Month 10:

Time seems to be flying by so quickly now. I feel like i blinked and a whole month was gone. I did quite a lot this month. I went to Berlin with my host family, we went to a few museums, visited some historical monuments and went shopping. We even found some Thai food! It was possibly the most delicious food I have ever tasted, partly because I haven’t had thai food in forever and partly because I was super hungry.

Just this last weekend I went to my re-entry seminar. I got to meet a bunch of other exchange students from all over the world. We all sat together for hours asking each other questions about our experiences in Germany and what it is like in our homelands. We could have done that for weeks. It was so easy to relate to people who have experienced similar things that I have even if we all came from totally different backgrounds.

Fun Facts:

• Berlin has a currywurst museum. YUM.
• At the Ikea in Berlin they have dog parking places.
• Switzerland is split into 3 different sections and in each section they speak a different language. It blows my mind because only 8 million people live there.
• It is finally starting to feel like summer here, but I still have school till the 11th of July.
• I now know people from at least 25 different countries.
• My left foot is asleep.

Okay so this month I had two and a half weeks spring break. So as expected I spent most of my time laying around being my normal lazy self. But for four days of my last week of break I interned at the local cheese factory. I got to learn about everything from how the cheese is made to how the cheese is packaged and sold to how to organize the receipts. I’m not sure when needing to know how to vacuum pack cheese will ever come in handy but it was really cool learning how.

So if you are wondering how cheese is made here is a quick description:

1. First a giant tub is filled with warm milk
2. Bacteria are added to the milk and it sits for about an hour
3. After the milk is pasteurized and is all thick it is cut up into tiny little cheese curds
4. The curds are then poured in to forms
5. The forms are flipped every hour so that they are evenly shaped.
6. The cheese blocks are removed from the forms and are then soaked in a salt bath for a few days
7. They are then stored in big cheese rooms for months so they can get all nice and stinky
8. It gets cut up into little chunks and then you get to eat it! (My favorite step)

Fun Facts:

• Children here are lead to believe that the easter bunny brings the colored eggs so the parents make them.
• Saw die Bestimmung (aka Divergent) and it was AMAZING! Like for realz. I went home and reread the book after watching it.
• I dyed my hair ombre. At first I thought that it was really light blonde at the ends and I was like “omg. omg. omg. I’ve ruined my hair.. I’m going to have to cut it all off.” but now i’m used to it and I like it a lot.
• I have discovered that the lace pattern on the curtains in my house look like a sugar skull cheshire cat. I actually just realized that it’s supposed to look like a basket of flowers.
• Teaching my little host nephew english so far he can say “hey baby” and “armadillo”.
• The ants have arrived and i’m freaking out. I hate ants. They are the most disgusting creatures.
• There are baby kittens here and my heart melts every time I’m around them.
• It is an easter tradition here that every year on easter a bunch of motorcyclists have a motorcycle parade that just happens to go right though my village. My host dad was super excited about it.
• If any of you are ever in Germany and want to eat some awesome cheese check out www.ostenfelder.de.
• Nicole sent me the most snuggly Illinois sweatshirt and I would wear it every day if it wouldn’t start to smell bad.

Month 7:

I went to Wolfsburg for a YFU seminar for a week to celebrate being half way through with my exchange year. In Wolfsburg I met a bunch of really interesting people from all over the world including; China, Estonia, Hungary, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, Mexico, Brazil, Romania, Egypt, and Turkey and of course a few Germans, but I was the only one from America so I felt pretty special. Wolfsburg is the home of the Volkswagen so we spent quite a bit of time learning about the history and technology of cars. I also got to go to Pheano, a science museum, while I was there and got to see a fire tornado. So basically now you should all be jealous. It was nice to get away for a week, but I was glad to get back home to my family. 

Month 8:

Besides being known as a small rainy town on the sea Husum is famous for its crocuses. Every year people come from all over to enjoy the thousands of tiny purple flowers that bloom around the Husum castle. This year the crocus festival was a little late and there weren’t actually any crocuses in bloom at the time, but I went a few weeks earlier to go see them. The whole park looked like it was right out of a fairy tale.

And that’s it. I’ve pretty much just been living my normal life (school, eat, sleep, TV ) so there hasn’t been that much to report.

