November & beginning of Dezember

So sorry I haven't posted in a while, I've been really busy!

Everything is going well here, stereotypes be damned i'm spending lots of time with just some of the nicest people! I think it's partly due to the fact that, defying common logic, I'm way more conversational here than at home!
Also got involved in Politics, kinda.

At the end of November I showed up at a meeting of the "Die Grüne Jugend" (The Green Youth), which is basically the 28 and under part of the Green Party (Bundnis 90/Die Grünen, which right now has 10% of the Bundestag).
Just to clarify I'm not really interested in politics, mostly just environmental issues.
And that's been great, I got to go to a climate conference, help organize a clothing exchange, and generally just have great discussions on a weekly basis. I even gave a 90 minute presentation/led discussion this week, all in german of course. Learned that Braunkohle ≠ Braunkohl! (Brown Coal and Kale, respectively)

Other things!

-Weekend in Frankfurt am Main! Museums, Bibimbap, Museums, Delicious Pastries & wonderful conversations with wonderful people

All the tourists are verbally
abusive of our friend here

An Obligatory "Wow we're so european! *whips bangs back pretentiously",
NOTE:  Green Tea Milkshake & Green Tea Sweetbread --> only enjoy slowly
(IImori Haus, Frankfurt)

-It's winter, but no snow-cover yet :(

Jogging through the woods in December!

Heavy fog on the Christmas decorations and random statue that just showed up last week! At the park near my house.

-Thanksgiving happened (I went around educating the Germans about the wonderful culinary opportunities of Thanksgivikuh) , homesickness ensued, partly due to the absence of my Grandma's Potato Rolls.  
-Partook in the German Tradition of Nikolaus Tag, got tickets to a drag queen Cabaret in my boots!

Oh, and melting lead to predict your destiny is a wholesome family activity

And now I wish you all a wonderful holiday season! I'll post again around Christmas!

-Liebe Grüße zur Weihnachtszeit aus Sachsen, Jack

Herbstferien an die Nordsee

So yesterday I got back from a 2 week vacation hanging out with my guest parents, guest ... relatives?, and some of their friends in "Norden" (literally: North) in Niedersachsen on the coast of the North Sea.

Is that Water? A River? An Ocean? No (well, yes) it's a PRIEL

A bit to the left we could see The Netherlands in the distance, accompanied by a big Coal Power Plant (on the coast b/c shipping) that was UPWIND of us.... yeah, thanks. (In all seriousness it was never on b/c Windturbines)

I definitely over-packed for it
I had the idea that it was going to be this frigid, wind raked, desolation, but it was actually really beautiful and warmer than back in Sachsen! That meant I was ROCKING the Chacos and Socks combo (somehow It really worked there).

Don't get me wrong, it was definitely windy, perfect for flying lots of kites!
And there was a huge storm last week that was the worst in the past 5 years or something, trees got uprooted, a historic windmill was destroyed, a handful of people died, not good. The sea's destructive power really impressed me. Growing up in Chicago, there are basically no risks of natural disasters (not counting you Snowpocalypse/-mageddon). And here on the North Sea there are Levees everywhere that have essentially reclaimed lots of land for farms and towns in the past 200 years, it is definitely a very vulnerable area in terms of sea-level rise. Ok enough about the environment, I'm planning on doing a whole post about it later.

Anyways it was really cool, we went to a few museums, saw a few Seals, drank some fancy Ostfriesischen Tee (figure it out people), flew some more kites, I dominated in Mini-Golf, went mucking about in the Schlick & Schlamm during low tide (The North Sea is home to the Wadden Sea, a huge tidal sea and world heritage site. If you time it right/have a guide, you could walk all the way to the coastal islands!), went horse riding, flew kites, went on an awesome bush plane flight around the islands, flew kites, drank traditional and ate LOTS & LOTS OF FISCH.

but we didn't celebrate Halloween.......... OnO       


So now I'm back at home and getting ready to start my regular school routine. Having left my guest home and then coming back to it somehow makes it feel more like home. I've been making friends, my guest parents are great, language is really no barrier anymore. And I found an extracurricular!!!:

-I will be playing the roll of Maximillian, Count von Moor in Schiller's Die Räuber (the robbers) with the school theater! It is not on the scale of ETHS theater (soooo bummed I missed Yamo), but I'm really happy I got a main roll and I can't wait to start rehearsal. Hopefully the Director will allow the Count to have an American accent, but I'm counting on my accent getting much better by the spring.


