Christmas lights!

Christmas is definitely coming! The time before Christmas is definitely celebrated more than Christmas itself here. All the decorations around town and in people's houses went up on the first of advent and they're all white! It's very weird but the light on the trees or round windows are all 1 colour and that's usually white! It's really pretty but not so colourful! So I decided to add some colour to our building and bought some multicoloured lights for my window. My flatmates came home from lectures to find me stressing out cos I didn't have enough cellotape to keep the lights up! But the lovely girls came to my rescue and now my room is particularly Christmassy (there were so many lights that they go round my window and then round my shelves!)!

Travels and teaching

Well, since you last heard from me I've been to the UK and back! I had a weekend in Scotland with all my lovely friends from CU at uni, and although not much sleep was had, I loved every minute of it! I think I'd forgotten how much God has blessed me with friends at uni - it just felt so natural and easy to chat with them, even about the silliest things! The weekend was filled with teaching, singing, hugs, catching up, pirates, drama, mud, and much much more! I also got a chance to see Em, Katrina and Becky who I lived with last year which was fab :) But, all good things and all that, so Monday saw me and Sim leaving Newcastle heading south for Peterbrough where I saw Sim's lovely flat before making him get up at 5 on Tuesday morning to take me to the airport - thanks Sim, you're a legend! Thankfully I managed not to cry my way back to Germany and once here, Ramona came to collect me - yey! It's really nice to be back but I still miss everyone loads. Thanks guys for a great weekend, for remembering who I was, for giving me a bed, and for listening :)

16th November was Buß- and Bettag here which is a public holiday to do with forgiveness I think! Haven't quite worked it out yet! But i spent the day at a teacher's house baking for Christmas (oh my goodness, they have such yummy food here!) and playing the Disney equivalent of Trivial Persuit (I won!). Since then it's been back to porridge - I'm really enjoying the extra-curricular English class with some of the Klass 10s (7 of them to be precise). We chat and play games and it's really relaxed. My teaching is coming along slowly althought there are times I find myself standing in front of a class thinking "what on earth am I doing here?"! Today someone asked me to explain the difference between using "will" and "going to" in the future tense...I had no idea! But I quickly grabbed my grammar book and gave them a brief run down and a few examples - I'm learning so much!

Second week

Monday and Tuesday of the second week were devoted to the English Camp at school. The English department is planning to run an English club one day a week for primary school kids, so they invited Class 3 students from the primary schools in the area to come to the school for a couple of days to try and encourage them to come to the English club. We had so much fun these 2 days - the first day we did classroom words so we sang songs, made pen-toppers and played lots of silly games. The second day was food which included a huge pumpkin sitting in the middle of the desk all day! We also made toasties (some of which had spaghetti in them - weird!) and banana smoothies. The kids had a ball, and I hope they'll all come to the club.
Wednesday morning saw me and Jos on a train bound for Hamburg. We went to visit the city and stayed with a couple of language assistants there who go to Newcastle Uni. Hamburg is such a lovely city and we managed to fit in loads while we were there, including a tour of the Rathaus (town hall), an organ recital and a trip in a tiny lift to a viewing gallery at the top of a church with fabulous views of the city. On Friday night we said our goodbyes and headed across to Berlin as mum and dad were arriving on the Saturday and I figured I really should be there to meet them! Berlin is an amazing place and if you ever get the chance, or have a spare weekend, GO!! The highlight was probably the 3 and a half hour (english) walking tour we did - it was so interesting and I really enjoyed seeing all the things that I've only ever read about in books. I was just overwhelmed by the amount of history there is and how almost everything has been remembered in some way, though a monument, a museum, or in the case of the wall, actual sections still standing. Seriously, go visit.
After Berlin mum and dad came down to Glauchau for a few days and were able to see my flat and even the school. They came in for a quick tour before meeting Ramona (who looks after me) and also the headmistress! We had a day in Dresden and visited the recently rededicated Frauenkirche, which is beautiful. Sadly they had to leave on Friday, but I had to sleep all day Saturday to recover from all the things we'd done!

