Monday 8th - Sunday 14th March
So, this time I decided I would be more punctual, and I'm actually writing this in a computer room at school on Wednesday. This means that I won't have so much to write on Sunday! As the title suggests, it is nearly the holidays again - I only have one week left of school before my Easter holidays. The school holidays start in two weeks, but I'm going to spend a week with Christin, my German assistant from when I was at school (some three years ago now!), before I go (or come, depending on where you're reading this) home to good ol' blighty!
So far, this week has been pretty average. Monday was a busy day with a whole two lessons, and little else! Tuesday was somewhat more manic at the Gesamtschule, I had to take two cover lessons for the Schuldirektor (one of which I was prepared for, the other was sprung on me with the worst class (not ability-wise, but behaviour-wise)). With the unexpected, and as such unplanned, class I came to an agreement which, whilst not being the most condusive to learning English, meant that I could do English with some of the class, because otherwise, put simply, nothing gets done, except the hoarsening of my voice! So the compromise/agreement we came to was that they could either do their homework or play English games. This actually seemed to work, because they were aware that if they didn't do either they'd be copying out the Hausordnung (Code of Conduct/School Rules) at least 3 times.
Tuesday afternoon I had quite a bit planned - well two things really - meeting up with my tandem partner (with whom I practise my German, and she practises her English), and a private lesson. As is usual, these plans fell through within about five minutes of each other. The others had planned an afternoon in Völklingen, so I thought I would join them there. We had all intended to climb up to the top of the steelworks to enjoy the view - instead we got distracted by an interesting exhibition about the brain, memory and senses. It was quite interesting, and not what I expected. I had to leave Voelklingen just before the others went up the steelworks because my private lesson had been re-arranged for later in the evening.
So, here we are on Wednesday, which presently appears to be pretty standard - normal school lessons, normal weather, and even the buses are running normally punctual! We shall see if anything exciting develops, and I'll add it on Sunday!
Where was I? It's now Sunday, and I'm writing this at on my bed, after having watched the Bahrain Grand Prix on RTL and a few episodes of Yes, Minister too! So, what happened between Wednesday and now? Not a huge amount; a few things, but not a lot particularly exciting!
Wednesday evening I went out with Esther, and as usual, it went on longer than foreseen, i.e. we met about 3.30 and I caught the last bus of the night home again at 00.17 Thursday morning. Somehow though, I felt better after having less sleep than normal, and was fresher and more alert in the morning. That said, this is not a method I plan on introducing on too regular a basis! Friday was not an overly exciting day, I did the washing, I wrote some more of my essay, and I watched a bit of TV, that was pretty much it really! Saturday involved a pretty lazy morning, and then meeting Harriet in town in the afternoon for a drink! Sunday, as I said previously, has been spent watching the Bahrain Grand Prix on RTL, in German, which was interesting - but there's so many new teams, it took a while to get my head around it!
What does next week hold? My last week of school before Easter, and the preparations for my trip to Jena; at the moment, not a huge amount is planned - but we shall see what develops!
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Chapter 25 - Two for One!
Monday 22nd February - Sunday 7th March
As the title suggests, this entry is rather like a supermarket promotion. You're getting two weeks worth of blog for the price of one entry! The simple reason for this is, as usual, I forgot! Luckily, I didn't do too much over these past couple of weeks; so this shouldn't be too long a read for you!
So, where did we leave the story? I'd just returned from Berlin, where I had a fantastic half-term. The first week back at school entailed a massive timetable upheaval (in that I swapped the days I worked at the schools), but once I'd got my head round it, it was a doddle! This half-year's timetable isn't quite as student friendly as the last one - I have 1 early start, and 3 starts in lesson 2. This means more early mornings, but as always, there is a plus side - I finish work by the fourth lesson on every day!
The rest of the first week was pretty much spent chasing my tail, trying to catch up on planning my lessons for my private students, and preparing for a project on addiction at the Gymnasium.
On Wednesday of the first week, we all headed out to Saarlouis to have dinner with Jenny, one of the assistants, who was leaving at the weekend to begin her next half-year placement in Paris. We went to a nice italian restaurant, and it was a very good evening. It was only slightly dampened by the driver of Bus 404 who decided that it was perfectly to stop at the Bus Station (not just any bus stop) for a mere 5 seconds, and then to drive off like a maniac despite the group of people running for his bus. Still, I got the chance to practise my complaining skills in German - and, touch wood, they seem to have been relatively successful.
On Saturday we saw sunshine - real unhidden, unblemished sunshine - it was really there! I could hardly believe it! Still, I soon realised that the appearance of the sun had had a similar effect on most other people. I went in to town to meet up with the others, and found that every man, woman, child, and all their dogs were in town enjoying the sun, and clogging up the main street. On Saturday, we organised our future weekend trips away, and we decided upon: Munich, Freiburg/Basel, and Lille. So keep your eye's peeled for those, although they're not until after the Easter holidays, which are remarkably close! Then we ended up stuck in Sarreguemines because Saarbahn decided that les Francais don't need a half-hourly service after 16.00 to Saarbruecken!
That was a brief summary of what I did duringg the first week - I may have done more, but nothing particularly memorable!
The second week, on the face of it, has a similar level of excitingness (I may have created this word, but can't be bothered to check!). The schooldays themselves were pretty normal except for Wednesday.
Wednesday saw the beginning of the 10. Klasse (Year 11) English project on addictions. This meant I had a full day of lessons (Periods 1-6), which is something almost unheard of for me. Never mind, though, I managed to cope! The students spent the whole day working on a mini-presentation on the topic of Alcholism, through which we guided them, and gave them support/advice. They now have to work on a series of other addictions over the next two weeks and produce some sort of handout, presentation and vocab sheet, which will help prepare them for their exam, as well as providing useful presenting skills - which, as anyone who has been through second year at Bath will know, are vital!
Friday was the other interesting day of this week - a trip to Heidelberg. Firstly, let me make reference to the weather; it was a fresh day (i.e. not terribly warm), but the sun was shining and that made all the difference. Looking at the weather forecast for Saarbruecken when I write this tells me that it's going to get down to -11 tonight - I may have to dig out the thick coat again! Anyway, back to Heidelberg, it is a very pretty city, especially the Old Town area, and the views from the Castle on the side of the valley are just fantastic. You could really see for kilometres (or miles if you refuse to me metricised!).
The weekend was used, sort of, to do household chores - i.e. cleaning up my room, doing the washing, and cleaning the bathroom - I know how to live!
Back to the topic of weather, it has snowed again - now I though we had got past the snow, but it would appear not. I'm a little sick of the white stuff, and have developed a nervous twitch in my fist when someone says "isn't it pretty/fun?".
At present, next week doesn't seem to be too interesting at the moment, but I'll see what I can do! We shall see!
As the title suggests, this entry is rather like a supermarket promotion. You're getting two weeks worth of blog for the price of one entry! The simple reason for this is, as usual, I forgot! Luckily, I didn't do too much over these past couple of weeks; so this shouldn't be too long a read for you!
So, where did we leave the story? I'd just returned from Berlin, where I had a fantastic half-term. The first week back at school entailed a massive timetable upheaval (in that I swapped the days I worked at the schools), but once I'd got my head round it, it was a doddle! This half-year's timetable isn't quite as student friendly as the last one - I have 1 early start, and 3 starts in lesson 2. This means more early mornings, but as always, there is a plus side - I finish work by the fourth lesson on every day!
The rest of the first week was pretty much spent chasing my tail, trying to catch up on planning my lessons for my private students, and preparing for a project on addiction at the Gymnasium.
On Wednesday of the first week, we all headed out to Saarlouis to have dinner with Jenny, one of the assistants, who was leaving at the weekend to begin her next half-year placement in Paris. We went to a nice italian restaurant, and it was a very good evening. It was only slightly dampened by the driver of Bus 404 who decided that it was perfectly to stop at the Bus Station (not just any bus stop) for a mere 5 seconds, and then to drive off like a maniac despite the group of people running for his bus. Still, I got the chance to practise my complaining skills in German - and, touch wood, they seem to have been relatively successful.
On Saturday we saw sunshine - real unhidden, unblemished sunshine - it was really there! I could hardly believe it! Still, I soon realised that the appearance of the sun had had a similar effect on most other people. I went in to town to meet up with the others, and found that every man, woman, child, and all their dogs were in town enjoying the sun, and clogging up the main street. On Saturday, we organised our future weekend trips away, and we decided upon: Munich, Freiburg/Basel, and Lille. So keep your eye's peeled for those, although they're not until after the Easter holidays, which are remarkably close! Then we ended up stuck in Sarreguemines because Saarbahn decided that les Francais don't need a half-hourly service after 16.00 to Saarbruecken!
That was a brief summary of what I did duringg the first week - I may have done more, but nothing particularly memorable!
The second week, on the face of it, has a similar level of excitingness (I may have created this word, but can't be bothered to check!). The schooldays themselves were pretty normal except for Wednesday.
Wednesday saw the beginning of the 10. Klasse (Year 11) English project on addictions. This meant I had a full day of lessons (Periods 1-6), which is something almost unheard of for me. Never mind, though, I managed to cope! The students spent the whole day working on a mini-presentation on the topic of Alcholism, through which we guided them, and gave them support/advice. They now have to work on a series of other addictions over the next two weeks and produce some sort of handout, presentation and vocab sheet, which will help prepare them for their exam, as well as providing useful presenting skills - which, as anyone who has been through second year at Bath will know, are vital!
