Note: I apologize in advance if my wording is weird at all. I've read straight through the Eragon books (or will have soon since I'm more than 2/3 of the way done with Brisingr). I haven't stopped reading it since I started, so I think the Lord-of-the-Rings-esque form of speech has influenced my wording a bit :P Lol.

Well, another week is gone. We only have 8 more days of school. I, personally, only have 7 because of Brigitte's and my trip to Paris this upcoming Friday. Can't say I'm not totally stoked. I thought going to Paris (AGAIN) would be somewhat tiresome and it may yet prove to be so, but I doubt it. For one thing, I get to miss a day of school without being sick. WOO! And for another thing, it means I have 3 whole wonderful days without my room mate.

Don't get me wrong. She's nice enough I guess. Were we not room mates, I would probably have no issue with her. However, being around someone on a nearly continuous basis is enough to drive me insane. Well, if we're friends it's not a problem. She and I are not, so the little things that irk me are made worse by the fact that I can never seem to get away from her. We even share a room, so no respite comes at home either.

But it's alright. We leave Berlin 2 weeks from tomorrow. I can deal with it until then.

My job in the fall is confirmed, which is awesome. :D I can't even begin to explain how stoked I am.

Germany isn't what I expected. I don't know what I WAS expecting, but I like this better. The people are amazingly friendly (albeit somewhat unhelpful when I try to practice my German. They want to help me and so generally switch to English when they hear my American (and sometimes French) accent when I speak. I know they're trying to help, but it's just frustrating. I LOVE the people that either can't or don't speak English with me. It's not why I'm here, you know? Anyway, moving on).

Living in Germany is much more natural to me than living in France, though to be fair I think it has a lot to do with having friends and not being alone all the time. Things with the group in France were...difficult. A clash of personalities, I think, is the best way to describe it. They were in to drinking and clubbing and what have you and I was...not. It was just the way it was. Now that I'm with kids from my own school, who share my religious beliefs and general values, it's much easier. I'm not nearly as tense as I was last year and I don't feel judged by the others for anything other than my personality and not my religion or life choices. It's a good feeling.

But in any case.

I'm rather frustrated with my teacher. She doesn't assign us any homework, so I have nothing to do. Sure, there are things I could study, but I can't just study. I need worksheets or exercises or assignments of some kind to guide me. Just studying in and of itself is tedious and generally proves pointless to me.

But still. My German continues to improve, which is really all that matters in the end. I'm hoping it will improve even more when I stay with Tobi in a few weeks. Living with Alexane and her family last summer did more for me than the rest of my stay in France, and it was only about a 10-day stay (as my stay with Tobi will also be).

I'm still pretty happy, though the more time passes the more I'm glad my stay won't be longer. I hate feeling like a traveler or living out of a suitcase - both of which apply now. I want to be able to do my own laundry. I WANT TO COOK ON A STOVE!!! Living off of the same food over and over again is insanely tiresome. And I think it's also (at least in part) the cause of my problems. But seeing as there's not much of anything I can do about it, I'll really just have to wait it out.

I get to talk to my brother today. =3 In about an hour and a half from now. Yay! I wish the time would go faster. I miss him. Plus there's little I can do between now and then since I have limited amounts of time. I've been reading most of the day, but I can only do that for so long at a time, you know?

Sorry I've been so bad at updating. Now that I have access to the internet at least most of the time, I find myself using it less. Haha. Oh well. I also haven't been taking as many pictures, but that's also because I've been going out less because I need to rest more. Being perpetually sick is not the best thing ever, but I think I'm dealing with it pretty well.

One last thought before I go: Disney films and the Gilmore Girls in German are REALLY awesome. :D Watching TV/movies and listening to German music has been REALLY helpful. It's something I need to try to keep up when I get back to the states, though it'll be more difficult then when it's not as readily available. However, reading will be easier because I'll need to do it for my classes. As it stands, we don't read much of anything at all in class. I wish we would. I can hardly read in German at all.

Oh well. It will come with time and study.

I hope all of you are well.

Watch the World Cup! And root for Deutschland!!! ;) (Or America if you choose to actually be patriotic... Weird...)

Tchüss.

P.S. One last thing (seriously this time). I'm compiling a list of horror movies I need to see once I get back (or in general. Whatever). Anyone have any suggestions? Here is the list so far:

1. Poltergeist

2. The Cube

3. Nightmare on Elm Street

4. Friday the 13th

5. The Blair Witch Project (and sequel?)

6. The Brood

7. The Fly

8. Saw

9. Janghwa, Hongryeon (A tale of two sisters)

10. Texas Chainsaw Massacre

11. The Orphanage

12. The Changeling

13. The Exorcist

14. The Shining

15. Rec (2007)

16. Scream

17. IT

18. The Eye (original)

19. Frailty

20. May

Things have been ridiculous lately. I feel like I either have no time or far too much of it. We have SO many assignments for our culture class that sometimes just looking at the list of them all makes my head spin.

