germany rollins 2.13.83 The country side is beautiful. I've never seen anything like it. Thatched roofs on the houses, snow everywhere. THe sky is so blue. I'm twenty two years old today. 010907 ... spoons i went there this summer it was nice 010907 ... Aimee I want to go back. It was so beautiful and utterly perfect. That truly is god's garden... 010909 ... silentbob is that where god grows souls? because the turnout he's had lately, i think he should see one of those garden doctors, because i think they have some kind of rotting disiese. the souls that is. 010910 ... epitome of incomprehensibility So I'm supposed to go there in two weeks. Yay? ...I mean, I'm looking forward to the trip; I just won't get a rest between the end of term here and the beginning of my intensive German class in Kassel. I may not even be done grading the Sociolinguistics essays before I have to leave. In Germany, there will be a couple of days orientation for our group and then, bam, five hours of language classes every weekday. Also, we're supposed to speak only German when we're in classes. Then to England to see David! Neither of us will have much money to travel around by then - he's saving for a conference after - but that's just as well because I suspect I'll need a rest. We're just planning to hang around Oxford, where he lives now, and take one trip to London. The Kassel course has two outtrips (Ausflüge) to Berlin and Nuremberg. I'm looking forward to Berlin! Julia is excited for me to see the park that used to be an airport. I'm curious about the Queer Berlin tour. 230415 ... e_o_i I never did see the park that used to be an airport and the Queer Berlin tour got canceled. But it wasn't all bad. With the all immer_immersion, if not as immer as advertised, I got slightly more fluent in speaking the language. I read a 19th-century play (okay, so it was edited for high-school readers). I saw a church where Pachelbel was the organist. And the non-Germany side trips! The Netherlands one weekend and Switzerland another - something I never expected when I signed up for the class. I felt incredibly lucky (especially since the hosts paid for almost everything in Amsterdam). Odds and ends: I missed peanut butter, which isn't that popular over there, at least not in Kassel. Patricia, my "host mother," noticed and bought some sweet cinnamon-y version. I haven't had sugary peanut butter since I was a kid, but I wasn't complaining. I'm sad I'll probably never see their dog again even if I see them. Lara, though alert and pert and well-trained and fetching (literally), is advanced in age and dog lifespans being what they are... But I do have a video of playing fetch with her where I say "Gib mir" when she's holding the ball. And she actually gibbed it! Gute girl. and I made up some germany_canada_dialogue, it is very accurate 240129 what's it to you? who go blather from