Die Ende für Deutschland

Not only is it the end for the National soccer team, but also for my stay here in this beautiful country that I have come to like so dearly. The game last night was really something. Aside from the lack of enthusiasm from the team, the crowd was loud and proud. We had a great time. I was wearing my national team jersey, had my face painted, and was also wearing a flag and scarf. (Photo to follow)
I went on a bike ride today, a solo tour, with my video camera to make a film of the town that I have been living in. I think I will take a video tomorrow of the school, the bakery, and so on. I will certainly miss my German family when I leave. But my host mother is talking me into returning for the World Cup in two years. Anyone up for a trip?

Tonight is a birthday party for Karen. She turned sixteen yesterday and since the game was last night, we are having the party today.

That is all for now.
Miss all you Americans!
My peace and love--as always
B

Wir werde Europameister

Finale!!!!
Germany is in the finals for the Euro Cup!!!!!!!!!
Woooooooooooo!.
My throat is killing me from last night, when they won.
Here are a few clips and films to check out to hear the songs that we are singing/screaming and the team that we are cheering on.
Supa Deutschland
Oh wie ist das Schön another of the same but a better video
My favorite player is 21: Christoph Metzelder...mostly I just like his beard.
in any case...watch the game Sunday if you can. I will be watching it live, full of Deutschland gear--flag, jersey, face paint, scarf. It's gonna be a ball. (no pun intended)

WOOOO!!! DEUTSCHLAND!!!

Nord See u. Grün KlassenZimmer

On Sunday, eight of us went to the North Sea via train. The ride up was beautiful as was the day in its entirety. We walked along the mud flats for quite some distance, a kilometer or two. They seemed to be never ending. These mud flats are vast are areas of mud...with a bit of water, a few inches deep, covering the mud and sand. It was incredible. As you can see in the picture there are yellow dots scattered on the beach. Those are Strandkorbs, or beach baskets, where people can sit, sheltered from the wind, and even lock their stuff up inside when they leave for an hour or so. Our group simply carried our belongings and sat on the sand. Student's budget. After the trek back to the beach, we went to lunch and to an indoor swimming pool with a wave pool and a slide. Oh, the pool was a salt water pool too. Wicked cool.

To finish the day, at the Nord See, we had ice cream. Which is actually a daily happening in most German towns/families. Ice cream when we are out and cake when we are at home.

_________________________________

Today we went into the Green Classroom, which is pretty much a farm with a classroom, and learned about the general milk production of Germany. While it is certainly more sound than America's milk production, I still find large farms to be careless and so forth. However, this farm had incredily interesting equipment and seemed to be aware of their animals needs. For example, each cow wears a collar that has number 'charms' as well as a charm with a computer chip in it (the larger green piece). The computer chip contains all of the information concerning that specific cow (or heiffer, actually). The most important task that this chip carries out is the measurement of the cow's grain. Other than being fed a standard portion of food--hay silage, straw (strange to be in food, I thought), minerals, corn silage, and dry hay--each cow gets a specific amount of dairy grain a day. This is where the extra cool equipment comes in. The cow walks into the feeding stantion when she so chooses, the computer reads her chip number, and then dispenses the amount of food that she is supposed to have. Now, here is the cool part, the cow taps a bar inside of the trough and the machine dispenses about a third of her amounted grain. If she decides to roam the barn (free stall kind of deal), the computer will read the next cow's chip when she enters. But, if that first cow decides to stay, she can tap the bar again to recieve another third of her alloted ration. The machine will stop dispensing grain once a cow's third portion is recorded to have been dispensed. Cool, eh?

That's not the only cool thing this farm has. They also had a cow back scratching devise. No joke. There was a machine hanging on a post in the barn that looked like a miniature car wash set up, without the water and soap. A cow would walk up to this set of green and white brushes and tap on the side brush with her head or back to start the motor. Then the brushes would start moving. The top brush when in a circular motion, while the side brushes went up and down or side to side. The motor would run for about a minute and then stop until the brush was tapped again. Bizzare, and yet very clever to keep the cows occupied and content.

This might drive some of you nuts, but I can't upload a video on this computer. And that is all I have of the brush machine, so I am uploading a picutre of a cute Holstein calf for you to look at in the mean time.

