Friday, January 27, 2006

19th Century living!... or may just simply country life




I finally remembered to take some pictures while it is light out. I got a few of the windmills and one of the house. There are 3 windparks right nearby, one to the east and to the west of the house, one lonely little windmill right behind the house, and a larger one closer to the coast that cannot be seen from the house. Literally windmills in every direction. Each windpark has between 20-50 windmills. Like normal, you can click on the pictures to make them bigger.

The house is taken from the south side... I know that because it is positioned exactly north-south-east-west. The sun is still up (only 6 hours of light in the winter!... 6 hours of ''dark'' in the summer... but even then it is not total darkness) so I couldn't take a picture from the north. The right hand door on the balcony goes to my room. I found a hammock under the couch yesterday that can be tied up there as well. Since it faces south, lots of good sun! The computer and piano room is on the corner, right under my room, and the two windows on the corner belong to that room as well. The kitchen is the middle window in the front of the house and the back window on the side of the house belongs to the living room. It doesn't look like it from the picture, but the house is surrounded by country side, as far as the eye can see. The neighbors own a lot of cows and so sometimes you get some real nice ''country air,'' but always fresh milk! We get eggs and chickens from some people further up the road. All the other types of meat we buy at the store, but only relatively local (ostfriesland) meat and vegatables are sold here. I think we get more tractor traffic on the road here than cars.

Wednesday was Clemens birthday, so the neighbors came over for dinner. It's been freezing the past two weeks (-7 degrees Celsius!) and the roads were really icy wednesday morning, so school got cancelled, of course, an hour after we got there, so Clemens had to come and get us. He played taxi most of the day, unfortunately. But back to dinner, dinner was great because Brigitte made a lasagna (it was almost as good as mom's at home!!) and I had this really good red wine. Everyone was really friendly, but I had a horrible time understanding what was being said because mostly plattdeutsch was spoken the whole night. It is very unfortunate to discover German is useless in Germany. Of course if the schools here would teach in platt, then I would have no problems, but the Gymnasiums (high schools) have to prepare for standardized testing and globalization. In fact a new law was just passed that eliminates the 11th year of school (the year that most german students go abroad because it is the lightest) and now all Gymnasium students in Niedersachsen have only 12 years of schooling. My head master claims that after gymnasium students (not all students go to high school, about 2/3 go to varying levels of vocational schools and apprenticeship programs) finish school, and then add a year of mandated military service (or community service disguised as cheep labor in many cases), and then Universtiy schooling, which takes several years longer due to class size and financial limitations, kids aren't getting into the work fields and starting a life until about 30. Therefore, Niedersachen is attempting to ''globalize'' their school system. And apparently, all the other West German states are following suit. The East German states already have 12 years in their Gymnasium program because of Soviet control.

But back to platt... you see, I just don't understand, when Ostfriesland is such an isolated, unique area of Germany, and STILL is a remote farming and costal culture (up until 30 years ago, everyone still used metal fire stoves and a lot of the kitchen and farm tools that Americans used at the end of the 1800's... excepting, ''modern'' versions... and many people still use some of the things...but mostly the people really out in the country.... like Roggestede. They aren't common anymore, but not impossible to find), then wouldn't it be easier to still use the FARMING and COASTAL language of the land? I wish I could be learning platt and german at the same time. But that is simply not possible. I guess my use of Hochdeutsch will forever make me a stranger in this land. Hochdeutsch (regular german) is the language of the tourists and the young. It finally makes sense to me why all these American influences bother me so much.... because it is simply so out of place. (However, everytime I have been in a city environment... the '''americanized, world cluture just seems to fit in and be the norm). On the other hand, I always wanted to know what it is like to live in the 18oo's. I always thought it would be interesting. Well... to be honest, it's really not that extreme here, but I'm privalleged to get a modern glimpse of it. To be serious... it's actually somewhat charming. And it proves to me that it is possible to live a more down to earth, natural lifestyle in a modern society.

As for other things, i'm leaving for France to visit Trevor Kellogg tomorrow, so I got a few last minute things I still got to do and hopefully slip in some tea time as well! Until later....

Sunday, January 22, 2006

pictures




whoooo... i love this computer, it is almost to fast for me. I am so used to the computer being slower that i can make lots of mistakes and the computer doesn't even notice. I gotta be careful now! Anyhow... the whole pictures on camera to computer to internet connection is finally easy, fast, and fun again! Here are a couple, one of my laterne (paper lantern) that I got for chistmas. They are the coolest things ever. The other is of Chelsa and Sam, the two short term South African exchange students that were here for 6 weeks. And the third one is of Ebbe (like ibb-uh)and Clemens, my host dad in the kitchen.

