First Day of School

Well today was my first day of school! J took a lovely traditional picture (just for my parents) with  my book bag in front of a door.

We got our schedules all figured out and then we had the first day of one of the classes. Thursday we have another one. Basically I love the German school system!!! They don’t have class for very long, and they don’t meet very often. I have class ONLY ON TUESDAYS AND THURSDAYS! Except for one class, and I am only taking a total of 5 classes, one is only for 3 weeks and one is taught in English!!

So on Tuesdays I will first have a layout and typography class, which will be great to do better on laying out presentations and boards to show for all my other classes and in my future career. This class starts at 10 am which is the earliest I will have to be to class!!! My second class is a level 2 art class, I don’t know much about it but it will be architecture related and I will be using lots of different types of media. I will be making models, sculpture, and drawings. The teacher says it is a pretty hard class, but he was comparing it to the level one class which is very very simple he says. Also everyone thinks we are first years because that’s who they put us with, so they are putting us in easy classes and don’t realize how skilled and knowledgeable we are with our major. So I’m hoping this art class won’t be too hard, but will be nice enough that I will have fun and learn something. But I am scared because every class is in German and I don’t understand a bit of it. So hopefully I can make a nice friend who will translate for me!!!!! The third class I have is on Tuesdays and Thursday evenings about 6pm. It’s a German language class for beginners. Basically all of the international kids take it who doesn’t speak German, so I’m excited to make my language better so I can hopefully understand professors!!! And I’d like to be able to read a menu so I know what to eat!!! J I do have a girl in my major who is an international student who is from Poland and she doesn’t speak English or German and she is struggling. She is crazy! I don’t know how she does it, its bad enough for me and I speak English!!!

Then on Thursdays I have my main studio class about 11:30 and all I know about it so far is I’m designing a winery. So hopefully it will be fun and easy! J I’m also taking a 2 week Photography class, like a real one with analog cameras and a dark room! It’s going to be really hard for these 2 weeks but fun I think. I sat through that class today as my first real class and the professor spoke English well but lectured for 5 hours in German then translated that entire 5 hours into a 10 min English lecture for us Americans at the end of class. So that worries me but I think most of the professors know that we really want to travel and see places, and that we are going to do our best on our school stuff but we struggle with the language barriers and all, so hopefully they will pity us or help us out a little. All I have to do is pass the classes, grades don’t matter at all, just pass or fail. Sooo it’s going to be interesting!!!!

There is a nice Cafeteria on campus where I can go for lunch only but I can get a salad a main dish and side for only 2 euros, really cheap and good food! This will be nice and handy! There are also TONS of vending machines that sell fresh bread and pastries and candy bars. Then I can get a cup of coffee from a machine for only 50 cent euros and all kinds of juice and beer, you can’t ever find water in a vending machine and they DO NOT have water fountains! But we bring 2 water bottles with us most of the time, one for our lunch and the other for all the rest of the time.

We are booking our tickets to Italy today!!! We plan on flying out April 4^th and going to Rome for 2 days, then Orvieto to see Melissa for 2 days, then hit Venice for 3 days before we fly home the 10^th! I’m really excited! I’m ready to see more of Europe, now that Trier has lost its “newness”! J I do love it here though!

I miss everyone a lot and everything will be much easier once I get internet in my apartment, then we can have a big Skype date with anyone who would like to join and I will be able to Skype more and longer when we do, right now I just don’t have much internet and when I do its slow or on campus! So I miss everyone and love you all!