Friday was the other interesting day of this week - a trip to Heidelberg. Firstly, let me make reference to the weather; it was a fresh day (i.e. not terribly warm), but the sun was shining and that made all the difference. Looking at the weather forecast for Saarbruecken when I write this tells me that it's going to get down to -11 tonight - I may have to dig out the thick coat again! Anyway, back to Heidelberg, it is a very pretty city, especially the Old Town area, and the views from the Castle on the side of the valley are just fantastic. You could really see for kilometres (or miles if you refuse to me metricised!).
The weekend was used, sort of, to do household chores - i.e. cleaning up my room, doing the washing, and cleaning the bathroom - I know how to live!
Back to the topic of weather, it has snowed again - now I though we had got past the snow, but it would appear not. I'm a little sick of the white stuff, and have developed a nervous twitch in my fist when someone says "isn't it pretty/fun?".
At present, next week doesn't seem to be too interesting at the moment, but I'll see what I can do! We shall see!
Friday, February 26, 2010
Chapter 24 - BERLIN!!!!!!!!!!
Monday 15th - Sunday 21st February
In case the title hadn't made it clear enough for you, I was in Berlin for this week! I had high expectations for this trip, and was about as far from being disappointed as it's possible to be! Refelcting on it, I would say that it currently holds, with quite a secure lead, first place in the list of my favourite pplaces I've visited in Germany! To revert briefly to my native westcountry - t'wer brilliant!
Now, an apology, for those regular readers of this blog, you'll notice this entry is slightly late (by about 5 days!). There is actually a relatively good reason for this; during the week in Berlin i had no access to internet, nor any will to do anything for school - I preferred spending the time with my parents and exploring a fantastic city. Consequently I have spent this first week back at school chasing my tail, trying to get on top of everything - which I have now managed!
So, my journey to Berlin started on Monday, at 15.45. I had to catch a bus to the airport, which runs every two hours and was free, seeing as I'm a student! The bus journey got be in about 20 minutes later, leading me to be at the airport at 16.05. The flight didn't leave for another two and three-quarter hours, but as people who know me will testify, I do have a rather annoying habit of turning up ridiculously early! So I was waiting at Saarbruecken Airport; which is Saarland's only international airport. It is effectively a barn with a runway! The terminal is a metal hangar-like construction, with 10 check-in desks; serving all four of the companies that use it, there are four gates; A-D, and one cafe pre-security, and one post-security! Check-in for my flight opened two hours before the flight, so checked in and went to go through the security area. I, stupidly, forgot I had a pocket full of loose change which had to be emptied out into a tray! I still set the detector off, and had my shoes x-rayed too (maybe I was walking too gingerly!). Once through the security area, I sat in the gate and could see the plane - it was no more than about 200 metres away. Yet, when the time came to board, they sent a bus to collect us and take us the short distance from the terminal to the tin bird.
The take-off and cruising of the flight were good, I'd forgotten how exciting it is to be taken up to 20,000 feet in a metal sausage with arms! We made good time too, we arrived in Berlin Tegel after 45 minutes, instead of the scheduled 75 minutes. Now when it came to the landing of the flight, I think the pilot forgot that he was flying a jet-liner not a harrier jump-jet, and that a Boeing 737 is not designed to land vertically. At least my spine thought that when it was bashed around! Maybe he was eager to get home to Mrs. Pilot - who knows!
At the airport, once I'd waited for my suitcase at the carousel, and then walked through the, obviously empty, customs (it was an internal flight, and whilst Saarland has had a checkered histroy as part of Germany, there are no trade restrictions these days!), where I met Sarah. Sarah is a friend from uni, who has the (mis)fortune to live in Calne, near Chippenham in Wiltshire. From there we headed back to her flat in the south of Berlin. (Tegel finds itself in the North West). I got the chance to experience Berlin's public transport in most of its forms; a bus, then a short trip on the U-Bahn, followed by a stint on the S-Bahn. I spent the night at Sarah's because the hostel was booked from the following night, when my parents would be there too!
The Tuesday was the day of my parents arrival in Berlin, and the first time I would really see Berlin in daylight. The first thing we did was to go and find the hostel and get it sorted, so I could leave my suitcase there. This meant travelling right across the city towards Alexanderplatz, which lies in the shadow of the Fernsehturm (TV Tower). The hostel wasn't too far away from that, and was fit for purpose, once all the beds had been made up! From the hostel, we Sarah offered to show me the main sites of Berlin, after we'd had some lunch! So we headed back to Alexanderplatz for a pizza and then walked down the main boulevard in central Berlin, Unter den Linden. On this walk we saw a lot of historic and interesting buildings/building sites! The first thing that you notice is the Fernsehturm, unless your visually impaired or looking at your feet. The tower was built to wave, an almost literal, two fingers at the West Germans. It was a symbol of East Germany's technological advances. There is a viewing platform and a restaurant at the top, which was rather expensive to go up to! After the Fernsehturm, you notice the Rotes Rathaus (Red City Hall), so called because, rather unsurprisingly, it's built of red bricks! Walking along towards the Brandenburger Tor (the most obvious image of Berlin),we passed many other old and interesting buildings, like the Cathedral, the site of the Palast der Republik, which is being rebuilt as the original Berlin Castle. After crossing the, frozen, Spree we passed the Humboldt, the memorial to the Burning of the Books, the embassies of Russia, the UK, France, and the USA before arriving at the Brandenburg Gate. From there, we went to the Reichstag Building, with its dome designed by Norman Foster. After taking pictures of it in the snow, we headed over to Potsdamer Platz, and the Sony Centre, which is a remarkable new-age construction. On the way, we paused and reflected upon the Holocaust Monument, which is worth a look, just because of what it symbolises. After taking in the Sony Centre, we went for a coffee, before running an erand for Sarah. When that was done, it was time to head over to Schoenefeld Airport to collect Mum & Dad. Now, the hostel had provided directions on how to get from the Airport to Alexanderplatz,so I thought I would follow them in reverse, which turned out to be a bad decision, as a few days earlier, the Berlin Transport Group had re-routed one of their S-Bahn trains. This meant I needed to get a Regional Train to the airport. I caught a train which would give me plenty of time to get to the airport and find them, except that my train took it upon itself to stop in the middle of nowhere for abotu 20 minutes, just to add to the tension I think! Anyway, when I arrived, it turned out that their flight, too, had arrived in Berlin early and they were already waiting for me! So, we then caught the train back into Berlin and headed back to the hostel, where we put our heads down for a relatively early night!
Wednesday arrived, and was the first whole day my parents had spent in Berlin. For this reason, I thought it would be nice if I took them on a similar walk to the one me and Sarah had undertaken the previous day. Fear not, though, dear reader, I won't repeat it all again! So, it was going well until we got to the Reichstag building, where it turned out Dad's sugar was a bit low, despite having had a sugary drink not too long previously. We walked on slowly, after giving him some more high-sugar drink, where, after about 250 metres, he began to suffer from a hypoglycaemic attack (a hypo). This causes him to lose control of his muscles, and for them to spasm uncontrollably. We tried giving him more high sugar drink, and some "Hypostop" (basically a very sugary gel, which acts quickly and gets sugar into the blood). None of these were having the right effect, and people were starting to become concerned. At this point, when there was nothing more I could do, and the stuff we'd tried had had no noticeable effect, someone called an ambulance for him. The ambulance arrived after about 10 minutes, just before which a doctor on her way home passed by, to see if he was OK. The ambulance crew, who it turned out, were part of the army, gave him some clugose solution intra-veinously, and then needed to take him to hospital (it's a legal requirement, because the ambulance crews are effectively technicians and need their treatment to be signed off by a doctor). So we all went to one of Berlin's hospitals where we met a Captain. Dr. someone, who wanted to run a series of tests, which weren't really necessary, so Dad discharged himself, and we headed off to get some dinner. This was, needless to say, some excitement I hadn't planned on, and wasn't part of my itinerary!
So after the excitement of Wednesday, we decided to try and do a vaguely DDR themed day. The day started with a visit to the Soviet Monument, which is in Tiergarten. After the wall had gone up, two Soviet Soldiers would march out and stand guard over the Soviet Monument, which was in the American section of the city. Following that, we climbed up to the top of the dome on the Reichstag building and enjoyed some fantastic views out across the city. Following looking at that, we headed over to the DDR Museum, which was quite interesting, but more so because I had my parents there, who were able to give me an insight into how similar living conditions were for them. Albeit without the threat of the Stasi and overbearing government control, but in terms of how the houses were equipped, they were pretty much the same to houses that the grew up in. After that, we had some lunch, before heading off to Checkpoint Charlie, which I know isn't the original one, but thought it would be a nice addition to the DDR Day. We took some photos of it, and then we headed off into the back end of East Berlin to visit the Stasi museum. This museum, I thought, wasn't quite as interesting as it could have been, it seemed to lack information on how the Stasi worked, and the sort of effect it had on ordinary Germans living within the confines of the DDR. Moreover, it was nigh on impossible to find, as it was in a courtyard, in a relatively anonymous building (probably the intention really!).
