My Accent

I have an American accent. I had never thought much about it before I came to Germany, but now everyone I meet points it out.
My accent is so strong that it literally defines me. I was in German class, and the teacher told us to pick out someone and describe them using a specific grammatical element.
The lady from Albania described me as "The light-haired, blue-eyed girl with the American accent".
Another time, a kid at school was looking for me in the classroom. I was sitting behind someone else, so he couldn't see me, but he stood up and asked, "Where's the girl with the accent?".

When I was in Austria, I didn't understand a word anyone said. Once, we were sitting in a ski lift with a few other people. They were talking among themselves in something that was kind of like high German. I understood a decent amount, but not as much as usual. I can usually understand everything. Then a guys telephone rang, and he answers and starts talking in a language that I didn't recognize at all. I couldn't understand a single thing he said. Nothing.
Turns out that's Austrian German.

I have a friend from Switzerland who was in Alaska on exchange last year. I recently messaged him to tell him that I was going to his city during our Eurotour. I messaged him in German because we both speak German, right? Oh boy was I wrong. I had to switch to English halfway through because we couldn't understand each other at all.

Then there are the local dialects of German. In the area that I live in, people speak Hessisch. I've been able to learn quite a bit of it, but sometimes when older people talk to me, I can't understand a word they are saying. IT sounds like extreme mumbling. Another time I was talking to a guy that lives farther south from me. He is from Bavaria. I told him that German was really hard and it kind of sucks to learn. He said "I know. I speak Bavarian. My German is really bad".

On the other hand, I have a friend from Northern Germany. He doesn't like talking to me in Germany because I don't speak 'real' German.

Just goes to show ya.

My English is too bad to form any more sentences.

More soon!

Austria

On Saturday night I got home from Austria. I got to go on a week-long ski trip in the Alps. It was so amazing.
But it was a lot of work too. My counselor arranged the whole thing, but he forgot to tell me about it. So, I week before we left I still didn't know anything. I ended up getting some snow stuff from my first host family, and that helped a lot, but I couldn't find any snow pants that I could borrow. And it really doesn't help that I'm fairly short with fairly large hips. I ended up having to buy myself a pair, which isn't tooooo bad considering I'm Alaskan, and I can always use them at home. It's different than a Mexican buying snowpants.

The drive there is usually a 6 or 7 hour drive in a bus, shorter in a car. It took us 11 and a half hours to get there. And because I was going with the 7th grade class for my school, I got to sit in a bus with 50 13 year old... For 11 and a half hours.... I'm surprised I still had hair when we got there.

My counselor was supposed to bring ski socks for me with him, but he forgot them, so we went and bought new ones for both of us. We also ended up having to rent me new shoes because the ones that I had from the school cut off the circulation to my feet.

The first day of skiing, I was with with the beginners group. We used snow blades the first day, which are kind of like half-skis, and they are good to learn on. I got the hang of that pretty fast, and the second day we used the real skis. Skiing is strange. I've always been a snowboarder, not a skier. I did cross country skiing when I was younger, but this was even strange. It is almost the exact opposite of snowboarding, only 100 times easier. If you ever want to learn how to downhill ski, I suggest you learn how to snowboard first. Or learn German. Because after you do something as hard as that, you can do anything.

The third day I got to go with one of the more advanced groups, and it was absolutely exhausting. I was DEAD by the end of the day. The next day, I went with tha group again, and we did a run through deep snow. I don't know what it was, but that made me completely understand. All of a sudden, everything just clicked and I could ski. It's still far from perfect, but it was something.

Unfortunately, my counselor had an accident while skiing. He fell, and hurt a muscle in his thigh. I don't know exactly what it was, because I haven't spoken with him yet, but he was picked up on Wednesday and taken back to Germany so he could go to the hospital. I hurt Myles too. I fell so where, but I didn't realize it until I took my skis off and practically fell over because I couldn't walk on my knee. I sat out for a day of skiing, and it's still a little sore, but I skied for the rest of the time.

Overall, I had a really amazing week, and I'm so glad that I got to go on that trip.

Holiday Break

I have full on writers block, and absolutely no will to write anything. Mostly because nothing exciting has happened since my last post.
It's winter break, which means that I get 3 weeks off of school.
It's such a long break. That people usually go on vacation and stuff.

