Everyday Life

Having now been in Germany a little over three months, things have begun to settle into everyday life. I'm over my "honeymoon phase" and have begun to accept that I'm going to be here for seven more months. Homesickness has been a very big obstacle in this stage of the year, but I've settled into a routine and everything is starting to feel normal again. Except for the fact that I can hardly understand anyone. Adjusting to the language has been much more difficult for me than I expected it to be. Everyday I pick up new words and phrases and I am starting to be able to understand people better but I am still having a lot of trouble speaking. German is such a complicated language and a lot of the time I feel like I will never get the hang of it, especially the grammar. I so desperately want to be able to speak and communicate with the people around me but it is just taking so much more time and effort than I ever imagined to get it would to get to that level. But I'm sure it will get better with time and practice. Anyways, I have two weeks left in Riesa before moving to my new host family in Berlin. There is so much going on in these last two weeks that I'm sure the time is going to fly by. On Wednesday, I'm going to Leipzig with my host family and we're meeting Kevin, a boy from my exchange group, and his host family there. Kevin and I have the same local cordinator who will also be there. I think we're all going ice skating together but I'm not sure. Anyways, it will be really fun. Then, next Thursday is Thanksgiving. On Thursday, my French teacher decided that we're having a little Thanksgiving party in class even though it has nothing to do with French. I'm really excited to share Thanksgiving with the kids in my class and I think I'm going to try and bring in a pumpkin pie and an apple pie for the class. Since Thanksgiving is not celebrated in Germany, we still have school that day, so I will not have time to cook a Thanksgiving dinner for that night. Instead, I'm going to cook a big Thanksgiving meal on Saturday for my host family and host grandparents. So far this proves to be easier said than done. Since Thanksgiving is not celebrated in Germany, it has been very difficult trying to find all the right ingredients needed for the traditional Thanksgiving meal, such as a large turkey, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie ingredients, etc. Hopefully, I will be able to find everything and make it as authentic as possible! The day after this big Thanksgiving celebration, I say goodbye to Riesa and my incredible host family here and head up to Berlin to start the next chapter of my exchange year! It will be very bittersweet to leave Riesa and the people here but I am so excited to go to Berlin and experience life in Germany's capital!

Tschüss,
Dani♡