Hello readers! (I felt like it might be a bit more appropriate to address you all, because you are wonderful readers, friends, family, et cetera! And it makes me feel like I am actually talking to people instead of typing into a computer!)
Well, as per my typical schedule of illness, I have come down with what is a combination of stuffed sinuses, runny nose, coughing, sniffling, i.e. the Common Cold. I have been drinking some nice Chinese tea that one of my neighbors had given me a few weeks ago for lending her 1€, orange juice, and plenty of water. Sleep has been about as good as it can be when I stay up late and wake up early; well, that is just the usual schedule of my inadequate amounts of sleep. But I digress.
What I should have done last week, was go to the store to try to find some simple cold remedies. Since many of my friends from the language course and in my building have been getting sick, we've all been sharing remedy ideas.
Point is, since I think I have been rambling, it would be a good idea for study abroaders to think about stocking up on simple medications. I should have done that a month ago. Darn. Oh well!
Simple post, keep reading! Bye for now!
Friday, September 27, 2013
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Birthday Weekend
Although this post may be a bit late, I would like to take the time to describe an interesting event following my quasi-birthday celebration.
Last week Friday, the night of my birthday, a few friends and I decided to cook some dinner before we attended an event with many of the other international students. The dinner was great, the night was fun, and at around 1:30, a few of us decided to go back home.
Unfortunately for us, the trams, buses, and trains all tend to stop running at about 12:30am, with the exception of a few. We were able to take the last tram to the main train station. From there we had either the decision to walk or to rent a taxi. The vote was in favor of a taxi.
Across the street from the tram stop is not only the main train station entrance but also the taxi gathering place. After the decision to travel by taxi, we crossed the street. When the light was red, signaling "do not cross." Upon reaching the other side of the street, we were approached by two police officers, who then asked for our identification. We then handed over our identification, and after about 20 minutes of waiting, we were let off with not only a warning (to not cross the street on red), but I was also given good tidings from the officers for my birthday!
We took the taxi home, and that was the end of a really fun night!
There was another small random party happening on Saturday as well, which further added some enjoyment to my birthday!
Last week Friday, the night of my birthday, a few friends and I decided to cook some dinner before we attended an event with many of the other international students. The dinner was great, the night was fun, and at around 1:30, a few of us decided to go back home.
Unfortunately for us, the trams, buses, and trains all tend to stop running at about 12:30am, with the exception of a few. We were able to take the last tram to the main train station. From there we had either the decision to walk or to rent a taxi. The vote was in favor of a taxi.
Across the street from the tram stop is not only the main train station entrance but also the taxi gathering place. After the decision to travel by taxi, we crossed the street. When the light was red, signaling "do not cross." Upon reaching the other side of the street, we were approached by two police officers, who then asked for our identification. We then handed over our identification, and after about 20 minutes of waiting, we were let off with not only a warning (to not cross the street on red), but I was also given good tidings from the officers for my birthday!
We took the taxi home, and that was the end of a really fun night!
There was another small random party happening on Saturday as well, which further added some enjoyment to my birthday!
Sunday, September 15, 2013
A really German weekend!
Although I have been in Germany now for over a week, the only German I have been exposed to has been in my language course, which consists of mostly listening and not much discussion; speaking German with other exchange students, which can sometimes be difficult when we do not know the words to explain what we want in German, so we usually switch languages; and talking to shop owners or people on the street (for directions for example). Not until this week have I really been fully and entirely drowned in German, and I mean that in a really positive way!!
After my small mishap with getting to the bus on time, and after a four hour bus ride, I arrived in Nürnberg, Germany to meet up with old GAPP exchange partners and to reunite some long-awaited friendships! Dani and Tobi picked me up from the bus stop, and thus began the beginning of a great weekend!
Upon arriving at their house, in which I was to stay the whole weekend, I met Dani and Tobi's parents for the first time in person, which was exciting!! After being shown my room and eating a very delicious and filling dinner, Dani, Tobi, and I went out on our own small bar tour, which turned out to be one of my longest and most entertaining nights in Germany! During our tour of a few bars, I met a lot of new faces, and I also got to see Moni and Anna, who were GAPP students in 2011 with Dani. Our final stop of the night was at a "club" known as A3 which had no more than 15 people in it, and the music played was some of the silliest music I have ever heard! BUT we danced and it was fun anyways! The night ended around 4:30am after a long yet fun trek back home.
The next morning, we ate breakfast, and shortly after, Dani and I met up with Jana and Jonas, my host sister and host brother from 2009!! We ate lunch, walked around Altdorf for a while, and then we made our way back to Dani's house. It was absolutely wonderful seeing friends (although they are more like family) whom I have not seen in such a long time!! :)
With Dani's family, we drove Tobi to his university in Bayreuth, and I had dinner with the family at a restaurant known as Oskar's. And upon returning home for the night, Dani, Moni, Anna (friends of Dani), and I played a board game, whose name is currently failing me, which required the players to write down answers to excruciatingly difficult questions, in order to bluff his/her way into receiving points to make it all around the game board. At the beginning of the game I was doing very well, winning I mean, but toward the end of the game, Moni overtook me and won the game; I came in second!! By then, I think, I had expended as much of my German speaking as I could, and we all turned in for the night around 1:00am.