I've spent a lot of time sitting at home.
And I've spent a lot of time alone.

It's lonely.

I went out with friends a few times, but this last week has been pretty dull and I'm fairly excited for school and German course to start up again.
I get to skip a level in the German courses because I learn so fast! I'm so excited. :)

Today I am helping one of my good German friends with his English homework, because he was having trouble writing summaries. I like that I can help people, and I also really like it that he always speaks German with me, even though he speaks English too. It's really good for my German, although my, English is suffering a little bit. ;)

Sometimes when I Skype with people from home, I'll accidentally start talking to them in German. It's the weirdest thing.
I was in Spanish class once, and my teacher asks me a question in Spanish and I answered her in German because that's what my brain is always trying to do.
I've also started thinking and talking to myself in German. It is so strange anyone who harps ever learned a foreign language knows what I'm talking about. Just suddenly realizing that you are talking to yourself in another language, without having to translate in your head or anything. I love it.
I also dream in half German/half Spanish.

That's always interesting when I wake up.

Well I have nothing more very interesting to say, so until next time, Internet folks!

Happy Christmas.

No matter what the calendar may say, it doesn't fell like Christmas here. No mater how many times I walk through the markets or see decorations and trees, it just doesn't feel right. There's just something about opening presents on the afternoon of a sunny, 60 degree December 24th that doesn't feel right.
Also, I haven't been here for very long at all. It still feels like it should be August to me.

Apart from the weird feelings about this time of year, Christmas was really nice. And the weeks leading up to Christmas were really nice too. I spent a while in Frankfurt, walking though the Christmas markets and seeing all the decorations on the streets. That was so amazingly beautiful. The first two times I went was at night, and it was unbelievably crowded. I was body against body at one point, and you had no say in which direction you went. There's was barely enough room to move your feet.

I went a one with my family too. I was still early in the day so it wasn't as crowded, and it was so much fun. Everything was really pretty and well decorated and there was so much to see. The market was huge.
There were interesting foods like roasted chestnuts and German sausages. There was also a lot of Glühwein. I love it. It translated to "Mulled Wine" (if that means anything to you). It's a sweet, dark red wine that's served very hot. It's great for warming up if the evening is cold.
The rest of the market was really great too. You can buy anything there, and half the people are tourists who speak English. It's fun to walk around and occasionally translate for people. That's always a lot of fun.

Here, we celebrate Christmas on the 24th. The family went to church together and then we opened presents and went to my host aunts house for dinner. We had chili which made me so happy. My family in Alaska always eats chili on December 24th. Every year. I'm glad I didn't miss that this year.

My host family got me some nice presents. I got soap, gift cards, and chocolate, and my host brother and his girlfriend payed the entrance fee for the New Year's party that we're going to. I bought them all similar things, with some additional Alaskan presents thrown in.

Today is Christmas day. Actually it's midnight so I guess it's the 26th now. That's why my writing in all over the place, but I know it's going to be hard to make myself find the time to sit down and write during the day.

Today I just hung out with my little host brother. We started building the big lego kit he got, and I think I might be having more fun with it than he is.

Well, I really need to go to bed, but I promise my next post will come soon.

Frohe Weihnachten.
Happy Christmas.

My New Family

It's been a long time since I have had time to sit down and write in my blog. I have had SO much going on. 

I'm currently living with my second host family. It's so different. And it's so strange not to wake up to the Kappes family. 

I'm slowly adjusting, though it's strange to be home all alone and not have any idea where anyone is. 

This house is so big. Such a change from my last family. Before, we all shared one bathroom and we were always close together in the flat. Now I have a whole floor of the house just to myself. There's 2 balconies, and I have my own HUGE bathroom. But it's lonely up there all by myself. And cold. It's so cold in my room, but my host dad insists and the heat be turned off and the window opened for fresh air. I don't need fresh air in the middle of winter, but whatever makes him happy I guess. 

I take the bus to school now. It's not so far, but it's good to not have to walk half an hour in the cold winter mornings to school. I still see my old host family all the time. I see my old host brother at school all the time, and I still go to dance and volleyball with them. 