I finally have the internet at home. Our land lady finally consenting to sharing the ethernet cord (which is at least 60 feet long BTW) with us. I finally get to call my family on a regular basis!

It's been really hard to be away from them for so long, especially when I couldn't call them whenever I wanted. I especially miss my brother. I got so used to being around him that I think I took it for granted a little. And I know he's dealing with a lot right now (as is all of my family but I don't normally live with them) and I wish I could be there. But I know I need to be here, so I'm doing my best to make the most of my time here.

I've been getting sick a lot lately. I have IBS and I'm having a lot more flares than I've had in a long time. Today I had to leave school nearly an hour early (GAH!) and just lay down for several hours. I went to the store to buy something for dinner and that was SO exhausting. I didn't even go to dinner meet-up our group had all together at an apparently amazing, very German restaurant that our professor was generous enough to pay for. I really wanted to go, but it's very far from here and I didn't have the strength. It was sad, but I watched Hercules is German instead and relaxed. I needed it, sadly. Hopefully I'll be fine tomorrow.

I've begun watching Disney films auf Deutsch on youtube. Very fun. :P The Emperor's New Groove and Hercules are the only one's I've watched so far, but Tarzan is next. Yay! Then whatever else I can find. I want to see Finding Nemo, but I can only find scenes, not the whole film. But I'll keep working on it.

My German is really coming along! I'm still ahead of basically everyone in the class, so sometimes it's boring, but I have a LOT more to learn and our teacher - Christine - is more than willing to answer all of my random and nearly endless questions. Nearly none of them have to do with the lesson we're on, so I wait to ask them until the breaks or after class, leaving me very little to do during class. We're given entirely too much time (in my opinion) for each activity and work-sheet, so often I have plenty of time left over in which I can do other things.

I've taken to trying to formulate lesson plans for my future students (though I won't be a certified teacher until almost 3 years from now) but I think it's a very good use of my time. I only started learning German 6 months ago (as opposed to French, which I started in 7th grade) so I still remember a lot of what we did in the beginning and I remember what helped with the basics and what didn't. Of course, I need to be adaptable to my students, but remembering how I learned it can't hurt. I'm doing all that I can to figure out the best way to teach German (and also French since I can apply many things from my German lessons to it as well) in the future. If that's not being productive (working 3 years in advance) I don't know what is! Haha.

I had a really awesome idea earlier of something I could do with my students, but now I can't remember what it was! I hate when that happens!

Let's see... What else?

I've had a couple people tell me they couldn't believe I'd only studied German for 6 months. My accent is apparently coming along (and I was right - it did set back my French accent a bit. The "R"s are much better, according to Alexane, though that's probably on account of me trying to imitate the German one as well, which is very similar to it. My vowels, however, are absolutely horrible. Hopefully it will come back with minimal effort...)

I've even had one or two people not believe me when I said I was American, but the conversations were very simple and very short. And for the most part it was with solicitors, and I'm sure people have tried that excuse to get away form them before, but even so. It was still encouraging. :)

I've made many friends since I got here and I'm, in general, very happy.

My dad and I talked once (and briefly at that) about my moving to Europe for a year and either studying, working, or doing an internship of sorts. I'd probably do 6 months in Germany and 6 in France, or I would go somewhere (like Strasbourg) where they speak both commonly, but I don't know about that. I've never been out of my comfort zone (my own country) for so long and I don't know if I could handle it at this point in my life. Maybe once I graduate, I can go abroad for a while before I start teaching? I have no idea. But I have another year before I can even conceive of going (since I'm already signed up for school, have an apartment, etc) so I'm not too worried about it now. Just something to keep in mind I guess.

I got up kinda late this morning (I stayed up too late reading "Eldest" haha - good book by the way; I'd never read it before). I made it to class on time, but barely. I need to get more sleep so hopefully everything will be good tomorrow. Plus, the earlier I leave, the fewer people there will be on the S-Bahn. Normally they don't bother me, but I'm really sick of high school boys hitting on me. The backpack I have for school makes me look young to them (they're only used by high school aged kids and younger) but whatever. If I leave earlier I can avoid them. (They're there the same time every day).

Anyway sorry this post was so short. I have so much to catch up on! Like my trip to Strasbourg and our group's amazing trek to Schwerin! I only have pictures for the second though. I'll explain everything later, now that I can actually assure that there will BE a "later."

Well, that's all for now then. Night all.

Tschüss!

P.S. The sun now sets around 10pm and rises before 4 sometime. I'm not sure exactly when but very early.

P.P.S. We only have 2.5 weeks of school left. Then we go on our tour of Germany, then I got to Bonn for 10 days. After that, it's back to the states, possibly to Georgia, to Canada, who knows what for a month, and then back to school!! Life moves so quickly when it's awesome... And very slowly when it's not. -sigh- So be happy! Then life will... be over? Weird.

I'm tired. Ignore me. Bye!!