Frühling Deutschland Style

My entire life, I’ve had a bit of a jagged view on spring. You see, I am from Colorado. Colorado is often called the “bi-polar state” and you often hear people saying “Go home, Colorado, you’re drunk.” Spring is basically a second winter filled with sunny days that give you false hope it’s almost summer time. One day its warm and you’re spending the day in the grass drinking lemonade in shorts and flip-flops. The very next school is called off and snow is already three feet high above your window outside. Then there is one day in between the process where all the roads look like rivers from snow melting like great water falls. Then it happens again. And again. Till school is over and summer can finally begin. This, of course, is not the case in Germany. Germany tends to be more practical in most spectrums, including seasons. Not that I don’t like my crazy Colorado springtime, spring has just been extremely pleasant here.

Unlike the wet, rainy, cold and gray tundra winter, spring is filled with many sunny and warm days. It is also SO green! There are flowers blooming all around and buds are growing from all the tree tops. The air feels warm and a light breeze cools your off when it gets too hot. Biking to school every morning has became so much more pleasant and we are able to eat lunch outside on the deck most days. My host family has a garden filled with all kinds of fruits and vegetables that are beginning to bud. If the weather could stay like this forever, I would not be complaining.

Spring has also brought more than just good weather. I am really enjoying my last few weeks here. It is so nice to finally have most things figured out. School is much easier than before and I feel like my German has improved so much. I will be taking the AP German test at an international school in May, which students usually take after 5 years of German in school. I can keep up in most classes, and even had the third best test in my Biology class. I have lots of friends, both American and German, many of who I will probably be in touch with for a very long time. As it is, I hardly have any school left, May is filled with long weekends and in June I’ll be going to Berlin with the other CBYX’ers for our end of the year seminar.

In my last few weeks here, I wonder what it is that I will miss most when I get back to America. Will it be the every day bike rides over car rides, sparkling water with every meal, the trains and busses that connect me to all over Europe? It’s hard to say. Home is like a distant memory at this point; Germany has become my home. I’m also curious if I will have any kind of culture shock coming back into the states. I suppose I will find it all out in good time.

As nice as spring is here, I am pretty stoked to get back. I will still have my senior year of High School, and I will be participating in a special program my school does called Senior Seminar. With the program, a selected group of students are chosen who spend the second half of the school year traveling around the U.S., volunteering, hiking, biking, and finding out who they are and what the world has to offer. Words cannot describe how excited I am. I can’t wait to see my family and friends again. To spend my days hiking, tanning pool side, and babysitting to earn travel money. I look forward to whole foods lunch dates with my mom and playing fugitive on warm summer nights. Nothing beats summer time.

Springtime always brings new life, and along with all the blooming flowers and chirping of birds comes a feeling of conclusion. It is in the air, the feeling that sooner than later this chapter of my life will be closing and a new one will be beginning. There will be things I will miss and things I will not be sorry to leave behind, but either way the lessons I have learned here will stay forever ingrained in my memories and I doubt a day will pass that I won’t think of my time in Germany for a very long time. 

Just call me a Traveling, Wandering Bum- Paris Spring Break 2013

From the top of the Eiffel Tower

There is no city quite like Paris. No city with such class,  such elegance, with yet such a modern vibe and a grungy underbelly. Paris is the city of my dreams. I do not know everything, and there is no way I have been everywhere, but I do believe that at this point in my young life I am becoming a seasoned traveler; who has experienced and seen a lot of places on earth other than the small corner I grew up in. And something about Paris just stands out from the rest. I cannot explain it, Paris just feels right. Something about the twisted subway corridors, the ancient and awe inspiring Palaces, and the elegance of sitting in a cafe while sipping a cup of tea and reading a good book; it beckons me to it.

I guess I should start from the beginning. In Colorado, I had a friend named Clara. Clara's family moved to France once a few years ago and once again August of last year. She goes to an international school and will be graduating there. From the moment I knew I was going to Germany, we always had a hope in the back of our minds that we would be able to meet up. We have a mutual friend. Her name is Katlyn and she is also from Colorado and on the same exchange program in Germany. So, I guess you can put the puzzle pieces together at this point, that over spring break Katlyn and I went to go visit Clara. Her family was so welcoming and wonderful to be with. I am so grateful for them. It was one of the most pleasant, relaxing, and beautiful weeks of my exchange.

