I've realized something recently that I find pretty interesting and that I wanted to share. You spend your entire life being told that it's good to try and stand apart from the crowd, but as an exchange student, you want nothing more than to fit in. You're constantly trying to assimilate; learning the culture, the language, the fashion, the way of communicating, etc. Constanze, Vera, Laura, and I are always joking that by the end of the year I'll be a typical "german girl". Laura and I went to a market in Hoxter the other day, and I tried on a scarf, turned to her, and said, "Does this make me look like a German girl?" (we ended up voting yes, and both bought a scarf :) ) I find it all in good fun. Just an interesting thing I noticed.
As an update on the language: I'm making progress. Slow progress, but progress nevertheless. I can't see day to day improvement which makes me feel like I'm not learning anything, but when I have an 'event' that I can compare, I can. For example, last night my host family and I skyped Jule, and I was able to understand the whole conversation, and sometimes add in in German. Comparing this to the first time I was with them when they skyped Jule, I was pretty excited. I'm left kind of confused as to why I can't understand more in school and in everyday life though. I think there's a few factors that make it easier/harder for me to understand.
1) The amount of people that are involved in the conversation. I have a much harder time at school when I'm sitting in a big group of people than when I'm sitting with 2 or 3, because the topic of the conversation switches so fast in a bigger group.
2) Whether or not I know the general topic of the conversation, or if I have "background information" about the topic. For example, suppose my host mom is telling my host dad something that happened while her and I were out at the grocery store. I can much easier follow what she's saying and connect the words she's saying to what happened, since I was there. But if I'm sitting in a big group of people at school and trying to understand what they're saying when I have no clue what the topic is, I'm hopeless. Last week or so, I was listening to Vera tell Constanze a story, and all I caught was "singing" "dancing" and "turning on the light". I was really confused, and I had no clue how that fit together to make a story. Turns out Vera was telling her she had a dream that there were a bunch of people in her room singing and dancing, and the dream was so vivid she woke up and turned on the light to make sure that they weren't actually there! So I catch a few pieces of the puzzle when I'm listening to a conversation, but obviously not enough to put together the whole picture.
3) And lastly, the content. Derivatives in math class, the 1848 revolution in history, DNA/RNA in biology? Forget it. I have a hard time understanding that stuff in English.
So in conclusion, I'm making a lot more progress than some of the people at my school sometimes realize :) The other day I passed someone in my class a piece of paper, and they said "Danke!". Then, realizing it was me, they said, "Oops.... I mean, thank you!" Oh, I wonder sometimes...
This past Saturday definitely was one of my best days in Germany so far, and probably will be one of the best of the year. That's because this Saturday I went to an Oktoberfest! I think the best part of the entire night was that I got to wear a dirndl. In case you don't know what that is, picture a typical German woman, and the dress you picture her wearing is most likely a dirndl. When Vera first told me that everyone wears a dirndl to Oktoberfest, I seriously thought she was just trying to trick me into being the only person to there wearing one. But as it turns out, all the women wear them and all the men wear lederhosen. It was definitely an "exchange student moment" to go to an Oktoberfest wearing a dirndl, and it was an experience I'll never forget. (It's also nights like those that make sitting in math class trying not to fall asleep worth it :) )
Vera, Celine, Lea, Anna, and I
Huxori, the three day market that takes place every fall in Hoxter
This picture would be a lot cooler if the flag were hanging down and not wrapped around the wire. Dang it.
My favorite "festival" food, calzones.
Laura and I with our matching scarves.
We also both bought flannels at H&M (hilariously pronounced here as "ha" und "em") and decided to both wear them to school today. We got one picture in front of this pretty tree.......
......and one in front of "the ugly school" :)
One of my friends at school, Johanna, started passing these blue pieces of paper around. I assumed they were invitations, and sat there wondering if I would get invited to whatever event she was inviting people to. Imagine my surprise when Constanze bit into one. Paper candy.... and they think our candy is crazy :)
No comments:
Post a Comment