In the morning, we ate breakfast and sat around the table into the afternoon, and afterwards we went to the Grundschule (grade school) for Dani and his parents, Jürgen and Sandra, to vote. Then it was goodbye to Jürgen and Sandra, and Dani and I drove to pick up another long-lost friend, Lupo!!! The three of us then drove to Nürnberg for one last meal together and a nice stroll through Nürnberg, and many memories began to flow back to me, seeing Nürnberg again! Thereafter we walked to the bus station for a few last words, some goodbyes, and I was off again to Frankfurt.
The whole weekend was really wonderful for a plethora of reasons. The most important was that I got to see great friends again whom I had not seen for two or four years! Another very great thing about the weekend was that I spoke German 98% of the time, and those around me also spoke only German; so this weekend was really my first taste of actually being fully aware that I am indeed in Germany. It was a great practice for my language, as well as an excitement for those around me who had not seen me for so long; the last time I was in Germany, I could speak maybe 20 different sentences, all of which were memorized and simple. And after speaking German for 72 hours, I hope that it really pushes me to speak more German, and I really do await my semester beginning, for I know I will have much more German there as well.
After my small mishap with getting to the bus on time, and after a four hour bus ride, I arrived in Nürnberg, Germany to meet up with old GAPP exchange partners and to reunite some long-awaited friendships! Dani and Tobi picked me up from the bus stop, and thus began the beginning of a great weekend!
Upon arriving at their house, in which I was to stay the whole weekend, I met Dani and Tobi's parents for the first time in person, which was exciting!! After being shown my room and eating a very delicious and filling dinner, Dani, Tobi, and I went out on our own small bar tour, which turned out to be one of my longest and most entertaining nights in Germany! During our tour of a few bars, I met a lot of new faces, and I also got to see Moni and Anna, who were GAPP students in 2011 with Dani. Our final stop of the night was at a "club" known as A3 which had no more than 15 people in it, and the music played was some of the silliest music I have ever heard! BUT we danced and it was fun anyways! The night ended around 4:30am after a long yet fun trek back home.
The next morning, we ate breakfast, and shortly after, Dani and I met up with Jana and Jonas, my host sister and host brother from 2009!! We ate lunch, walked around Altdorf for a while, and then we made our way back to Dani's house. It was absolutely wonderful seeing friends (although they are more like family) whom I have not seen in such a long time!! :)
With Dani's family, we drove Tobi to his university in Bayreuth, and I had dinner with the family at a restaurant known as Oskar's. And upon returning home for the night, Dani, Moni, Anna (friends of Dani), and I played a board game, whose name is currently failing me, which required the players to write down answers to excruciatingly difficult questions, in order to bluff his/her way into receiving points to make it all around the game board. At the beginning of the game I was doing very well, winning I mean, but toward the end of the game, Moni overtook me and won the game; I came in second!! By then, I think, I had expended as much of my German speaking as I could, and we all turned in for the night around 1:00am.
In the morning, we ate breakfast and sat around the table into the afternoon, and afterwards we went to the Grundschule (grade school) for Dani and his parents, Jürgen and Sandra, to vote. Then it was goodbye to Jürgen and Sandra, and Dani and I drove to pick up another long-lost friend, Lupo!!! The three of us then drove to Nürnberg for one last meal together and a nice stroll through Nürnberg, and many memories began to flow back to me, seeing Nürnberg again! Thereafter we walked to the bus station for a few last words, some goodbyes, and I was off again to Frankfurt.
The whole weekend was really wonderful for a plethora of reasons. The most important was that I got to see great friends again whom I had not seen for two or four years! Another very great thing about the weekend was that I spoke German 98% of the time, and those around me also spoke only German; so this weekend was really my first taste of actually being fully aware that I am indeed in Germany. It was a great practice for my language, as well as an excitement for those around me who had not seen me for so long; the last time I was in Germany, I could speak maybe 20 different sentences, all of which were memorized and simple. And after speaking German for 72 hours, I hope that it really pushes me to speak more German, and I really do await my semester beginning, for I know I will have much more German there as well.
Friday, September 13, 2013
Trip to Nürnberg almost began badly!!
This will be a short post.
Today I had tickets for the inexpensive bus transit to Nürnberg from Frankfurt and back again for the weekend. The bus left at 15:05, exactly five minutes after its scheduled departure. Due to a train which was entfällt (forgotten/lost/skipped) and my less than good knowledge of the transit system, I arrived at the bus, after running inbetween traffic of other buses, cars, and trams, at exactly 15:03; I had just enough time to ask the driver if this was the bus going to Nürnberg before he shut the door!
