Things got complicated, but ended up being even better

First, I will say some things about my school experiences. As Bethany pointed out, I finally wrote about school, which I haven't really done yet. The first thing I want to mention is the ridiculously long bell they use at school. Maybe it is because I have never attended a school that used a bell that actually sounded like a bell. My grade school didn't have one at all, and my high school was no bell sounding, more of a ding. But at Humboldt, it is a bell, and it is always a bit longer than I expect it to be, so I always think that is actually the fire alarm going off. You would think that after five months I would have gotten used to it.

The second thing is about a new student in one of my 11th grade classes. We are currently reading Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and Tennessee Williams writes some of the parts in a southern dialict. I have gotten used to the German-English accent, but this new girl didn't have that. She said she lived in London for four months, so she has a really good British accent, but when reading a play that is intended to have a southern accent, it just sounded really quite funny.

And the title of this entry is about my search for a cheap flight to Rimini, Italy for Easter. I will be playing Paganello again this year. This is a huge beach tournament with teams from all over the world (there is even a team that is Chicago based, which I love!). I am playing with a team from Luxembourg, and playing mixed (guys and girls). And now I am at the point where the flight needs to be booked. Had I booked it a month ago, I would have gotten an even cheaper deal than I did, but I am doing it now (there are still two months until the tournament). Orignally, I was going to fly with Russ, but now he isn't sure if he is going to go, so he told me I should book my flight to get the best price. For the past few days I have been searching the cheapest way to do this, because as another Frisbee players told me, "You are either rich in time or money" and right now I am very time rich. The end product looks like this: flying out a day earlier than I wanted from Berlin to Venice for 20euros, and then flying back on the day I wanted from Venice to Hanover. Now, this seems quite strange, but the airline offers a train special, so I booked for an extra 20euros my train ride to get back home. The other reason I really wanted to fly with this company (TUI) was because they are German, and I can use my German debit card for no charge to pay.

Woo! Booked for Paga!

Somethig still...

This week has been pretty good for teaching. On Monday, I taught the 11th grade class by myself, which isn't normally what I do. The class was amazing, we didn't have the most exciting lesson, but they listened really well, and we got through what we needed to without any extra hastle. I have been talking a lot about the election with the older classes, and today I found myself trying to talk about who Mormons are, and all that came out where the stereotypes that I know, hmm, maybe I should do a bit more research before I share with 10th graders that Mormons have 4 wives and think that Jesus fled to the US.

What was really interesting this week was one of my eighth grade classes. I made up a cute little story that I traveled to New York, and that every place I mentioned that was very "New York" I found a dollar, and they had to figure out how many dollars I had when I left. It was cute, and they really enjoyed it. But what was really interesting is that three girls did a presentation on September 11th. I never really know what to talk about when that topic comes up, and of course it would since New York is a unit in the book. They gave a talk and then showed part of a documentary that was made. The clip they showed us what the planes hitting the buildings, and I haven't seen the images in probably five or six years, and it made me emotional watching it again. They then asked me what I felt and where I was when it happened. The teacher also shared what she felt when she saw it. The students in the class would have been 7 or 8 when it happened. And that just blows me away as well.

It hurts, don't it?

This past week I was hit with a slight cold, yes, again. It wasn't anything terrible, but since I have been running around for the past however many weekends, this weekend I am being really lazy and staying in. I just watched an episode of Miami Ink, and I am extremely glad that I got my tattoo before watching an episode of that show. But it makes me miss home, like pretty much everything. And hey, if any of you reading this live in the Chicago area, and want to get a tattoo, go see my brother at Lunchbox Tattoo, he is awesome. Ask for Mark.

You Rock!

I just found out that a friend of mine got recommended for a Fulbright scholarship for next year!