There's always those certain people that you'll remember for the rest of your life. My first host family are definitely some of those people. And they are always welcome in Alaska. I couldn't have asked for more.

I'm sure I be perfectly happy in this new family too, it'll just take me a while to get used to things. 

I now have a little brother and an older brother. The little one is 10 and the older is 20. The middle child is my age and she is currently on exchange in Ecuador. I have spoken with her once, and she seems very nice, though I don't know if I'll ever get to meet her. On Monday, I spent time doing homework with the little one. I was helping him (a little) and he was helping me (a lot). It was a lot of fun. I had a blast. So for now I'm hanging in there and just getting accustomed. :)

More soon.

Culture Weekend

This weekend was culture weekend. All of the exchange students (Inbounds) from Hessen met in a youth hostel in the middle of Frankfurt. The future exchange students from Germany (Outbounds) and the people who had already gone on exchange (Rebounds) as well as Rotex and adults from Rotary. We met of Friday afternoon and it was great to see everyone again. There are people from the southern hemisphere that come in January (Oldies), and people from the northern hemisphere that come in August. I know all of them because we meet up occasionally, but this was the first time that we had all been together in the same place at the same time. Friday we spent a lot of time listening to the guy in charge talk. We all introduced ourselves to the new Outbounds and they introduced themselves. We had to say why we were doing our exchange, and it was really hard because no two people were allowed to loose the same word. By the time my word came around, every word in my German vocabulary had already been used, but everyone had already started repeating things, so I was okay. In the evening, we had a "Question and Answer" session with the Outbounds and then we sat around and played guitar and sang. There was a couple people who were interested in going to Alaska, which I was really excited about.
On Saturday we presented our countries to the Outbounds. We all did Powerpoint presentations and some people had videos. I wasn't really happy with the America presentation, because we never really took the time to make it really nice. I tried, but I can't do everything by myself. I'm just glad that it's over. Later we got to show dances from our cultures. The Latin Americans all had really cool dances, but America's dance was by far the best. We did Cotton Eye Joe. We used the original dance, and mixed it with a couple of other line dances that we knew, and it was a lot of fun to dance and to teach to the other people.
The weekend came to an end way too soon. Sunday was a very sad day because it was the last time we were all going to be together. The people that came in January have all come to the end of their year hear, and they are heading back to their home countries. By the end of the day, we were all sobbing and hugging each other. The funniest part was that we were all crying and hugging each other right then, but half of us were still going home together. A couple of the exchange students even live in my same house, and I have my German course with 3 of the Oldies.
All in all, it was a really fun weekend, and I'm glad I got to see everyone.

More soon.

Birthdays

Birthdays are celebrated a lot differently here than what I am used to.
Since I have been here, we have celebrated 4 birthdays.
If the birthday is on a free day or a weekend, then people are invited over for coffee and cake at 3pm. Coffee is ALWAYS at 3. For my birthday, we had brunch because it was a free day in the middle of the week.
People eat cake, drink tea or coffee, and sit around and talk. Around 6pm or so, supper in ready and we eat chili, or casserole here. When we were at one of the grandma's house, she made a bunch of very delicious foo that I'm not exactly sure what was. It was meat, noodle things, beans, salad, and some other stuff that I can't entirely remember.
The guests sit and talk for a while more, and usually at about 10pm, the last people start leaving.
It's interesting and fun for a the first couple hours, but after a little while I get tired of listening to German. When it's really late, I can barely speak German at all. My brain is just too exhausted.

Last week on Thursday was my host mom's birthday. They strangest thing was that her brother and sister-in-law came over for a little while. They stayed and had cake and coffee, and then they left their two little girls for us to watch while they went dancing. I thought that was the strangest thing in the world.
"Happy birthday, watch my kids". They're fun and cute, but VERY loud, and I just thought it was a little strange.
Yesterday was my host sister's birthday, and I ended up sitting on the couch at 10 playing games with her 10  and 14 year old cousins. None of these people speak English, and my brain was dead.
Today, Maike's friends are coming over. We're going to go somewhere in my town and do something that's kind of like bowling, but the balls don't have holes for your fingers. Should be fun.

More later.