Travellers beware! Be sure you allow enough time for mishaps like I had if you need to make a certain deadline!
But I made it, and soon I will be reunited with some old GAPP friends and families! :)
Thursday, September 12, 2013
Meeting friends and the perks that come with them!
After the first week, well it was not really a full week, but you get the point, I began to meet some more people. So far, I have met many, many people from around Europe, most of whom are students on a European wide exchange program called ERASMUS. I have met and befriended many students from Poland, Czech Republic, Italy, Greece, Finland, Holland, Ireland, et cetera, you get the point! What is really cool about having newly made friends from around Europe, is that they all speak German really well, and they also speak English. These last few days we have had small gatherings in one of the communal kitchens in our building, and the conversations bounce around between German, English, Greek, and Polish! I am actually starting to learn just small bits and pieces of Greek and Polish!! :)
I have also met two awesome guys who are from UW-Lacrosse!! Small world!
Another great thing about having met my group of international friends, is that their organization, ERASMUS, has planned out for them different trips, on which the entire group goes together, and I plan on tagging along on many of these trips, just to experience parts of this country with my friends! Why not, right?!
One of the events took place last night. At 20:00 (8:00pm) the ERASMUS students were to meet by the Südhauptbahnhof, where they were going to go on a pub-crawl to four different bars in the inner city. I, of course, decided to tag along! Before we left our building, my friends and I met at 18:00 to have a group dinner and have a few drinks before heading out to the event. We had a nice smorgasbord of sausages, bread, very soupy spinach, and some sauce filled meat balls, along with some other random fixings. Like many of our other nights spent in the kitchen, our conversations bounced around the different languages! Then we left for the pub-crawl to join up with a group of about 100 international students. 100 students all going to different bars together! "This will be interesting," I thought to myself, but we made it work! Each of the bars we went to, although tiny, was able to accommodate about 1/3 to 1/2 of our group at a time; people would get there drinks then go outside the bars to enjoy them, because in Germany, it is legal to drink alcohol out in the open air no matter where you are.
Throughout the night I got to meet a lot more of the international students, who were friends with the friends I had already met, and again conversations ranged between a variety of languages; but if I had to keep track, I think that 75% of the conversations I was a part of took place in German!! (By now I have been in Germany for more than one week, and as of this past Tuesday, I have felt that my brain is now beginning to process German much easier than the last week; I have had my language course for about 3-6 hours a day, and I have just been exposed to the language for a lot longer now.)
At the end of the night, we were luckily able to catch the LAST train home!
This morning then, Thursday, I was able to go with my friend, Aga, to FINALLY get our Immatrikulation (enrollment) paperwork turned in, so in two weeks, I can pick up my student ID/free transit ticket, my GoetheCard, and that will mean the only more paperwork I need to get is my residence permit to stay in the country!!
That about does it for now. I have bought bus tickets to go down to Nürnberg to visit some of my old GAPP exchange students this weekend!! I am so excited for that!!
I have also met two awesome guys who are from UW-Lacrosse!! Small world!
Another great thing about having met my group of international friends, is that their organization, ERASMUS, has planned out for them different trips, on which the entire group goes together, and I plan on tagging along on many of these trips, just to experience parts of this country with my friends! Why not, right?!
One of the events took place last night. At 20:00 (8:00pm) the ERASMUS students were to meet by the Südhauptbahnhof, where they were going to go on a pub-crawl to four different bars in the inner city. I, of course, decided to tag along! Before we left our building, my friends and I met at 18:00 to have a group dinner and have a few drinks before heading out to the event. We had a nice smorgasbord of sausages, bread, very soupy spinach, and some sauce filled meat balls, along with some other random fixings. Like many of our other nights spent in the kitchen, our conversations bounced around the different languages! Then we left for the pub-crawl to join up with a group of about 100 international students. 100 students all going to different bars together! "This will be interesting," I thought to myself, but we made it work! Each of the bars we went to, although tiny, was able to accommodate about 1/3 to 1/2 of our group at a time; people would get there drinks then go outside the bars to enjoy them, because in Germany, it is legal to drink alcohol out in the open air no matter where you are.
Throughout the night I got to meet a lot more of the international students, who were friends with the friends I had already met, and again conversations ranged between a variety of languages; but if I had to keep track, I think that 75% of the conversations I was a part of took place in German!! (By now I have been in Germany for more than one week, and as of this past Tuesday, I have felt that my brain is now beginning to process German much easier than the last week; I have had my language course for about 3-6 hours a day, and I have just been exposed to the language for a lot longer now.)
At the end of the night, we were luckily able to catch the LAST train home!