Friday was a day, in which my Dad wanted to be impressed by some sort of important building. So, we started gently, with Museuminsel (Museum Island), which is largely under restoration, or scaffolding (naturally!). From there we headed over to Gendarmenmarkt, where there was an interesting exhibition about the journey to German democracy in the Deutscher Dom there. The French Dome is used for religous meetings for francophone synods. From there, though I decided we would head out of the city a little, and we went to Schloss Charlottenburg, which was a very ornate, imposing, and impressive building both on the outside and on the inside. We spent a few hours there taking in the building, and some of the history of the building, which was interesting. From there, we headed back into more central Berlin, to see Schloss Bellevue, which is the Presidential Residence (rather like the White House). It looked quite impressive in the dusk light, when we saw it. Following that, we headed for dinner, and a beer or two, before contemplating our exciting trip to Colditz on the following day!
So, Saturday arrived with a bite! We left the hostel quite early and armed with a Schoenes-Wochenende Ticket, we began our journey to Colditz. The first journey involved a train to Falkenberg, from where we had a connection with a train to Leipzig, from where wed had another connection to Grossbothen, from where there was a bus to Colditz! The journey itself was relatively uneventful going this way, it took just over 4 and a half hours in total, but it was worth it as it was one of the few places I really wanted to visit during my time in Germany. When you arrive in Colditz, you have to walk a little bit before you can see the Castle. But when you get to the river, you can see it standing rather imposingly above the town. From there, all that's left to do is to walk up to it! When we got there, we went in and had a look around the museum, which was genuinely fascinating. It detailed the majority of escape attempts from the supposedly insecapable POW camp. It is something I would highly recommend. Along with going on the tour, which the lady in the ticket office didn't tell us about. On the tour, you got taken to to different areas of the castle, which are not normally open to the public. After we'd finished at Colditz, we headed down into the town, and had a coffee before heading back to the bus stop to begin our journey home. The first part of the journey to Leipzig was OK. When we arrived in Leipzig we went to an italian restaurant and had a very nice pasta meal together, before returning to the Hauptbahnhof for the train to Rosslau (Elbe). This train was double decker, and seemed to have real difficulties going over points; indeed, the first time it went over them I wasn't sure it hadn't become derailed. It was juddery, very noisy (almost like it was falling to bits!), and slightly concerning too! The journey back from Rosslau suffered from a similar ailment! Still, at least it stopped me falling asleep! We arrived back in Berlin at about half eleven, when we returned to our Hostel and put our heads on our pillows!
So Sunday, the last day of the Berlin Extravaganza. We had to be out of the hostel by 10, which wasn't too much of a problem. We packed everything up and then headed to the station, where we left our luggage in the locker, and headed off to Berlin Zoo. It was only, originally, planned to spend the morning going around the zoo, however when we got there, it was plain to see why it would be easily possible to spend a whole day there. We spent the morning looking around some of the animals, for example the gorillas who seemed to have fallen out with each other, and the lions who were sleeping (quite senisbly!). But for me the highlight of the zoo was seeing Polar Bears, which I don't recall ever having seen before The afternoon we spent looking around the aquarium, which was equally as interesting. We left the zoo about half three, and headed back to Alexanderplatz, where we partook in a coffee, and reclaimed our luggage. Mum & Dad then got on the train to the airport, and I headed off to the bus to Tegel (which went from about 200 metres away). I estimate we probably arrived at about our respective airports at roughly the same time, but they had to wait another 1 after me until their scheduled departure time. At Tegel it was all very easy, I checked in almost as soon as I'd had something to eat, and went through the security checks without any problems at all. Then I had to sit and watch for my aeroplane to arrive, which it did in due course. We boarded and left punctually (very German), and on this plane there were computer screens which told you where you were, how fast you were going and when you would arrive. It also provided computer generated images of what you could see out of the windows on both sides, which I thought was very interesting and far more advanced than anything I remember from previous flights. The flight itself took about 1 hour, we seemed to have more of a headwind, which took us a little longer. The landing, this time, was, to quote the Air Stewardess, "Enthusiastic" - which is a euphamism for too fast, and bouncy! From the airport, I had to get a taxi, seeing as the buses had stopped running some four hours before. I was home by about 11 and in bed by half 11.
So, what about Mum & Dad, well, they weren't quite so fortunate. Because of snow in Switzerland (!) they hadn't left Berlin by the time I had made it home and was on my computer. They arrived very late the following morning, and my sister had to wait to pick them up from Bristol Airport.
To conclude this rather epic blog entry then, Berlin is a fantastic city, and a week definitely isn't enough time! There are soooo many interesting things to see & do there, that I had to prioritise as it was - as such Berlin is definitely on my list of places to go back to (although not this year, it's too expensive to get there again - it's, ironically, cheaper to fly there from Bristol than Saarbruecken.
So, now the blog is done, I can get up and have a shower and some breakfast! The next blog entry concerns itself with the first week back at school, and me chasing my tail to try and catch up with everything! I'll try and make it a little more puenktlich!
In case the title hadn't made it clear enough for you, I was in Berlin for this week! I had high expectations for this trip, and was about as far from being disappointed as it's possible to be! Refelcting on it, I would say that it currently holds, with quite a secure lead, first place in the list of my favourite pplaces I've visited in Germany! To revert briefly to my native westcountry - t'wer brilliant!
Now, an apology, for those regular readers of this blog, you'll notice this entry is slightly late (by about 5 days!). There is actually a relatively good reason for this; during the week in Berlin i had no access to internet, nor any will to do anything for school - I preferred spending the time with my parents and exploring a fantastic city. Consequently I have spent this first week back at school chasing my tail, trying to get on top of everything - which I have now managed!
So, my journey to Berlin started on Monday, at 15.45. I had to catch a bus to the airport, which runs every two hours and was free, seeing as I'm a student! The bus journey got be in about 20 minutes later, leading me to be at the airport at 16.05. The flight didn't leave for another two and three-quarter hours, but as people who know me will testify, I do have a rather annoying habit of turning up ridiculously early! So I was waiting at Saarbruecken Airport; which is Saarland's only international airport. It is effectively a barn with a runway! The terminal is a metal hangar-like construction, with 10 check-in desks; serving all four of the companies that use it, there are four gates; A-D, and one cafe pre-security, and one post-security! Check-in for my flight opened two hours before the flight, so checked in and went to go through the security area. I, stupidly, forgot I had a pocket full of loose change which had to be emptied out into a tray! I still set the detector off, and had my shoes x-rayed too (maybe I was walking too gingerly!). Once through the security area, I sat in the gate and could see the plane - it was no more than about 200 metres away. Yet, when the time came to board, they sent a bus to collect us and take us the short distance from the terminal to the tin bird.
The take-off and cruising of the flight were good, I'd forgotten how exciting it is to be taken up to 20,000 feet in a metal sausage with arms! We made good time too, we arrived in Berlin Tegel after 45 minutes, instead of the scheduled 75 minutes. Now when it came to the landing of the flight, I think the pilot forgot that he was flying a jet-liner not a harrier jump-jet, and that a Boeing 737 is not designed to land vertically. At least my spine thought that when it was bashed around! Maybe he was eager to get home to Mrs. Pilot - who knows!
At the airport, once I'd waited for my suitcase at the carousel, and then walked through the, obviously empty, customs (it was an internal flight, and whilst Saarland has had a checkered histroy as part of Germany, there are no trade restrictions these days!), where I met Sarah. Sarah is a friend from uni, who has the (mis)fortune to live in Calne, near Chippenham in Wiltshire. From there we headed back to her flat in the south of Berlin. (Tegel finds itself in the North West). I got the chance to experience Berlin's public transport in most of its forms; a bus, then a short trip on the U-Bahn, followed by a stint on the S-Bahn. I spent the night at Sarah's because the hostel was booked from the following night, when my parents would be there too!
The Tuesday was the day of my parents arrival in Berlin, and the first time I would really see Berlin in daylight. The first thing we did was to go and find the hostel and get it sorted, so I could leave my suitcase there. This meant travelling right across the city towards Alexanderplatz, which lies in the shadow of the Fernsehturm (TV Tower). The hostel wasn't too far away from that, and was fit for purpose, once all the beds had been made up! From the hostel, we Sarah offered to show me the main sites of Berlin, after we'd had some lunch! So we headed back to Alexanderplatz for a pizza and then walked down the main boulevard in central Berlin, Unter den Linden. On this walk we saw a lot of historic and interesting buildings/building sites! The first thing that you notice is the Fernsehturm, unless your visually impaired or looking at your feet. The tower was built to wave, an almost literal, two fingers at the West Germans. It was a symbol of East Germany's technological advances. There is a viewing platform and a restaurant at the top, which was rather expensive to go up to! After the Fernsehturm, you notice the Rotes Rathaus (Red City Hall), so called because, rather unsurprisingly, it's built of red bricks! Walking along towards the Brandenburger Tor (the most obvious image of Berlin),we passed many other old and interesting buildings, like the Cathedral, the site of the Palast der Republik, which is being rebuilt as the original Berlin Castle. After crossing the, frozen, Spree we passed the Humboldt, the memorial to the Burning of the Books, the embassies of Russia, the UK, France, and the USA before arriving at the Brandenburg Gate. From there, we went to the Reichstag Building, with its dome designed by Norman Foster. After taking pictures of it in the snow, we headed over to Potsdamer Platz, and the Sony Centre, which is a remarkable new-age construction. On the way, we paused and reflected upon the Holocaust Monument, which is worth a look, just because of what it symbolises. After taking in the Sony Centre, we went for a coffee, before running an erand for Sarah. When that was done, it was time to head over to Schoenefeld Airport to collect Mum & Dad. Now, the hostel had provided directions on how to get from the Airport to Alexanderplatz,so I thought I would follow them in reverse, which turned out to be a bad decision, as a few days earlier, the Berlin Transport Group had re-routed one of their S-Bahn trains. This meant I needed to get a Regional Train to the airport. I caught a train which would give me plenty of time to get to the airport and find them, except that my train took it upon itself to stop in the middle of nowhere for abotu 20 minutes, just to add to the tension I think! Anyway, when I arrived, it turned out that their flight, too, had arrived in Berlin early and they were already waiting for me! So, we then caught the train back into Berlin and headed back to the hostel, where we put our heads down for a relatively early night!