Fun Facts:

• There is a tradition here in the north german villages that towards the end of February they make a giant bonfire in a field and stand around watching it eating brawtwursts. It was originally done to scare off the ghosts of winter.
• Laura and I washed the ponies. The pony pictured above is named Mini Cooper.
• I sprained my ankle in the Wolfsburg train station and it was super embarrassing.
• I live two blocks away from a sheep farmer and I got to go take pictures and pet the cute baby lambs.
• I got reaccepted at the U of I. So pumped for college!
• I have my return flight, 17th  of July.
• Did i mention that I saw a fire tornado? I saw it twice, because it was that cool.
• Caroline also came to visit all the way from Croatia.
• I got to sit in a Porsche.

Well the time just keeps flying by. I celebrated my birthday yesterday and I had the most amazing day with my families (birth family was just on skype but it felt like they were here). Other than that I’ve had a pretty chill month, just hung out with my family, went to a few costume parties (germans sure do love to dress up), watched the Super Bowl (which started at midnight here. So I was up till four) and took lots of naps (it is just so darn cloudy here and it makes me so tired).

Fun Facts:

• I am transferring to a new class, but I’m totally going to miss my old class.
• It finally snowed. All you Urbana people are probably over the whole snow thing but I was really excited about it.
• There is a german version of the bachelor… in the first like 10 minutes they showed his naked butt. I was so scandalized.
• When you buy a boiled egg at Ikea it comes with a super cute little holder that no one seemed as excited about as I was.
• I am officially addicted to the moth. Like I could listen to it all the time. If any of you haven’t heard of the moth than you should totally check it out it is so amazing. Goal in my life is to tell a story at the moth. http://themoth.org/
• My brother also had his birthday! Congrats Squirtle on being 14.
• Made peanut butter blossoms from the hershey’s kisses my mom sent from America.
• I got so many books for my birthday. So many = 8.

So I have been having a great time. Time goes by so fast here that i would probably forget that it’s been a whole month since my last blog post if it weren’t for my american mom’s reminders.

For the last two weeks we have had no school so lots of hanging out with my family, eating, watching movies and laughing. Here in Germany Christmas is celebrated on Christmas eve. We went to church, ate a special dinner and opened presents. So that present opening took a little longer we each took turns rolling a die. If you rolled a six than you got to open a present. On top of our at home family celebration we of course had to do something special with both of the grandparents. Lots of delicious food was consumed during those visits and now my host family and I now all own adorable matching slippers.

Hope you all had a great winter break and enjoy the snow (if your in Urbana), because we have no snow here and I miss it.

Fun Facts:

• Laura and I got matching tiger onesies for christmas.
• It is really annoying to have to pee when you are wearing a tiger onesie.
• I made my host nephews laugh.
• The whole family had coffee at my host Oma’s house. She had teacups with four little feet.
• Went to a German church for christmas eve and attempted to sing along with everyone else.
• My family got me Ender’s Game in english for christmas. Already read the whole thing and loved it.
• This is my first post in 2014.  #happynewyear
• Steffi discovered the word burp.
• I raised my hand for the first time ever in a german school and answered the question right. The answer was “personifikation”. New favorite word.
• I am on a mission to find black beans.
• My brother in America bought Sperry’s and I’m worried about how preppy he is becoming in my absence.

Fun Facts:

• Detour and die Tür are way to similar and have caused way to much confusion in my life.
• Here they turn whole towns into christmas markets. selling all things christmasy and people dressed up as santa and angles walking around. Very festive.
• The other host grandpa had his birthday party. Food coma #2.
• I saw my first german snow.
• I named the little black cat Hariko.
• Went to a chess tournament and our team won 3rd place. Instead of giving us a boring trophy or ribbon they gave us giant chocolate santas… so much better than a trophy.
• Went to Berlin for a week with my class.
• Laura and I had a photo shoot where she got photo bombed by some cows.
• Saint Nicholas left me presents in my shoes.
• Went to a handball game in Flensburg. Phone ran out of power and I had to ask like  ten people if they would let me use their phone. Shout out to Lorenzo for finally letting me borrow his.

Laura’s host brother from America came to visit for three days. So my step host brother? We got to show him around Husum and I got to learned more about the town as well. It was really fun to get to hear Laura and the rest of my new family speak in english for a couple days.

