Weekly Post #8

Hey everybody!

I hope everyone's week was great and their weekend beautiful. I know The Packers killing the bears today made my weekend even better.

20. September 2014:

On Saturday my family celebrated my host granpa's birthday. We spent the day talking with family, eating kuchen, and watching soccer. I learned a bit about the German healthcare system from my mom's brother-in-law. I thought it was also pretty intresting to hear his view, as a doctor, on the American healthcare system. Later on we had a big dinner with everybody. I really feel like I am getting to know everybody much more.

21. September 2014:

On Sunday my dad and I went to the world's most beautiful coal factory. The coal factory is now made into The Ruhr Museum in Essen. As a coal factory I didn't expect much from the world's most beautiful coal factory. I, honestly, was astounded by how pretty a coal factory could be. Because it was a coal factory and now a museum, there was soot all over the place. The thing is, is it's supposed to be there. Because it is a museum people aren't allowed to clean it up because it's authentic. Of course they cleaned up a bit before it became the Ruhr Museum, but there is still a lot of soot. We ended up taking a two hour tour of the factory in german. This was pretty difficult because our tour guide spoke really fast. But I was able to catch enough of the numbers to know that this factory is impressive. I also learned that this particular factory still runs a tiny bit, because, I believe, if it didn't the water being pumped out of the ground would cause half of the city to collapse into marshland.

22. September 2014:

On Monday I had to finally get up for my Liturature class. I rode my bike to school with a few friends. I can definately feel fall coming, as I rode to school my hands and nose froze. In Lit we talked about a play we are going to put on either at the end of the year or semester. (I'm not really sure) English wasn't as rough today because I ended up talking to some new friends in the back corner of our class. I also had my art class on monday. We are talking about photography of people and work. I keep learning new terms for photo in german which is pretty cool. I also learned about this think called Klausur. I had no idea what it was and people were talking about it but I figured whatever would come would come and it wasn't a big deal. Well I guess Klausurs are a big deal. I learned that Klausurs are big tests that, in the last two years of your study, count in your overall grade for the huge Abitur test. I also learned that my first one would be for German. In Old German. Analysing a text in Old German. I also learned that that test was first thing the next morning, and I hadn't even tried to rough my way through the 100 and some page Kabala und Liebe book by Schiller. That night I read that whole book, but it was in English. As I went along each scene I would write a little summary of what happened so I might actually be able to form a coherent essay the next morning. Needless to say that was a rough evening.

23. September 2014:

On Tuesday I had my first Klausur in Old German analysis.We were given three hours two write the klausur. There were two essays we were supposed to write in that time about a page and a half long excerpt of Kabala und Liebe. One of the questions was on how the language was used in this experpt to expose the underlying meaning beneith their words. I took one look at that and knew I was about to spend the whole three hours translating this old german excerpt from old german to german and then into english. I did just that. I never even had a chance to write a thesis to my essay because I translated the whole three hours. The paper that I handed in was completely covered in pencil marks and summaries of what was going on. I hope that the teacher gives me some points for my diligent notes of the excerpt. After my klausur I had about 5 hours at home to just laze around because of free periods and a cancled gym class. I was so thankful for this after my klausur. After the five hours of rest I had 30 minutes of math and then I got to go home again. (Haha right I know 30 minutes of math after 5 hours) But after math was done my dad picked me up and we ended up planning a day trip to Amsterdam in the fall holiday. We looked at all the intresting places to go in Amsterdam and how much we could realistically do in a day. After we had made some of our plans we took advantage of the early fall breeze to go look at the new camper they had recently bought. There were all of these little inventions that the previous owner had built into it that made it so much more handy.

24. September 2014:

On Wednesday in school I had my history class in which we were preparing for our history klausur. We were also finishing off a text that was pretty complicated for everybody else in the class. I tried to explain it in simple terms for them but I had no idea how I could do that. It was a really interesting feeling. I supposed thats how some people feel when they try to explain something so obvious to me. After school I studied and read about the Napoleonic wars and their after math. I felt like I was back in Mrs. Nimmers history class. I really feel like what I learned in that class helped me for this klausur.

25. September 2014:

On Thursday I had my history klausur which was in English. This Klausur couldn't have been more different from my German one. We were still given three hours to write the exam, but I ended up finishing my paper in about 2 hours. I also ended up being a tiny bit late to my klausur because the german e sounds like an a in english and we flipped back and forth between English and German for a bit so I got confused and thought my klausur was in A20. It was in E20. I ended up running up and down about 3 flights of stairs before I finally found the room.

26. September 2014:

On Friday I had my math class. I expected to be confused as ever as I usually was in math class. There are some symbols in math that are used completely different in english math which makes that class really interesting. But on friday I finally deciphered my way through them to find that we are learning something that I learned about two years ago. I ended up teaching my friend next to me. This, I have to say was really refreshing to try to explain something to another person in german instead of trying to decipher it. After school our family friends came over and we played a few rounds of Scotland Yard again. I got to play a round of the bad guy, Mr. X, I made it about half way only to be caught by them at the 12th turn. At least I made it past the 2nd unlike my first attempt to be Mr. X. I even have my new plan for the next time I get to be Mr. X. This is probably my new favorite board game.

Thanks for reading!

Sandra