I don't really want to talk long about today, since not much is happening here at the moment. Today my class had breakfast together in first period, with some people bringing in buns (Brötchen), and a few others brought in toppings for the buns, like marmalade, Nutella, cheese, cold cut meats, or cut up fruits and vegetables. Next, we had Gym (or Sport, as it is called here), and we went outside and ran laps around the football (I mean soccer) field, for the first half of the class. Then we came inside and half of the class played football (I mean soccer - I am starting to use more British and German terms in my English), while the other half (my half) played dodgeball.
In history, we are talking about who is at fault for the second World War. Who should get the blame, if the Germany of today and the younger generations are still responsible nowadays, and so forth.
I had a great weekend. My two oldest host siblings, Kay and Julia, came home on Friday, and so the whole weekend the whole family was together, hanging out. It was a lot of fun, and so nice to just be together. On Saturday night we all made pizza together, and we all stayed up late eating it together, and just chatting.
Oh - a story I forgot to share about Friday evening:
We were just hanging out, and it must have been around 11 p.m when I suddenly had a craving for cheesy garlic bread. I had no idea how to make garlic bread (I can cook... I just did not know how to make garlic bread), so I just made up my own recipe - which actually turned out decently okay. In Germany cheddar is either really hard to come by, or really expensive, so most people don't eat it here (from what I know), so I substituted it with a white cheese. I set the bread on the table in the dining room, grabbed a piece, and headed back to the kitchen for some water. When I came back, I discovered that everyone else had an appetite for garlic bread now, so my host mom (who is a really good cook) and I went back into the kitchen and made another batch of proper garlic bread, and served it with halves of garlic that people could rub on the bread if it wasn't strong enough.
Apparently it was not strong enough for my host dad, who after ten minutes started going through the bread and applying another, heavier layer of garlic to all of the bread. Not realizing he had done this, we took slices - and the taste was overwhelming, so strong that it was spicy, and stung the tongue and throat as we ate it. The rest of the bread was unofficially left for my host dad. Maybe it doesn't come across like this when written out, but it was quite funny at the time and we all teased my host dad about it for the rest of the night. I don't know if it is just a strong memory, but I swear I could still feel the garlic in the back of my throat a few days later!
There is not much new. I have kind of decided that I did not come to Germany to do homework - which is nice, now. I don't allow myself to stress over it. If I have the time and I feel like doing homework, I will. I don't want to spend the last half of my year like a large portion of my first - bent over a study desk, studying for classes that won't even count for anything back in Canada.
But that is not to say that I am doing nothing now. Everyday or almost everyday I am using the public transportation (which is an amazing creation) and going somewhere, a nice change from studying.
And I have also been getting prepared for my next school year in Canada. I will be having to rejoin school a year lower than my friends, in grade 11, but for the most part I don't mind. I'm actually quite happy about it, because I have decided to join the IB (International Baccalaureate) program in my school. It is an intensive program, which acts in part as a good prep for university. I think it might also make it easier to come back to Germany, for part or all of my time in university, if that is still what I want to do. I can't do much for preparation now, but I know that every year the entering class has summer homework, which includes reading "1984" and "Swallows of Kabul", so I decided to start reading 1984 now.
My Aunt Scarlett and Uncle Bill asked for photos of my school and house. As I leave school today, I'll try and take a photo of it - if not, I'll do that soon. I will also try to include some other photos I took in the last week.
Hopefully all is well with you guys - and I will hopefully talk to you soon.
-Jason