huh?

A Day at a Time - Part 1

Today was not just any old Sunday, it was Mother's Day!

Being here in Germany, I have had the opportunity to realize how important my mother is to me. I'm so grateful for everything she has done for me. I love her so much and am counting down the days until I'll be seeing her (and the rest of my family) once again. Also have to recognize my host mother who is super sweet. I'm so grateful and amazed at all she does for me as well.

Alrighty, so this next week I'll be blogging every day since this my last "normal" week, meaning my last week with school everyday. The weeks after this I have a few days off every week because of various holidays and whatnot. Summing it all up, I only have 15 more school days!!!

So today, I woke up and realized my whole body was so sore. I laid there thinking what I had done the previous day to make me so sore....oh yeah...I spent the day a roller coaster park with some friends. Definitely worth the soreness.
I got out of bed, took a shower, straightened my hair, finished getting ready, and then headed off to church. After church, headed back home, and had a delicious lunch with the host family.
After that I headed to my bed and took a nice, long, well-deserved nap. Later I woke up, went downstairs to socialize with my host family, but they were all gone, doing various things, so I headed back to my room. I chatted on Skype with my best friend, Shannon, for a bit. It was great to talk to her! (Thanks Shannon!!!!) After that I talked (Skype) with my Aunt Wilola for a few minutes, and then I got to talk (again on Skype) to my wonderful family in the USA. (Love ya all!!!)

Well, that's it for Part 1. My Sundays aren't very eventful. I usually go to church in the mornings. Then in afternoons, I read books, talk with family/friends in the USA, and/or spend time with my host family. :D

It's all rushing by too fast!

Update of what I've been up to lately.

Saturday April 18th - Heidi decided to put my harp talents to work or to show me off, which ever way you want to see it. She invited a "few" friends over (turned out to be about 20 people), and she went all out. (click on pictures to see a larger view in another window)

She had cheese, grapes, strawberries, chocolates, munchies (chips, pretzels, things to go with wine…) and just everything. She also set up candles around the whole dining/living room area. Then I was set in the winter garden area with greenery all around me. Wow, was it romantic or what!?!


3rd Tuesday of April - I choose my housing for BYU-Provo at 11pm my time (silly 9 hour time difference!). Yep, I'll be going to BYU starting Fall 2009. I'll be pursuing a major in Neuroscience and a minor in Music. I'm pretty excited about all that, but hey that's not so exciting as what I'm doing here in Germany.


4th weekend of April - we (Dieter, Heidi, Laura and me) drove to Stuttgart for the Konfirmation of Dieter's godson. After that we drove to Schloss Neuschwanstein (aka castle that Walt Disney copied) and Schloss Linderhof. Wow, they were cool. That was a fabulous weekend! Check out the pictures below.

Then last weekend - we were in Nuernberg for 2 birthday parties. All I have to say is...I think I ate enough food to last me a month!!! It was great to see all the relatives again, and probably the last time before I leave for the USA. All of them are extremely nice and told me that I was welcome to stay with them anytime I come back to Germany (that means I have more than 10 different places I could stay throughout Germany!!!).


Yeah, that's about it. Next week I'll be posting everyday....to give you an idea of my typical week with school and everything. :D



41 more days!