Vorsicht! Frisbee Review

Vorsicht is a really great German word, it means, Be Careful, or watch out! I just got back from playing yet another Mother Tongue tournament. That would put me at three for this year, making it six overall. I left my room on Friday at 11.30am on Friday, and got back at 10.30pm on Sunday (today), 11 of those hours were spent on a train. The first six were getting down there, and I almost went crazy, mainly because I was tired but also so excited to get to Dresden.

The first great thing to happen was running into my new friend from Greifswald on the train platform. Matthias was traveling to Berlin, so that was about the first three hours of the trip. It was nice to have someone to talk to for the first part, but then the second half of the trip was extremely boring and uncomfortable, but that is what happens when you decide to get the cheaper ticket. Oh well, Biscuit was there to meet me at the station! And then we met up with Ben and Meike. The four of us made our way to the gym, put our stuff down, and found a local pub for food and spirits. On the way there, we passed a super shady, dilapidated apartment building. Most of the windows were busted, and there was one room that had curtains with some kind of wind blowing them around, but there wasn't really wind. While there, we talked and laughed, mostly about nothing, but still great, then Lanna and Garrett arrived. It was nice to meet a new tongue (Garrett), and we all got to know each other with small introductions.

Meike, Lanna and I left the boys to meet up with Robin at the gym and to claim our space. The night progressed from there, Robin came, hooray! The boys came back and had found a box full of stuff outside of the haunted house (broken down apartment building). Russ took a game called Labyrinth which was a bit wet and moldy on the inside. Finally, the last part of team arrived, Wayne, April, and newcomer Matt. Matt played frisbee, but took a 12 year sabbatical, this tournament was the start of his comeback! We had the world's longest huddle, heard some exciting news, and then helped make a potato salad. I crawled into my sleeping bag at 3.30am, but a few of our players were up until 4.30 playing games with the polish players.

Luckily, we didn't have our first game until 12.30pm the next day, but it still wasn't that much sleep. Our first game was against one of the Dresden teams (they had two teams since they were the hosts, and they can do things like that). We started slow, didn't know how we play together, and left with a loss by one point.

Our next game was against P7, from Prague, a team we often meet, but don't often beat. But we came into the game wanting to take it, with our first game behind us, our defense became more solid and the offense was coming together. We scored the first few points, which in the end were extremely helpful, because they started to catch up, but we came away with the win!

The third game we had was against a beginner team full of native English speakers. That was an easy win, but we didn't really put too much of a fight in it, which is always frustrating watching us make stupid mistakes. But since we won two games, and the way our pool worked out, we ended up at the top of the pool! Which meant we were put into the upper half of the teams, so the worse we could do was 8th for the weekend, not too bad.

Generally after this at most tournaments, you will maybe one, at most, two more games, but we had three games and played until about midnight. We lost the fourth game we played, but again it was only by one point, and that is always really frustrating. It was against Saxy Divers, a team from Leipzig, and they have two other Tongues on the team, so we couldn't be too mad about it. Game five was against Yellow Fever from Prague. We went into the game thinking we were going to lose, and that is exactly what we did. Had we not already been mentally beaten, who knows, there could have been a different outcome.

And by now we are all pretty much exhausted, but only one more game, so let's go out and give it our all. After the loss, we all came out hard. We played against Magdeburg, and they also came out hard and ready to play. We were up, then they were up, and then we traded points. They got the last point of the game, which meant we ended up in a tie, and since we were still in pool play, that was allowed. Everyone else on the team was excited by how hard we played, but I was feeling down about the tie, but after the post game huddle, my spirits were lifted.