At the end of the tour, we all got a box of Milch/milk and a cup of yogurt. People in Germany eat or drink dairy products warm. Milk isn't kept in the fridge. Neither is butter (my American family does this too-just with some butter) or yogurt.

So, finally a picture of Dan and me at the classroom. He had his 18th Birthday yesterday. Congrats, Danny!

Hope all is well in America. I hear the flooding is doing awful things for farmers. :( Mother Nature should really poor down on the Bush estate.

...who said that? not me.

And happy summer solstice, a few days late.

My love and peace,

B

Freitag gibt Freiheit -- Friday gives Freedom

Tonight, after the BBQ at Marie's, a few of us are going to Kreml. And out of my interest in honest journalism, I am attaching the link to Kreml's site for you all to check it out for yourselves. Dad, I am bringing the light up ice-cubes to Marie's party and to Kreml. I figured most people will get a kick out of them there. I plan on taking pictures and bringing the cubes, at least one, home for Karen's father.
Tomorrow we are all hoping on a train, way to early after a night out, and heading for Hanover. There will be an hour long tour through a museum of hunting and such (blek!) and then shopping and roaming time. When we get back, some of us might end up at Kreml for a while. Hanover is a nice city and the weather is expected to be beautiful this weekend--in the high 20s and low 30s (Celcius).
Sunday will be a small group trip to the North Sea/Nord See for swimming, shopping, and such. The train ride up to the N.S. is about three hours.

I Skype-d the folks this afternoon. My dog (Karnali) has created a blog to keep me updated on her well-being and that of the others in the family. We're pals. And obviously are sincerely missing each other. So after you finish checking my blog, you may want to check out her blog.

Alles gut in Deutschland
B

Schule

I attended classes with Karen today at Gymnasium Suligen today. After the first two classes were Physich und (u.) Mathe. After those classes, the American students met up and walked to the Rathaus/Political Building to be greeted by the politicians of Suligen. The next few classes were mixed up from usual.

We must go eat, because tonight we are going to Sebastian's birthday party and a football game.
Viel spaß.

lata
B

Die Reisse

We just got back from our four day trip into central Germany. For the sake of time, I am going to make a quick list of events (including photos) that you all should be interested in and informed of. My luggage came! I am happily sittinging in my own pajamas in front of the computer.

Our first stop on the trip was the Wartburg/Eisenach--the home area of Bach, Martin Luther, Goethe, and other famous people.

(Me--at Bach's house)

Dan, me, and Mark at Wartburg

This is a picture of Karen and I on our way to the Stadtralley (History/Scavenger Hunt)

We stayed in Eisenach for two nights. The second day we took a hike into a National Preserve.

There was a tree top/canopy walkway built by the design of an inspired student in 2005. The tour guide was wonderful, spoke understandable German, and pointed out very interesting facts about the flora and fauna. The walkway ended with a huge tower that had a viewing area indoors and an outdoor lookout on the roof. The view was beautiful. We could see farmland for miles.

The last two days of our trip were spent in Fulda. We hiked down a mountain to the beggining of one of the rivers in Germany. I say in Germany, because the river does not flow into any other country. The spring that starts the river is a small stream that begins within a stone well. People were filling up their water bottles from the spring, but some of us simply drank from the stream itself. The water was crystal clear. Today, before we left Fulda, we took a tour of St. Bonifus' Cathedral and the garden house from one of the old palaces. The Cathedral is the resting place of the body of St. Bonifus as well as the home of the area's bishop and the meeting place for the annual German Bishop's Conference.

So, all is well in Deutschland.

Tschüs!

B

Unterhosen u. Fussball Heute

The highlights of the day were buying underwear, because my luggage will not come until Monday now, and going to the city's 18/19 year old football game. Suligen was winning 3-0 at half time, so the team prepared for the win by bringing out the winner's shirts and beer. They of course won in the end. 5-0, I think.
Tomorrow we leave for our trip into central Germany. It is a five to six hour bus ride. No one is looking forward to that.

I'm learning a lot; mostly farm related vocabulary and commonly used slang from the students. I think in German a little bit more each day. It helps in translating and figuring out what I am going to say. It is a little scary as well to hear yourself think in a different language. Also, the keyboard here is a little jumbled. If some of the y's in the words are replaced with z's (for example) you will know why. It could also be because my brain is a little jumbled as well.

