Posted October 22, 2022
Enjoy my scattered Diary thoughts, two weeks in, of my CBYX fellowship in Germany
I’m now two weeks in Germany and I can say that it has been a time of growth.
I was first welcomed by my host family, a couple in their 50’s and 60’s named Carina and Andreas. Both are working in the education field as well as world travelers. They have been hosting students for years in their home. They have split their house into two, allowing rooms for three students. Inside, is my own kitchen and bathroom that I share with a German girl named Julia who works as a tv set manager in the city. If there are no students to host, Andreas and carina will rent the rooms to others like in Julia’s case.
The family was my personal tour guide in the city showing me around villages, and walking with me to buy from many of the “honesty stations” that farmers have outside their homes. These could be small little shacks or unplugged mini-fridges containing honey, eggs, and oil. The honesty part comes into play when you put the money in the piggy bank they have placed next to it.
My program only requires the host families to provide breakfast for students, but Carina and Andreas have been asking me to join them for dinners pretty often with the two of them. I really love doing that.
If there’s one thing that Germany is, it’s how environmentally conscious it is. On the first day, Carina took my grocery shopping and brought empty bottles and cans they had from the house, and the grocery store, Aldi, gave .25 cents back for each bottle and put it towards our groceries. It’s even custom here to leave your empty bottles and cans in parks and on top of public trashcans so homeless people can pick them up easier and bring them to the deposit stations. They took me to the outskirts of the city and showed me the second largest coal mining site in Germany. This is where all the electricity is sourced and explained Germany’s plans moving forward with Green Energy.
The family’s ingredients come well from their home garden and are very conscious about where ingredients are sourced and what is in them. I have been eating healthier ever since I got here.
Now to my everyday life. Every morning at 8 am I take a 15-minute train from my city, called Frechen-Köningsdorf (a smaller village) to the center of Köln, to attend my language school where I practice and study German for the next five hours. After class, I will either go to a cafe and finish up some more studying and work and then bike 8 miles home.
Let me transition into how I have never walked or bike so much in my life. If we want to go anywhere it’s usually with your two feet. With all the walking, my shoes gave out at one point, causing me to walk half a mile barefoot to the nearest shoe shop to purchase my first pair of Birkenstocks.
Public transportation here is always on time and accessible. It’s very reliable for going anywhere at any time (as long as the workers aren’t on strike like we experience this week). With having been in a car only once since being here and my switch to sustainably sourced foods, my global footprint since being here, has to make Gretha Thunberg very happy.
Now the people. Germans overall are cool people but I have yet to make a good German friend yet. Germans are not as friendly and open to you on the streets as Americans are. For the most part, if you say “hallo” first they will say “hallo” back but a lot just love to star at you and then advert their eyes when you try to acknowledge them. I just know for me that I must give first before I receive so I have been the one to say hi or to smile at people and to make conversation first because once you get past that hard front of germans they’re usually much better. The servers at a coffee shop I frequent, know me by name and are very nice and a Lithuanian guy did a backflip for my number, but I know those close friends will just come with time and usually when you least suspect it.
The city of Köln has a big Syrian and Turkish population, making that food the best in the city. I eat Döners a couple of times a week which are something like a Greek gyro and I have fallen in love with Turkish food. German food has not been my favorite or flavorful but they do have amazing bakeries and sandwiches for so cheap all over the place that is great for a student budget.
The group of 30 students who are with me in Köln are amazing people. So incredibly smart, talented, and hardworking people that as I gear up for my internship phase, their insights and connections are going to be incredibly helpful (one girl on this program is a freelance cinematography camerawork and has done several projects for VICE news). This week we even got the chance to speak to Ingo Zamperoni, a famous german newscaster/journalist who is married to an American and it was really interesting to hear what he had to share and to answer our questions.
My first two weeks in Germany have been extremely positive but it hasn’t been easy. I’ve had to show up to a country where I don’t speak the language and while many can speak English, they don’t particularly like to, because not everyone is fluent. This made doing basic things for myself difficult, such as ordering and asking questions especially when I didn’t have any understanding of the pronunciation of words. It wasn’t just as simple as reading google translate. My phone was also another issue in being able to have access to the internet wherever I went wasn’t guaranteed due to complications with my prepaid sim card and no wifi. There were so many instances at the train stations where I had to piece together my little German to ask for help. The feeling of not being integrated is probably the hardest part. I’m not working amongst Germans so I’m not meeting Germans my age. The people are what make you fall in love with a place and the beginnings are always difficult. Things are getting better though. I’m becoming more confident in my language abilities and as long as I keep moving forward, remaining hopeful, and staying friendly, soon the jobs, opportunities and friends will follow.