Still alive

Sorry for the lack of communication recently. It's our autumn holidays at the mo which means I've had no email access for a coupl eof weeks as I use the computers at school. So what have I been doing on my happy hols? The first weekend I had a training course with a few other assistants in a town called Meißen which is famous for its (very expensive) china. We had a good weekend and even managed some wine tasting on the Saturday evening! I spent Mon-Thurs at Ramona's house. She's the teacher who looks after me, she lives out in a little village and I really enjoyed spending time with her family and even trying to keep up with her 6 year old son! I chilled out Fri-Sun, but the big excitement of the weekend was finding a church - yey! It's very new and a bit modern and it's even got young people! One family has taken me under their wing and had me back to their house for dinner. I really glad to have found good fellowship at last - thanks so much to everyone who's been praying for that :) Will keep you updated.Will fill you in on the second week in the next post.

German style celebrations

Just thought I would show a few photos of the very German event in one of my teachers' villages last week. It was the village's 600th birthday and they had a big parade with floats from different organisations. On the right is the float Gunula and her family decorated, and all along the route people had put guys like these on the left in their gardens but I'm not really sure why! After this there was a kind of fair where you could drink beer, eat sausages and buy old postcards of the village. There was also a 60 foot crane that you could go up in to see over the countryside but I have to sayI decided to give that a miss as it didn't look particularly safe and because I'm totally petrified of heights! The middle photo is me with Gundula. It was really cool to see something so typically German and to get to know Gundula a bit more.

My flatmates have arrived! I was a bit nervous talking to them at first but we get on really well, and I'm understnding most of what they say to me! They both have quite thick accents - Gisene's from Thuringen and Dorene's from Halle, near Leipzig - but it's really good to be speaking more German. They've been introducing me to the delight that is the German music world and attempting to help me understand the whole rubbish bin situation.

Yesterday morning I arrived at church to discover that the service started earlier than usual and was actually somewhere else, so I'm thinking that someone really doesn't want me going to church in Germany! This is a different church than before but I enjoyed the service here so think this is where I'm going to try to get involved, that is if I can get through the front door of course! I decided to go for walk around the church area and discovered a beautiful park with a little lake, and a bit further on I came across the reservoir! It's really pretty (though of course not as nice as Silent Valley for all you NIrish!) and I walked all the way around it. Also discovered a tennis club, so that was quite exciting too! On the way home I met some some of my Class 5 students who were able to point me in the direction of my house as I wasn't entirely sure where I was!

Lots of posts!

For the sake of ease, I am publishing the following posts in one go! This brings me nearly up to date with my diary! Enjoy :)

Wednesday 14th September
Bins go out on a Wednesday. Well, when I say bins, I really mean bin bags, and more specifically, the yellow bin bags. These are for all packaging material, except glass and paper. At the minute I only have one bin in my flat, so if I want to avoid the nasty weekly bin sortage, I’m gonna need to get myself some extra bins.

Thursday 15th September
It’s official, I have watched my entire DVD collection, twice.

Friday 16th September
Ramona explained to me today what had changed since pre 1989.
Then:
1.there were only 2 state-owned TV channels. If you wanted more, you had to have a special aerial, which everyone had.
2.cars were in short supply as you could only buy ones that were made in East Germany. You couldn’t just go out and buy one, you had to register and therefore it could be 2-3 years before you got one. So people took good care of their car knowing that the next one could be a long time coming.
3.homelessness didn’t exist.
4.there were no drugs.
5.medicine and health care were free.
6.you couldn’t travel West, only East.
7.the school system was such that everybody schooled together until the 8/9th class (14/15 years old) and it was only then that you changed to Gymnasium/Realschule etc (grammar, secondary).
8.milk, bread, the essentials were cheaper.
9.there were certain you didn’t know existed because they just weren’t sold. Certain fruits were difficult to come by: Ramona had never seen a kiwi til post 89. Bananas were also in short supply.

Monday 19th September
The impression I get is that many young people are not proud if being German. When they discover that I chose to come to Germany, they all ask “Why?!” as if I’m totally crazy.

People are disillusioned by the elections as well. Especially because everybody wants change but obviously not enough to step out and vote for the opposition. The result is that there is now no government. Schröder called the elections a year early as he no longer had majority in the Bundesrat (like the house of representatives in the US) – the CDU (Christian Democratic Union) did so they made it impossible for him to govern. In yesterday’s election the CDU got 35,9% and Schröder’s SPD (Socialist Party) 34%. But Schröder is announcing he won as the CDU and CSU (CDU’s sister party in Bavaria) are technically 2 different parties and therefore his party has the largest proportion if the vote. This is crazy as the CDU/CSU have always been considered the same party when it comes to election results. This is the worst possible outcome as there needs to be at least 3 parties in the coalition to make an absolute majority.