Here's an overview of some of the many things I did over the week:

 -Visit the Louvre at night. The largest museum in the western side of the world is open late certain days, and makes for a much more pleasant experience than a day  trip filled with crowded hallways leading up to the Mona Lisa and an hour long line to the door. As we wandered the corridors filled with Parisians enjoying the night time stillness and art classes taking place, we were really able to feel a spirit throughout the Palace that would be missed if we were in a rush. The emotion coming out of the statues eyes, the stories being told by the many painters, and the mysteriousness of the long and never ending corridors narrates the serenity and history of a place filled with endless stories and endless mystique.

-Spend a sunny day at a Park outside Paris.

Sadly, Clara had to stay home and do homework, but the rest of her family and us took the train one day and set out for a popular park about 30 minutes from the city. After the long and cold winter in Germany, I have never had more appreciation for laying and soaking up the sunshine. It was an extremely pleasant day filled with walks up and down lines of fountains, visiting a chateau, and enjoying the nice spring time weather.

-Took on Versailles in 45 minutes.
The Palace of Versailles was absolutely spectacular and jaw dropping. So was the massive and never ending crowd of people. With travel guides read before hand and cameras in tow, Katlyn and I somehow busted through Versailles in less than 45 minutes. My favorite parts were the painted ceilings, which never ceased to amaze me, and the famous Hall of Mirrors Louis XIV himself designed. I cannot believe the craft and time put into every detail. After getting through the palace we both felt mentally and physically drained from the mass of people. We headed back and spent the rest of the day wandering through the streets of Paris, and ended up finding the most mouth watering chocolate eclairs to put a sweet end to our day.

 - Ate at the restaurant I have missed most since I left home
It turns out there was a Chipolte in Paris! I just had to include this in my blog. For those of you who don't know, Chipolte is a "fast food" restaurant that serves "Mexican food" pertaining to burritos, tacos, and salads, but mostly burritos. After a solid 8 months without my favorite Mexican American concoction, I guess I can say that it was a pretty mouth watering meal! ;)

--Spent Easter at the American Church of Paris and the Jewish side of town where we ate Falafel and went thrift store shopping. This mural <<< is a painted on a building not far from the Modern Art Museum.

 Visit the Musée d'Orsay and Musée de l'Orangerie. Both are composed of collections of impressionist and post impressionist pieces , and features painters such as Vincent Van Gogh, Monet, and Pablo Picasso. The Musée de l'Orangerie is most famous for its collection of water lilies by Claude Monet.


--Visit the American University of Paris. This small liberal arts school set in the middle of the city is very likely to be somewhere where I may be spending a lot of time in the future. What I really love about the University and about Paris, is that there is this huge international community of people who have so many interesting stories and so many people that possess the same spice of life that I have. It makes it harder to feel like you're far from home, especially with a school that holds a group Thanksgiving every year and a has a American diner right on campus.  I am not entirely sure where my story will take me, but I do know that this trip to Paris has helped me to uncover another piece of the long, twisted, and adventure seeking path that is my life.

THE SHOWDOWN

                                                                                          Gymnasium VS. High School

VS.

 Both learning institutes. Both preparing

students for the future. Is one better than the other? A question I prepare to detangle.

This has been a topic that I’ve wanted to write about for a while. There are so many random things that make a Gymnasium (This is the name for a high school in German,) and an American High School Different. It may not be the most interesting topic for some of you, but I want to address how the learning style and basic outlook of the two institutions differ.

**Note that these differences apply to my high school at home at the school I am going to in Germany. I cannot say that every school fits these standards.

Some Random Differences Between a Gymnasium and a High School:

·   There are 3 different levels of schooling in Germany after grade school or “Grundschule.” It is determined what school you will go to sometime in the 4^th grade. Gymnasium is the highest form of schooling.

· A Gymnasium has grades 5^th-12^th and sometimes a 13^th grade as well. This is the last year my school will have a graduating 13^th class because they have chosen to eliminate it.

·     In Germany, everyone writes with these ink fountain pens.  They make everything look really fancy. When the ink runs out you replace it and buy more.  They hardly ever use pencils, and when they do it is usually to graph things in math. In America we use mechanical pencils nearly 100% of the time and nothing else.

·    Germans take really neat notes. They always use a ruler or a triangular shaped device called a “Geodreieck” to have straight lines.

