Witch hunts, Crabbing, and Fashion Shows...

Last week I had midstay camp with other CBYX students here in Germany.
We were staying in Bad Honnef, which is near Bonn.
We spent two days in Bonn. One day in Köln (Cologne), and one day just hanging out at the Youth hostel.
It was soooooooooooooo much fun!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I can not even describe how much I enjoyed it.
At the beginning of the week, in all honesty we(as a group) did not get along with the liaisons. They thought we were hard to motivate and that we weren't really very interested in what they were doing with us.
By the end of the week, however, we were all very good friends with the liaisons, and the liaisons even said that we were really interested in what we were doing (even if we took some time to show it :p).
It was really really inexplicably nice to see all the people that I hadn't seen since September at our prep. camp in D.C.
In Bonn we took a walking tour, which was rather interesting. Then we went in the "House of History" in Bonn, which was also interesting.

Our second day in Bonn we went to the BPB, and found out where we could find good information about Germany. Then we had some freetime in Bonn.
The group of people I was with and me went to a cafe(I still can't find accents on this keyboard). Then we decided to find the Beethoven House. It was unfortunately closed. That did not deter us. We decided to just take pictures in front of the door :)

The next day we were in Köln, it was sort of a day off for us (no CBYX workshops). We first went to the Cathedral. We also wanted to climb the Church tower, but that unfortunately was also closed. I don't think we would have seen too much anyways, the one downside to the week was the weather was TERRIBLE. Anyways afterwards I went to a Chocolate Museum. It was interactive which I LOVED.
Then we had the choice of going to an Olympic Sport Museum or having freetime in the city. I would have liked to see more of the city, but it was really so windy and rainy I didn't want to be outside. Plus, I was interested in the Sport Museum. The Sport Museum was amazing! It was also interactive, it had a weight you could try to lift, a long jump you could try, a pommel horse, a balance beam, and a boxing ring you could play in. It also had a rowing section, which I naturally enjoyed.

Saturday, we stayed at the Youth hostel. We started off our day with talking about the week. Then we were given free time. It was the one day with nice (partially sunny) weather. A bunch of us went out and played soccer. The liaisons played with us too, and then even some other Germans who were staying at the youth hostel too.

Then later that night we had a talent show. It was very very very funny. I normally Irish Dance at talent shows, but I didn't have any music. So the other Maryland kids and I decided to give a shortened explination of how to crab. It turned out actually to be rather funny. There were a number of singing, dancing, playing instrument acts. The Massachusetts group of kids decided to a "Massachusetts History" including: landing at Plymouth rock, Witch hunts, Boston Massacre, and the Boston Tea Party. Then there was also a pajama fashion show.

This is the imitation of our liaisons, and the new AFS rules.So this is the witch hunt....
Crazy Bavarian dance
Pajama Fashion Show :)

We ended the night with a dance party. Just an overall really good last night of Midstay, and a really good week at Midstay!
We played lots of games, learned lots, and all with very little sleep!! :)
And at this time I would like to send all our thoughts to those people who have lost someone close to them in school shootings this week. Especially, to those people in and around Stuttgart.

I admit it, I like skiing......

The last week of February we had "Faschings Ferien," which would be like if the U.S. had a week of vacation for Mardi Gras. My hostfamily and I went to Switzerland to go skiing. To say I was not a big fan of skiing before this week would be an understatement. I wasn't looking forward to the whole skiing part of our ski vacation. It turned out, however, that now I like skiing, quite a lot actually, and it was lot of fun!
We left on Saturday. There was sooooooooooooooo much snow as we headed south! It was fantastic!!! Driving throuhg the Swiss Alps at dusk is absolutely amazing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We arrived around 6, quickly unpacked, and then settled in for dinner. After dinner we played "mafioso" or mafia. It was fun.
They had soooooo much snow you couldn't see out some of the windows!

The house we were staying in was adorable!

The next day we woke up to snow. Lots of snow. There was all ready lots there, but it was snowing more. The 4 boys (my host brother and 3 host cousins) decided to go early anyway. The rest of us decided to wait a while, until the snow lightened up a little bit.
From left to right: Jonas Mario Dominik

We picked up my skis and got a ticket. My oldest host cousin, Mario, was assigned to give me ski lessons for the rest of the day. I had actually never met Mario before this trip. His brothers Jonas and Dominik study in Karlsruhe and I knew them very well all ready. Mario, however, is very very nice, a good ski instructor, and reminds me of my oldest brother, Ryan.
So anyways I had expected that the next day I would be in a ski lesson with lots of little kids (4-6 year olds), but was pleasantly surprised that there were only two other people in my group and they were around my age. Our ski instructor's name was Balzer. The one girl was 15 and her name is Lisa. The other was actually a Chinese woman, named Ellen. Ellen couldn't speak German and my instructor couldn't speak English. I offered to translate. Following conversations all in German......just by the way :)
After hearing me speak English Lisa turned to me and said "Wow you speak good english!"
I laughed. "Thanks, I actually am from the U.S." I said.
"Oh," she said, "Are you here on exchange?"
I nodded.
"I'm studying abroad in the U.S. next year" she said.
"Oh with what program?" I asked.
"With Congress-Bundestag" she replied. (Ok really she said PPP because that's what CBYX is in German)
"REALLY?!?!?" I said, "That's the same program I'm here with!"
Lisa Me and Tabea

What a small world! Or really what a big one AFS is making!
Anyways after one run down the "Baby slope", as my host family calls it, Balzer decided to take us up the actual lift.
We took the entire two hour lesson to come down about a half kilometer. Then our instructor told us that we wouldn't be having a full day lesson, because there were only three of us.
My host mother and Lisa's mother then decided to take it up with the ski school.....not too much more to be said.....
They compromised we got one afternoon of semi-private lessons.
Anyways we continued the course the next day and the instructor decided it was a good idea to take us up all the way to the top of the mountain.
I somehow managed to ski successfully down the intermidiate slopes with out falling :)
As the week went on I learned how to ski in parrallel, I don't have to make a triangle with my skis when I turn. It was exciting! I also started having things said to me like "You stand well on your skis" and "Now you can go down any slope"
On Wednesday we had a fourth person join our ski lesson. Her name was Rose.
She came up and asked if we could all speak German (in German). Lisa and I explained that Ellen could only speak English.
"Cool!" Rose replied.
"Do you speak English?" I asked.
"Ja I'm from England" she said.
"OH, I'm from the U.S."
"Then why the hell are we speaking German?!?" she replied (in English now)
I couldn't help laughing. Rose turned out to be our entertainment for Wednesday and Thursday.
On Wednesday I also went in this cute Church in our village. The thing I liked best were that the people at the end of mass would dip their hands in the holy water and then turn to who was next to them and share it.....
It was REALLY interesting.


By Thursday Lisa(who had been joining in on my afternoon lessons with family) and I finally felt comfortable enough to go all the way to the top (without Balzer).

It was sad to say goodbye to Lisa on Friday but we exchanged email addresses and now have contact with another.
I skiied down from the top of that (the thing on the left)
From Hitzeggen to Vella.....


Saturday we went hiking in the snow. Had a snowball fight. It was fun......

But I actually liked skiing better (never thought I'd say that.....)
I was sooooooooooooooo sad to go back to Germany Saturday! It was such beautiful weather!!!!!!!!!
The snow staircase Jannis made...

On the way back we stopped at a rest stop that, no joke, was called Heidi Land.
View from Heidi Land....

Anyways those are my skiing stories!