Well, it looks to be officially autum here in Germany, now. Even though the sun is out, shining brilliantly today, its still rather cold. The entire weekend was a rather cold and rainy affair too, sunny only for a bit on Sunday. Despite the weather (or maybe because of the weather, I do like fall), I had a really good weekend. Friday night was fun- went over to Alex/Emily's apartment (two girls also in the AYF program) who live just down the way from me in the StuSie complex. They have a really nice appartment, and I got the chance to really meet some of their roommates. We had a "Sing-Star" party, a game that is played by singing songs into a microphone, and which ever team wins the most songs, wins. We played two rounds- my team lost (specatcularly) one round, and won the last round. It was a real good time. Then we played a german card game, kind of similar to an American game I learned many years back, known as "Scum" or "P and A." Strange names, but the german name for it was even weirder. I dunno who comes up with names for card games... but they should probably be fired. Saturday was a really low key day. It rained. A lot. So I stayed in and watched movies, and talked to Marilyn for a while. From the chaos of the week, it was a strange feeling having nothing to do. I felt kind of bad though, I missed my make up call from Emily/Alex, there were some people going to France that morning. I woke up just about the time the bus left. Kind of frustrating, but I got to catch up on some sleep, that I had sorely needed. And besides, who plans a trip on a saturday morning to have to get up at 8:30? Not when I've spent the entire week getting up early and doing homework... I wanted a break. And thats what I got. Sounds like France was a bit of a bust, in any case. At least it didn't rain for them. Yesterday was another low key day. I got a little bit of homework done, read some Harry Potter (shouldn't come as a surprise to anybody by now), and had a lovely Italian dinner with some of the girls from StuSie. It was a lovely little Italien place, we talked about making a sunday night dinner there a tradition. I would love that.

Alright, the day is moving on, and I still have a bit more homework to finish up before I start class in a couple hours, so I must say farewell. Glad to see Michigan State won their football game with ease (and without Dantonio) on Saturday. Big game coming up on Saturday! The program is dominated with Wisconsin students, so I think there is going to be some trash talking this week. I won't get a chance to watch the game, I'm planning on joining some people on a trip to the 200th Oktoberfest! Should be fun.


"For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move.
-Robert Louis Stevenson

Well, today is friday, thank goodness! I haven't updated my blog in a while, since this week has been busy. Well, busy is putting it nicely. Up to my neck in things to do is another way of putting it. We had a mandatory meeting this morning to talk about scheduling classes. There was a lot of important information, and I'm worried that I'll have trouble keeping it all straight, seeing as how we don't start actually start signing up for classes for about two weeks, leaving plenty of time for me to forget everything I just heard. But I suppose thats why I can always ask the people in charge here for help.

I was supposed to give my presentation yesterday- but my handout didn't send properly via e-mail, so I was one of two people elected to go today instead. I would have preferred to just have it done and out of the way, but this way it gave me a little more time to think about some things I wanted to change. Okay, in reality it just made me more nervous, but at least I got to see everyone else go ahead of me, so I can borrow some of their styles or whatever. There were some pretty good presentations- I suppose thats because I'm in a class with kids who have either lived a decent portion of their life in Germany, or have dedicated a lot of their life to learning German. Not that I'm out of place, just that when you're giving a presentation to a room of your peers, it's a little intimidating.

This presentation is on top of the two tests and paper that was due this week, plus all the regular homework. I'm certainly not bored when I get home from classes, I'll tell you what.

But time is quickly wrapping up for these courses, which is unbelievable, since that means that we're almost entering October. Next wednesday marks one month from being away from home. I don't mean to sound rude, but I haven't really missed home much. Too much going on to think about everyone else, really.

Not much new to add on my end- Discovered a restaurant with unbelievable spaghetti, and from 6-7:30 pm its only 1,80€. Oh, and I've been eating a decent amount of ice cream this week, since the weather was suddenly very pleasant. Of course, being the weekend, the weather decided Friday should mark the first cloudy day all week, and a sharp drop in the temperature. It was even sprinkling a little on my walk over to the AYF Center where I am now.

I went to a soccer game on wednesday- it was a very long day, but the soccer game was really a blast! I liked it more than I liked football back in America. The game was incredible, but Freiburg gave up a goal within the last few minutes. Unfortunate that Freiburg had to lose to their rivals, Schalke. The whole town was wearing red and black on wednesday (SC Freiburg's colors, naturally), and anyone wearing blue was obviously an enemy. The Schalke fans all dressed in blue were rather boisterous, even before the game. I was really hoping that Freiburg would quiet them, and they almost did! So many close chances. Regardless, still a great game.

Well, its time to finish up my Referat (presentation), and then fill out a quick worksheet. Then all I have to do is sit through four hours of classes, give a presentation, and I'm home free!

"I had to experience everything very preciesely... I am such a realist, you know, that I have to see everything with my own eyes."