Wednesday arrived, and was the first whole day my parents had spent in Berlin. For this reason, I thought it would be nice if I took them on a similar walk to the one me and Sarah had undertaken the previous day. Fear not, though, dear reader, I won't repeat it all again! So, it was going well until we got to the Reichstag building, where it turned out Dad's sugar was a bit low, despite having had a sugary drink not too long previously. We walked on slowly, after giving him some more high-sugar drink, where, after about 250 metres, he began to suffer from a hypoglycaemic attack (a hypo). This causes him to lose control of his muscles, and for them to spasm uncontrollably. We tried giving him more high sugar drink, and some "Hypostop" (basically a very sugary gel, which acts quickly and gets sugar into the blood). None of these were having the right effect, and people were starting to become concerned. At this point, when there was nothing more I could do, and the stuff we'd tried had had no noticeable effect, someone called an ambulance for him. The ambulance arrived after about 10 minutes, just before which a doctor on her way home passed by, to see if he was OK. The ambulance crew, who it turned out, were part of the army, gave him some clugose solution intra-veinously, and then needed to take him to hospital (it's a legal requirement, because the ambulance crews are effectively technicians and need their treatment to be signed off by a doctor). So we all went to one of Berlin's hospitals where we met a Captain. Dr. someone, who wanted to run a series of tests, which weren't really necessary, so Dad discharged himself, and we headed off to get some dinner. This was, needless to say, some excitement I hadn't planned on, and wasn't part of my itinerary!
So after the excitement of Wednesday, we decided to try and do a vaguely DDR themed day. The day started with a visit to the Soviet Monument, which is in Tiergarten. After the wall had gone up, two Soviet Soldiers would march out and stand guard over the Soviet Monument, which was in the American section of the city. Following that, we climbed up to the top of the dome on the Reichstag building and enjoyed some fantastic views out across the city. Following looking at that, we headed over to the DDR Museum, which was quite interesting, but more so because I had my parents there, who were able to give me an insight into how similar living conditions were for them. Albeit without the threat of the Stasi and overbearing government control, but in terms of how the houses were equipped, they were pretty much the same to houses that the grew up in. After that, we had some lunch, before heading off to Checkpoint Charlie, which I know isn't the original one, but thought it would be a nice addition to the DDR Day. We took some photos of it, and then we headed off into the back end of East Berlin to visit the Stasi museum. This museum, I thought, wasn't quite as interesting as it could have been, it seemed to lack information on how the Stasi worked, and the sort of effect it had on ordinary Germans living within the confines of the DDR. Moreover, it was nigh on impossible to find, as it was in a courtyard, in a relatively anonymous building (probably the intention really!).
Friday was a day, in which my Dad wanted to be impressed by some sort of important building. So, we started gently, with Museuminsel (Museum Island), which is largely under restoration, or scaffolding (naturally!). From there we headed over to Gendarmenmarkt, where there was an interesting exhibition about the journey to German democracy in the Deutscher Dom there. The French Dome is used for religous meetings for francophone synods. From there, though I decided we would head out of the city a little, and we went to Schloss Charlottenburg, which was a very ornate, imposing, and impressive building both on the outside and on the inside. We spent a few hours there taking in the building, and some of the history of the building, which was interesting. From there, we headed back into more central Berlin, to see Schloss Bellevue, which is the Presidential Residence (rather like the White House). It looked quite impressive in the dusk light, when we saw it. Following that, we headed for dinner, and a beer or two, before contemplating our exciting trip to Colditz on the following day!
So, Saturday arrived with a bite! We left the hostel quite early and armed with a Schoenes-Wochenende Ticket, we began our journey to Colditz. The first journey involved a train to Falkenberg, from where we had a connection with a train to Leipzig, from where wed had another connection to Grossbothen, from where there was a bus to Colditz! The journey itself was relatively uneventful going this way, it took just over 4 and a half hours in total, but it was worth it as it was one of the few places I really wanted to visit during my time in Germany. When you arrive in Colditz, you have to walk a little bit before you can see the Castle. But when you get to the river, you can see it standing rather imposingly above the town. From there, all that's left to do is to walk up to it! When we got there, we went in and had a look around the museum, which was genuinely fascinating. It detailed the majority of escape attempts from the supposedly insecapable POW camp. It is something I would highly recommend. Along with going on the tour, which the lady in the ticket office didn't tell us about. On the tour, you got taken to to different areas of the castle, which are not normally open to the public. After we'd finished at Colditz, we headed down into the town, and had a coffee before heading back to the bus stop to begin our journey home. The first part of the journey to Leipzig was OK. When we arrived in Leipzig we went to an italian restaurant and had a very nice pasta meal together, before returning to the Hauptbahnhof for the train to Rosslau (Elbe). This train was double decker, and seemed to have real difficulties going over points; indeed, the first time it went over them I wasn't sure it hadn't become derailed. It was juddery, very noisy (almost like it was falling to bits!), and slightly concerning too! The journey back from Rosslau suffered from a similar ailment! Still, at least it stopped me falling asleep! We arrived back in Berlin at about half eleven, when we returned to our Hostel and put our heads on our pillows!
So Sunday, the last day of the Berlin Extravaganza. We had to be out of the hostel by 10, which wasn't too much of a problem. We packed everything up and then headed to the station, where we left our luggage in the locker, and headed off to Berlin Zoo. It was only, originally, planned to spend the morning going around the zoo, however when we got there, it was plain to see why it would be easily possible to spend a whole day there. We spent the morning looking around some of the animals, for example the gorillas who seemed to have fallen out with each other, and the lions who were sleeping (quite senisbly!). But for me the highlight of the zoo was seeing Polar Bears, which I don't recall ever having seen before The afternoon we spent looking around the aquarium, which was equally as interesting. We left the zoo about half three, and headed back to Alexanderplatz, where we partook in a coffee, and reclaimed our luggage. Mum & Dad then got on the train to the airport, and I headed off to the bus to Tegel (which went from about 200 metres away). I estimate we probably arrived at about our respective airports at roughly the same time, but they had to wait another 1 after me until their scheduled departure time. At Tegel it was all very easy, I checked in almost as soon as I'd had something to eat, and went through the security checks without any problems at all. Then I had to sit and watch for my aeroplane to arrive, which it did in due course. We boarded and left punctually (very German), and on this plane there were computer screens which told you where you were, how fast you were going and when you would arrive. It also provided computer generated images of what you could see out of the windows on both sides, which I thought was very interesting and far more advanced than anything I remember from previous flights. The flight itself took about 1 hour, we seemed to have more of a headwind, which took us a little longer. The landing, this time, was, to quote the Air Stewardess, "Enthusiastic" - which is a euphamism for too fast, and bouncy! From the airport, I had to get a taxi, seeing as the buses had stopped running some four hours before. I was home by about 11 and in bed by half 11.
So, what about Mum & Dad, well, they weren't quite so fortunate. Because of snow in Switzerland (!) they hadn't left Berlin by the time I had made it home and was on my computer. They arrived very late the following morning, and my sister had to wait to pick them up from Bristol Airport.
To conclude this rather epic blog entry then, Berlin is a fantastic city, and a week definitely isn't enough time! There are soooo many interesting things to see & do there, that I had to prioritise as it was - as such Berlin is definitely on my list of places to go back to (although not this year, it's too expensive to get there again - it's, ironically, cheaper to fly there from Bristol than Saarbruecken.
So, now the blog is done, I can get up and have a shower and some breakfast! The next blog entry concerns itself with the first week back at school, and me chasing my tail to try and catch up with everything! I'll try and make it a little more puenktlich!
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Chapter 23 - The last week of term
Monday 8th - Sunday 14th February
As the title suggests, or in fact explicitly states, this week is the last week of term before the half-term holidays. The holidays mark the changeover point in my year abroad. Not in that I'm moving countries, simply that after the holidays I'm changing the days at which I work at my schools. This is quite exciting because I will get to work with some different classes, and have a different timetable! The only downside was the organising of the new timetable - primarily because it meant I had to chase teachers down; finding out when they were teaching English. But, nevertheless (which, for some bizarre reason I wrote as three words on my first attempt!), I managed to sort it out, and my timetable isn't too bad; no days scheduled to finish after 4th lesson, and only one early start a week!