So enjoy the rest of fall everyone, thanks for reading
-Jack

Here's a lovely fall picture, all the leaves have painted the forest floor and the Beech/Birch trees are strikingly vertical. It keeps reminding me of Gustav Klimt's "Beech Forest".

My view waiting for the Train every morning, I seriously need to get up there and hike around

The Character's on my Guest Cousin's kid's TV show "Mia & Me" Seemed familiar to me. I checked, and that's also inspired by Gustav Klimt! Oh Europe...

First 3 weeks of my new classes

So I've been pretty busy adjusting to my new routine in the 11th grade, I just have to say I love it!

I'm meeting some wonderful people and I love my classes.

So I think I'll just dump photos all over you because I'm lazy, and I don't want to waste your time

(remember, click on them for their full glory)

Ok, so 2 weekends ago another YFU exchange student (Kamila from Czech Rep.) came to visit

The Bards

Host Dad + Ye olde bread bowl

Schwatzen mit einem Paar spitze Bayern

(chatting with a pair of cool Bavarians)  

And for one glorious evening, this was my reality. What you are looking at, ladies & gentlemen, is a hardcore, totally legit medieval tavern called Anno Domini (legit except for the bathrooms fortunately). We're talking all candle lighting, the menu is all pre Colombian-Exchange germany (i.e. no Potatoes, Tomatoes etc.), you got a wooden spoon and a wooden knife, there was an awesome drum/guitar/bagpipe/wooden flute playing duo of bards that played loud, repetitive, but appropriate "songs". And to top it all of, my guest family, Kamila and I had the great luck of being there the same night as some kind of club from Bayern, decked out in lederhosen, completely drunk, singing drinking songs and schuplatting (above photo) on tables.

As for me I ate the shoulder of a pig with onions, leeks, sauerkraut & mustard basically entirely with my hands, drank a Liter of Radeberger, and banged my fists and shouted along with everyone else, YOU GUYS IT'S CALLED CULTURAL IMMERSION.

For the record: Bayern is Germany's Texas, Oktoberfest, Brezels, Lederhosen, Yodeling                       --> all Bavarian Culture (or to a greater respect Alps culture). I live in Saxony so that stuff's not normal at all here, but BELIEVE me they were more than welcome at that restaurant.

Two other things I got to do that weekend:

Kamila and I went hiking with my area representative Ulli. She is like a super cool, friendly, intelligible, physicist and rock climber (ETHS kids, german Doc C), I literally could not ask for a more understanding and involved area rep.

We went hiking through the Sächsische Sweiz (Saxon Switzerland, note: not in Switzerland), and it was majestic.

 
 

I also got to check out the Sächsische Landtag (State Parliament), cool building, later I got to observe sit in the balcony and watch a session of Parliament!!!

Here is some other sweet stuff:

I went with Heidi (host mom) to a Harvest Fair, met the self titled "Kräuterhexe" (Herb-Witch), she laid down some knowledge, that's just my paying attention face.

I went to a Paint Party/Concert with Noah, the other American exchange student at my school. He's here with Rotary. I got to meet some other Rotary students who were there. The party was really fun HOWEVER: I personally would not recommend Rotary because they have a reputation for spending most of their time with other Rotary kids, speaking mostly English with one another, Partying, and the program includes multiple highly Touristy excursions. If that's your thing that's fine, it's just personally not the experience I was looking for.

Anyways here are some pics from the aptly named "Neon Splash"

As you can see, I've been quite busy, but hopefully I can get back to blogging bi weekly because I don't want to keep giving my readers Literary Dyspepsia.

Right now I'm on vacation at the North Sea, It's beautiful, and I'll write about it next week.

DANKE FÜR DAS ABLESEN! (thanks for reading)

Aaaaaaand I'm no longer in 9th grade

So the school finally gave me my new class schedule yesterday!

I'm a little disappointed that it took so long (Bureaucracy), and I still have 3 periods a week in the 9th grade (Bureaucracy), but I'm just going to look on the bright side and be glad that on Monday I'll start going to more challenging classes with people my age. I didn't get to pick the classes, that's not really a thing here, but the School Director nicely allowed me to write down which classes I was interested in and tried to fit a schedule together.

