What’s Blau in Blaubeuren?

Riding in a Stocherkahn with some friends on the Neckar River, Tuebingen!

Hallo alle!  First of all, I should apologize for the long hiatus in between blogs.  Right now I’m in a month-long intensive German language course called Deutsch-Kompakt, and I haven’t found much time to write in between classes, homework, and most of all, spending time with the  amazing people I’ve met from all over the world!  Our class consists of around 45 students from around 20 countries (I tried to count it out and got 17, but I’ll say 20 to be safe).  One of my biggest reservations about coming to Germany was the fear that I wouldn’t be able to connect with anyone or make any friends.  Fortunately, my experience has been exactly the opposite!  Our group connected from the very first day of class, and the last few weeks have been a whirlwind of group get-togethers and lots of Unterricht (class).  I’ve been missing my student organizations at Valparaiso University, so the community atmosphere in Deutsch-Kompakt is something I really value.  I love how close-knit our group has become!

We have class in the morning from 9-12:30 with a 30 minute break in between (Germans love taking their breaks and so do I).  Morning class consists of mostly German grammar, and practice speaking and discussing.  Our discussions are usually about the similarities/differences between the countries and cultures represented in the classroom.  I’m not only learning about German life and culture, but also about cultures from all over the world!  What we learn in class is applicable every day, and I definitely feel like I’m learning a lot!  We’ve even gotten to learn a little bit of Schwäbisch, the German dialect spoken in Baden-Württemberg.  We then have a two hour lunch break, during which we usually go to one of the Mensas (student cafeterias) in town.  One of them is on the first floor of my dorm, which is extremely convenient!  After lunch comes Tutorium, which is taught by a student tutor from UniTübingen.  Tutorium focuses on practical lessons about living in Germany including an explanation of the candidates and parties in the elections as well as how to separate trash into glass, paper, packaging, general waste, and biodegradable waste (there’s actually that many places for trash everywhere).

Last week our class took a week-long immersion trip to Blaubeuren, a small town in Baden-Württemberg where the University of Tübingen has a study retreat center run by a family.  Our group lived, ate, and had class in the same building.  The trip was a lot of get-to-know-each

other time, which was a lot of fun!  On the first night, we had a Stadtspiel, or a scavenger hunt around the city of Blaubeuren.  This scavenger hunt didn’t include things that we had to find by ourselves, but questions about the history and landmarks of Blaubeuren that we had to ask people we met in the street.  We split up into groups of four, and my group immediately started looking for people to answer our questions.  The people we found seemed to be really helpful, and even wrote the answers to the questions on the paper themselves.  By the end of the scavenger hunt, we had answered everything, and we thought we had the prize in the bag.  We were so wrong.  Our “helpful” German scavenger hunt friends had written down incomplete and sometimes wrong answers.  We came in tenth place out of ten groups, but fortunately we still got a little German chocolate and some good laughs as a consolation prize.

Our group also took an excursion for half a day to Ulm, which is only about 10 minutes away from Blaubeuren!  We had fun exploring the city, especially the Ulmer Minster, the tallest church tower in the world (until the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, Spain is finished).  I have two small phobias: heights and staircases, so climbing up the tower was quite an adventure.  Climbing up the tower was a long haul up winding staircase after winding staircase, but the view from the top was worth it all!  Looking over Ulm from 530 feet up made me dizzy and the strong winds made me afraid that the whole tower would blow over, but nothing could beat the view and sense of accomplishment.

This past week our group has been back to our regular shenanigans in Tubingen, including putting together our first group presentation for class.  Our group’s topic is the history and etiquette of German wine.  Part of our grade is holding a wine tasting for the class DURING our presentation, which is one thing that wouldn’t happen at a United States university for sure.  Our group is making this project the fanciest/classiest presentation of them all!

Check back for more updates on my adventures in Germany, including our group’s short trip to OKTOBERFEST IN MUNICH next weekend!  Definitely something to cross off my bucket list!  So much excitement!

Peace,

Hannah