I spent most of the first week jet lagging. I was basically just tired all the time.
Though I did make it to my German class once that week. The class I am in has about 20 international students of all ages. I am pretty sure I am the youngest with the oldest being my parents age. The class runs from 8:30am-11:50am. With a 20 minute break at 10:00. I have about a 25 minute walk to and from school. Most of the days so far haven't been too cold, though it is overcast most of the time here. I have learned quite a lot in class, and can already tell that I will be able to read/write and understand German much better than I will be able to speak it. The dynamic in the class is a little weird because it seems like everyone has 4-5 people who speak their native language to talk to before/after class and on breaks. There is just one Russian girl in the class that speaks English well enough to carry on a conversation. I guess this is just more motivation for me to improve upon my German skills.
That first Monday in town I went to an OM Womens bible study that meets once every two months and I met some lovely ladies who are all working in Mosbach with OM. I then learned of a single womens bible study that meets every week on Mondays and plan on attending that more regularly once it gets up and going. I went the next week to the study and it was one of the girls' birthday's so we just hung out and ate yummy desserts. (Including Nutella Brownies which are my favorite dessert here).
Tuesday was Carmen's birthday. She turned 7! We had all the girls from her class over on Wednesday for her party! There was tea and cake and the girls puffy painted/bedazzled t-shirts. It was a fun time! We also painted the girls' toenails!
I am usually over at the Witherall's from 1pm-7pm each day. This time is flexible if I make plans with someone or if I want to get lunch with a friend after school. I will usually stay at home with Elsie while Helena goes to pick up Carmen from school at 1 and then the middle two kids get out of Kindergarten at 2pm. Kindergarten is very different here in that it starts at age 2 and goes until 6 (school age). All the kids are mixed ages in the same class, though they try to keep siblings in different classes. The day is mostly just play and fun activities with the older kids helping the younger kids. There is a circle time, but really no formal instruction. The kindergarten is all in German.
When the kids get home I help with lunch and clean up, then we usually try to go out either to the park or do some kind of activity with the kids, we are hoping to start some home schooling for the middle kids, so they can develop their English language reading skills before being taught solely in German at school. Dinner is usually around 5:30pm and bedtime is started around 6:30pm, with the goal of everyone being in their rooms by 7pm.
Most of my nights here I come back to my "house" (which is really just a decently sized bedroom with a bathroom on the third floor of a house/restaurant in town) and watch movies or lately I have been working on Grad school stuff. I have a great view of the pedestrian zone though. Which on any given night can be quiet or filled with people who have had a few too many to drink. Luckily I am a heavy sleeper and have yet to be woken up by any drunken escapades down the Pedestrian zone.
My second Sunday in town, we hosted the international students for dessert and a movie. We had delicious Nutella Brownies and watched Anchorman. Believe it or not it was my first time seeing it. I thought the movie was pretty good but really the highlight of the night were those brownies. And getting to meet some of the students. Six of the 30 or so students came to hang out. I am excited for the next time we have them over and to start building relationships with them on a more individual basis.
The week before vacation, a pastor and his wife from Texas were visiting. They came over for dinner a few nights. It was fun to have other American's (more so people who speak English) around for a few days. We went up to see a castle in a nearby town one night and it was beautiful! I'll see them again in Rome in July as they are bringing a team to Transform to do VBS for the kids of the staff.
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| Carmen and Juliette |
My first two weeks in Mosbach were a lot of adjusting to the culture, family, kids and living a foreign country. But after almost 4 weeks living in Europe, Mosbach is starting to feel like home. I started to decorate my walls with pictures that I had printed in the US, and I am looking forward to coloring pages from friends and kiddies for my birthday to add to my decorations. I've even gotten used to the church bells that go off on the quarter hour and then at other random times throughout the day.
We left on 10/25 for Fall break vacation in England, the 18 hours spent in the car in the first 24 hours of the trip was an adventure in itself, but I will cover that in another blog. We returned on November 2nd, and I have had quite the busy week since then.
Sunday the 3rd, there was a festival in town. So the streets were filled with a bunch of different vendors and cool stuff for the kids to do. Sunday is my day off, so I spent most of the day sleeping/reading/watching Duck Dynasty (I just started watching it on vacation, Gary has the first three seasons on DVD). I ventured out into town for meals though, I had a pizza thing for lunch and then a nutella and banana crepe for dinner and a chocolate chip bagel/pretzel thing for dinner/breakfast the next morning.
On Monday I skipped German class so I could run some errands. I needed to pick up a few things at the charity shop and do some grocery shopping. Monday night, bible study was canceled because It was just going to be 3 of us, so I invited one of the girls over the Witherall's house and we made Scones with clotted cream and had tea. It was nice, and the scones were delicious I can't wait to make them again!
Tuesday and Wednesday were pretty typical days. I went to class both days and then over the Witherall's afterwards. We had a party in my German class on Wednesday, everyone brought in Yummy food and we even had some leftovers for Thursday. After class on Thursday I picked up Carmen from school because she gets out early (12:15) on Thursdays and its on the walk home for me. I hung out with the kids for a few hours and then at 5pm I went to Zumba at the OM office with one of the girls I met from bible study and afterwards we went home (we live across the pedestrian zone from each other), showered and went out to dinner at a pizza place just up the street. It was really good! I ate an entire thin crust 32cm pizza! She told me that people often hang out there to watch soccer games, so I am looking forward to heading up there next time there is a game on.
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| German class party! |
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| Sunset on my walk to Zumba |
I am going to a church down in Heidelberg on Sunday with Rachelle. Its about an hour train ride away, and this will be my first time on the trains and adventuring into different parts of Germany. I am pretty excited. Hopefully I will have time to work on two more blogs tomorrow after church and maybe just maybe my internet will work and I'll be able to post them! God has been teaching me a lot in my time here so far. I have been Journaling quite a bit, but it is always hard to put my thoughts into something other people might make sense out of. I am going to try my best though.
For those that are curious, I decided that I am applying to the Clinical Audiology programs at UMD, Towson and Gallaudet for grad school, with UMD being my obvious first choice. FOREVER A TERP. <3 I am finishing up the applications and essays and I hope to have everything officially submitted by the 1st of the year.
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| Photos of a sunset one night |
Some things I have noticed/learned in Germany...so far
- Mosbach has a lot of Graffiti everywhere, pretty much every graffitiable surface has tags.
-They don't have ranch dressing here or chocolate chips.
-Soft pretzels are really popular here and are quite cheap and good. They are 60 euro cents each, which is about 80 dollar cents. These make for a good snack/lunch on the go!
-The main type of pen here is the "sharpie pen", different brand obviously, but I am quite happy with this because I love writing with marker tip.
- The traffic lights go "green, yellow, red" and "red, yellow, green"
-Milk isn't refrigerated
-You have to pay for the size of your trash can, and trash is only collected every two weeks, and recycling is on the alternating weeks. This is slightly problematic with 4 kids. There is a lot of trash.
-They don't cut pizzas in Germany.