So, what have I been up to this week? Not a huge amount during the week - a couple of private lessons, a tandem meeting, and having a few drinks with friends! Also we sowed the seeds of some longer journeys we may go on, but more about those when they've popped their heads out of the "wouldn't it be nice to go to...?" phase, and they enter the "Planning" phase! Needless to say, it could be quite an exciting three months!
Thursday saw the beginning of the exodus (by exodus, I'm referring to the four British Assistants who are leaving Saarland to its own devices for a week). Harriet headed off to Marseille, via Paris. As we're beginning to expect when Harriet tries to go anywhere, her train was late, and she missed her connection in Paris, but SNCF being reasonable sat her in First Class on the next TGV to Aix-en-Provence!
Saturday saw a day trip to Worms; which, for the record, is not so named because of any link to a blackbird's favourite meal. Worms, it has been argued, and is still being argued, is the oldest city in Germany. Whether or not this is the case, to me is somewhat irrelevant, for Worms does have a couple of 'claims to fame' without the need to be recognised as the oldest city. The first and, probably, most famous reason for its historical importance is its links to Martin Luther. Those of you who are not up to date on the Reformation or the foundations of the Lutherian Church may think I'm talking about the dream-filled American Human Rights campaigner, if you are thinking that....you are wrong! The American was Martin Luther King, the famous German Christian reformist was Martin Luther! So, back to the story, Luther was called before the Diet of Worms (a sort of religious court for the Catholic Church) to defend books that he had written, and opinions that he held regarding the need to reform the Church. In case you hadn't noticed, the Reformation isn't my strongest area of German History, so I shall provide a link to a Wikipedia Page, which explains the Diet of Worms better and more eloquently than I can! Yer t'iz
The other reason Worms is famous, or well-known, is because it is the home of the oldest Jewish Cemetry. Worms used to have one of the largest Jewish communities in Germany, if not the whole of Europe (excluding Russia). The Jews suffered in Worms, as they did all over Germany, on Kristallnacht (9th November 1938). The Synagogues were destroyed, the Jewish cemetery was desecrated, Jewish business were robbed, and trashed, Jews' homes were pillaged, vandalised, and, quite often, set ablaze. Following Kristallnacht, life for Jews became increasingly unbearable in Germany - as I'm sure everyone's aware! After the war, the Jewish population in Worms had been reduced by a huge percentage, and to this day remains very small.
Here endeth the History lesson!
Worms was a nice city really, with a charm, which I can't quite describe or put my finger on! Navigation around Worms was made somewhat challenging by the fact that the tourist information centre was closed on Saturdays (arguably the day when a city would get the most visitors!). This left us navigating my signs with maps on them, which was fine - you simply headed in the rough direction, and when you came upon the next sign, you adjusted your route if necessary! But, on the whole it wasn't too bad to find our way round! I would dispute one thing that Worms advertised about their city - they gave the impression that Worms had a nice promenade along the banks of the Rhine. This, I feel, might be the case if you worked for Wincanton logistics, or had a penchant for the smell of petrol refineries! There was, however, a nice bridge over the Rhine with a castle gatehouse on the Worms end. This bridge was closed though, because it was too dangerous to cross. The new bridge now takes the strain of the traffic leaving Rheinland-Pfalz and heading to Hessen.
After walking back to the centre of Worms, we decided to head back to Saarbruecken, but stop off in Ludwigshafen on the way, to see what was there, while we were out in that direction! There was, it turns out, a Hall in Ludwigshafen called Bugger. The Hauptbahnhof is situated a far away from the city centre, and is surrounded by big hotels. So, after a somewhat disappointing visit there, we got on the train to Kaiserslautern, where we would have half an hour before the train back to Saarbruecken. Now, we thought we would go and find a cafe where we could get a coffee and keep warm. We were somehow out of luck - there is a cafe that's open on Sunday, but not Saturday afternoons! So, we found a machine in the station that sold hot chocolates, in which we partook, before catching the train back to Saarbruecken.
Sunday, the day of St. Valentine, was spent packing a suitcase and getting organised for my evacuation of Saarbruecken. I am spending the half-term holiday in Berlin, where I will meet a friend from Bath, and where my parents are coming over on Tuesday. I'm looking forward to it for a multitude of reasons; it'll be the first time I've been on an aeroplane in years, it's BERLIN (that should need no further explanation!), also there's a day trip to Colditz planned too! All in all - it should be a fantastic week - and I'll be sure to take lots of photos, and have plenty to say about it - so brace yourself for a ridiculously long entry next week! Until then, adieu my friends, and adieu Saarbruecken!
As the title suggests, or in fact explicitly states, this week is the last week of term before the half-term holidays. The holidays mark the changeover point in my year abroad. Not in that I'm moving countries, simply that after the holidays I'm changing the days at which I work at my schools. This is quite exciting because I will get to work with some different classes, and have a different timetable! The only downside was the organising of the new timetable - primarily because it meant I had to chase teachers down; finding out when they were teaching English. But, nevertheless (which, for some bizarre reason I wrote as three words on my first attempt!), I managed to sort it out, and my timetable isn't too bad; no days scheduled to finish after 4th lesson, and only one early start a week!
So, what have I been up to this week? Not a huge amount during the week - a couple of private lessons, a tandem meeting, and having a few drinks with friends! Also we sowed the seeds of some longer journeys we may go on, but more about those when they've popped their heads out of the "wouldn't it be nice to go to...?" phase, and they enter the "Planning" phase! Needless to say, it could be quite an exciting three months!
Thursday saw the beginning of the exodus (by exodus, I'm referring to the four British Assistants who are leaving Saarland to its own devices for a week). Harriet headed off to Marseille, via Paris. As we're beginning to expect when Harriet tries to go anywhere, her train was late, and she missed her connection in Paris, but SNCF being reasonable sat her in First Class on the next TGV to Aix-en-Provence!
Saturday saw a day trip to Worms; which, for the record, is not so named because of any link to a blackbird's favourite meal. Worms, it has been argued, and is still being argued, is the oldest city in Germany. Whether or not this is the case, to me is somewhat irrelevant, for Worms does have a couple of 'claims to fame' without the need to be recognised as the oldest city. The first and, probably, most famous reason for its historical importance is its links to Martin Luther. Those of you who are not up to date on the Reformation or the foundations of the Lutherian Church may think I'm talking about the dream-filled American Human Rights campaigner, if you are thinking that....you are wrong! The American was Martin Luther King, the famous German Christian reformist was Martin Luther! So, back to the story, Luther was called before the Diet of Worms (a sort of religious court for the Catholic Church) to defend books that he had written, and opinions that he held regarding the need to reform the Church. In case you hadn't noticed, the Reformation isn't my strongest area of German History, so I shall provide a link to a Wikipedia Page, which explains the Diet of Worms better and more eloquently than I can! Yer t'iz
The other reason Worms is famous, or well-known, is because it is the home of the oldest Jewish Cemetry. Worms used to have one of the largest Jewish communities in Germany, if not the whole of Europe (excluding Russia). The Jews suffered in Worms, as they did all over Germany, on Kristallnacht (9th November 1938). The Synagogues were destroyed, the Jewish cemetery was desecrated, Jewish business were robbed, and trashed, Jews' homes were pillaged, vandalised, and, quite often, set ablaze. Following Kristallnacht, life for Jews became increasingly unbearable in Germany - as I'm sure everyone's aware! After the war, the Jewish population in Worms had been reduced by a huge percentage, and to this day remains very small.
Here endeth the History lesson!
Worms was a nice city really, with a charm, which I can't quite describe or put my finger on! Navigation around Worms was made somewhat challenging by the fact that the tourist information centre was closed on Saturdays (arguably the day when a city would get the most visitors!). This left us navigating my signs with maps on them, which was fine - you simply headed in the rough direction, and when you came upon the next sign, you adjusted your route if necessary! But, on the whole it wasn't too bad to find our way round! I would dispute one thing that Worms advertised about their city - they gave the impression that Worms had a nice promenade along the banks of the Rhine. This, I feel, might be the case if you worked for Wincanton logistics, or had a penchant for the smell of petrol refineries! There was, however, a nice bridge over the Rhine with a castle gatehouse on the Worms end. This bridge was closed though, because it was too dangerous to cross. The new bridge now takes the strain of the traffic leaving Rheinland-Pfalz and heading to Hessen.
After walking back to the centre of Worms, we decided to head back to Saarbruecken, but stop off in Ludwigshafen on the way, to see what was there, while we were out in that direction! There was, it turns out, a Hall in Ludwigshafen called Bugger. The Hauptbahnhof is situated a far away from the city centre, and is surrounded by big hotels. So, after a somewhat disappointing visit there, we got on the train to Kaiserslautern, where we would have half an hour before the train back to Saarbruecken. Now, we thought we would go and find a cafe where we could get a coffee and keep warm. We were somehow out of luck - there is a cafe that's open on Sunday, but not Saturday afternoons! So, we found a machine in the station that sold hot chocolates, in which we partook, before catching the train back to Saarbruecken.
Sunday, the day of St. Valentine, was spent packing a suitcase and getting organised for my evacuation of Saarbruecken. I am spending the half-term holiday in Berlin, where I will meet a friend from Bath, and where my parents are coming over on Tuesday. I'm looking forward to it for a multitude of reasons; it'll be the first time I've been on an aeroplane in years, it's BERLIN (that should need no further explanation!), also there's a day trip to Colditz planned too! All in all - it should be a fantastic week - and I'll be sure to take lots of photos, and have plenty to say about it - so brace yourself for a ridiculously long entry next week! Until then, adieu my friends, and adieu Saarbruecken!
