Too School For Cool: My First Months in Germany

So... I realize that I kinda really suck at doing the whole "posting every two weeks" thing, but I swear that I will get better. :) Today marks the 3 month anniversary since I have said goodbye to my family in America. Tomorrow marks the 3 month anniversary since I left America, and the next day marks the 3 month anniversary that I have been in Germany. Of those three months, two months and 3 days of them have been spent with my host family living in Heilbad Heiligenstadt (which, if you translate it, means Holy City which I think is pretty schnazzy). :P These past two months have been a combination of excitement, sadness, homesickness, loneliness, happiness, and pretty much any other kind of emotion it is possible for a human to feel. :) Most of these emotions have been caused by one thing: School.
I came into town on the 7th of September, and I started school on the 9th. I found out that my school was a Catholic school... I'm not Catholic... This would be weird.... Oh well... The first day was just setting up my schedule and introducing me to my school and showing me where my classes were going to be held. Because I was already graduated from high school in America, it really didn't matter what grade I was put in, so naturally I got put in the 11th grade (I couldn't be put in 12th because that is the year they take the Abitur (which means "high school graduation, but is actually a week of all day long tests), so thank goodness for that :P). I was terrified when on my schedule it said that I would be in German 2, Math 11, Spanish, History and Physics. I knew that I would not be able to get straight 1's (Germans use 1-6 instead of A-F... Weird, I know) in all of my classes even though I was a great student in America, but I also knew that they wouldn't be too strict with me. :D
The next day (Tuesday) was my official first day of school and I had Math, English, History, and German. I just knew that this was going to be a crappy day overall, because I would be diving in feet first, without even getting to catch my breath, but then I found the silver lining: my first period teacher (Math) was not there!

Ha! And in Germany, if you have a teacher that isn't there, you don't have to go to class! Yes! But trouble struck in the form of my councilor. She noticed that our first class was free, so she told one of the other math teachers, and he volunteered to take us for the day... Gross. So now, me and the other exchange student from my group were not only in unfamiliar territory, but we weren't even in the RIGHT unfamiliar territory. Perfect way to start the day. So we are sitting in math, and we can't understand a word that the teacher is saying. Plus, German school is harder than American school, so they were doing Calculus crap and I had no idea what was happening even though I had already taken Calculus. Just as I was sitting there thinking that I hate my life and that I wanna go home, the bell rings!! I was never so happy to hear a bell in my entire life!! Oh! But wait! I forgot that I had 2 hours of Math! NNNNnnnnooooooOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!! I was so upset I wanted to burst out in tears in the middle of class, but I knew that that would only hurt my future reputation, so I kept my cool which I was pretty happy with. :) So I suffered in silence for the next hour of Math, and then I was happy again because I had an hour of English to look forward to. :) I knew that I was going to love English, well, because it was English and I could actually understand. :P

So I walk into my English class, and I have to stand awkwardly off to the side of the classroom (all alone because the other exchange student was in English 4 while I was in English 2... stupid, I know) until EVERYONE ELSE SITS DOWN so that I can find an empty seat... That was probably the worst part of my day because everyone stared at me awkwardly and then turned and started talking to the people next to them. Perfect. I now know what it feels like to be an animal at the zoo. Its not a pleasant feeling. You feel like everyone is staring at you and judging you (which they probably were, even though I hadn't even done anything yet), and even though I had tried to look super cute for my first day of school (I had even gotten up early enough so that I could straighten my hair, which, for those of you who know me, know that it is rare for me to do that), they still managed to make me feel like I was wearing nothing but my underwear (sorry for the graphic image everyone). So I wait awkwardly until the teacher comes in, and when she sees me standing there, she does a double-take. That was another thing that I "loved". The school had accepted us as students, but had apparently "forgot" to tell all the teachers that we were coming. So now we get the fun job of explaining that we are exchange students from America, that we will be attending their class for the

remainder of the year, yadda yadda yadda and so on. So when my English teacher asks me (in German, how ironic) who I am and why I am there, and I explain it to her, she gets so excited!! She is so happy to have a native English speaker in her class, yadda yadda yadda and so on. So I take my seat in the very back corner of the class, and she says, "Okay kids! Let's take a quiz!" Oh good Gandhi! Could this day possibly get any worse? And the best part was... It was from German to English. Perfect. So I have a quiz in English translating from a language that I have no idea how to speak?! Perfect... So I take a wild stab at one of them, and then I just sit there. She collected the tests and I felt completely miserable. She went on to talk about the lesson and she went on, and I understood everything, but I was still miserable about everything that had happened thus far, that I just sat in the back corner and sulked. :P
After English, I looked down, and my heart dropped to the floor: I had a double block of German next. I groaned inwardly because I was so miserable, and I knew that being in German would not be good for my self-esteem or for my self-intelligence or for anything about myself. It would just make me feel more pathetic than ever. Well, at least the other student was in my class this time. So she came in, and we awkwardly

stood off to the side until everyone was seated, and we introduced ourselves to the teacher and the class, and then we went and sat down (once again, I sat in the very back corner of the room, while the other girl sat in the front). I sat there miserably and told myself how I would be perfectly justified in going home right about then, but that it would be worth it to stick it out, and I sat there with this internal dilemma and I was possibly literally fuming. It was horrible. I then had a lunch break for 40 minutes, and I sat in the tower (yes, my school has a tower. Proceed to be jealous) and I fumed. I was so upset, and I couldn't focus on anything. I went to History and went through the exact same process, and I was finally done. The first day was at least over.
I went home, and I immediately got online to drown my sorrows in movies/tv shows just like a normal person. :P I went back the next day, and it was pretty much the same, except for the fact that I had 2 free hours during the day because my Math teacher was once again gone, and you wanna know what I did with that time? I slept. :) I didn't go to sleep late the night before, but I think the emotional, physical and mental exhaustion of diving in to school like that wasn't good for my body. So I sat on the bench in the hallway and I passed out. :) So did the other girl. So it was like a mini slumber party... on the benches... in the school... in the middle of the day... but whatever. We woke up and went to our two separate English classes, and after my English class ended, my teacher asked me if I would present something about me, America, my school, and free-time activities. Its not like I could say no, so I said that I would be glad to. She told me to have it ready by the next Wednesday, so I said that worked. After that little

meeting, I had 3 free periods before I had to be back for Spanish, so I went up and sat in the tower again and I worked on my presentation for English. I really didn't have to work that hard at what I wanted to say, so I got the whole thing done in 10 minutes. I then decided to sleep until Spanish. So I closed my eyes, and then the next thing I remember is I hear a bell ringing, so I jolt awake. I look at the clock, and only one hour had gone by. So I fall back asleep. The next time I wake up, I look down at the clock and I see that it is 2:15. Unfortunately for me, my Spanish class started at 1:50... I had slept through my Spanish class on the first day. Fantastic. I felt totally great about myself now. I decided that I would just go home because there was no point in going at that point. So I went home, and can you guess what I did? If you guessed that I drowned my sorrows in movies and tv shows, that would be right. :)
The rest of the week was pretty much that same way, and honestly, in most of my classes, I sat in my seat (usually in the back left corner of the class) and just tried to understand at least a little bit of what was going on. It was brutal. There were several times where I wanted to just throw in the towel and give up, but then I would tell myself that quitters never win and that I wanted to be able to have bragging rights over all of my friends, which I won't get if I go home early. :/ oh the woes of being an exchange student... :P So that is what my life has been like for the past 2 months and 3 days since I have gotten to my host family. School, school, school, school, school. But that's just a day in the life. :)