Thursday, January 19, 2006

home

After only a couple of days here, I already feel more at home than I ever did by the Hoyers. Not that I didn't feel at home there, which I did... just here feels like I am a part of the family. For some reason, being further out in the country is easier than being on the edge of town. I guess it is that all or nothing philosophy. I gotta be living in either way out in the country or right in the middle of a city.

My host father, Clemens, is a choir director of a rather good size church choir in a neighboring town (but as an occupation he is a house doctor... that means he acutally visits people at home, as a doctor, just like the old times!!). Anyway, he seems to know a lot about classical music, which makes the car rides interesting because he explains what we are hearing coming out of the radio (classical music). I think he is really funny and we seem to be getting along very well. For example, the first day of Brigitte (host mom) and I trying to wash all my clothes (we are still washing clothes!), we had hung some out in the car port. Everytime Clemens tried to park the car, he would have to manouver around the clothes. Then when I would make a comment about everything smelling he would start going... ''Becky stinks, Becky stinks!!''.

At school, things have been going really well. Since Jacob has left, a lot of people are talking to me. It is perhaps a comination of that I don't stink like smoke anymore, my german is getting better, and I'm in a happier mood. I've made a couple of close friends and I am starting to meet a lot of other people through them. The teachers have probably given up on me because I just sit there and do nothing. Even if I understand what is going on, it usually is too much engery and hassle to join in. I usually am in conversation with my ''neighbors'' a good protion of the time (which is something completely allowed in german schools as long as you don't talk louder than the teacher). The last 2 days have been very interesting since I found the slang dictionary that Mrs. Agar at HFL gave me for my graduation. Apparently the mish-mash of slang from the whole of Germany, Austria, and Switzerland makes for very uniqe and interesting collection of words. And then today, I found skeleton in the biology store room. A typical full scale model, excepting this one was made of real bones. It was really cool! All I could really think of was the fact I spent all of last year in AP Art trying to draw bones and skeletons (to learn about the understructure of the body to get the propotions correct when sketching) but of course they were all made of plastic. It was always so difficult because the plastic models don't have all the tiny details. But still... there was a real human skeleton in my bio room. (My bio teacher said it is really old and that now a days, real skeletons are not allowed. Apparently it was from an old medical clinic or something.)

I also need to make a comment on windmills... on my way to and from school everyday, I pass several fields of windmill farms. It is an impressive sight. In my opinion they are like big peopley giants always flailing their arms. When driving in the car really fast, it almost looks like they are moving all around and you half expect them to start fighting with each other or reach down and pick up a boulder to fling at one of the others.... assuming that stone exsisted here, which it doesn't (it's coastal... all sand, clay, loam, and the remains of bogs in the earth!) I guess in New York the state government is letting the towns create their own laws on windmill restrictions and most of the little towns are not very ''pro-alternative engergy'' in regards to large, metal, noisy things whipping around and marring the landscape... think extra tall, moving cell phone towers! There are a few Hollandish windmills here... the cute ones. But most of them are tall metal structures. These ones here are over 100 meters tall. There is a big discussion on the coast about putting windmills in the sea... but there are a few technicalities. The cool thing is that more energy is created than used here. That also accounts for the fact there there are no large engery consumers here, such as factories, etc.

Tonight I am going with Herr Heinzel again, but I think this time to Wilhemshaven. I have no idea what we are doing, but it must be something interesting because a couple of other kids are going along too.

Monday, January 16, 2006

New Host Family


I moved to my new host family this weekend. I have been trying to pack all this last week, and now this week I get to unpack! My new house is about 10 Km (every 3 Kilometers are 2 miles) from Esens and about 4 Km from a little town called Dornum. If you look on the map here (click on it to make it bigger), I am about 2/3 of the way from Esens towards Dornum (and Esens is not far from the coast in about the middle of the penisula). In the opposite direction is Wittmund, where Diana lived. Mario, from Mexico lives in Carolinensiel. To put things to scale, it takes about 45 minutes from Esens to Wilhemshaven, way on the east coast; a little less than an hour and a half to Oldenburg.

My new little town is called Roggenstede (sort of like Dog, only Rog- gen-shtay-duh) with 280 people. Every window I look out of I can see fields of giant windmills in the distance. When the windows are open and it is a windy day you can hear the whoosh whoosh of one of the windmills in the back yard. Otherwise, I can hear lots of birds and if it is a cold day there are Boßeln (bow-zeln) players out in the streets.

...Boßeln is the ''national'' sport of Ostfriesland where in most cases (but not all!) a small round ball (I've seen rain boots being used) is tossed down the street as far as it will go. There are 2 teams and the both try to get a series of throws to go the furthest... often several kilometers. I don't know the exact rules, but I do know that between throws a shot of schnopps is drunk. And when everything is done and over with, everyone eats Grünkohl... (green cabbage, shreaded up with spices and eaten with wurst!)....