This morning then, Thursday, I was able to go with my friend, Aga, to FINALLY get our Immatrikulation (enrollment) paperwork turned in, so in two weeks, I can pick up my student ID/free transit ticket, my GoetheCard, and that will mean the only more paperwork I need to get is my residence permit to stay in the country!!
That about does it for now. I have bought bus tickets to go down to Nürnberg to visit some of my old GAPP exchange students this weekend!! I am so excited for that!!
Saturday, September 7, 2013
Wandering: can be very helpful and can do some damage!
Today began quite as calmly as it could have, being a Saturday morning and having absolutely no responsibilities or plans of any kind. After I woke up, had breakfast, and bought some very delicious food, which I directly after prepared for lunch, I decided to take a walk around my neighborhood to a) get a bit lost, b) to find my way to the Grüneburgpark, which is very, very delightful and calm, and c) to walk to the main campus of my university, Campus Westend.
Walking through the neighborhood and the park was nice, for I had gotten lost and found my direction again quite easily. The park was nice, and I plan on spending many a morning/afternoon running through it for my exercise in the coming months. While wandering my campus also, I was amazed at how large many of the buildings are, many twice the size of Hyland Hall (for you Whitewater people), but all of them at least the same size as Hyland.
One of the buildings I decided to go into was one I had visited the other day to attempt to turn in some paperwork. While I was looking around, checking out the different areas, I walked to the end of the hallway and through a door, which proceeded to lock behind me. At first I thought it was no problem, for I was then in a stairwell, and I presumed their may be a door leading out of the building or to one of the ground floors. And there were, except that the doors to every other floor were locked, and the door to the outside was a Notfall Tür (emergency door).
After trying every single door on every single floor (seven floors total), I decided that my only option was to call the only emergency number I knew, 112, which gets one to the Feuerwerk (fire department). I explained to the operator on the phone that I was an exchange student who had been in Frankfurt for a few days now and had been exploring the campus and one of the buildings, the name of which the operator did not know, but I was able to explain where it was on the campus, and he explained to me that I was to use the Notfall Tür, pressing the emergency button to open the door, and he would take care of everything else. He was very helpful, even though I had lost service and had to call back, possibly blocking up their emergency lines, but what was I to do!? I was quite literally trapped! I asked him if he needed my name or information to inform anyone from the building, and he told me that every was good, and I need not worry about any consequences. He also was surprised when I told him that I was from the USA because I had conducted the entire 10 minute, mildly scared and a bit exasperated, good, understandable German.
Moral of the story, for those of you possibly studying abroad: though it may not be vital to know the host language of the country, it can prove to be EXCRUCIATINGLY helpful in emergency situations; wandering is good, but make sure you do not get yourself in a tight situation; KNOW THE EMERGENCY NUMBERS!! without prior knowledge of the emergency numbers in Germany (110 and 112), I would have been stuck in that building, or I would have had to use the emergency exit without an emergency, and I could have gotten in trouble; minor tip: have a map or know building names, landmarks, street names, bus stops, bus route number, train numbers, et cetera.
Walking through the neighborhood and the park was nice, for I had gotten lost and found my direction again quite easily. The park was nice, and I plan on spending many a morning/afternoon running through it for my exercise in the coming months. While wandering my campus also, I was amazed at how large many of the buildings are, many twice the size of Hyland Hall (for you Whitewater people), but all of them at least the same size as Hyland.
One of the buildings I decided to go into was one I had visited the other day to attempt to turn in some paperwork. While I was looking around, checking out the different areas, I walked to the end of the hallway and through a door, which proceeded to lock behind me. At first I thought it was no problem, for I was then in a stairwell, and I presumed their may be a door leading out of the building or to one of the ground floors. And there were, except that the doors to every other floor were locked, and the door to the outside was a Notfall Tür (emergency door).
After trying every single door on every single floor (seven floors total), I decided that my only option was to call the only emergency number I knew, 112, which gets one to the Feuerwerk (fire department). I explained to the operator on the phone that I was an exchange student who had been in Frankfurt for a few days now and had been exploring the campus and one of the buildings, the name of which the operator did not know, but I was able to explain where it was on the campus, and he explained to me that I was to use the Notfall Tür, pressing the emergency button to open the door, and he would take care of everything else. He was very helpful, even though I had lost service and had to call back, possibly blocking up their emergency lines, but what was I to do!? I was quite literally trapped! I asked him if he needed my name or information to inform anyone from the building, and he told me that every was good, and I need not worry about any consequences. He also was surprised when I told him that I was from the USA because I had conducted the entire 10 minute, mildly scared and a bit exasperated, good, understandable German.
