Herbstfeiren and I finally know how bells are made

I just read through my last post, and it occurred to me that I should probably proofread these things before I post them on the internet. I'm just going to claim that my English is going because I only speak German here (haha jokes) and that is why I can't figure out how to use the correct "your".

Moving on, the last two weeks I haven't had school because it's Herbstferien (or fall break) for my area of Germany. The first week I went on a cruise with my host family, which was absolutely amazing. It was a cruise around the Mediterranean, and every day we got to see a different city. We saw six cities- Marseille, Barcelona, Palma De Majorca, Rome, Florence and Pisa. It was totally amazing, and I loved all of the cities. I think Rome was my favorite because I want to be an archaeologist when I grow up, and seeing all the ruins was one of the coolest things ever. Here are some pictures that I took. I took like 300 pictures in the whole week so it took forever to pick out which ones I wanted to post on here.

Day One: Marseille

A little market in Marseille

The view from the Notre Dame 

The Notre Dame Bascilica

Barcelona!

My first Gaudi building

And the Sagrada Familia

The Catedral in Majorca

More Catedral in Majorca

The Colosseum!

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St. Peters Basilica

The Panthenon

The Trevi Fountain

An archaeological dig site we stumbled upon 

Cathedral in Florence

Bridge in Florence

And I couldn't go to Pisa without taking one of these pictures. It was raining really hard, hence the poncho

After we got back I still had another week with no school so I had a lot of time to do stuff with my friends and just kind of chill. I went into Munster with my friend one day, and we found a knitting store, so now I'm learning to knit which I'm very excited about. I had to ask the woman at the knitting store many questions about what yarn and needles to buy, so I know more knitting vocabulary in German than I ever thought I would need to.

My German is ok, but it's not anywhere near perfect, and I have trouble understanding people when they talk really fast or use big words. I have found though that people are so nice and helpful when they find out I don't speak that much German, and especially when they see my trying to speak it instead of just using English. Some of the best moments are when I successfully do something in German, like buy knitting needles or mail a box or order something with no sauce, and people are always so ready to help me get there. It's been one of my favorite things about exchange so far.

Wednesday I spent the day with friends, and then Thursday my host mom had of off work so the two of us spent the day together. She randomly found the Bell Museum a few towns over from us, so the two of us decided to go there in between getting the winter tires put on all the cars (a German tradition). I love tiny museums like that, and this one was actually pretty cool. They had so many bells, even some really old ones, and I got to learn about how a bell was made, which was interesting and not at all what I thought it was, not that I had spent a lot of time thinking about how bells are made, but still.

Look at all those bells

This is how bells are actually made

Friday I went with my liaison to see Finding Dory (for the third time) in Dulmen. It was the first time I had used the train by myself. Mostly I bike or use the bus, so I was very excited about my first foray into solo train travel. That is until I got stranded for 45 minutes at a train station 30 minutes drive from my town because my train got canceled. It turned out fine, my host dad and some of his neighbors came and picked me up and we all went to McDonald's (it was a very weird outing), but the whole incident forced to face the cold hard reality- even German public transportation isn't reliable.

All in all I really enjoyed the whole concept of a two week break two months into school, and I 10/10 would recommend it to American school systems.

So next weekend is my first AFS sleep away camp. I'm going to take the train up to Paderborn (that is not how you spell it) and spend the weekend with all the other exchange students from my area. I'm pretty excited and I'll write more about it next week, but I have to go to sleep because I have a math exam tomorrow first thing. Yay!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

I know this post has gone past regular late and reached the extra late stage, but your just gonna have to forgive me.

So, like I said, on Monday, I had my first German lesson with Frau Stuber, which was actually fun, for a German lesson. She doesn't have us use books or anything, it's more just a conversation in German, and the other two exchange students worked on this presentation they have to do about their home country for their exchange organization. We have a three week break because the next two weeks are Herbstferien (Fall Break) for Germans, so no one has school, and I'm going on vacation with my host family.

