http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Katze/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Katze en-us Thu, 24 Dec 2009 11:28:29 +0000 Thu, 24 Dec 2009 11:28:29 +0000 Let's pretend for a minute that it's still December and I didn't actually miss two weeks of writing in my journal on account of being lazy...ok enough pretending the imagination door has been closed. So therefore I've got a bit old fun pile of catching up to do. On Friday the 19th we had our last day of school. First period class that day was Biology and we ate breakfast together. Everyone bro http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-366627.html This morning I had forgotten that one of my classes had been canceled so I woke up at 645 only to realise that I now had narly two and a half hourse before school started. Therefore I hvaea bit of extra tie to do some writing. on Saturday I went to a christmas party for the Karneval people with my host family. It was in a bakery and ended up being super fun. The teenagers all sat at a table towa http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-366618.html This morning I awoke at 730 and prepared myself for the day trip to cologne that Kairi and I had planned a while ago. The trip ended up being a huge hunk of awesome Christmas shopping fun. Both Kairi and I got some great stuff for ourselves as well as for our families. The christmas Market in cologne was open and I swear to you my dearest reader there is no better atmostphere than that of a Germa http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-366611.html The Christmas market is finally open Although I suppose I shouldn't really say finally because it is only about two hours until thanksgiving day is completely over and actually the christmas Market has already been open nearly a week. Regardless though I find it to be an absolutely marvelous tradition and I love the atmostphere. this is the first year ina long time that I have hactually felt like http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-366610.html This weekend I was in Monschau for a choir trip. It was nothing extraordinary really. Monschau is just a little village near the edge of Aachen only like an hour long drive. The elevation is higher there though which makes it much more friendly to snow. I never would have guessed that I especially being a North Dakota girl would have been so excited to see even that small amount of snow. The sun http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-364775.html I got to bake cookies for my Germany Course yesterday evening. Our teacher told us to translate a traditional recipe out of each of our own countries into Germany and then bring it to class for the others to try. This excercise seems fairly dull until you consider thatour class consisted of natural born cities from Brazil France Spain Greece Italy Thailand China and Korea. That truly was a http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-364772.html I was surprisingly nervous about going to Orchestra practice for the first time. I found it intimidating because no matter how many people I asked I couldn't find anyone else who was also in it. Today I found out why...there are only nine members including myself. I absolutely loved it though. I had to sight read which is something I'm not particularly good at. This made my first pratice with a s http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-350366.html Let me just quickly tell you about my day. This week is Praktikum. Last week was Praktikum as well. This is a two week time period were allt he eligable students in the eleventh grade go to work in place of school. I being an exchange student stayed behind with a few other kids who had either already done Praktikum at a different school or couldn't find any place open for them to work. So for th http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-350363.html Today was my last day of break and I spent it doing the exact same things I've been doing every day for the past two weeks read and sleep. I finished The Picture of Dorian Gray and I'm going to be so bold as to pick it out as deserving of the title of being my favorite book. Oscar Wilde is a fascinating however controversial man. I suppose I should say 'was' though because similar to the majo http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-350359.html The past two weeks have been very uneventful. Apart from my trip to the North Sea I have not left Aachen. Most of the free days were spent doing nothing more than sitting around in my room and reading books that I shouldn't have bought when I already had too many to begin with. Partick came over a few times just to sit around and visit or play cards with us. Today though we went to a waterpark i http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-350348.html The Carolus Therme is a gigiantic bath house in Aachen. There are eight or more differnet hot tub pool type things in one great hall. I went with Kairi. She is another ASSE student. At first she and I had a difficult time figuring out where we were supposed to go. I was aware that I had to take the 51 bus in the direction of Alsdorf. I was however not aware that we did not actually need to ride http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-338940.html So I have a bit of a cold. It's possible that it could be due to the fact that I was so insistant on swimming in the 10 C waters of the North Sea yesterday. This was probably not the greatest idea but there is no way that I could have stood the thought of going allt he way to Holland to visit the North Sea and not swimming in it. I didn't swim today. I guess my common sense must have caught up t http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Germany/North-Rhine-Westphalia/blog-338931.html I've had a long day. And I can say this in all honesty. My family and I woke up around 7 this morning and packed our things in preparation for our trip to the North Sea. It was about a three hour drive from Aachen to Domburg the small town where we stayed. Comparatively it would be like driving from Westhope to Bismark but with much more to look at on the way...well for a foreigner at least. I' http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Germany/North-Rhine-Westphalia/blog-338923.html Today's activities included shopping ice skating and staring out into the vast explance of the beloved city that is Aachen. Earleir today I had made plans with Kairi to go shopping and maybe have a cup of coffee. Since it was such a wonderful day my parents offerened to take Kairi and I up to Lousburg which is one of the seven hills surrounding Aachen. The over look was aboslutela breath taking http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Germany/North-Rhine-Westphalia/blog-338909.html I attended a party in Kln this weekend and it was a ridiculously large amount of fun. On Saturday about 11 o'clock or so I met up with a few of the others from my language camp and we took the train to Kln Cologne I spent most of the day with Kairi. We did a bit of shopping where we both bought matching turtle necks. However not for the purpose of matching just because they were amazingly cu http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Germany/North-Rhine-Westphalia/blog-338902.html I adore Mondays. I truly do. And here's what is surprising I say this without even the slightest bit of sarcasm. My Studenplan allows me to come home at 10 o'clock and sit around for an hour and a half before going back to school for only one lesson. It's like I'm easing myself back into school after every weekend. Not like I really need to be. I'm not doing much for work at the moment. Part of t http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Germany/North-Rhine-Westphalia/blog-338893.html I'm beginning to feel very silly for worrying about school at all. I've been Stephi's shadow for exactly one week and I have no doubts about my capaility of being successful on my own. Today I was finally able to look over my list of classes and pick out the ones that I wanted. I'm required to take at least ten classes and I can't take any more than twelve. Thus far I'm figured in for eleven and I http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Germany/North-Rhine-Westphalia/blog-338885.html Yesterday was interesting. A few other appropriate adjectives would be cold wet and very very long. All four of us got in the car at 930 and drove to Nurburg Ring in Eifel. We went there for a car race but it was canceled becuse of the rain. Well not because of the rain but it was a dangerous factor considering that ealier Saturday morning there was an accident and some petroleum spilled on http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Germany/North-Rhine-Westphalia/blog-338890.html This whole week has actually been very interesting. Stephi has been doing a lovely job of showing me around and such. I'm actually starting to feel like there's a chance I won't make a complete fool of myself when I start out on my own. Which I still won't be doing for another couple days. Herr Opitz has been sick for the first part of the week and upon returning he was far too busy so we set an http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Germany/North-Rhine-Westphalia/blog-331113.html It's only 130 in the afternoon and I'm already finished with my first actual day of school. One could say it was entertaining...but that would be untruthful. Today was actually surprisingly dull. It's nice though so see what school here is like. I've been curious about it for a long time. Stephi was very nice. I tried to stay out of her way as much as possible because I know that having some f http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Germany/North-Rhine-Westphalia/blog-331108.html