Right, so it is midnight, actually, 11.30pm by the time we are all showered, and are hungry. Apparently, the pizza places have all closed so we can't call in for delivery. What? It is a Saturday night, and we are in Dresden, at a university! Instead we venture out looking for some food. Four of us got in the car and started driving around. Quite quickly, we found a Döner/Pizza place that was still open. We quickly put in an order for 11 pizzas. It really only took about 20 minutes to get all the pizzas made, and April, Matt, Garrett and myself took this time to just sit, relax and chat with each other. Back at the gym, the beer race happened, which are always really funny to watch, we didn't win, we never win. As we walked in with our steamy, tasty pizzas, most other players in the gym looked at us with jealous eyes. More time for team bonding, eating pizza, and then trying to bounce a ping pong ball into cups, this entertained us for 30 minutes. Then Russ and Ben ran to the other gym, took a few birdies (shuttle cocks) and made another game, playing badminton with discs. At this point, it was just Russ and Ben hitting it to each other, but later turned into a doubles game with a human net.

The party was great and had different elements. Mother Tongue spent the first hour or two in the gym, playing games with each other, then we finally made our way to the dance floor. Many of the players did dance, which was great, but there were also side conversations and more chatting. I got tired and went back to the gym and spent probably another 45 minutes in there, we had four person spooning action going on, always a good time. Then I went back to the dance floor, talked with Ian, the Brit who was playing for Dresden (and played with us on Sunday), danced until I was too tired to move, and then spent the last part of the evening talking to players from Dresden. Didn't get much sleep that night, but that is what the week is for, right?

We didn't play on Sunday until 12.00pm again, love it! Our first game was against Halle, and we came out to play, and were ahead for most of the game, but there was a lot of point switching which is frustrating. They used a zone, and we were able to get through pretty easily, but would get too excited in the endzone, and throw away more than we should have. We lost the game on the last point, due to my stupidness. I still want to go for the glory, so I threw a long pass to Russ who wasn't really open instead of a short pass to Biscuit who was extremely open! Turnover, then the girl I was guarding scored the point, dang it! The worst part, is that there is a picture of me throwing the disc away and Biscuit is in the shot, clearly open.

But the weekend ended on an up note, because we played the other Dresden team and took a pretty easy win, well, we won by three points, but we did work for it. We ended taking 7th overall, not to bad considering at our last tournament we took last, and didn't win a single game. But I think about the teams we beat, how they must feel. They are teams that actually train together and then there is us, a team who just comes together for tournaments, and it is never the same team. But we generally have a good amount of experience with us.

So yes, great weekend! Thanks to Wayne for organizing it, of course (he says I don't mention him enough in the blog). But really, great, and the train ride back was nice and relaxing. Now I still have to prepare for tomorrow, then bed!

What I really wanted for Christmas

This is really what I wanted for Christmas: A Banana Guard. At first, it looks ridiculous, but then, when you think about it, it is brilliant. If you are still searching for birthday ideas, pink or purple are my preferred colors.

Something Wonderful

There are moments when I want to stay here, but then I get on the phone with the beautiful people from home, how can I stay?

Back home, at least for a little while

Since my last post, it has been Christmas and New Year's. Christmas was great! I spoke a lot of German and was warmly welcomed into the Schaarschmidt's house. We got there on Sunday, had fish for dinner, and I am talking a whole fish here, head and everything, it was delicious. The family was great, her sister, Cindy, spoke English without a German accent, really, she had a perfect American accent. Her husband was hilarious, it was nice to hear the typical American accent, and a lot of colloquialisms to go with it (although I still can't really explain "dibs" in German, like if you call dibs on something).

Germans celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve. We started the day by watching some home movies. Unfortunately, Nadine was sick that day, and spent most of the day in bed. Around 4.30pm we went to church, and I went to the protestant service with the family. I have been to protestant services before, and they are never the same, but really, it was kind of boring. I do actually like all the standing/sitting/kneeling the Catholic service offers. But there was a cute play put on by high schoolers, and it included a rapping Santa Claus (or Father Christmas). After church, we opened our presents, and I was given a bag of goodies, including homemade strawberry rhubarb jam, which is my favorite jam in the whole world. We had a light dinner, and then the relatives came over. I met Opa, and an Aunt, and then some cousins. They stayed at the house until about 1am, but I headed to bed around 11.30pm.