On a brighter note, I spent this weekend in Chemnitz with Jos. It was really fun. We spent Friday evening chatting to her flatmate from Dublin, Linda, went shopping on Saturday afternoon, after the lady in the tourist information refused to let us do a walking tour of the city – see, we really did try and do something cultural! Chemnitz was formerly called Karl-Marx-Stadt so Jos showed me the biggest landmark in the city – Karl Marx’s head. (not his actual head of course). We watched a DVD on Saturday night and then Sunday morning we went to church, although we needed to leave a little early as we both had trains to catch. I really like Chemnitz, it’s big enough to be a decent sized city but not so big that you can’t find your way around. I’m looking forward to going back soon.

Also, I finally got my oven to work – woohoo! It’s gas and I just couldn’t get it to light, even though there was definitely gas coming out! A nice English teacher sorted it for me – I’m sure she thought I was totally incapable, but the problem was I was trying to light it at the back (is that not normally where you light a gas oven? Please someone clarify this for me so I know I’m not totally insane! Of course, if you don’t light it there, I don’t want to know) and I needed to light it at the front. So I had baked potato to celebrate.

Wednesday 21st September
This week is Project Week in school. It’s also random excursion week so all of years 6,8 and 12 are away for the week, not really sure why! But the school is incredibly quiet! I went to Leipzig today with the class 11 (L6th) that I’ve been working with. Their learning about the American diplomatic presence in Germany, and they’ve all got slightly different topics to present, such as German-American relations, the Sister-Cities programme, the Embassies etc etc. So today we went to Leipzig to visit the Consulate-General. It was fun, and I learnt that Glauchau is in the process of becoming the sister city of Lynchburg, Virginia, which I thought was quite exciting. Afterwards we had some free time to look around, and I found ….. The British Shop! It’s amazing! I can buy PG Tips, Cadbury’s chocolate and even, wait for, Heinz Salad Cream! I hadn’t realised all the things I couldn’t buy here. To be honest, I haven’t really missed them (except the tea – had to get mum to post me emergency rations) but I can order from this shop over the internet, so I thought it might be fun to do a bit of a lesson on food. There’s not much difference between German and British food (ok, except the sausages) but we have so many different brands, and things just taste different! So I’m formulating that lesson plan for when the scary time comes that I have to get up in front of class and actually do something with them!

Ice-cream!

The ice-cream truck came by today. It played its music, and then the ice-cream man got out and started ringing a bell! It reminded me of that bit in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang where the child catcher poses as an ice-cream man in order to capture the kids. Without the scary child-catcher of course.

Doing well at school

My achievement for today is having an entire Klass 5 say “h” Northern Irish style :)

Church

Well, I made it to church this morning, although I couldn’t figure out how to get in the building! When I eventually figured it out (seriously, it wasn’t as simple as you might think), I was then late, and the combined factors of German punctuality and the door being right at the front of the room, led to a rather red-faced Lynne. But, I managed to remain calm and cool, and awake for the whole service. It was rather a traditional service, complete with sung responses (kinda scary when it’s in English, let alone in German) so I’m going to ask around in school and see if anyone knows somewhere else I could try.

Weekend Happenings

Town is dead at the weekend – if a shop is still open at 12.30pm on a Saturday you’re doing well. Managed to acquire my German sim – reminded me how much I miss my English Sim.

Checked out church times – it appears that not only are the Germans content with starting school at the ridiculous hour of 7.30 (not that I can complain since I don’t start any day until 9.20, but it’s the principle), but also starting church at 9, am, in the morning, Sunday morning. So it’ll have to be bed early tonight!

The junior choir had a concert tonight which one of the English teachers took me to. The little boy I sat beside in 6th grade English was singing and when he asked me if I was going, I was glad I could truthfully answer yes! They did a “round the world in 80 minutes” and sang songs from around the world – they even had a whole powerpoint presentation to go along with it! It was fab! I particularly liked “What shall we do with the drunken sailor” for Ireland!

Shopping, again

Why does this happen? I don't know! But here's the post again!