·    Grades in German tend to be lower than in America. The grading scale is from 1-6, 1 being amazing and 6 being unsatisfactory. Unlike the elite students in America who get straight A’s, it would be nearly impossible, and so to say legendary for a student in Germany to get all 1’s. I’ve seen really intelligent students be happy with a 3 on a test they were nervous about.

·    You also need to make an effort all around to get good grades. I was really surprised when I got graded harshly in gym, a class that I always took for a bit of a joke in America. Well, I still kind of take it for a joke here. It just shows now…

·    Half your grade is based on the exams you take, and the other half is mainly based on how much you speak in class. They assign a lot of homework, but technically you don’t have to do it. You can either present your homework in class or hand it in to the teacher for them to look it over. You never get a “0” for not handing it in.

·     The exams are a lot different. They are scheduled ahead of time, and last 1-4 hours.  There is no such thing as multiple choice. They happen less often than American tests, and cover more material.

·   In Germany every room has a chalkboard. You write with old classic chalk and clean the board with a sponge. A small percentage of the rooms have smart boards as well.

·   There is absolutely no school spirit in Germany. School is simply a place where you go to learn.

·    If you have to ride a bus to school, you ride the public transportation bus. There is no such thing as a German school bus.

·      Instead of having a parking lot, the majority of kids bike to school.

·     There is not an organized school day. There are 12 periods from 8:00a.m. To 6:00 p.m. and you will often have free periods throughout the day. Most school days a student will have class from 8:00 to 1:30 and sometimes afternoon classes as well, however this differs for every schedule. There is also no lunch schedule, but there is a pause between every period where you can snack.

·      In America, we seem to believe it should be a God given right to be able to go to the bathroom when you need to. It is not so in Germany. You can rarely go to the bathroom during class, and when you do you have to go to the office and go get a key to unlock the door. It’s a pain. I also thought it was funky that you have to get toilet paper from outside the stall near the sink and bring it with you.

·     There is no public Wi-Fi in the schools, nor a real library, or access to computers unless it is scheduled during a class. At my school in America you have constant access to a library and computers, as well as WiFi access from any device. We do, however, have blocks on social networking sites.

·    The relationship between students and faculty is very formal. You use the formal version of you, “Sie,” to address your teachers over the casual “du” version.

·    Class in Germany is very dense. There isn’t any time spent doing busy work and nearly no goofing around.

·    They also don’t have school dances, however they have parties at clubs that you can go to when you’re 16 or older that are thrown by several schools. They also have a thing called an “Abiball,” that happens at the end of 12^th grade.  Unlike prom, this has ballroom dancing, and often the entire family attends.

·   In America, we have SAT’s and ACT’s as our big college tests. In Germany they have something called an “Arbitur” or translated as A-Levels at the end of the 12^th grade.

·     Teachers do not care if the students smoke outside the school. I suppose they put a blind eye to it in America as well, however if the wrong teacher caught a student they would be due for some serious consequences.

·      Most students don’t have lockers, if you want one you have to pay for one.

·      If a teacher is sick or not there, you can find out on a board posted at the front of the school. This means that the class in cancelled.

·   The only “spirit days” a German student will ever have is in the 12^th grade, right before taking the Arbitur, unlike the common “Spirit weeks” American schools have around 1-2 times each year.

·  There is virtually no such thing as a snow day, it just does not snow enough.

(We usually expect around 2-5 a year in Colorado, and throw a major fit if we don’t get them. They’re just the best days ever.)
-In Germany, you select two "Leistungskursen" which you have for more time during the week and are more advanced. In America, you can choose to have as many AP or honors classes as you want that are for the same time periods as other classes but tend to be a higher level or learning with a higher work load.
-German schools also take several class trips with their students. For example, in the 9th grade they go skiing for a week and in the 12th they go to another country for a week. (Spain, England, Rome, etc.) In the 10th grade they also do a "Praktikum" or internship for two weeks.
-It is normal when a student is having a hard time in school to repeat a grade. I see this only very rarely in America
-In Germany a student is allowed to have their "Handy" a.k.a. cell phone out. At my school, although some teachers don't care, many will take them away and your parents have to pick them up later. It's super annoying and somewhat unnecessary, and I find that it's not really a problem to have them allowed in Germany.

These are some of the few basic differences… however the list can go on and on.

Now the question I prepare to confront it, is one of the institutes better than the other? The two schools both accommodate to two very different cultures, however I believe that if we combined the positive qualities of both schools and got rid of what isn’t working, we could have an extremely well tuned learning system.