I already know my new host family because they have been taking me to choir practice all year. My new host mom loves to cook and even wants to cook stuff with me! I have 2 rooms, one is a room for my bed and my closet (... there aren't really closets, they are these cabinet things) and the other room has a couch, a bookshelf, a desk, and a door that goes out onto a balacony that I share with my host brother. I have 3 host siblings, the youngest is a boy- Jelle (Yell-e), the middle child is a girl- Clara (19), and the oldest daughter lives somewhere in Holland.

So far, I have only spent a lot of time talking with my host parents and unpack most of my stuff. This morning we decided that all of my clothes needed to be rewashed and hung outside so we have been trying to get through the mound a little at a time. My last host family smoked in the house and so everything I own reeks!

My new address is...

Rebecca Volzer
c/o Familie Groppe
Alte Dorfstr. 12
26553 Dornum

The computer here is much faster so I will be able to post more pictures here on the blog rather than at Ringo.... make things a little more intersting! Sorry I can't explain more now, the washer and clothes lines are calling me.

Wednesday, January 11, 2006

Archeology?

Ok... so one of the first times I ever got interested in Europe was when I read a book called Clan of the Cave Bear (I have heard this has been made into movie). This fictional story is about a young woman during the time when 2 species of humans lived on the earth (of which really only europe, the middle east, and africa was populated on the earth). When the woman (Homo Sapien... our type) was a girl she lost her family unit in a earthquake and was adopted by a clan of the other species (of which I forget the scientific name at the moment). The book describes what it was like to grow up with people so different and she eventually gets thrown out of the clan and she manages to survive on her own until meeting a man (a homo sapian) and the two travel across europe in a series of books following the first. ...the point I am getting at is, I always have been interested in this part of history, but never in my wildest dreams imagined that it would be possible to actually learn about it first hand.

That is until I met Herr Heinzel, the teacher who took me to the museum and on a tour of churches. Last night I went with him to a presentation he made, about 45 minutes away, about the work he does in the Wattenmeer. Herr Heinzel is one of the leading experts on early civilizations and everything since then in East Frisia. He has been digging in the Watt with students and experts for 25 years and has found over 20 villages. Besides that, he is a very nice man and seems to know everything about East Frisia. (I find it funny that my host dad claims Herr Heinzel knows ''every stone in Ostfriesland''.) What I find amazing is that he wants teach me all about everything he does and has even invited me to visit a few museums (one as far as in Holland!) and go out into the Watt to dig. I think I have learned more from him about Germany in a few hours than I have the entire time I have been here alone. I also think the students like him a lot because he seems to be a very good teacher.

At school, things seem to be going better. My german improved a lot over break because I did so much reading in German at the museums I visited. It is a lot easier to talk in German (besides the fact that I am starting to notice where all my mistakes are) and people are starting to talk to me more. The people that I am meeting with my new schedule are really nice. I love my art class (although it is only 2 hours a week) and although my german teacher is the most boring person I ever met as a teacher, he is always very nice to me and talks to me or answers all my questions. I am also looking forward to starting German history in my History class when the new semester starts after working on American history all this time. I think that it must be hard for a teacher to have a student that can't speak the language in their class. And even though most of my teachers don't have time for me, I am always surprised at how they will speak to me (or other students) like equals between breaks or out of school.

I really feel like this week is the begining of my second half of my year. Yesterday was full of tearful goodbyes as I went to Bremen to see Diana off to South Africa and said goodbye at school to the short exchange students (the flew home today) and Jacob who flies early tomorrow morning. It really hit me that I was alone today... but makes me more determined to make the most of what I got. They always say that you get more out of an exchange when you make good friends with the locals and not just the other exchange students. I am really looking forward to moving to my new host family, if only for the change of pace but also because I like them very much (and I am pretty sure the other way around as well). There will be so much to write about in the next few weeks about settling into a different german family and seeing how things are different and the same as my first two.

And after 5 months and a lot of traveling in the past month, I can acutally say I am glad that I am here and not somewhere else. If I was closer to the cities I would not be learning German so fast. But also, I really love having the coast nearby. I have discovered that I really love having water near me, whether a lake, river, or ocean. And the drinking water here in East Frisia tastes better than the water in the entrie rest of Germany (hence... better tea!). The open and fresh air, the beautiful landscape, the food, and the cows eating the greenest, brightest grass (even in the dead of winter it is still bright green) that I have ever seen. I had a really hard time the past few months but I really think that I have fought the hardest part of the battle. It can only get better from here. And then I will be home and thinking back... wow, it's all over, what a great trip!