Ramona and I went serious food shopping today – it was fun!
1.I have not seen such an impressive sight at a supermarket than that of the “bottle bank” at Kaufland. It’s incredible! It’s ….a bank, it really is! Crates containing the same type and colour of bottle lining the wall from one end to the other, and back up the other wall! I’ll post a photo soon.
2.I can buy apple compote here – you don’t understand how exciting this is. Mixing it with yoghurt is the ultimate breakfast delicacy (no, I’m not prone to exaggeration).
3.They do sell kettles here – it’s a miracle!

Shopping

First impressions

…..and still couldn’t get my eyes open at 7.30 this morning! School was good, although after observing the classes, I’m feeling a little intimidated at the prospect of working with the older ones – I’m just not cool enough, and they all think I’m crazy, especially after I told them I like Britney (unbelievable as it is, Bryony, she is not cool here!)

The teachers are friendly and willing help. Met the headmistress who, in standard German fashion, had me in and out of the office in 7 minutes flat, having covered all the practical things I need to do for living here, arranging to take me to register (have to let the authorities know I’m here) and making me feel most welcome in her school.

Shopping was an interesting experience. Ramona took me to pick up a few essentials, and it’s funny how even the simplest of tasks is stressful in a foreign country. Thankfully Ramona was able to help me discover things I was familiar with, as well as recommend good sausage, and not laugh when she found me looking at an aisle full of tea and looking totally bewildered cos I couldn’t find PG Tips anywhere (seriously Becky, if you come to visit, bring a supply!)

Missing post

Sorry about Tuesday's post - not sure what happened there! But here it is:

Made our way across the entire of Germany today and despite being delayed in Cologne and consequently missing our connection in Düsseldorf, not to mention ending up in the wrong section of a train that was due to split and go in opposite directions, the trip passed fairly smoothly. It was good to have Jos, my roommate from Altenberg, for company. She continued on to Chemnitz after I descended at Glauchau.

Ramona is the teacher in charge of me and she’s lovely. She met me at the station with a bunch of flowers and brought me to my little flat. She has stocked my fridge, given me linen and towels, brought me a TV, and, most importantly, has furnished me with a chocolate supply! So tired that I’m going to crash now at 9.30.

Lesson Planning

Today I gave a lesson to 13 native English speaking 20 year olds that was actually designed for 16/17 year old German speakers. Interesting! It went well, and I think everyone enjoyed it and I'm a bit less nervous of having to do it for real now.
How is it 5th September already? Just 2 months ago I was planning talent shows and dancing to the YMCA at Uxbridge and it feels like yesterday!
Spoke to a couple of people about Christianity today - it's hard to get away from religion and bring it round to Jesus. Praying for wisdom.

Assistantship Course in Cologne

It's like starting uni all over again.

"Hi, I'm Lynne. What's your name?"
"Amanda*" [*name has been changed]
"Hi Amanda, where are you from?"
"Nottingham, you?"
"I'm from Belfast but I study in Newcastle. Which uni are you at?"
"Leeds [seriously, everybody is from Leeds Uni] Where are you going?"
"To a small town in Sachsen, west of Dresden [I can see by the faces they have no idea where that is]
"Oh right, I'm going to Hamburg [never been but there are a zillion people going there]
"Oh cool, that's meant to be lovely"
...............etc etc

It's exhausting but worthwhile.

Tip Top, Top Tips

It struck me today how it's not just the language barrier you have to overcome in a new country but the foreign culture as well. For example how does one tip in Germany? This may seem like a simple thing, but not so. Do you add it on the receipt? Is it already added? Should you leave it on the table and hope they'll realise it's for them and not just money that the stupid Brits have left behind? Should you give them the tip in cash when paying the bill, then run out so they don't think you want change? Or should you just not tip at all? All of these, plus a few randoms others, were suggested at dinner tonight in Cologne when, between 6 of us, we couldn't decide how it was done. I'd never thought that there would be such a worry about "doing the wrong thing". Eventually the boys took an executive decision to leave it on the table and run!

First Post

2 days to go, and I'm a bit nervous. The cash machine ate my card today which was mean but I'm looking at it in the proper perspective. Yes, it's annoying and really not helpful but any number of other things could have gone wrong so it'll be fine! I'm not really looking forward to this course I have to do in Cologne - I just want to get started on the teaching, although I'll probably not be saying that once I'm a couple of weeks in! This time next week I'll be arriving in Glauchau which is where I'll be spending the next 6 months. Am praying that God will provide me with a church and good Christian support.