            I appreciate the learning structure in Germany. I think that you have to pay a lot more attention in class and participate more when your grade is on the line. As much as I love multiple choice, you are also forced to learn a lot more with out it. I wish we had a language program more similar to Germany’s in the U.S. I realize English is so to say an “international language,” however I think it would be in our best interest to start teaching a second language at a very young age, whether it be Spanish, French, Mandarin, or whatever else. We also need to focus more on conversation and speaking than grammar and busy work during our foreign language classes. The knowledge of a second language and the skills it takes to learn are lifetime lessons. The organization of German schooling is also well done in my opinion. Germans don’t have to waste class time with substitute teachers. In reality, we don’t really do that much in America when the teacher is not there. I also really appreciate the testing schedules. The last week of school before vacation in America is always really stressful with finals, especially on days where you somehow end up having a test every period. I believe scheduling the testing ahead of time is a really good decision for both the teachers and the students.

            America has its positive qualities as well. In America, a school is a key part of the community. With pep-rallies, sports, organized clubs and more opportunities, school is a much happier place to be and the student body is a closer group. I thought I would appreciate the lack of school sports, however in reality I really miss it. School just isn’t as much fun. Americans have a lot of pride for their schools, where as in Germany it is, like I said before, just a place you go to in order to learn. We also have more electives and clubs available. In Germany students have the option between art, music, and theatre, and are required to take gym. We have so much more variety in America. For example, if you want to take art, you can choose to specifically take a course in painting, drawing, pottery, photography, etc. This allows one to focus more on one topic and really be able to get something out of the class. We also have home economics, student government, engineering classes, mechanic classes, and so many others available. If there is a course you want to take but your school doesn’t offer it, you can also take it at a local college or online. It is also more important to be well rounded in America. We put a very large emphasis on volunteering, participating in clubs and sports, and what you do with your life outside of the classroom. Both grades and outside activities contribute to college selection. In Germany college selection is based mainly off grades, at least from my knowledge. In my opinion it is more important to be a well-rounded person than to only have good grades. Grades play a large role in a student’s life, however they are obviously not everything. I also believe that technology and creativity are pushed more in American schools, something that is extremely important in our modern day society. If we hand in a paper in America, it would be unacceptable if it were not typed. Every classroom has a smart board and a white board. The Internet and website resources play a very large role in education. We also are required to take computer classes up till the 9^th grade, where we learn how to properly use computer programs and how to type. I believe that the lack of modern technology is one of the biggest downfalls of German schools. We also do a lot more projects and presentations in America, allowing us to show our creative side a bit. I always learn a lot more from projects and prefer them to constantly rigidly organized class periods.

            All in all, both schooling systems have positive and negative aspects. I don't want it to be perceived that German schools are really strict and American schools are a party, because it is absolutely not that way. School is school, and not the most favorite place to be for teenagers no matter what, and kids will be kids and find ways to work around rules. I believe that if we somehow combined the organization of German schooling with the community and technologically advanced atmosphere of an American high school, we could have an extremely fine-tuned learning institution. I am so happy to have this opportunity to be here and compare the two different life styles of Americans and Germans, and I hope that I will be able to bring something back to my country with the knowledge I’ve gained as well as share what I know with the culture I am now a guest to.

Wir bleiben wach, bis die Wolken wieder lila sind: Köln 2013

We're staying awake till the clouds turn purple.
(A famous German song, and one that was stuck in all of our heads the entire seminar)

Thursday, January 17^th, after a long and arduous day of staring at the clock, I boarded a train to Köln (Or to the English speaking world- Cologne,) to meet up with the 49 other American exchange students half a year after our time in language camp together.  I must say, this was probably one of the single best weekends in my entire lifetime. Not only is Köln an amazing city that sits right along the Rhine and is packed full of amazing culture, but the people I was there to share it with have truly became my family and understand me like no one else at this time point in my life. When we all got in late Thursday evening, the feeling was just about as close to coming home as it could get. Sharing hugs with the people I haven’t seen for half a year is indescribable. We all have seen so many beautiful things, endured a few struggles, and overcame them all smiling and always ready for more. I am so lucky to have such an awesome support group.

We stayed in a youth hostel a short U-Bahn ride from downtown Köln. It is actually quite nice to write this blog and not to have to orientate it, because I have had quite the difficult time pronouncing the German “ö.” Any of my German friends reading this are probably chuckling from me making a fool of myself during my many attempts at unsuccessfully manipulating my mouth to form whatever sound it requires.