Monday, February 8, 2010
Chapter 22 - Nearly the holidays again!
Monday 1st - Sunday 7th February
As the title suggests, it is, indeed, nearly time for the holidays again! It doesn't seem like I've been back at work very long at all to be honest, and certainly I haven't been to many places! I have only got one week until the holidays arrive, during which I shall be heading to the Berlin, which I'm very much looking forward to!
School was pretty standard this week. One of my 7. Klasse at the Gesamtschule have now been divided from a class of 31 to classes of 15 and 16, which is apparently a 'normal' class size for languages. The teachers were somewhat surprised to discover that 31 was a pretty average class size when I learnt French at school!
I have also begun to to undertake some private tuition. The reasons for this are two-fold; the primary reason (seeing as I live in a capitalist society) is financial gain - I offer my services and receive money. The second, somewhat less fiscal reason, is that it gives me something to do in the evenings. One of my students is a trainee English teacher, and the other a psychology student from the uni. It's nice to get to meet some new people, and certainly from the teacher learn some new things myself (e.g. teaching methods, materials etc.).
The Gymnasium at which I work held its Tag der offenen Tuer (Open Day) on Saturday, which involved me being at work for 8 in the morning! I shan't discuss my thoughts about holding open days on a Saturday on here again, those of you have read this blog up until this point, will undoubtedly be bored by them! I was able to actually teach a lesson on Open Day. I taught a 6. Klasse (Year 7 equivalent), who had only been learning English since September. It was an eye-opening lesson; the kids were pretty much able to understand everything I said, and the lesson was conducted wholly in English for my part - something of a difference to the Gesamtschule, where they are able to understand a fair bit, but they have been learning English for one year longer, and are probably not as good! What was also interesting about Open Day was the different amounts of effort the teachers went to in terms of deciding what to wear! The Schuldirektor (Headmaster) had a suit and tie on, other teachers had also dressed up a bit (i.e. suit without tie), some had dressed as if it were a normal day (shirt and jeans), and others had got up, gone "It's Saturday, all my work clothes are in the wash, where are my DIY clothes?" (Naturally they would have said this in German, but as it's a ficitious, imagined occurence, I shall allow you the ease of having it in English).
Following the Open Day, I met up with Claire and Esther and we had a nose around the Art Gallery in Saarbruecken. This was OK, there were certain things that were eye-catching, interesting, some more traditional works of art, and some that I could have done (and I missed the artisticly talented gene when I came onto this Earth - my sister seemed to get my share!). Following the art gallery we headed for lunch in the city, and had a drink there, when we heard that Will was coming into Saarbruecken to watch the rugby at the Irish Pub. So, we thought we'd do the friendly thing and tag along! So, the evening was spent watching the England v. Wales match in the Irish Pub, drinking some Stowford Press Cider! Those of you who know me, will know that Sport wouldn't be my Mastermind Specialist Subject. However I learnt more about the rules of rugby in that one evening than from the 5 years of compulsory PE I did at school. The key principle, which, to be fair, I did already know, is that you run forwards and through backwards. If you have the ball, it's a good idea not to stand still as there are likely to be some rugby players with the finesse and elegance of a Tomahawk cruise missile homing in on you! Still, the result was approved by the majority of the pub (mainly English and Irish ex-pats, who took the mick out of the sole Welshman there). One thing that did become apparent is that during the time when Wales had the ball, Jones and Williams stood a good chance of having posession!
Sunday was a day spent tidying my room, I decided that it needed doing, and as everything is closed on sundays I set about it. It actually didn't take as long as I had envisaged, and so I had intended on writing this blog entry then, but just forgot about it, so here it is, slightly late again!
Coming up next week, is the day trip to Worms, and the preparations for my week in Berlin during the holidays!
As the title suggests, it is, indeed, nearly time for the holidays again! It doesn't seem like I've been back at work very long at all to be honest, and certainly I haven't been to many places! I have only got one week until the holidays arrive, during which I shall be heading to the Berlin, which I'm very much looking forward to!
School was pretty standard this week. One of my 7. Klasse at the Gesamtschule have now been divided from a class of 31 to classes of 15 and 16, which is apparently a 'normal' class size for languages. The teachers were somewhat surprised to discover that 31 was a pretty average class size when I learnt French at school!
I have also begun to to undertake some private tuition. The reasons for this are two-fold; the primary reason (seeing as I live in a capitalist society) is financial gain - I offer my services and receive money. The second, somewhat less fiscal reason, is that it gives me something to do in the evenings. One of my students is a trainee English teacher, and the other a psychology student from the uni. It's nice to get to meet some new people, and certainly from the teacher learn some new things myself (e.g. teaching methods, materials etc.).
The Gymnasium at which I work held its Tag der offenen Tuer (Open Day) on Saturday, which involved me being at work for 8 in the morning! I shan't discuss my thoughts about holding open days on a Saturday on here again, those of you have read this blog up until this point, will undoubtedly be bored by them! I was able to actually teach a lesson on Open Day. I taught a 6. Klasse (Year 7 equivalent), who had only been learning English since September. It was an eye-opening lesson; the kids were pretty much able to understand everything I said, and the lesson was conducted wholly in English for my part - something of a difference to the Gesamtschule, where they are able to understand a fair bit, but they have been learning English for one year longer, and are probably not as good! What was also interesting about Open Day was the different amounts of effort the teachers went to in terms of deciding what to wear! The Schuldirektor (Headmaster) had a suit and tie on, other teachers had also dressed up a bit (i.e. suit without tie), some had dressed as if it were a normal day (shirt and jeans), and others had got up, gone "It's Saturday, all my work clothes are in the wash, where are my DIY clothes?" (Naturally they would have said this in German, but as it's a ficitious, imagined occurence, I shall allow you the ease of having it in English).
Following the Open Day, I met up with Claire and Esther and we had a nose around the Art Gallery in Saarbruecken. This was OK, there were certain things that were eye-catching, interesting, some more traditional works of art, and some that I could have done (and I missed the artisticly talented gene when I came onto this Earth - my sister seemed to get my share!). Following the art gallery we headed for lunch in the city, and had a drink there, when we heard that Will was coming into Saarbruecken to watch the rugby at the Irish Pub. So, we thought we'd do the friendly thing and tag along! So, the evening was spent watching the England v. Wales match in the Irish Pub, drinking some Stowford Press Cider! Those of you who know me, will know that Sport wouldn't be my Mastermind Specialist Subject. However I learnt more about the rules of rugby in that one evening than from the 5 years of compulsory PE I did at school. The key principle, which, to be fair, I did already know, is that you run forwards and through backwards. If you have the ball, it's a good idea not to stand still as there are likely to be some rugby players with the finesse and elegance of a Tomahawk cruise missile homing in on you! Still, the result was approved by the majority of the pub (mainly English and Irish ex-pats, who took the mick out of the sole Welshman there). One thing that did become apparent is that during the time when Wales had the ball, Jones and Williams stood a good chance of having posession!
Sunday was a day spent tidying my room, I decided that it needed doing, and as everything is closed on sundays I set about it. It actually didn't take as long as I had envisaged, and so I had intended on writing this blog entry then, but just forgot about it, so here it is, slightly late again!
Coming up next week, is the day trip to Worms, and the preparations for my week in Berlin during the holidays!
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Chapter 21 - On we go...
Monday 25th - Sunday 31st January
So, after the last couple of weeks, which were slightly lacking in interesting things, here is one entry, which features a trip out!
As per usual, school was pretty standard this week. Having said that something interesting did happen at my Gesamtschule (although I wasn't personally involved in dealing with it - we hear about these things in the staffroom.) - what happened was that the Headteacher caught some kids from the 8. Klasse (about 14-15) smoking cannabis in the toilets at school. When they were caught, the reason they gave was simply that they didn't want to be caught leaving the premises - this I found rather amusing!
Lidl, who, in case you hadn't realised, are a supermarket of German origin, have now developped not only the power of telepathy, but also the ability to translate from English to German. Lidl ran a "British Week" this week in their stores, meaning that they were selling a selection (not huge, but big enough) of quintessentially British foodstuffs - cheddar cheese, corned beef etc. All things which whilst living in the UK you take for granted, yet somewhat lacking in most other countries! So, needless to say, I went down to Lidl, despite it being right on the other side of the city, to stock up on Cheddar Cheese. I have since found out that it's running into this week a bit, so I shall be heading back there on Monday to collect more supplies of British food!
Now to our trip out, the location of which was suggested by Harriet (notice the pre-emptive apportioning of blame there!). We decided to go to Karlsruhe on Saturday using the DB Group ticket, meaning that the whole trip cost us less than 7,50€. Karlsruhe itself is a little under 3 hours away by train from Saarbruecken, so easily do-able as a day trip. The city is relatively close to the French border, not quite as close as Saarbruecken, but probably the closest city in Baden-Wuerttemburg (the federal state where it is).
