Wow, I haven't updated my blog in almost a week!

It's been a busy week too. School wrapped up on thursday... but leading up to the exams was a long and busy week. I had so much material to cover, I was swimming in homework and study materials. So after many hours of studying, and some late nights, I took my exams. The first one went pretty well, the second one felt a little rougher. But thursday night was fun, regardless. We all got together, the so called StuSie "family" and celebrated the end of classes. We were over at Lauren's place, and some of her german roommates came and joined us. While we were there, one of her new roommates arrived. He was from Oregon, and seemed nice.

Friday was a really low-key day. We had orientation meetings in the morning, and then I spent the second half of the day cleaning my room up a little bit, and reading. It was a cold, rainy day. I went to bed really early, since I had to get up around 4 in the morning for the long train ride to München (better known as Munich to you folks) and Oktoberfest. We were going to do a day trip, which meant we wanted to get to Munich as soon as we could, since we heard Oktoberfest fills up quick. This was also the 200th anniversary of Oktoberfest... It was a big deal!

Needless to say, we got there safe and sound. I had a blast- the atmosphere was incredible. It was essentially a giant festival. Everyone seemed to get along- surprising since it was full of Europeans (and American's and Aussies) and alcohol, and on more than one occasion, I heard people break out in national songs. I thought this might stir up trouble, but on the contrary, it was pretty light-hearted fun. It was a great day.

The trip home was interesting- on our first train switch, the train we were supposed to be in was much too full to fit any body. There were some people (me and the girls I was with included) that had to wait for the next train. Well, Deutsche Bahn being the nice people that they were, gave us tickets to ride the ICE trains. We had originally bought a "Schönes Wochenende" ticket, which allows you to ride on the Regional Trains only, but for around 7€. The ICE train actually got us back to Freiburg much sooner than our original plans, so it worked out for the best. It was a great time, though I was exhausted by the time our train was getting back toward Freiburg. We had been up for almost 24 hours at that point.

Today I slept in, and lounged around. School is done, and I am planning on spending my time this week looking into classes, exploring Freiburg, and looking into making little travel arrangements to meet my old host family from last summer in Mayen, and my friend Manuel in Stuttgart.

So far, my time here has been great. I feel so extremely lucky to be doing what I'm doing. I have to thank my parents for making this possible, and MSU too, to an extent. This program is really well organized, and I get all the support I need from both MSU and from the AYF program. That being said, I still sometimes miss home. Though more and more, I'm starting to realize that if my next 10 months here are anything like my first one... I might not be ready to leave next August. This place is already starting to feel more and more like home. I can't say that there has been any great culture shock. In fact, I really enjoy the German culture, except perhaps their directness. If they don't like something, or they don't think you're doing something right, they'll tell you. It's a little abrasive at first, but once you realize that they mean well, and aren't trying to simply be rude, it's easier to adjust.

I'll continue this post more later, and with some pictures from Oktoberfest- but I'm rather tired for now. It's been a really eventful weekend- I definitely count Saturday as one of the best days of my life.

"In the end, it's not going to matter how many breaths you took, but how many moments took your breath away."

-Shing Xiong