A lot of the Seminar was filled with, you guessed it, seminars. We would meet up a few times a day and discuss topics ranging from our experiences so far, to advice we want to give to future CBYX’ers, to our plans with meeting the Bundestag in Berlin. These were 100% in German, and it was really fun to finally be able to speak with our language camp teachers and show them how much we’ve learned.

Group photo in Bonn. My language camp teacher, Rolf, is throwing snowballs at us from the bottom ;)

Friday all 50 of us and a few of our teachers loaded the train for the nearby city, Bonn. Bonn is a very famous German city that has played a significant role in the history and German culture. We began our day by visiting Beethoven’s house. It was quite the extraordinary feeling to be standing in the same rooms where the famous composer was born, raised, and wrote so many amazing pieces.

            While searching for lunch we found a restaurant titled “Tacos.” So naturally, we were all pretty excited to satisfy our Mexican food craving. Unfortunately, the restaurant did not have any tacos on the menu. I had an extremely “Mexican Style” quesadilla that consisted of potatoes and corn, and somehow, no cheese. Nevertheless we all had a pretty good meal. J

            The second half of the day we went to a German history museum that turned out to be surprisingly cool. It covered a lot of the history between the GDR and FRG, and reunification of Germany. I’ve been learning about all of this in my history class and it was fun to see all of the elements in a more hands on environment. We also had the tour in German, and I understood the entire thing.

From the top, absolutely gorgeous

            The second day we had the morning to explore Köln.  We started by climbing up to the top of the Kölner Dom, the highest Cathedral in Europe. After a long, long, climb we reached the top to discover an absolutely amazing view from the top of the city and the Rhine. After that we went to the chocolate factory museum. At this point we were all pretty pooped and quite honestly a bit over filled with information. We may be student ambassadors, but everybody has to chill right? Well, we know how to do it. In the cafe of the museum, which was filled with glass windows displaying the unusually sunny day along the river, around 10 of us sat down and ordered 10 different cakes, passed around assembly line style. It was like we enjoyed the variety of 10 different cakes, with the calorie content of one. We’ve all became a little chubbier than we were in language camp over the last six months. ;)

            Sunday a group of us began our day by going to the church service at the dome. I’m not religious, however I have a tremendous respect for the service they put on and am 100% open to seeing the beliefs of others. It was a really classy, catholic service, and it was such a cool experience to view a service in such an old and historically famous church.  There was a huge choir, with boys draped in long black and white cloaks, who followed three men swinging a lantern-like device with smoking incense. They were singing in some twisted and beautiful language, presumably Latin. The way it echoed through the huge stone church was absolutely memorizing and wonderful.

"Fantastic Four-" Outside the theatre after Pitch Perfect

            The rest of day was filled with seminars, but afterwards we were let off early to cherish the short amount of time we had left together. After eating dinner, a group of us went to go see “Pitch Perfect” in German. Funniest movie of my entire life. I think it was just that we understood all the jokes in German, and they were 10000x better than they would have been in English. We laughed SO hard. And provided a high quality surround sound for the entire theatre ;).  When we got back to the hostel, a huge group of us went out to go for a midnight walk along the Rhine. We all huddled together and embraced the chilly temperatures, really wanting to embrace the moment; knowing that tomorrow we would get on the trains and not see the majority of each other till we meet up again in Berlin in June. We walked to a bridge that illuminated all the city lights from the top. With snow lightly falling over our heads from the top of the city skyline, we all threw snowballs into the river together and made wishes. The feeling was simply magical. After hearing one loud “plop,” we began to head back to the hostel. Along the way, we got in just about the longest and most epic snow ball fight of all time. Wet and freezing, we got back to  the hostel and after using my hair dryer to warm up, dragged nearly all of our mattresses into one room for a movie night. We were pulling an all nighter. Well, at least that was the plan. We all fell asleep within the first 5 minutes, actually. It led to quite the rude and unexpected awaking in the morning. Monday. The melancholy day we all boarded the trains for another half a year of full on German integration. After a 2-inch snowstorm, nearly every train at the station was late. Finally, I was on my own for the return home reminiscing the weekend. A mix of happy and sad hit me, these people are my family and despite the fact that we stay in contact, I miss them all like crazy.  I got to see so many historical and beautiful things over the weekend, but the best part was reuniting with the people that know exactly what I’m going through. It was an absolutely spectacular weekend.