Right off the bat, everything is Awesome, my guest family, the school, the house, the whole area. There are no real issues short of a different culture, language, and school system (Even math is different, HOW CAN MATH BE DIFFERENT?!?)
Here's a list of things I've done in my first three weeks here:
I rode in a Hot Air Balloon!!!!
(but I didn't fly, they were very clear in saying that you don't fly in a balloon, you ride): It really helped that i was able to actually walk around Dresden city center the day before, so I could put what I was seeing in context. Really beautiful, here is some evidence:
German flag swag
yep, I took the cover photo for my own blog, btw those are 3 different buildings.
Stadt Zentrum facing süd
der Zwinger, really beautiful baroque palace, currently has like 3 museums in it.
Dynamo Dresden Fußball Stadion, Schwarz-Gelb!!! Aka the original blackandyellowblackandyellow
Actually, Wiz Khalifa needs to show up here.
Brand spanking neu Bridge a little south of downtown, literally opened 2 weeks ago.
Pic of me and my host parent's granddaughter Kaja who visited, wir vermissen dich Kaja!
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| Another hot air balloon and the Dresdner Fernsehturm, they all took off from the same spot in a 20 minute window, looked really cool. |
Moritzburg:
Last week my whole guest family went with a guest family from another YFU exchange student (Brathering!) to check out an astoundingly beautiful baroque palace.
Fasanenschlösschen --> Little Pheasant Palace (the whole place was a hunting reserve for royals)
9th grade:
So they put me in the 9th grade in my school, yeah.... But it's not actually that bad! Everyone is super nice and it's not too complicated, think back to the class structure from elementary school with the same people in mostly one classroom all day (and they've all been in the same class together for 4 years!). The principle told me that if I wasn't there they'd have to put two classes together (oh German Bureaucracy...), but after a few weeks they'll switch me, at least that's what they said.
Heavy loads conveyed:
My host-mom's son Mario runs his own special transport trucking company. I got to go with him twice as we drove a whopping 80 on the Autobahn in an escort vehicle behind the overloaded truck. The first time was for a power plant Turbine, we got a police escort for that which was cool, and the second time they moved a tunnel boring machine thingy
We met the trucks in front of an old East-German factory, looked like something from Half Life 2
Pancakes:
I cooked american style pancakes this weekend for my host family. They've only ever had Blintzes and Crepes (that should be a band name), and they've never had Maple Syrup :O , so I enlightened them. And you guys, I DIDN'T USE A MIX. After some experimenting the last half turned out ok, but they were definitely no Walker Bros.
The election for Bundeskanzler/in is in a few weeks. There are posters all over the place and I watched two debates on TV. The first one was Merkel (CDU) vs. Steinbruck (SPD) that was like a US presidential debate, and then the next night was the "Dreikampf" between Trittin (Grün) Brüderle (FDP) and Gysi (die Linke). I wasn't able to understand it all, but irregardless interesting. I like how people in Germany have 2 votes, one for the candidate and one for the political party, I don't exactly get how it works but I will eventually!
Here's a random list of some of the things I'm really enjoying here:
1. South facing window = My Waka Waka actually waka works!
2. Everywhere in German they have these awesome windows that can swing out both horizontally or vertically!
3. The whole area is really beautiful. Unfortunately it's way to hilly to ride my bike anywhere in my neighborhood without breaking a sweat. But the forest next to my town is awesome, and has a non-threatening yet Brothers-Grimm aesthetic.
Bis nächstes Mal!
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