Don't get me wrong, I'm now friends with a good number of people in my old class, they were incredibly friendly and helpful to me and I'll miss them, BUT I think everyone can imagine that It was slowly starting to get very boring/weird being in a class of 14/15 year olds who's time is scheduled by their parents and in Math are learning   
xaxb=xa+b

I'm not sure right now what grade I'm in, but I have classes both in 11th and 12 grade here's a list:
-3 "Leistungskurse" --> Intensive Studies course, so just more in depth and more classes per week
             -Geschichte (History)
             -Mathe (figure it out yourself)
             - Englisch (6 periods a week, 3 different classes, 2 different teachers, WHAT? But I think I'll be able to help out a lot
             which is nice, we'll see how that all works out, It's not like I'll do the homework)
-Geography (once in upper class and once in 9th)
-German level 1, I feel like that will be with the slacker kids, and I had this teacher once as a sub and I was really scared of her.
-Biology
-Music
-Art
-Informatik (computer science) and Profil Naturwissenschaft: Both are with the same teacher who's really great. Every year
people get to pick a Profil (Art or Science) where they rotate every month to a different subcategory (Ex photography to
sculpture, or Communications to Robotics). What I'm doing I THINK is just going along with Herr Franz and learn 
computer programming by taking all the Informatik Profil rotations. I did my first german presentation in my Profil class on Bitcoin, click to see that I'm not lying. So hopefully I'll get some experience with C++ and HTML and what have you by the end of year, I'm already learning a language, why not two more?

Classes that most people take here that I'm not:
-Spanish level 4,000 , I just can't catch up with them and It'd be just too hard, I wouldn't be able to do anything
-Sports, woot woot
-Physics, Chemistry, I could deal with it, but I think i'm taking enough classes as it it.

So I've done a lot since I last posted, It would get a bit long-winded to , so I'll just post some interesting photos I've taken from them:

 So two weekends ago I was really bored, so I hiked 7 miles through the Tharandter Forest, I go jogging there like 3 times per week and I've enjoyed exploring it. Here's a unique rock outcropping, I could really picture all the colorful history in this forest going back hundreds of years when it used to be a hunting reserve for Barons. There are still hunting-stands all over the place, pretty sure there are still wild boars here. Below is a view from the town Landberg "Landmountain". I could see really far, even the Dresden TV tower, which is on the other side of Dresden, couldn't see the city because it's down in the Elbe river valley.
(click it for the full pic)

Cool decorations at a late night event at a high ropes course

My host mom, host cousin and I drove 30 minutes to the Czech Rep. to get gas because it's way cheaper.

                                                                                                                                                 

Yesterday I went with another Exchange Student (Noah, from NY state with Rotary) and a friend from school to walk around Dresden. We went to this store "Globetrotter" which was just awesome! Something like a Gander mountain and Dicks Sporting goods that carries things from REI. They had a indoor Diagonal 3 Story Climbing Wall that was free and open (that's where I found this gem of a sign), a pool to test out Canoes and Kayaks, a Rain Room to test Rain Jackets and Tents, and a giant freezer to test out winter jackets.

The Election posters are mostly still up, I saw the one on the left ("Good for big and Small") yesterday in Dresden. He'res an actual photo of him, I was half hoping he'd look exactly like the drawing.

Another Wahlplakate. Effectively reads "Sharing Is Fun: Tax Millionaires!"

Something you'd never see so unabashedly in US politics.

Die Linke (the Left), is, well, leftist, and is a carryover from the East Germany majority party btw

Thanks for reading!

Odd Sodas, Popsicles and things

Hello!
This is a short and pippy post... probably... possibly

First off: I'm in the paper, again, it took a while to translate it, check it out on the Media page, or click this

Now that that's out of the way, everything is running smoothly here. Here are some interesting things I've seen:

Highly derpy baroque sconce at the Zwinger, it made me laugh and think about the possible sculptorial intent. Made even funnier by the fact that it was twice as big as life sized and there were several.

Che Guevara themed soda at Dresden zoo, complete with "Hasta la Victoria Siempre". I don't think that this generic, over-priced cherry cola is financing, or even in the spirit of, a Latin-American revolution. But the marketing made me really want to buy it, victory for the capitalist establishment?

Sparkling water named "Sinus Quelle"

Fritz-kola seems to me in the style of Jones Soda, I had this Coffee flavored Soda at the beach, just wonderful.

Come on nestle ice-cream subdivision, this is just a massive failure of inter-linguistic branding. You're telling me that people in Europe (sorry Richard) purchase and then proceed to lick "Bum-Bums" to cool off on a hot summers day? (Bum = Arsch for the non-amis)

And that is all.

Thanks for reading!