The food is good. Lots of carbs in every meal. Breakfast is normal, similar to the US. Lunch is always a large, hot meal to sustain yourself throughout the day. Then dinner is quite small and seemingly late compared to the US. It works out well with the farm life, because the large lunch allows us to take advantage of the sunlight. Last night the sun was up until about 9:20 pm.

B

Schweinimpfstoffe

Today was the day for the family's weekly shopping trip. We went to three or four stores to get food for the week. Then Karen's mom brought us to an ice-cream shop. I had spaghetti Eis, which is vanilla ice-cream in strings covered in strawberry sauce and shaved white chocolate.
I just finished giving forty-something piglets vacciations/impfstoffe. That's right. I gave all of them, except for the first, the demonstration. I cannot explain to you how much these babies scream. My exchange father, the farmer, had to get earplugs for himself half way through the deal. They yell and yell, even after they are put back with their mothers. Oh, I forgot to mention that they also had their teeth cut. I expect more of the similar chores in the weeks to come. Piglets are popping out like crazy.
Also, as a point of interest, when a piglet is called a runt, you can tell the difference immediately. One can see the hip bones, ribs, shoulders, and so on of the runts. It looks like their insides were sucked out. I mean they are tiny.

In a few minutes, Karen and I are going to meet up with the boys, Sarah, and Marie at a Greek restaraunt for dinner. Tomorrrow we (karen, i, mark, hagen, and hagen's sister) are probably going to Bremen for shopping in the city. I am looking forward to buying some underwear as I still do not have my luggage.

Tschüs.
B

Fußball Spiel

Last night was fantastic. Although Germany lost the game, the fans were just as rowdy after the game as they were before the game. The garage type building that the game was shown in, was passing out fan kits including a flag for the car window, face paint in a stick form that had the colors for the german flag in order, and a football figure with small soccer balls and a goal.
German football gatherings are much more patriotic and fun than I had ever imagined. Great night.



(Sarah, Marie, Me, and Karen)

Today was the day of the Suligen Gymnasium SportFest. There was an all day tournament between the 10th and 11th year students. We left once Karen's class lost. Then when we got home, Karen's Opa/Grandfather was at the house for lunch as he is every friday. Lunch was delicious. A veggie mix with seeds of some sort and cheese. Lecker.

All for now.
B

Erste Tag

The fight to New York was fine, however my luggage was left in Chicago along with three other pieces of the group's luggage. Luckily, Karen bought me a Deutschland Fußball jersey for the EuroCup which is currently going on. We are going to a party tonight to watch the match. Anyway...the fight to Germany on AirBerlin (LTU) was seven hours...no sleep. All of the flight attendants on LTU were beautiful and friendly. A veggie option on the speisekarte\menu as well!
Upon our arrival in Suligen, after a four hour bus ride, our students greeted us with open arms and hugs with running starts. My host mother was the first person I saw, actually we recogniyed each other from the bus\school window. There was a small party for us all. Spitze! Super!

Karen and I just finished a long tour of their town, Brenburg (1000 pop.). We started by clothing up to see the pigs, tractors, and fields. I held a few of the newly born piglets...one just after it popped out! There are a few barns of sows and piglets...only two boars. All healthy and lively. I will definately post pictures soon. The tour finished with a bike ride to the river, which apparently we were tresspassing, but the sign seemed more like a decoration in the field of wheat than a serious business kind of a deal. Karen's mom greeted us with coffee and cake when we returned.
I like this place already.

Will keep you posted on football and other things.
B

Departure for Germany

It's 9:30 pm and I should be going to bed soon. I've still have a little farm-lag, you know, like jet-lag, but from farm work.
The group meets at 6:00 am tomorrow for our departure. It is going to be a long day. We leave here around 6, like I said, then take a plane to JFK (in New York) followed by another plane to Dusseldorf. Once in Germany, we will take a bus to school in Suligen to finish out the day with our students. At this point it will be Thursday night in Germany. On Friday there is a sports fest/day at the school, which the Americans are all invited and expected to join. We will all be pretty wiped by then!
Our first week in Germany is going to be a trip into the central part of the country. We'll visit historical sites mostly. I am not positive on the exact day, but this trip will begin Saturday or Sunday. Crazy, huh?
I will keep you all posted.
Feel free to comment (don't forget to leave your name) or send me an email (can't say that I'll check that though)

My peace,
Bridget