Life in Hedersleben

Herzlich willkommen! This is now my 6th post, and I’m now just over 6 weeks into my exchange. I recently added all my pictures to my last post, so you should check it out again! This is a super late post about the second half of language camp, and I’m so sorry this took me so long. I think from now on I’ll keep my posts shorter and less elaborate, and hopefully that will speed up the process. Anyways, this post is over the middle part of language camp, and what a normal day was like. It covers from August 15 to August 24. I hope you enjoy!

   For one and a half weeks after our trip to Leipzig we had a completely normal class schedule every day. A normal day for me started very early in the morning. I usually woke up at 5:50, and after getting ready for the morning I would be out by 6:20. Breakfast didn’t start until 8:00, so I used this time to write blogs, read my friends blogs (you should check them out too! Look for the “other CBYX blogs” tab at the top), edit videos (a slow process), and upload photos. At 8:00 we would go to breakfast. Breakfast was usually the same from day-to-day, and for me was typically a roll with sausage, cheese, or butter; a glass or orange juice or water, an apple, and a bowl of German cereal (muesli as they call it; similar to but much less sweet than American cereal). Although we did have it every day, it never got old.

  I was usually finished breakfast at around 8:20, after which I would find something to do, such as study, until class started at 9:00. I was placed in the intermediate class, and my teacher was Magda, who was super cool and fun.  We would begin every class by going over what happened in the news last night (I’ll get to that later), and after that we usually just did whatever lesson Magda had planned. We always had a break at some point during the class, but besides that we just did lessons for 3 hours. At the end of this first class, we went back to the tables for lunch. Lunch was usually the biggest meal of the day, as is common in Germany. We always had some form of potatoes, some vegetables, and a main dish that was usually meat-based. We had everything from fish, duck, and blood sausage to ox, and it was always delicious. Lunch sometimes came with dessert, which was often pudding, ice cream, or fruit.

   Once we had finished lunch, we would usually hang around and talk for a bit before getting to our homework. For my class, our homework was usually writing a 100 word essay in German, always with a theme. For me, this homework maybe took half an hour to 45 minutes. After this, we would hang out until 2:00, when we were allowed to leave the monastery until 3:00. If I did leave, I would usually head to the supermarket or the döner place in town. The “supermarket” wasn’t really a supermarket (by American terms), but a tiny grocery store that sold everything from  chocolate to bicycles, in an area the size of an apartment. I didn’t actually buy something every time, but came just to get outside and do something with my friends. We would then be back at the monastery by 3:00, when “Kaffee und Küchen” was put out. It was just as it sounds, coffee, tea, and cake. It wasn’t cake in American terms, as in it wasn’t super sweet, topped with icing, or super fancy. It was delicious every day, and I personally loved the tradition. Sometimes the classes made the cakes, including ours. One day our class made several batches of brownies for Kaffee und Küchen.

             

   After we had gotten some coffee and cake, we headed to our classes once more for 3 more hours of German. We had a break at some point during the lesson, and we ended each day of German class by listening to a song in German, and then translating it as best we could. It was super fun, and it was a great way to practice, learn some slang, get into German music, and have fun all at the same time. Once we had finished with everything, we left class and headed straight to dinner. Dinner was always something to look forward to, because it was always delicious. Dinner was served buffet style, starting with breads, cheeses, and sausage; trays full of pastas, casseroles, and more in the middle; and ending with dessert.

   Every meal was always delicious, but occasionally we had some odd dishes. We had hard-boiled eggs in mustard soup, duck, ox, a sweet vanilla grits, sandwich bread topped with ketchup and pickles and cheese, raw salted herring, and more. I tried almost everything; some I ended up loving, others I wouldn’t recommend. My personal favorite meals were schnitzel, currywurst, kartoffelpuffer (potatoes pancakes), and the German barbeque we were treated to at the town center.

   Speaking of the town activity center, we spent several evenings there having fun. The first time we visited it was for an “activities evening.” We were split into two groups, and my group was the first to get to play “Kegel.” This is a German form of bowling, in which you roll a ball (this ball doesn’t have holes and is slightly smaller than the American bowling ball) down a narrow, inward-curving wooden lane, to knock over 9 pins. It was tons of fun, and not quite as difficult for beginners as American bowling. After our short bout of kegel, we headed back up to the main level, where we could paint, make a candle, paint a keychain, make soap, and more. I painted and made a candle, and I think both came out pretty well. We were invited back a few more times, for some USA vs Deutschland Fußball and Volleyball matches, and finally for that delicious BBQ evening I previously mentioned. After said BBQ, we were allowed to play around in the indoor volleyball/fußball/basketball building. We had tons of fun playing around after the delicious dinner, and it was a great night.

          

   The town also held several other events for us, such as a small festival with music, classic German food, and lots of fun; and a tour of their volunteer fire department. We got to ride around the town in a fire engine, and blast tons of water out of the nozzle. It eventually turned into the coolest (but one-sided) water gun fight ever.

           

That's it for this post; I hope you enjoyed it! I should be following up this one very quickly with a second half, so don't go anywhere! Thanks for stopping by,

Bis Gleich!