The next day, Nadine was fine, but I woke up sick, bleh! So I spent the day in bed. But it only lasted the day, and I was able to laugh a bit with Nadine and cousin Gina.

The Germans actually have two days of Christmas, the 26th is still Christmas. I still can't wrap my head around that concept. But again, another lazy day, I slept in and then a friend of the family came over. After dinner I went out with Nadine and met her best friend. It was really fun to meet her, and I also didn't feel out of place, we all just laughed and talked together. We went to the irish pub and made plans to live in Dresden next year, Nadine just has to find me a job.

We headed back to Dresden on Friday. Nadine had to work on her thesis, so I went out and worked on my novel, read a little, then found my boots! After searching and searching, I went in one last shop before heading back to the apartment, and I found a pair of black boots with a nice sized heal, not too tall, but still there, and they were a bit slouchy, within my price range, fit well, and looked really great. Yes! After showing Nadine, and her wanting a pair of her own, we went and threw a frisbee around, more fun, made dinner, and played air hockey at a really cool bar. Nadine and her boyfriend hadn't ever played air hockey before, so it made it even funnier.

On Saturday, I met up with Julia, another Frisbee friend, and we headed up to Berlin. We were staying at Rob's place, her boyfriend and a friend of mine. He went home for Christmas and would be getting back into Germany on the 31st (it is only the 29th). Two of her friends met up with us in Berlin, so we were quite the party. We went grocery shopping, had some food, napped, then I met up with Russ for dinner and drinks. I got in pretty late that night, but still woke up with the other girls. We went ice skating on Sunday, which was fun, but I got gipped out of a euro, dang it! We made dinner that night, and then played Chinese ping pong. This means that we went to a gutted store with almost no decorations in it, but a ping pong table in the middle of the floor. And you rent paddles, and get into the circle. When you hit the ball, then the person behind you is up, and the entire group makes a circle around the table. When you mess up, you are out. It was loud, smoky, but really fun. Only in Berlin...

Then it was New Year's Eve! Woo! Julia and I met Rob at the airport, and we waited and waited because both of his pieces of luggage were lost, great. It didn't take too long to get it sorted out, and then we headed back to the apartment for some naps. Shower, dinner at the great Vietnamese restaurant I had been to already, some yummy strawberry daiquiris, then a house party where I didn't know anyone who lived in the apartment,but it was still good fun! 3, 2, 1 Happy New Years! Watch everyone light fireworks, off every balcony in the area, from the street, everywhere. It was great until the homesickness set in, the first time in about 6 years that I hadn't been with Bethany, tears, text messaged to her, received a text message from her, more tears, then Russ saw me crying on the balcony, so he came out to cheer me up, and actually called her! He then spent about five minutes on the phone with her before I talked to her. It made me feel better, but also just as sad. But now I owe Russ, because 15 minutes on an English cell phone calling from Germany to the states, ouch (but when I called home on Palm Sunday from the Vatican, I was on the phone for a minute, and it only cost 1euro).

Leave the party late, or early morning, get back to the apartment, sleep in, then brunch, which just meant we ate all day. We left Rob's place (tranfser stuff to Russ's), sat in the internet cafe for an hour in a half, got to the apartment, are both exhausted, so we watch Big Fish.

Hmm, lovely, but very glad to be back home. I forgot my christmas present from my brother, so that was waiting for me. I asked for a threadless T, I got not only 1 shirt, but four! And they are all great! Here is what he got me:
Defend the Kingdom (which is what I am currently wearing)
Dark Side of the Garden (perfect for the Star Wars nerd in me)
Frida's Garden (perfect for the girly side of me)
And Don't Give up on your dreams (which I actually already own, bummer, but it still is awesome, and perfect for me).
So my brother hit a home run with this gift, I am excited to wear all these shirts!

And right now Jurassic Park is on the television in German, awesome.