We met at the Hauptbahnhof at about 8.45 and caught the train at 9.03. The train journey, as is becoming more typical in Germany, means it is not possible to travel in a straight line there, so we had to change trains twice. Once in Kaiserslautern (or K-Town as it's known by the US Forces stationed there) where we had then caught a train to Schifferstadt, before getting on a train to Karlsruhe itself. Once in Karlsruhe, we located the Tourist Information Centre, from where we acquired a map (simply an A3 sheet of paper). Then, as per tradition, we found a nearby cafe where we planned our day, with the aid of the map. I say "with the aid" of the map in the loosest sense of the word. The map was OK in that it fulfilled its most basic function - i.e. it showed where the roads were, but following on from that there was hardly anything to help tourists find anything. Thus, we walked to the Schloss, which is actually impressive, and naturally, it had the scaffolding, which I am becoming convinced is a legal requirement.
From the Schloss we headed over to a church nearby, which looked, on the map, to be the Cathedral (or at least an important church in Karlsruhe). It turned out that, whilst it was a nice church, it almost certainly wasn't a Cathedral or equally significant eclesiastical building. Slightly disheartened by this, we decided to head back into the city centre and nose around to see if there was anything else worth seeing. We found a couple of nice buildings, before sheltering in MediaMarkt (effectively an HMV/Comet mixture (or fnac for anyone in France)) to kill some time prior to returning to the train station for the return journey.
The journey back wasn't too fraught with difficulties, once we found the right platform (although I should hold my hand up for that one - I was reading the wrong sheet of paper, which could have led to us travelling south from Karlsruhe, when Saarbruecken is North-West!). The journey was only hindered in a minor way on the journey from Schifferstadt to Kaiserslautern, where we were delayed by about two minutes. This sounds like I'm simply moaning for the sake of it, but that two minute delay ate up 50% of our connection time for the train to Saarbruecken. Luckily, the train from Saarbruecken came in late, and went out late, so we didn't miss it, and indeed hadn't needed to run after all.
We got back into Saarbruecken at about 19.00 when we decided to go for a drink before going back home. We left the pub about 22.15 to get to the bus stop in plenty of time. When we got to the bus stop we waited, and waited, and then waited a bit more. After waiting for about 20 minutes we abandoned that plan and resorted to gehen-ing instead of fahren-ing (Germanists will know the difference - for non-Germanists the verb: they both mean 'to go', but gehen is used to describe walking somewhere, whereas fahren is used to explain going somewhere using some sort of transport; hence we walked home instead of catching the bus). Why was this necessary - well that comes next!
To revert, once again, back to type I ought to talk briefly about the weather that we've had in Saarbruecken over the week. It's been cold, but seeing as it's winter that's not a huge surprise, and it's snowed, and snowed, and snowed again once or twice. It's also been pretty icy at times. The roads have been becoming increasingly dangerous - the buses have been skidding to a stop at the bus stops on my hill (not because they're boy racers, but simply because they've been sliding on all the snow that conscientious citizens have cleared off of the pavement). But on Saturday night it was exeptionally icy - the roads were just awash (possibly not the right adjective, but it's being used so tough!) with sheet ice, as were the pavements in some areas. Because of this Saarbahn (the local bus & tram company for Saarbruecken) had decided it was too dangerous to run buses in these conditions - not an entirely irresponsible decision either, I might add! This meant that anyone who wanted to get anywhere in Saarbruecken had 3 main options: 1; take a taxi - but they are expensive, especially as they would be driving slower because of the ice, 2; take the Saarbahn (the tram) - this is good if you live on the north side of the river, but for anyone living on the south side this isn't terribly helpful as the tram doesn't come this way! 3; walk - not much fun, quite slippery, but free. I opted for number 3 and walked, and slid too at times, home. It was, in fact, easier to walk on the pavements where they'd not been cleared of snow than where the conscientious citizens had cleared them. Crossing the road was not very easy - it was done in little steps to avoid looking like Bambi learning to walk!
So why hadn't the Germans, masters of organisation, not gritted the roads - well it seems that Saarland, not reknowned for being the coldest of the Federal States were slightly unprepared for it, and had run out of grit to salt the roads. The motorway had been done, but sparingly. There is no real justification or supporting statements I can use here to explain or defend the situation. It was, as far as I can tell, a cock-up! That said, there was no sense of panic from the media - it was very much an "oh, well - life goes on" attitude. On the local news there were no correspondants stood in gritting depots foretelling the apocalypse of life without road grit, which I'm sure there was on the TV in the UK when they had their cold snap (which was pretty lame compared to the 2 month one we've had over here!).
So what has the next week got in store? A trip to Sarreguemines to pick up a train ticket, and perhaps a trip to somewhere in France (although not Strasbourg) at the weekend - who knows?
So, after the last couple of weeks, which were slightly lacking in interesting things, here is one entry, which features a trip out!
As per usual, school was pretty standard this week. Having said that something interesting did happen at my Gesamtschule (although I wasn't personally involved in dealing with it - we hear about these things in the staffroom.) - what happened was that the Headteacher caught some kids from the 8. Klasse (about 14-15) smoking cannabis in the toilets at school. When they were caught, the reason they gave was simply that they didn't want to be caught leaving the premises - this I found rather amusing!
Lidl, who, in case you hadn't realised, are a supermarket of German origin, have now developped not only the power of telepathy, but also the ability to translate from English to German. Lidl ran a "British Week" this week in their stores, meaning that they were selling a selection (not huge, but big enough) of quintessentially British foodstuffs - cheddar cheese, corned beef etc. All things which whilst living in the UK you take for granted, yet somewhat lacking in most other countries! So, needless to say, I went down to Lidl, despite it being right on the other side of the city, to stock up on Cheddar Cheese. I have since found out that it's running into this week a bit, so I shall be heading back there on Monday to collect more supplies of British food!
Now to our trip out, the location of which was suggested by Harriet (notice the pre-emptive apportioning of blame there!). We decided to go to Karlsruhe on Saturday using the DB Group ticket, meaning that the whole trip cost us less than 7,50€. Karlsruhe itself is a little under 3 hours away by train from Saarbruecken, so easily do-able as a day trip. The city is relatively close to the French border, not quite as close as Saarbruecken, but probably the closest city in Baden-Wuerttemburg (the federal state where it is).
We met at the Hauptbahnhof at about 8.45 and caught the train at 9.03. The train journey, as is becoming more typical in Germany, means it is not possible to travel in a straight line there, so we had to change trains twice. Once in Kaiserslautern (or K-Town as it's known by the US Forces stationed there) where we had then caught a train to Schifferstadt, before getting on a train to Karlsruhe itself. Once in Karlsruhe, we located the Tourist Information Centre, from where we acquired a map (simply an A3 sheet of paper). Then, as per tradition, we found a nearby cafe where we planned our day, with the aid of the map. I say "with the aid" of the map in the loosest sense of the word. The map was OK in that it fulfilled its most basic function - i.e. it showed where the roads were, but following on from that there was hardly anything to help tourists find anything. Thus, we walked to the Schloss, which is actually impressive, and naturally, it had the scaffolding, which I am becoming convinced is a legal requirement.
From the Schloss we headed over to a church nearby, which looked, on the map, to be the Cathedral (or at least an important church in Karlsruhe). It turned out that, whilst it was a nice church, it almost certainly wasn't a Cathedral or equally significant eclesiastical building. Slightly disheartened by this, we decided to head back into the city centre and nose around to see if there was anything else worth seeing. We found a couple of nice buildings, before sheltering in MediaMarkt (effectively an HMV/Comet mixture (or fnac for anyone in France)) to kill some time prior to returning to the train station for the return journey.
The journey back wasn't too fraught with difficulties, once we found the right platform (although I should hold my hand up for that one - I was reading the wrong sheet of paper, which could have led to us travelling south from Karlsruhe, when Saarbruecken is North-West!). The journey was only hindered in a minor way on the journey from Schifferstadt to Kaiserslautern, where we were delayed by about two minutes. This sounds like I'm simply moaning for the sake of it, but that two minute delay ate up 50% of our connection time for the train to Saarbruecken. Luckily, the train from Saarbruecken came in late, and went out late, so we didn't miss it, and indeed hadn't needed to run after all.
We got back into Saarbruecken at about 19.00 when we decided to go for a drink before going back home. We left the pub about 22.15 to get to the bus stop in plenty of time. When we got to the bus stop we waited, and waited, and then waited a bit more. After waiting for about 20 minutes we abandoned that plan and resorted to gehen-ing instead of fahren-ing (Germanists will know the difference - for non-Germanists the verb: they both mean 'to go', but gehen is used to describe walking somewhere, whereas fahren is used to explain going somewhere using some sort of transport; hence we walked home instead of catching the bus). Why was this necessary - well that comes next!
To revert, once again, back to type I ought to talk briefly about the weather that we've had in Saarbruecken over the week. It's been cold, but seeing as it's winter that's not a huge surprise, and it's snowed, and snowed, and snowed again once or twice. It's also been pretty icy at times. The roads have been becoming increasingly dangerous - the buses have been skidding to a stop at the bus stops on my hill (not because they're boy racers, but simply because they've been sliding on all the snow that conscientious citizens have cleared off of the pavement). But on Saturday night it was exeptionally icy - the roads were just awash (possibly not the right adjective, but it's being used so tough!) with sheet ice, as were the pavements in some areas. Because of this Saarbahn (the local bus & tram company for Saarbruecken) had decided it was too dangerous to run buses in these conditions - not an entirely irresponsible decision either, I might add! This meant that anyone who wanted to get anywhere in Saarbruecken had 3 main options: 1; take a taxi - but they are expensive, especially as they would be driving slower because of the ice, 2; take the Saarbahn (the tram) - this is good if you live on the north side of the river, but for anyone living on the south side this isn't terribly helpful as the tram doesn't come this way! 3; walk - not much fun, quite slippery, but free. I opted for number 3 and walked, and slid too at times, home. It was, in fact, easier to walk on the pavements where they'd not been cleared of snow than where the conscientious citizens had cleared them. Crossing the road was not very easy - it was done in little steps to avoid looking like Bambi learning to walk!