Moral of the story, for those of you possibly studying abroad: though it may not be vital to know the host language of the country, it can prove to be EXCRUCIATINGLY helpful in emergency situations; wandering is good, but make sure you do not get yourself in a tight situation; KNOW THE EMERGENCY NUMBERS!! without prior knowledge of the emergency numbers in Germany (110 and 112), I would have been stuck in that building, or I would have had to use the emergency exit without an emergency, and I could have gotten in trouble; minor tip: have a map or know building names, landmarks, street names, bus stops, bus route number, train numbers, et cetera.
Friday, September 6, 2013
Day 2 and a bit of Day 3
Day two in Germany; Day two sneaking time off of Starbucks' Internet! Although, if I come back tomorrow, I get a half priced drink!
On my second day in Germany, fear not I will not be posting every day, but much more is happening in these first couple of days, I had many a thing to do during the day. The first, after sleeping only seven hours yet feeling fantastisch, was to go to an appointment at Commerzbank to open a bank account with them. My newly befriended Polish friend and I went together to the Commerzbank right off of one of the Straßenbahn Warten (tram stops). When we arrived, and I spoke with the teller asking about my appointment, he informed me that I was at the wrong bank, for I had made an appointment with the Filiale (headquarters of the bank, so to speak), and we had to walk down the street about five blocks to find the correct address, after we had walked two blocks in the wrong direction! Alles klar! We arrived finally, later than we should have, but we had not known in which directions the bus routes went, though the bus would have taken us directly in front of the building in 1/3 the time. The woman at the bank was very friendly, helpful, and understanding to my situation, but I was able to conduct the entire bank account opening progress in the most German I had used in months! There were only a few times when I had to ask her to either say it another way, in German, or try to explain in English. By the end of the appointment, I had a bank account, had put money into it, transferred money to the proper accounts for my Immatrikulation (enrollment fees), as well as transfer money for my Polish friend, Aga, who would not be able to open her account for a week or so, and I also acted as a quasi-interpreter between the woman at the bank and Aga, in order to get some of the basic paperwork done for her account.
This second event, with the interpreting, took place after Aga and I had gone to the Bürgeramt (municipal building) to register our places of residence with the police/city/state/country? I am not quite sure, but it is an important document which international residents are required to get. That was about a fifteen minute appointment. So that was good!
After all of this, she and I returned to our residences, and then I had plans with which to follow up, to meet with Andrew Pechmann at the Hauptbahnhof (main train station). He and I managed to find a delicious restaurant, serving some sort of delicious curry-pork-rice-vegetable mixture! That and the few beers we had (my first beers of being in Germany), brought us back to the Hauptbahnhof, where he left and I went back to my residence around 8:30pm, to fall asleep promptly afterward, for I was still quite exhausted from a bit of jet-lag and my first day of being awake 30+ hours and walking everywhere.
Now onto the third day, a bit shorter, I ate breakfast and met with Aga, for we had to find our testing room before 10am. It is quite close to our residence, and after asking directions of two separate people, we found the way to the room, whilst bringing along another small group of international students. The test was quite different from what I expected. We had thirty minutes maximum to write answers to four questions, in German obviously: Why we chose to study in Germany; why we chose the Goethe-Uni; what our reasons were; and what sorts of expectations we had about Frankfurt, the Uni, und so weiter (et cetera). After finishing the test, I called the International Office to try to figure out when we could get our Immatrikulation (one of the LAST, and right now most difficult, documents we need to acquire) from said office, and it seems that Monday we should be able to go right after our language course to get these papers. After this, she and I met up with my wonderful friend and guide to Frankfurt, Svenja (!!!), to help us find many a necessity in our dorm/apartment-style residences. I was able to get some inexpensive silverware, dishes, cooking utensils, a pot and a pan, and, FINALLY, a pair of sandals to wear around in the shower. CAUTION: Those studying abroad, if you will be living in a dorm with a common toilet room/shower room, bring your own sandals; we went to five stores to find mine today, and there were in a fitness store and much more expensive than they needed to be for a cheap pair of sandals, meaning, if you can bring $1 sandals from home, do it!
Positives so far: the language is becoming easier, now that I have more sleep, and I have had to use it to do some very adult things, i.e. open a bank account, make phone calls to register classes, ask for directions, und so weiter; I am excited for my language course to begin; I am becoming ever more familiar with this city, in its enormity, and its transit system; I vow to learn how to cook, for buying food at street vendors and restaurants would be expensive (so if you have any simple recipes for noodles or chicken or something with vegetables or a mixture of things, PLEASE!! let me know via Facebook or a comment here)! There is a lot of room for exciting things to take place!!!!
Negatives: for I have not been exposed to many students my age, I have not had a chance to practice German in my free time, and I have not met many people, but this will change through the language program I hope!; down time is difficult to enjoy, for I have no Internet access and familiarizing myself with the city does become very tiring after a long day; it is relatively expensive to start off a new life in another country, having to buy a lot of things right away, things which one would not normally think about because we are used to having them so close at hand when living at home; not having student dining services fifty feet from my room (Drumlin Dining Hall, for those who know UW-Whitewater) forces one to have to cook for oneself or spend time and money looking for a place to eat in the city (which is hard to do efficiently without Internet access); limited Internet access, also a bummer.
