When I woke up this morning, I wasn't feeling the greatest mentally. Nothing was blatantly wrong, but it was just one of those mornings. However, I went to school, and was immediatly put into a class with second graders. I got to play some games with them, and then go outside and play more games. Its pretty hard to feel gloomy around them!
Next was the 6th graders, who i have been with the most. I don't know if i mentioned it, but they are working very hard to prepare for their upcoming play about King Midas. I sat and watched, and during the breaks, I started talking to some of the girls. Even though my German is pretty good, i still struggle sometimes, and feel pretty self conscious. But i was able to carry on a decent conversation, and learn what they did over the weekend and what not. One girl showed me her new bracelets, which i told her were very pretty. The next thing i new, she had taken one off and put it around my wrist. She called it the "turkish eye", which of course i knew nothing about. So i wikipedia-ed it when i got home to find out that it is actually a sort of talismen to defend against the evil eye, which in many cultures is taken seriously. Giving someone the evil eye is like wishing bad luck or injury on them, but when you have this so called "Nazar stone" (another word for the turkish eye), it supposedly draws the attention of the evil eye to the stone, and not the person. I thought it was really cool, and I was touched that she gave it to me, as i don't know her very well at all.
Anyways, my big challenge of the day was when my host teacher (who is the band teacher) gave me the four clarinet players and told me to work with them on their music. This was really challenging for me, especially with the language barrier problem. I literally mixed in English words, because i had no idea how to say some of the terms in German! But the kids were really nice about it, and I think they improved a bit. I really do enjoy trying to teach them music, as it is something I really love as well, especially clarinet. I was kind of frustrated with one girl, because she had no idea how to play the majority of the notes, and she has been playing for 3 years. But then, there was a boy who plays very well, so i guess it sort of ballenced out. One of the things i have learned (on a musical note, no pun intended), is that in Germany, what we in the States call "B natural" is actually called "H" here. Our version of "B flat" is what they call "B natural". I actually ended up teaching some of the 4th grade saxophonists the wrong thing last week because of this (oops!) but i was kindly corrected by my host teacher/mom.
That has been my day so far, and tonight, we are apparently eating white asparagus and schnitzel for dinner (very German!) and then going to Rouen to the village choir for singing (yey!). It really is fun, and i am looking forward to it.
I guess i never talked about my weekend either-it was great!! I went with the other fellows on a walking tour of Prenzlauerberg, a somewhat artsy, ecclectic area of Berlin. We learned a lot of interesting history of the area, such as where one of the first "gay houses" was, where one of the lead singers of Rammstein lived, and the location of one the first and most famous currywurst stand was (Konnopke). After the tour, i went with some of the girls to this fusion resteraunt, and it was fabulous. We ate for about 10 euros each, and were full by the end. It was a lot of coconut milk, spices, noodles, fish, and fruit mixed in with a variety of meats. That night, I ended up going to a club in Prenzlauerberg with Tanya and Ellen called "Soda Club", and that was a lot of fun. In some ways, it was suprisingly similar to clubbing back home, but here, people seem to be a lot more respectful of space, which was refreshing. All in all, it was a good night, and I think we all had a lot of fun.
Thats about it for now, hope everyone is doing well :)
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