-Otto Dix

(Appropriate, since I'm giving a presentation on him!)

Strange how whenever I ought to be doing something else, I tend to write a blog entry isn't it? Tomorrow we have a test in our language classes, and then we have a presentation to give on Wednesday. Wednesday is going to be a busy day, because after class a large group of us are going to the SC Freiburg soccer game. Thursday's going to be a long day predictably, since everyone's going to be tired and run down from the night before. Freiburg's soccer club has been doing great so far though- and we have tickets to their rivalry game. Exciting!

I need to start doing my research for my presentation. Maybe I'll take a break from writing my essay and looking up German verbs to start digging a little bit.

I am really glad to hear about the Michigan State game yesterday! It was quite a way to win a game. It's kind of weird to read on Facebook about how all my friends are at the game, and yet I can't even watch it on TV cause it came on around 2:30 a.m. Oh well, I was up late and caught the score of the first half on ESPN.com before going to bed. The thing about having classes at three every day, my sleep schedule is very strange. I do a lot of homework at night or in the morning, not really during the evening. Hopefully when the actual university starts up, things will make a little more sense.

One of these days, I'm going to dedicate a whole blog entry to just posting pictures of Freiburg, and giving my opinion on the whole region. For now though, I'm going to be a good student and starting tackling this mountain of homework and then start studying.

"The call of the year!"

-Brad Nessler, on Mark Dantonio's call to fake the field goal in overtime.

Pictures of Basel, Switzerland

It's been a long while since I've written a decent entry to my blog, hasn't it? I guess its time to remedy that. What a week. Seriously. What a week! Classes are in full swing, which, for the most part, is a good thing. It keeps my busy and keeps my mind off of other things, like people back home for example. I'm really making a lot of friends with other students here though, so I'm certainly not feeling lonely. At the risk of sounding a bit crass, I haven't really gotten homesick yet. It's not that I don't miss home, that's certainly not the case. I suppose it's more like I've come to the realization that things are business as usual back home, and will be for the next year.

Like I was saying, class has been really busy. We have class four hours a day, from 15:00 until 19:00 (thats 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. for you silly American folks). Don't ask me why we have it so late, I'm not entirely sure why. But we're not the only group of people using the building, and its rather small. The "International House in Freiburg" is basically a converted house. At least it has nice big windows.

I have two teachers- Susanne, who teaches grammar, and Corinna, who teaches language and vocabulary. Susanne is the typical German instructor for the most part- kind of old school, lots of worksheets and lots of homework. Corinna is a really goofy lady who's probably only 8 years older than most of the students, putting her about 30 or so. She's a little more conventional, in terms of teaching, and thankfully hands out less homework. We have a test on Monday, covering all sorts of stuff. I probably ought to be studying instead of writing this, but there's always time tomorrow. It's only Saturday after all!

We also have to give a "Referat," or a Presentation, in front of the class on Wednesday. That's going to be interesting. I haven't selected my topic yet, but I'm considering the idea of doing it on "Trümerfilmen," the name given to movies that were made in the ruins of post World War II Germany. It's a very interesting time period for Germany, especially their cinema. One of my favorite German movies comes from this period. I'm excited to look into this a bit more, learn about some other influential German movies. German cinema is a really fascinating topic, if you're into films at all.

What else have I done this week? Right! We had a "wine-and-dine" party with some of the most powerful people in Freiburg on Wednesday night. One of the members of this group had studied abroad at the University of Wisconsin Madison, and every year when the students from the program arrive, he invites them all over for a little party. Only thing was, we were in what everyone in Freiburg considers -the- nicest restaurant in town. Oh, and it also happens to be on top of the highest point in Freiburg, a little mountain, in what used to be a castle. Yeah, it was nice. The food was outstanding, albeit only finger foods. They had the nicest champagnes and wines for us. It was outstanding. The view of Freiburg was unbelievable; I wish I had my camera, it was stunning. I talked (and talked, and talked, and talked, the man wouldn't stop talking!) to a German man who gave us a lot of advice on what to do in Freiburg, and told us to speak German as often as possible. He was very nice, though he chattered on for quite a while. The night was a huge success.

I also got what I might consider the worlds best bowl of spaghetti the other night. The downside? It set me back a whole 1,80€. After you convert that, it probably comes out to be around two bucks. This restaurant serves cheap spaghetti every night from certain times. I'm going to be gaining lots of pasta weight, I can assure you!

I also got to watch the SC Freiburg game yesterday. The "SC" stands for Sport Club. Strange, because the only sport that they're into is soccer. Freiburg's team is doing really good this year, and yesterday they knocked off Frankfurt, 1-0 in the 91st minute! It was quite an amazing game.

Well, I've spent a long time in front of my computer, and I ought to get some lunch and go grocery shopping. Good thing the stores are just across the street!

"Has the world ever been changed by anything save the thought and its magic vehicle the Word?"

-Thomas Mann