Alles wird besser!! (Everything will become better!!)
Thank you for reading, and we will see how the weekend goes!
On my second day in Germany, fear not I will not be posting every day, but much more is happening in these first couple of days, I had many a thing to do during the day. The first, after sleeping only seven hours yet feeling fantastisch, was to go to an appointment at Commerzbank to open a bank account with them. My newly befriended Polish friend and I went together to the Commerzbank right off of one of the Straßenbahn Warten (tram stops). When we arrived, and I spoke with the teller asking about my appointment, he informed me that I was at the wrong bank, for I had made an appointment with the Filiale (headquarters of the bank, so to speak), and we had to walk down the street about five blocks to find the correct address, after we had walked two blocks in the wrong direction! Alles klar! We arrived finally, later than we should have, but we had not known in which directions the bus routes went, though the bus would have taken us directly in front of the building in 1/3 the time. The woman at the bank was very friendly, helpful, and understanding to my situation, but I was able to conduct the entire bank account opening progress in the most German I had used in months! There were only a few times when I had to ask her to either say it another way, in German, or try to explain in English. By the end of the appointment, I had a bank account, had put money into it, transferred money to the proper accounts for my Immatrikulation (enrollment fees), as well as transfer money for my Polish friend, Aga, who would not be able to open her account for a week or so, and I also acted as a quasi-interpreter between the woman at the bank and Aga, in order to get some of the basic paperwork done for her account.
This second event, with the interpreting, took place after Aga and I had gone to the Bürgeramt (municipal building) to register our places of residence with the police/city/state/country? I am not quite sure, but it is an important document which international residents are required to get. That was about a fifteen minute appointment. So that was good!
After all of this, she and I returned to our residences, and then I had plans with which to follow up, to meet with Andrew Pechmann at the Hauptbahnhof (main train station). He and I managed to find a delicious restaurant, serving some sort of delicious curry-pork-rice-vegetable mixture! That and the few beers we had (my first beers of being in Germany), brought us back to the Hauptbahnhof, where he left and I went back to my residence around 8:30pm, to fall asleep promptly afterward, for I was still quite exhausted from a bit of jet-lag and my first day of being awake 30+ hours and walking everywhere.
Now onto the third day, a bit shorter, I ate breakfast and met with Aga, for we had to find our testing room before 10am. It is quite close to our residence, and after asking directions of two separate people, we found the way to the room, whilst bringing along another small group of international students. The test was quite different from what I expected. We had thirty minutes maximum to write answers to four questions, in German obviously: Why we chose to study in Germany; why we chose the Goethe-Uni; what our reasons were; and what sorts of expectations we had about Frankfurt, the Uni, und so weiter (et cetera). After finishing the test, I called the International Office to try to figure out when we could get our Immatrikulation (one of the LAST, and right now most difficult, documents we need to acquire) from said office, and it seems that Monday we should be able to go right after our language course to get these papers. After this, she and I met up with my wonderful friend and guide to Frankfurt, Svenja (!!!), to help us find many a necessity in our dorm/apartment-style residences. I was able to get some inexpensive silverware, dishes, cooking utensils, a pot and a pan, and, FINALLY, a pair of sandals to wear around in the shower. CAUTION: Those studying abroad, if you will be living in a dorm with a common toilet room/shower room, bring your own sandals; we went to five stores to find mine today, and there were in a fitness store and much more expensive than they needed to be for a cheap pair of sandals, meaning, if you can bring $1 sandals from home, do it!
Positives so far: the language is becoming easier, now that I have more sleep, and I have had to use it to do some very adult things, i.e. open a bank account, make phone calls to register classes, ask for directions, und so weiter; I am excited for my language course to begin; I am becoming ever more familiar with this city, in its enormity, and its transit system; I vow to learn how to cook, for buying food at street vendors and restaurants would be expensive (so if you have any simple recipes for noodles or chicken or something with vegetables or a mixture of things, PLEASE!! let me know via Facebook or a comment here)! There is a lot of room for exciting things to take place!!!!
Negatives: for I have not been exposed to many students my age, I have not had a chance to practice German in my free time, and I have not met many people, but this will change through the language program I hope!; down time is difficult to enjoy, for I have no Internet access and familiarizing myself with the city does become very tiring after a long day; it is relatively expensive to start off a new life in another country, having to buy a lot of things right away, things which one would not normally think about because we are used to having them so close at hand when living at home; not having student dining services fifty feet from my room (Drumlin Dining Hall, for those who know UW-Whitewater) forces one to have to cook for oneself or spend time and money looking for a place to eat in the city (which is hard to do efficiently without Internet access); limited Internet access, also a bummer.
