I've reached the the halfway mark of my study abroad trip. I have two months left. I continue to love Germany more every single day, and I haven't gotten super homesick yet, or in a "slump" like some people said I would. I could definitely see myself living in Germany someday. I think my speaking has gotten a lot better as well. Sometimes I think in German, or accidentally say German words even when I'm speaking English to someone.
Although I am loving my time here, I did have my first difficult experience today trying to send a package to my family. I was at the post office, and I asked one of the workers where the boxes were without a problem, but once I had the box to send my package, I had no idea how to put it together, and the directions were in German. I can't even put a box together when the directions are in English so it took me about fifteen minutes to put the box together, and there were about thirty people in the line next to me just watching. I was embarrassed, and a little too afraid to ask for help. After I finally got my package put together, I got in line to send it. I waited about ten minutes, just for a man to tell me irritably that I was in the wrong line. After figuring out which line to get into, I finally sent my package, but the man that helped me also rolled his eyes, because apparently my package was overweight. I don't know why that was a huge issue, but I didn't want to ask. After I finally got the package taken care of I needed a stamp for a postcard. I forgot what the word for stamp was (it's die Briefmarke) so after struggling to ask, I finally asked if he knew english, and all he said was "Nein" and waved me away. I left without any stamp, and was feeling a bit defeated. I honestly wanted to cry, but I refrained. I guess it was just a learning experience, and hopefully the next time I send a package, it won't be as bad.
Other than that little moment, everyone has been more than friendly here. As long as my friends and I attempt to speak German they try to help us out as best they can. If some people start right out with English, a lot of people aren't so friendly and eager to help, which is understandable. I have made a good group of friends here, Kelsey, Stefy, Hayley, Susan, and me. We travel together on the weekends and they are all super nice. We went to München together last weekend, and we will be going to Dublin, Ireland next weekend, which should be a lot of fun.
Other than traveling on the weekends, I'm a bit of a hermit during the week. My classes have gotten a little more difficult, and I have a final exam Friday so I'm trying to prepare for that as well. Every week I have an essay due and a quiz along with an exam every Thursday or Friday. It is a bit intense, but the language courses are my only classes so it isn't too awful.
I'll be posting a couple of photos below of my trip to München this past weekend.
Tschüss (:
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| Behind us is the München Rathaus-Glockenspiel. Every hour it plays music, and it's really cool to see. |
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| While in München we also visited the Residenz Museum, which used to be a huge palace. It was massive, and had over 150 rooms to see. This is a picture of one of the rooms, and it was unimaginable how huge it was. |
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| Trying not to be stand out as tourists, but failing miserably |
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| Susan, Kelsey, Stefy, Me, and Hayley, taking a break, and also trying to figure out where we were at |
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All of us went to the top of St. Petersburg, and we could see the entire city. This is a picture
of the Rathaus from the church. |