Monday, January 09, 2006

back home

hello everyone. I am finally back home after touring Göttingen which is an absolutely beautiful city. All the old buildings are still standing because there was surprisingly very little damage during the second world war. And there is a very large university there which I got a chance to look at. The University specializes in medicine, so that definately interested me. After a few days, I traveled further to Bielefeld again and visited Maria and some other exchange students I met last time I visited. That was fun to have a change in pace and just hang out with friends instead of visiting museums and churches (which I found very interesting). I even saw a candy cane painted church from the 14th century! ...(the inside is all painted in bright candy colors and the columns and parts of the walls are painted in optical illusions.)

This week is so stressful. Diana, Jacob, and the 2 short term exchange students here in Esens all fly home this week. I also have to schedule my flight home as well and start confirming plans for several trips that are planed for my second half of the year. I'm traveling to France at the end of January for a few days to visit Trevor Kellogg who is on exchange there as well with Rotary. Then two days after Easter I am going on a 17 day Europa Tour... France, Switzerland, Italy, Austria, Hungary, the Czech Republic, and a small part of Germany (Dresden). After a week of recovery, I will then be heading to Stuttgart to visit Denis Rudisch, the german exchange student at HFL last year for a week and then meet up with my grandparents and their good friends and travel to the Alps and Munich (hopefully) before heading back to East Frisia with my grandparents for a few days. All that is a 17 day Southern Germany tour plus a few days here in Ostfriesland being a tourist instead of a townie! Its all so stressful to schedule everything and get permission from all the different parties and etc. But I am so excited.

Today I have been saying goodbye to all the exchange students and tomorrow I am going to Bremen to see Diana off at the airport. My head is spinning.

Thursday, January 05, 2006

Happy New Year

Hey! Happy New Year! I haven't written in a while because I have been traveling, again! Right now I am in Göttingen, in the heart of Germany, visiting my host sister who is studying here at the University. I unfortunately didn't get a chance to go to Berlin because of a 4 inch snow storm (it is just too dangerous with that much snow!!) but I took a trip to Bremen for a day and slept overnight at Shiranya's house (from Malasia) and the next day went to Oldenburg to bring in the New Years by partying all night at the disko's. On New Year's day we caught the first train home and finnally crawled into bed at 9 am.

On the 2nd I went to Diana's house and spent the night. She flies home on the 10th and so we wanted to hang out together at least one more time. The next morning I caught the train and travelled to Hannover, the capital of Niedersachsen (my ''state'') and spent two nights with my eldest host sister, Julia. Hannover is a beautiful city but it is almost entirely new because in WWII over 50% of the city was completely destroyed. However, it is very beautiful because it has many restored old buildings and all the wonders of modern technology! I learned a lot about the history of the area (what else!) and really enjoyed my stay. Julia lives in a very multicultural part of the city so we ate Chinese, Turkish, and and even America bagels! It was really neat to see all the turkish people, culture, and food again as well. One of the nights we went to the movies and ended up seeing a new film... Jarhead (sp?) ... I really wonder what kind of reaction and publicity it is getting back home. (Anyone wanna comment on that for me??) I also saw a really neat museum about the history of Hanover and learned that the royalty of England have direct ties out of the former kingdom of Hanover. I saw some cool clothing too and even a real joker's costume, with the bells and everything!

Then this morning I took the train to Göttingen, about an hour and a half south of Hannover. I haven't done anything but see some absolutely fabulous landscape and buildings. There are even ski slopes here (but not the time to visit them, schade!) So, until next time...

Happy New Year

Hey! Happy New Year! I haven't written in a while because I have been traveling, again! Right now I am in Göttingen, in the heart of Germany, visiting my host sister who is studying here at the University. I unfortunately didn't get a chance to go to Berlin because of a 4 inch snow storm (it is just too dangerous with that much snow!!) but I took a trip to Bremen for a day and slept overnight at Shiranya's house (from Malasia) and the next day went to Oldenburg to bring in the New Years by partying all night at the disko's. On New Year's day we caught the first train home and finnally crawled into bed at 9 am.

On the 2nd I went to Diana's house and spent the night. She flies home on the 10th and so we wanted to hang out together at least one more time. The next morning I caught the train and travelled to Hannover, the capital of Niedersachsen (my ''state'') and spent two nights with my eldest host sister, Julia. Hannover is a beautiful city but it is almost entirely new because in WWII over 50% of the city was completely destroyed. However, it is very beautiful because it has many restored old buildings and all the wonders of modern technology! I learned a lot about the history of the area (what else!) and really enjoyed my stay. Julia lived in a very multicultural part of the city so we ate Chinese, Turkish, and and even America bagels! It was really neat to see all the turkish people, culture, and food again as well. One of the nights we went to the movies and ended up seeing a new film... Jarhead (sp?) ... I really wonder what kind of reaction and publicity it is getting back home. (Anyone wanna comment on that for me??)

This morning I took the train to Göttingen, about an hour and a half south of Hannover. I haven't done anything but see some absolutely fabulous landscape and buildings. There are even ski slopes here (but not the time to visit them, schade!) So, until next time...