We've added an American to our group :) Amy's roommate arrived last week and she is also from Iowa (what are the odds?!). For some reason, at every event we go to the girl that heads the Entree exchange student program makes a comment about the English speakers hanging out together and how we need to branch out and speak more German but when I look across the room, the people that speak Italian are together, the Turkish are together, etc. etc. etc. I think it's because there are a LOT of people that speak the other languages and only the 5 of us though. And we definitely do talk to other people...And no one will speak German with us because we speak English! Even in the dorms, when the other students ask a question in German and I try to answer or didn't catch what they said, they realize I speak English and that's all they speak after that!
Classes start Monday! My language course will be on Mondays and Wednesdays from 6 to 9 (yuck!), my grammar and phonetics courses won't be decided until after the first night but they will be in the evening Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday, and my other courses are Survey of Austrian Culture (Wednesdays from 2:30 to 4) and Issues in Second Language Acquisition (Tuesdays, 12 to 2). It's going to be pretty rough, huh?! No classes on Thursdays or Fridays.. no class Monday until 5... I don't know how I'll manage!! It's hard to believe that is worth the 15th hours I signed up for at Washburn... but I won't complain!!
I've started making a list of places to travel to... and knowing that I have 4 day weekends every week makes it even better!! Hopefully someone else will have long weekends as well and we can travel together. I think the top 5 places I want to go are: Vienna, Berlin, Venice, Prague, and....okay, I don't know what my 5th one is but that's definitely a good start! Wicked the Musical is playing in Stuttgart-- in German!-- so I really would like to go see that one weekend. It's expensive but if I could go to a matinée, it wouldn't be that bad-- and how awesome would it be to see that?! I know all the songs by heart in English, so even if I wasn't positive about vocabulary, I would be able to figure it out and it would be really interesting to see how they adapt it! I think it's kind of a must! :)
For now my homesickness is very much subsided! I'm getting to know Amy and Sam better and I really like Amy's new roommate, Audrey. There have been a lot more welcome and "meet and greet" events for us this week, which has been a lot of fun and has helped us meet more people-- most of whom I will never remember the names of! I am still dealing with some culture shock but I am reminding myself that I have to just adapt to it for now and in 3 months... it won't be a problem anymore! While it's frustrating that they are closed and don't seem very bothered to be helpful, the concept of the whole system is a good one.... maybe I'll end up a fan-- we'll see!
Here are some pictures from one of the welcome parties this week:
Wicked in German - I love it!! You have to go - and report back, of course! :)
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