Alles wird besser!! (Everything will become better!!)
Thank you for reading, and we will see how the weekend goes!
Wednesday, September 4, 2013
Day 1
Well, I am currently able to write this post due to my Wi-Fi mooching abilities; thank you, Starbucks. So, my first day:
Of course it is difficult to get a lot of sleep the night before one leaves the country for a year. In saying that, I was only able to acquire about five hours of sleep my first night, and I did not get any on the plane to Germany (do not do that!! Sleep on the plane!!). However, once I arrived in Germany, I immediately had a conversation in German with a girl who was sitting in front of me on the plane, coming home to Germany from an internship in the States. After saying good-bye to her, I was able to grab some coffee and breakfast with two friends, Erin and Svenja, who were so very kind to wake up at 6am to pick me up from the airport! Svenja, who lives in Frankfurt, showed us around a little. After breakfast, I dragged my luggage through the Bahnhof (train station), which was silly because I guess I could have left them in the luggage lockers until I acquired my room. I got to my housing office to fill out paperwork, and afterwords, I was given the task of showing a Polish exchange student the way to our building; I mistakenly spoke German to her at first, thinking she was a German student helping me find my way to my building, but that was figured out shortly. When we arrived at our building, we were given very quickly-spoken instructions about the rooms, the paper work, and other things which I cannot remember, and I had to do my best to understand myself and translate for my newly found friend. She and I parted ways, and I moved my things into my room, not really putting anything away, though.
It was around 10:30am when I had finished these things so far, and I decided to try to set up my Internet and find out some of the hours of the buildings I needed to go to in the next couple of days. Unknown to me, I was unable to get connected to the Internet in my building, for I needed my student account information for that, which I will be getting today. So, I decided to take a trip around on the trains, for I had bought a week-long pass, allowing me to travel on any of the public transit vehicles, an unlimited amount of times for one week. I went down to the Bürgeramt (municipal office/hall) to try to acquire one of the many documents I need to prove I exist in this country, but I arrived a bit too late, for it was getting busy, and the building was closing soon, and I needed to meet up with friends for lunch. That, however, was difficult in itself. Keep in mind, I have no Internet, no cellphone, and a map to show me around. We had agreed on a place to meet, but I had forgotten exactly which part of the train stop I was supposed to wait, so I spent about thirty minutes walking around looking for my two friends. We finally found each other, after I had randomly gotten a bloody nose and had been on my feet for hours and was very hungry, so we went to eat.
After eating a quick meal on the street, we went shopping, for I needed many many things to be able to function overnight; things such as shampoo, a broom and dustbin (my floor is tile and was left dirty), wet wipes, and OH YEAH! bed sheets and a pillow (I could not bring that on the plane; not enough room). So after many stores having been searched by us, we found some fairly inexpensive bed sheets and a large pillow for me. Then the three of us went back to my Wohnheim to unpack, show them around, and get my room ready to live in. I also was able to set up my cellphone with a SIM card I bought during our shopping excursion! After we did this, it was time to eat again, and we hopped on the Straßebahn (tram) to head to a very good Döner Imbissstube (Döner snack stand) for some delicious döner and a trip to Svenja's apartment to enjoy them. Around 9:45, I headed back the way I came, surprisingly finding my way home despite being over-tired, unfamiliar with the area, and without my very helpful map. When I was home at last, it was around 10:30, and because we are not supposed to use the floor shower room between 10pm and 6am to be courteous, I just used the sink in my room to wipe away some of the sweat, and I almost immediately crashed on my newly made bed, to sleep a wonderful eight-ish hours to begin a new, and soon to be very busy day!
Thank you for reading about my first day; I know it was long, but a lot happened! It was very stressful at times and also very promising and fun in others. I got to really feel how alone one can really be in a huge city, but I also forced myself to become familiar with the public transit system and rely on directions from maps and locals, and really utilize some of my language skills, which are by no means in the best of shape; I am very rusty with a summer without German.
More posts to come!
It was around 10:30am when I had finished these things so far, and I decided to try to set up my Internet and find out some of the hours of the buildings I needed to go to in the next couple of days. Unknown to me, I was unable to get connected to the Internet in my building, for I needed my student account information for that, which I will be getting today. So, I decided to take a trip around on the trains, for I had bought a week-long pass, allowing me to travel on any of the public transit vehicles, an unlimited amount of times for one week. I went down to the Bürgeramt (municipal office/hall) to try to acquire one of the many documents I need to prove I exist in this country, but I arrived a bit too late, for it was getting busy, and the building was closing soon, and I needed to meet up with friends for lunch. That, however, was difficult in itself. Keep in mind, I have no Internet, no cellphone, and a map to show me around. We had agreed on a place to meet, but I had forgotten exactly which part of the train stop I was supposed to wait, so I spent about thirty minutes walking around looking for my two friends. We finally found each other, after I had randomly gotten a bloody nose and had been on my feet for hours and was very hungry, so we went to eat.
