Further Update

Unfortunate news.

No skipping of Der German Class I Shouldn't Be In. Will just have to suck it up for the semester, just because the credits don't quite work out to have it already covered. On the plus side, if I just bite the bullet and chew on it on my back molars until December, it will also mean finishing the German Lit. and Language major for good without having to worry about trying to herd in any more requirements in my final semester. For each glass, there is both an occupied and unoccupied side, I suppose.

How's It Goin'?

Nah, I haven't posted much recently. University in America has reared its unseemly head in the last few weeks. And what's currently on my mind right now is a very large amount of class reading to do, and getting out of a German class, Intermediate Composition and Conversation, that is supposed to be required for my major.

Why? Because I just spent an entire year in Germany doing heavy research on and writing 10-page papers in German about things like Der Bewußtsseinsstrom in Leutnant Gustl von Arthur Schnitzler and Metaphoriken des Wassers in Ingeborg Bachmanns Undine Geht and Gedichtanalyse der anakreontischen Lyrik von Gotthold Ephraim Lessing and so on and so forth. And if you had been writing whole essays and giving oral presentations on such topics in front of entire classrooms of native speakers of your 2nd/3rd/4th language, you'd be pretty bored senseless too if you came back and your German class assignments look like this:

Read this one-page, large-print story written for the difficulty level of a German 3rd grader in this text book that's slightly thinner than the width of your index finger but stupidly cost you over $100 (?!).

Then write 10 adjectives regarding this-and-this topic of the story, and compose a 150-word letter from one main character to another.

SAVE ME.

'Burgweh - Knock Knock!

Today was the first day of classes at Vanderbilt. After each class, I keep wanting to knock on my desk, and sometimes I (very) briefly wonder why nobody is doing the same. And I'll admit... I still do it very quietly anyway, knowing that I'm the only who hears it or understands it.

In Germany, that's what you do when class ends. I had always wanted to get a brief video of it, but never did, for some reason. It's kind of interesting... And don't ask me why they do it, I don't know the actual reason.

But it feels SO NATURAL to do it now!! Everyone should knock on their desks upon the end of class!!

Okay... so I realize this is yet one more little thing I miss now. If this seems rather strange to you, then imagine going to normal live performances where the audience doesn't clap at the end of the show, but simply gets up and starts to leave when it's done.

Not Amused

*chokes, wheezes, retches and gags at the smell of weed/pot/whatever overwhelming her from the girl sitting at the next computer three feet over*

Uuuaaaghhh.... why, WHY do so many of you here do this??? I think it just rotted through my lungs and diaphragm and into my stomach. I had to think about how to spell "diaphragm" just now. I'm at a German computer at the University, so the auto-spellcheck is useless because it identifies every English word as wrong in German. Page of red underlines. I could spell it die-uhframm and I wouldn't know the difference. "Die! A framm!" Speaking of die, OH THANK HEAVENS, she and her friend just left. Let me just sweep out the pile of brain cells that shriveled up and died in the last few minutes and get back to work on my essays.

Schnecke

It takes approximately 40 minutes for a tiny snail to mope around, poop, eat half of what came out and then go along on its merry way.

I know this because that's how long I watched one yesterday evening on a bench at the University.

Seriously, there are soooo many things I would rather do than write my final essays.

(Did you know it doesn't come out the "tail" end, but rather at the opening of the shell, fairly close to its head if it's curled closer up? I know this post has been utterly disgusting, but I can't help but always be fascinated by biological things.)

Here We Go Again

Trying to successfully complete three 10-page term papers and a final exam on German literature after 1945 by 24. July, and preferably earlier than said date.

Blog entries minimal. All you need to know right now for updates is that I was visited by a Dutch friend who flew in from the Netherlands and stayed for a few days last week.

Wait for it.... wait for iiiit....

A FLYING DUTCHMAN!!!

Happy Trails until my return, all.

Ripe Old Age

Although I'm in my third year of college in the States, I'm the same age as the majority of the first-year students here at the Uni Regensburg. Two or three times, I've been asked how old I was and gotten the response, "Wow! So young! And already even out of the country and abroad??" .

But not only do we start earlier for university in the States, we typically go for a shorter amount of time as well. It's 4 years in college, in and out, and your path diverges afterward to either an immediate career start or further study for a Master's or PhD degree. If it's the latter, then you've still got a few more years, but typically, most people are definitely done by, say, age 27 or 28 at the latest. (Not counting certain exceptions like med school, etc., where you could still be going to class, say, by the time you're already walking with a cane.)

This is almost never the case here in Germany. Although there are plenty of people who are about 23-25 who are writing their master's theses, I know almost just as many people who are about age 28-30 who are most definitely still in school. Still students. But this is nothing out of the ordinary here.

Protest

Earlier this week, there was a demonstration at the University. It was more or less a protest of the increased Studiengebühren, or tuition fees. The topic has also come up by chance in several of my classes over the last year.

The sum of the tuition fee against which many students are protesting is around €600-750 per semester, by what I know, which equates to about $800-1000.

Okay. I still know that's a lot per semester, and especially so if it used to be essentially free to go to university here. But in every discussion about it that I come across, I can never bring myself to join in the debate. Even on some scholarship, my family pays exponentially more than that for me every year. The amount that the German students pay per semester covers... maybe my meal plan at Vanderbilt... per semester.

Most students in America have to hurl themselves into decades of debt just to go to school. I do sympathize with the situation in Germany, simply because of how drastic a change it has now become for them over the years of gradual tuition increase. But sometimes, it's hard not to say something against their argument from our side's perspective.

Curiosity

"Also, hallo, ich heiße Lena, und ich bin eine Austauschstudentin aus den USA. In Regensburg studiere ich Germanistik, und ich bin hier seit... letzten September oder so."

I was sitting on the second row in one of my seminars today. Since it was the first day, we went around the room and introduced ourselves. As it comes around to me and I introduce myself, I almost couldn't help myself from laughing.

The instant that the words, "-and I'm a foreign exchange student," come out of my mouth, I watch all five heads on the first row individually whip around and look at me with sudden surprise and curiosity. I'm betting there were several other heads behind me that simultaneously looked up from their desks at that moment, too. There's nothing wrong, I don't feel offended or discriminated or anything. It's also not an uncommon response. Instead, I find it hilarious.

Overlap

While those of you in America, and very likely other countries as well, are cramming and stressing for final exams/term papers, we in Germany just started classes yesterday at the universities.

If that's too weird for you, you can just remember that our second semester goes until the end of July.

Wait, maybe that doesn't actually reassure you.