Just Keep Swimming!

Hello friends and family! I hope all is well in your respective locales. Things are moving right along here in D-land. I had my first class yesterday! Yikes. It's called "Der erste Weltkrieg in der deutsche LIteratur" which means roughly "World War I in German Literature." At first I was really nervous, because this class is a smaller class rather than a lecture. But then about 35 people showed up, and I was sitting next to a friendly German student, so I felt a little more excited. Then the professor came in and he seemed pretty cool, and the books he was describing for our class sounded interesting. But then! He assigned a 4-5 page paper over the first book for our next class period. *Sigh* I'm not sure I can read that much and write a paper in German by our next meeting. In English, it obviously wouldn't be a problem, but I haven't taken a German class since first quarter Freshman year, so I think this class might be too hard. Anyway, I also had a floor meeting yesterday, and all my roomies were talking back and forth in German, so I felt pretty overwhelmed with German yesterday. It was kind of a discouraging day, because even though I could understand the professor, I think the course material will be too difficult for me, and when my roommates were speaking, I only picked up about 60% of what they were saying because they talk so quickly. I'm not sweating it too much though; I know it's all just part of the ups and downs of study abroad. The past couple of weeks have been great, so a couple less-than-average days aren't so bad.

Speaking of the past couple of weeks! Munich was great. The weather was wonderful, and Steff's guest family was awesome. We ate dinner with them for four nights I think, and it was great to use our German with Kira's parents. We talked about all sorts of things! On one day during our trip we went to Salzburg in Austria, which I really enjoyed. It was filled with tourists, but it's a really charming city. I definitely recommend visiting. :) Since I've been back, I've just been hanging out with friends, getting to know my roommates better, going on walks in the forest and preparing for classes. That's all I've got for now, but I'll update you on things once I attend my other classes. I miss you all!

Whew!

Wow, so my computer broke, which is extremely frustrating. It wasn't all bad, because it forced me to do other things when I would have been sitting on the computer. However, the Nachteile (disadvantages) greatly outweighed the Vorteile! (advantages) Today has been a superb day so far though. :) We're done with START-Kurs! This morning we took our test, and tonight we have a party, about which I'm extremely excited. I plan on getting my dance on in a big way. I went to the grocery store earlier today to stock up on food, because stores are closed for Friday, most of Saturday, and all of Sunday and Monday for Easter. How cool is that! I was always under the impression that religion was not as big a deal in Western Europe. That is, I had this idea of America as the "Christian" nation and Western Europe as more secular, but that's not exactly true. For example, everything is closed three days for Easter, and I have a week break during this semester for a holiday recognizing Christ's ascension into heaven. Also, on some legal document I turned into the Buergeramt (not sure what it's called in English, but it's the place where you deal with passports and citizenship), there's a line where you fill out your religion. It seems to me now that in America, we are always avoiding speaking about religion ("Happy Holidays," winter break instead of Christmas break, etc.) I'm going to my first church service here on Sunday, which I'm looking forward to.

This weekend I plan on having "fambly" dinner with some other Americans for Easter. Hooray! By the way, "Frohe Ostern" is "Happy Easter" in German. :) Which reminds me! I know that English is a Germanic language, but learning German along with people from Japan, Poland, France, Turkey and Brazil really makes me realize how much easier it is to learn German if you speak English. For example, "frustrierend" in German is "frustrating" in English. There are so many words in German that I can hear and understand because they sound like English words, but it's not so easy for someone who speaks Japanese, for instance! Lol, although most of the international students speak a good amount of English anyway.

Classes don't start until the week after next, so I'm planning on going to Munich with a couple friends! Steff, another girl from DU, lived there with an exchange family in high school, and they offered to let us stay there. How exciting is that! I'm looking forward to it. I also want to go to Berlin, Milan, Paris and Barcelona while I'm here. And that's just to start. :D Also, there's a big Apple store in Munich, so I really hope I can get my computer fixed there. Right now I'm borrowing Erin's computer, because she brought two! It's really been wonderful that she let me borrow her other one. Anyway, I'm sending big hugs to you all. :) Frohe Ostern!