We went to Laura’s grandpa’s birthday party where the main theme of the day was eating. First there was soup, than meat with all sorts of sides (potatoes, vegetables with cheese, red cabbage, green beans, fried potato balls and more that i’m forgetting because of the food coma I was in), the main meal was then followed by dessert (ice cream with warm cherry sauce), and the day was ended with Kaffee und Kuchen (coffee and cake). I was full for like 2 days afterwards.

I just realized that you haven’t been introduced to my host family yet. I live on a farm in a small village near the city Husum with Claus my host dad, Steffi my host mom and Laura my host sister, some horses, 3 goats, a rabbit, a dog and a bunch of cats.

Fun Facts:

• My host mom taught me how to make Bauernfrustuck aka farmers breakfast. it’s like  a very german omelet.
• There is a reality show here called “Bauer sucht Frau” aka “farmer seeks wife”.
• There was a hurricane, so bad that it got us out of school for two days and I slept through the worst part.
• I found the perfect bunny footsie pajamas/costume but it was made for a 6′ 7″ 600 lb man…
• I’m  not really into scary so I went to a halloween party dressed as the statue of liberty. I got a lot of funny looks.
• I was overly excited about eating McDonalds.
• Laura and I went to Hamburg to a chocolate museum.

Week 9:

My host family left for America for two weeks leaving me with Oma and Opa. They are the sweetest. They wave from the door as I walk to school and hug me goodnight. Who could ask for more?

I’ve lived near the north sea for over a month and had not tried krabben (prawns is the best translation I could find) yet. They are a big deal here apparently. we drove to the harbor and bought a bag full, then went home and shelled them and had delicious krabben on toast with eggs for dinner.

Week 10:

Fall break! Because my host family was still in America I went to Hannover to visit Niklas. I had an amazing time, we toured the city, went to a party, ate lots of pizza, went mushroom picking, went to a variety show and I got to meet all the friends he had told me about when he was in America.

Fun facts:

• Riding the train alone is terrifying.
• Most english movies with songs in them that are translated into german leave the songs in english. It sounds so weird when they are talking in german and then singing in english but the voice is different.
• WhatsApp is the app  everyone here texts with. I like the name.
• Here I will forever be Silvia.

My wonderful family has been taking such good care of me. They buy me so much food and all of it is delicious. I have yet to eat anything here that I didn’t like enough to never eat again. Last weekend they took me over to the island Amrum and we biked around it. It was a perfectly sunny day and the island was so beautiful!

School is crazy here. I’m taking history, german, english, art, geography, math, biology, chemistry, politics, philosophy and P.E. Art is my favorite so far because there isn’t very much german and drawing is fun.

Fun Facts:

• Strandkörbe or canopied beach chairs are so comfy. Perfect for napping.
• When the sky is half stormy and half beautiful blue it’s considered normal weather.
• The fall vacation here is 2 weeks!!
• The greek yogurt here is the most amazing thing I have ever tasted. Like the commercial is not even lying http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=STBBpaHvPzU
• School is so exhausting in german. I start the class wide awake and 5 minutes later i’m so tired I cannot even keep my eyes open.
• Saw a purple cow.

With my new permanent family! They are amazing. So kind and generous and always helping me with my german or feeding me.

Everything being so new makes my mind crave the familiar.  For example, I swear to god I saw Hilary Clinton on the bus in Flensburg. I stared for like 30 minutes and she still looked just like her. But it happens everyday. I think it’s pretty cool. I can now say that I have seen almost the entire cast of Harry potter. Still no Ron yet though, but I’m waiting. 

Fun Facts:

• Sølve is a real name.
• I saw a 6 year old alone on the bus. I was impressed. then she pulled out her iphone and called her mom asking what she should pick up at the grocery store. then i was scared.
• It literally rains everyday here.
• The German word for nucleoid is Kernäquivalent.
• German movie theaters are kind of like airplanes. You push a button and someone comes over and asks you if you would like something to drink.
• I can see 3 of the worlds cutest goats from my new bedroom window. (Squirtle be jealous)
• Got to see a litter of 2 day old golden retriever puppies, but I’m still not convinced that they weren’t just a bunch of naked mole rats. In my mind they were all named Rufus.