Normally in America I never come right home after school, I always have some sort of activity, like a sport or club, or I go and do my homework with friends or something. One of the things I've been struggling with in Germany is that I don't know what to do after school, but on Wednesday I decided to go to my homework in a Cafe. I sat down and ordered a Spagettieis (my fave) and just did my homework alone, and it was so nice and relaxing. Also there is great people watching in the little pedestrian zone, and if you know me you know I love some good people watching. So I came home after doing my homework, and I told my host Dad where I had been, and his reaction was so funny. He looked at me like I had three heads. Apparently it is not normal to sit in a Cafe by yourself and do homework in Germany! (Is it gonna stop me? No. I don't play by the rules. I'm a real Maverick)

Thursday was normal, I had my German course and then I went home. The weather was a little rainy for the first time since I've been here though. Friday was very fun. I talked to my parents and then I went to my friends house. Advice for other exchange students- people invite you places, which is very good, but always make sure you talk to the person hosting the event before you go. My friend invited me to the party on Wednesday, well she invited me to what I thought was a party  but turned out to be just four people eating pizza. I felt a bit bad for crashing their little hangout, but they were cool with it and it turned out to be very fun, and I felt like I got to know the other 4 people better, which was good, and we spoke only in German, which was also good.

I had to get up at 7 the next morning for what I thought was going to be a breakfast with another exchange students family, but turned out to be 2 hours (OK more like 45 minutes) of manual labor. We had to move an entire truck full of firewood from the truck to our backyard, and we had 6 people doing it, so it actually wasn't that hard and didn't take that long, but still, I had to touch firewood (a first for me) so it was labor. Then we got to eat breakfast, and thank god we did because I was famished from all that work :)

Sausage with pictures in it is a thing here (this is a tractor) 

Saturday night was the birthday celebration for my friend Anika, which was held at the fabulous Ahaus Mongol, a giant Chinese food buffet that rivals any American equivalent in both size and MSG usage. It was hilarious and delicious and I smelled so much like fried food after that I needed to shower, so all in all a success I think.

We had Monday off, so the other exchange student to who I am always referring stayed with us on Sunday night. ON Sunday we went to the Ahaus Staadfest. It was a pretty small festival, just a few food stalls, but Olivia and I made our way to almost all of them. Below is a photo diary of everything I ate while there...

Waffle on a stick (Delicious) 

Pastry that was like a huge cream puff (also delicious) 

Fried fish, apparently a Dutch specialty (yes I ate them in this order) 

I also ate Latkes but there's no picture of that. Sorry.

We also got a chance to go inside the Schloss Ahaus, which I was super pumped for because I thought it would be all done up in like 18th century style, but it turns out it was just a small art gallery as well as classrooms for one of the schools. A little disappointing. But the we found the tiny Schulmuseam, which was all about old schools in Ahaus, and it was so cite and I talked to the man who was working there and his kids went to my school and it was kind of awesome, so all was right with the world after my crushing schloss-disappointment.

The lovely Schloss from up close

The art from inside the Schloss

Statues also inside the Schloss

Die Schulmuseam!

We got caught in the rain walking home from Ahaus, so we decided to duck in to the only store near us- the Garden Center. Little did we know that in doing so we were leaving our world and entering a crazy universe where it is totally normal to have your Christmas decorations up on October 3rd. I absolutly love Christmas, so I am all for this new way or Christmas thinking. I actually asked my host parnets about it cause I thought it was so weird, and they said that it's actually pretty normal for a lot of German stores to have their decorations up this early. The whole rest of the day felt really weird like it was almost Christmas though and it messed with my brain.

Christmas Decorations at our lovely neighborhood Garden Center

Monday was the Tag der Deutsche Einheit (the day east and weest Germany reunified) We had off of school and my host parents had off of work, so we, along with everyone else in Germany, headed to the Netherlands to do a little shopping. I bought a few things, and there was another market for Oliva and I to eat our way through. It was another fun day.

My new love, giant warm Stroopwafeln

Next week is Herbstfeiren, so I'm going to be on a cruise with my host family!!!! I won't be updating this week, but I will definitely have a super long post with lots of photos for you guys when I get back. Miss everyone back in Bmore!!