So why hadn't the Germans, masters of organisation, not gritted the roads - well it seems that Saarland, not reknowned for being the coldest of the Federal States were slightly unprepared for it, and had run out of grit to salt the roads. The motorway had been done, but sparingly. There is no real justification or supporting statements I can use here to explain or defend the situation. It was, as far as I can tell, a cock-up! That said, there was no sense of panic from the media - it was very much an "oh, well - life goes on" attitude. On the local news there were no correspondants stood in gritting depots foretelling the apocalypse of life without road grit, which I'm sure there was on the TV in the UK when they had their cold snap (which was pretty lame compared to the 2 month one we've had over here!).
So what has the next week got in store? A trip to Sarreguemines to pick up a train ticket, and perhaps a trip to somewhere in France (although not Strasbourg) at the weekend - who knows?
Monday, January 25, 2010
Chapter 20 - Normality continued
Monday 18th - Sunday 24th January
Firstly, I would like to give congratulations to...myself...for managing to complete this blog entry more punctually than previous entries! So, well done me!
Now I did claim, at the end of last week's entry, that this one would be slightly longer and more interesting, and it will be; but it probably won't be edge of the seat stuff (not unless you forgot to put your glasses on anyway!).
So, school was OK this week. On the Tuesday I had to start quite early (8 a.m.) and was a cover teacher for two double lessons with the 12. (Year 13/Upper Sixth (for you old fogies) equivalent) and 11. (obviously Year 12) classes. I had to do some preparation for this, which basically involves me playing around on the Internet for a couple of hours trying to find a suitable article to adapt and create activites for. Obviously, upon finding the articles I then have to create a lesson plan around them, which is the more time consuming part - as I have to try and remember what I could do at their ages, and then create activities of a suitable level (apparently 5,000 word essays aren't suitable!).
Also on Tuesday, I had my first private tuition lesson. That is to say (which is less clumsy in French) I was giving the lesson, and receiving payment, not being the student. What's more interesting is that the person I'm giving tuition to is a Referendarin (Trainee Teacher). The tuition is easy, from my perspective, too - all I have to do is sit there and be a guinea pig (I tried being a hamster, but the wheel just wasn't for me) for her lessons, which she runs through with me, and then I comment, suggest, and correct where applicable.
Friday saw some more recording taking place, I would tell you what it was about, but I wasn't invited this time, so I can't! I did meet up with the other assistants after they had finished for a drink. After this Harriet and I took the Saarbahn to Sarreguemines (which I won't describe again - because seasoned readers of this blog will likely be bored by it!(if you've not heard of it, go back to the beginning and start again!)), where we had a wander round some of the shops - looking for French things to boost our cultural knowledge at a low price. Our journey was largely fruitless, so we returned empty handed to Saarbruecken and disappeared into the night (by which I mean we went home!).
Saturday, the day of Brunch, arrived plenty early enough. Several of us were meeting at Harriet's for Brunch. Arriving punctually (this German thing is starting to rub off on me!) clutching my bag containing tomatoes, a cucumber and a red pepper, we spent several hours there; chatting, comparing lecturers, universities and experiences. We also met some Erasmus students from the University of Saarland, which I had hoped to do earlier, but other things came up (i.e. I forgot).
At the moment Saarbruecken is the home of the Max Ophuels Film Festival, which is up there, as you would imagine, rivalling Cannes in prestige and glamour. (Rather like David was rivalling Goliath). So, being the cultural beings we are, we decided to head into town on Sunday evening (well, what else is there to do?) and watch a film being shown as part of the festival. The film we opted for was U.F.O., which tells the story of a family living in Germany in 1986 (a year of explosions - with the Challenger Space Shuttle exploding during take-off, and the small matter of Chernobyl (or Tchernobyl) exploding. The story focuses on the mother's paranoia about danger from the sky/space. She appeared to believe that the above named explosions were the actions of aliens, who had also invaded Earth, and were posing a direct threat to her and her family. Needless to say, this caused a certain level of stress within the family unit, until she drives off in a car and has an accident, after which she is sectioned and treated for Schizophrenia. She is released, but refuses to take all of her pills, so has a relapse, and goes to jump off the roof of her block of flats. I fear that a cliche may be necessary here, but you did, really, have to be there to make much sense of that description.
As a review, I would say that it was no Disney film, it's not particularly comic, preferring instead to show the effects of Schizophrenia on a family (rather than directly on the patient) and how they try and cope with it, that said, it did have a happy ending. It was a good film though, and one I would recommend to others interested in experiencing modern German cinema.
So, that was this week. Those of you who have read this before will know that before Christmas it was not uncommon for a group of assistants to go and do something at the weekends, and you will also note that this hasn't really happened at this juncture. Fear not! We are heading off to Karlsruhe for the day on Saturday, so I will report back on that next week! (Hopefully on Monday, as I have the day off!)
Firstly, I would like to give congratulations to...myself...for managing to complete this blog entry more punctually than previous entries! So, well done me!
Now I did claim, at the end of last week's entry, that this one would be slightly longer and more interesting, and it will be; but it probably won't be edge of the seat stuff (not unless you forgot to put your glasses on anyway!).
So, school was OK this week. On the Tuesday I had to start quite early (8 a.m.) and was a cover teacher for two double lessons with the 12. (Year 13/Upper Sixth (for you old fogies) equivalent) and 11. (obviously Year 12) classes. I had to do some preparation for this, which basically involves me playing around on the Internet for a couple of hours trying to find a suitable article to adapt and create activites for. Obviously, upon finding the articles I then have to create a lesson plan around them, which is the more time consuming part - as I have to try and remember what I could do at their ages, and then create activities of a suitable level (apparently 5,000 word essays aren't suitable!).
Also on Tuesday, I had my first private tuition lesson. That is to say (which is less clumsy in French) I was giving the lesson, and receiving payment, not being the student. What's more interesting is that the person I'm giving tuition to is a Referendarin (Trainee Teacher). The tuition is easy, from my perspective, too - all I have to do is sit there and be a guinea pig (I tried being a hamster, but the wheel just wasn't for me) for her lessons, which she runs through with me, and then I comment, suggest, and correct where applicable.
Friday saw some more recording taking place, I would tell you what it was about, but I wasn't invited this time, so I can't! I did meet up with the other assistants after they had finished for a drink. After this Harriet and I took the Saarbahn to Sarreguemines (which I won't describe again - because seasoned readers of this blog will likely be bored by it!(if you've not heard of it, go back to the beginning and start again!)), where we had a wander round some of the shops - looking for French things to boost our cultural knowledge at a low price. Our journey was largely fruitless, so we returned empty handed to Saarbruecken and disappeared into the night (by which I mean we went home!).
Saturday, the day of Brunch, arrived plenty early enough. Several of us were meeting at Harriet's for Brunch. Arriving punctually (this German thing is starting to rub off on me!) clutching my bag containing tomatoes, a cucumber and a red pepper, we spent several hours there; chatting, comparing lecturers, universities and experiences. We also met some Erasmus students from the University of Saarland, which I had hoped to do earlier, but other things came up (i.e. I forgot).
At the moment Saarbruecken is the home of the Max Ophuels Film Festival, which is up there, as you would imagine, rivalling Cannes in prestige and glamour. (Rather like David was rivalling Goliath). So, being the cultural beings we are, we decided to head into town on Sunday evening (well, what else is there to do?) and watch a film being shown as part of the festival. The film we opted for was U.F.O., which tells the story of a family living in Germany in 1986 (a year of explosions - with the Challenger Space Shuttle exploding during take-off, and the small matter of Chernobyl (or Tchernobyl) exploding. The story focuses on the mother's paranoia about danger from the sky/space. She appeared to believe that the above named explosions were the actions of aliens, who had also invaded Earth, and were posing a direct threat to her and her family. Needless to say, this caused a certain level of stress within the family unit, until she drives off in a car and has an accident, after which she is sectioned and treated for Schizophrenia. She is released, but refuses to take all of her pills, so has a relapse, and goes to jump off the roof of her block of flats. I fear that a cliche may be necessary here, but you did, really, have to be there to make much sense of that description.
As a review, I would say that it was no Disney film, it's not particularly comic, preferring instead to show the effects of Schizophrenia on a family (rather than directly on the patient) and how they try and cope with it, that said, it did have a happy ending. It was a good film though, and one I would recommend to others interested in experiencing modern German cinema.
So, that was this week. Those of you who have read this before will know that before Christmas it was not uncommon for a group of assistants to go and do something at the weekends, and you will also note that this hasn't really happened at this juncture. Fear not! We are heading off to Karlsruhe for the day on Saturday, so I will report back on that next week! (Hopefully on Monday, as I have the day off!)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)