After eating a quick meal on the street, we went shopping, for I needed many many things to be able to function overnight; things such as shampoo, a broom and dustbin (my floor is tile and was left dirty), wet wipes, and OH YEAH! bed sheets and a pillow (I could not bring that on the plane; not enough room). So after many stores having been searched by us, we found some fairly inexpensive bed sheets and a large pillow for me. Then the three of us went back to my Wohnheim to unpack, show them around, and get my room ready to live in. I also was able to set up my cellphone with a SIM card I bought during our shopping excursion! After we did this, it was time to eat again, and we hopped on the Straßebahn (tram) to head to a very good Döner Imbissstube (Döner snack stand) for some delicious döner and a trip to Svenja's apartment to enjoy them. Around 9:45, I headed back the way I came, surprisingly finding my way home despite being over-tired, unfamiliar with the area, and without my very helpful map. When I was home at last, it was around 10:30, and because we are not supposed to use the floor shower room between 10pm and 6am to be courteous, I just used the sink in my room to wipe away some of the sweat, and I almost immediately crashed on my newly made bed, to sleep a wonderful eight-ish hours to begin a new, and soon to be very busy day!
Thank you for reading about my first day; I know it was long, but a lot happened! It was very stressful at times and also very promising and fun in others. I got to really feel how alone one can really be in a huge city, but I also forced myself to become familiar with the public transit system and rely on directions from maps and locals, and really utilize some of my language skills, which are by no means in the best of shape; I am very rusty with a summer without German.
More posts to come!
Sunday, September 1, 2013
Pre-departure nerves, where are you?!
Today is currently 01. September, meaning that I depart for Germany in fewer than two days (One day, 21 hours, and 20 minutes, roughly)!!! The thing is, I do not even feel as though I will be leaving the country yet, despite the fact that I will be gone for just over 11 months, we can call it a year.
Everything seems to be done and prepared, though. I have my bags packed with as much as I am able to take at the moment, which is not nearly everything I'll need for a year; I have got my Euro; I have made copies of, stacked, and organized all of the paper work I will need to: open a bank account, enroll at my university, move into my Studentenwohnheim (student dormitory), apply for my visa, and I have also generally familiarized myself with my area, the locations of these places, and some of the train schedules/locations. Even though I have done all of this, I have not once really become nervous for the immense transition it will be to begin a new year/new life in another country.
On another note, it may be prudent to put this in writing, so that anyone reading this can call me out on it if I am not posting regularly: I would like to post once a week minimum to this blog! When I first arrive in Germany, however, I am sure there will be much down time, and I will be able to post some of my first impressions, difficulties, achievements, et cetera, but after the first couple of weeks, expect to be able to read this once a week; I will most likely post on Sundays in the morning or afternoon.
If I promise to keep up with my blog, I want you to do me the honor of reading it as often as possible (if not every week)!! I am leaving a lot of people behind this year, and it would be very difficult, time consuming, and taking from my experiences in Germany if I were to have many the same conversation about what I am doing/what I have done with each one of you. This blog is my way of not only making a memoir of my wonderful year to come, but it is also a way to stay connected with all of my family and friends in America (as well as to be able to inform anyone, who is contemplating studying abroad in college, of some difficulties and advantages of studying abroad; this goes out to you guys, too!)!!!
Everything seems to be done and prepared, though. I have my bags packed with as much as I am able to take at the moment, which is not nearly everything I'll need for a year; I have got my Euro; I have made copies of, stacked, and organized all of the paper work I will need to: open a bank account, enroll at my university, move into my Studentenwohnheim (student dormitory), apply for my visa, and I have also generally familiarized myself with my area, the locations of these places, and some of the train schedules/locations. Even though I have done all of this, I have not once really become nervous for the immense transition it will be to begin a new year/new life in another country.
On another note, it may be prudent to put this in writing, so that anyone reading this can call me out on it if I am not posting regularly: I would like to post once a week minimum to this blog! When I first arrive in Germany, however, I am sure there will be much down time, and I will be able to post some of my first impressions, difficulties, achievements, et cetera, but after the first couple of weeks, expect to be able to read this once a week; I will most likely post on Sundays in the morning or afternoon.
If I promise to keep up with my blog, I want you to do me the honor of reading it as often as possible (if not every week)!! I am leaving a lot of people behind this year, and it would be very difficult, time consuming, and taking from my experiences in Germany if I were to have many the same conversation about what I am doing/what I have done with each one of you. This blog is my way of not only making a memoir of my wonderful year to come, but it is also a way to stay connected with all of my family and friends in America (as well as to be able to inform anyone, who is contemplating studying abroad in college, of some difficulties and advantages of studying abroad; this goes out to you guys, too!)!!!
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