My Studies in Freiburg

Hey Everyone,

So, this is a blog site that I just started to hopefully be a little more routinely connected to you guys. I'll be periodically posting things here in case anyone is occasionally curious about the goings-on. I'll give you a quick update on everything. There's quite a bit of stuff that's happened since I left the States to study here in Freiburg, Germany, but as these blogs will prove to be a nice place to play out some "dear Diary" tendencies, I'm sure you'll get a good idea about my experience(s) here.

Quickly:
Living:
I moved to Freiburg on September 4th, 2008. On the way to Stuttgart from Amsterdam, I met an American named Patrick. I overheard him telling a woman "I'm from San Francisco (pause)... but I'm not gay." Of course, I informed him that anybody who says that and they're from San Francisco is probably gay, even if they don't know it. Needless to say, we became friends, even though I did get a little scared about the fact that he offered me a "ride" to Freiburg from Stuttgart. My suspicions subsided a little when he furnished proof of monogamous heterosexuality by showing me pictures of his wife and two daughters. Anyway, he's a good guy and I've since met his awesome family (played tag with his daughter) and snagged a free bike from him.

I then stayed at the Black Forest Inn Hostel with about 12 other people in a room for almost a week. That wasn't the best circumstance considering I needed to find housing and get settled relatively quickly. I called listings in the newspaper and started with something like this "hey, sprechen Sie Englisch?" Normally, the conversation was really short. Luckily, after having contacted a housing-locating student-type organization, I got some listings and fumbled through some really bad German with somebody on the phone. I went to this person's house and noticed a Brazilian book (in Portuguese)--we continued in Portuguese and I moved in the following day. I needed something fast, and I've been living with the Brazilian-German family (a mother and two boys) since September. I'm looking to get a place in the next three months with my Irish friend, Liam--I'm a little scared with him though. He's got like 3-4 girls on the hook and usually a beer in the hand. Okay, correction. This number has since diminished--the law of diminishing returns as well as preference has taken hold. He's grand entertainment, but I need to obviously focus on the studies, so we'll see.

I live right now really close to the train station---visitors are easily welcomed... ahem. I plan on staying close to the train station just for sake of ease.

Freiburg is a cool town. There's enough bars and restaurants to keep entertained. The surrounding area is gorgeous and, as already mentioned, the trains are easy to use. I'm excited for Spring/Summer so I can get out and hike some more. I should be outside a lot more come Spring/Summer because of field-work courses with the program that I'm doing.

Studies:
So, I'm in Freiburg (Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg) studying my masters in forest ecology and management. The director of the program has a strong wildlife ecology background and I'm seeking out some internships (a mandatory part of the program) in either Norway or Europe (with wolves), Africa (the UN in Nairobi) or the US (hopefully some policy type work in a NGO or with a government office) with her help. I'm still researching that.

They do a block system here (a 3-week course and then you move on to the next one). Consequently, the professors throw a barrage of information at you and it's difficult to figure out what the test will be like. Normal stuff. I finished "Global Environmental Change", "Tree Structure and Function" and recently "Environmental Applied Statistics"-- I liked the first class. The second was good for me to get caught up about trees, but the Stat class was slowwwww... Still, I was able to lead a study session with some other folks which helped me understand the stuff a bit better, too.

Overall, the academics are going well and I'm glad I chose the faculty. Many students make parties here in a joint effort. I was talking to a guy from Nepal--oh yeah--I'll give you a quick list of where people come:
My program: Nepal, Brazil, Iran, Ireland, Ghana, India, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Greece, Germany, Spain, etc.
Another closely-related: Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, Ecuador, "Macedonia", Switzerland etc.
So, yeah, the parties are very cool. However, a nepalese guy, Bhupendra, told me that he wasn't going because he didn't have the time, but asked that next time we do the party for "peace and prosperity". Wow. So, I'll court the neurotic drinkers and see if we can drink a few less beers one night (still drink some of course) and the proceeds of restraint will go to a charity. I figure we'll do a presentation of a charity that we know of in our respective countries, and then we'll all vote at the end for where we want the money to go. It won't be much money, but at least we know it'll go somewhere worthwhile as well as known. This is going to happen after Christmas. We wanted to get this done before Christmas but it won't happen.

Personal:
Meeting new friends and families (where I live and Patrick's). I hang out with an American, Nate (from Pennsylvania), and Liam, the Irish guy, the most. I'll start hanging out with others more soon, but unfortunately, native and non-native speakers self-segregate in the beginning. Not for long.

Actually, I'm in Norway now at my Uncle's house. I have a dog licking me in the morning, him to hike with, and saw my Grandma so far. It's nice to make a fire! I had some deer yesterday--delicious! Now, I need to go half-mindedly watch Shrek with my uncle. Duty calls.

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