Random Tandems und Carpe Diems.

This week came and went.. Can you believe that it's almost November? Wasn't it just yesterday I was packing my suitcase getting prepared to fly off halfway around the world? Next week will make it 3 months I've been in Deutschland. This past week has been nothing short of amazing. I took my homie's Alex advice and Carpe Diem'd the HELL out of each and everyday this week. 

Am Montag
Monday was my Einführung in die Informatik Kurs. This was my first time being back in this class since the first time I introduced myself to the teacher (the prior weekend was the Bier festival in Stuttgart and... I just couldn't make it to class that Monday). This class is literally from 8am - 1pm with a couple 10 minute short breaks inbetween. I couldn't remember whether the professor said class started at 945 or at 8 so I stood outside the classroom and just waited. and waited. and waited. Until he showed up ten minutes after 8 with a huge smile on his face. I was so relieved, I didn't have to embarrass myself by walking in the wrong class lol.

Unfortunately, the class was sooo frickin' packed that I had to sit at the BACK of the class. It didn't help that my professor has terrible handwriting and he was writing on a projector so I had to squint just to see what was being written. Of course this course is taught entirely in German so I only understood about 45-60% of what was being said, but I actually learned a lot. The topic of discussion that morning was mainly Sequenz, Auswahl (selection), und Iteration. As well as different Algorithm techniques and how you would process them accordingly. I think I learned more vocab than anything that day. My brain was in overload trying to soak it all in. There were two guys sitting in the back with me and they looked just as confused as I was trying figure out how to answer one of the sample exercises. At one point we just gave each other the "keine Ahnung" (no idea) look and just waited for the professor to solve it.

Am Dienstag
Tuesday was another early morning class. I am NOT a morning person, but I've been able to get up in time for these 8am classes. The weirdest thing to me is how DARK it is at like 7am in the morning. Does the sun not like Germany? It's been like this for the past month I've been here, I'm dreading the dark,cold,bitter winters that are in my near future. I survived this class and the workload better than last time, but I'm still having a hard time trying to grasp the concept of learning a foreign language while also learning a new programming within that foreign language. Confused yet? Good.

I sit in class with my computer translating notes as I write them. It's a hassle, but it's the only way to know what the hell we're talking about that day.

Dienstag's Beispiel war: Welchen Wert hat m nachdem der Codeabschnitt durchlaufen ist? (Tuesday's example was: What is the value m after the section of code is run?)

I literally guessed the answer and somehow got it right! haha, I guess my natural programming instincts kicked in. (the answer was 7 btw).

That evening I received word from the Rent-An-American rep who I reached out to so I could finally get started on some volunteer work while I'm here. As a requirement of the program we have to complete at least 40 hours of volunteer work. More Geman interaction? BRING IT. So I will be visiting classrooms talking to younger students about different issues that are happening in America and of course my region of the U.S. I got home from class  and noticed something new on the floor I live on.... 

My floormate Ela drew a mini-version of me with my room number on top. He even has a cool pair of TOMS on his feet and my signature sweater I always wear. So legit. Isn't it awesome?

Am Mittwoch

So Wednesday was probably one of the best days of the whole week. I went to my Deutsch Fremdsprache (foreign language) class as normal, but my school has this strange "some of the students are on fall break, but some aren't" type ordeal. Instead of 18 people in class today, we had 6.

It was so awkward because the professor would ask us questions and no one would respond, it was so quiet you could literally hear your hair growing. During our short break I talked to one of the other guys in my class, Ivan. He's Croatian studying here at Reutlingen for the semester. He's really cool and we talked about different places in Europe and travel experiences and whatnot. He's from Zagreb, which is the capital of Croatia. I mentioned that I've heard so many great things about how beautiful it is there. After informing him that I'd be on this side of the globe until July of next year rather than just for the semester, he invited me to stay with him in Croatia and he'd be my personal tour guide showing me all the cool things to do there! 

After the Deutschsprache Kurs, I headed to the fitness facility we have on campus (it's mainly just aerobic/dance classes, swimming, rock-climbing, and a basketball court) with a new friend I made last weekend named Irina. She's an adorable blonde-haired girl from Russia and speaks really good German. I'm not sure how it happened, but when we first met I somehow agreed to go to the Salsa dancing classes they have every wednesday night. 

Needless to say I don't know jack squat about Salsa unless I'm using it to dip my chips in. After an hour and a half of spinning, sashaying, and looking seductively into each other's eyes, we got a few moves down with not too much difficulty. Irina likes to take control, but the guy has to lead in this dance so she just had to deal with being my puppet. [insert evil laugh].

Later that night was Dawn's birthday and we celebrated it by going to a local club at a party spot called P&K, the theme was "dress like a nerd". I didn't dress up seeing that I didn't have any nerd gear on hand, but when I tell you we partied HARD.

The bass from the speakers were so loud that I was deaf for a slick 12 hours afterwards. We got back around 3 or 4am and I couldn't even make it to class that next morning. 

Am Donnerstag

Thursday was the most interesting, time consuming, fun, "wtf" days I've had this week. I received a letter from German customs about my replacement iPhone my mom sent from back home. I walked all the way there just to have a 15 minute convo (in broken Deutsch) with the guy there and it ended with him saying I have to wait an additional few days for a letter saying whether or not I'm allowed to receive my OWN package. I was given two options and they both SUCK DONKEY SCROTUM.

Option #1: If customs says yes, I have to pay 85€ (or $117) in import/export fees.

Option #2: If custom says no, it gets sent back to the U.S. 

               My letter to Customs:     Dear German Customs

                                                          I hate your stinking guts.

                                                         You make me vomit.

                                                         You are scum between my toes.

                                                    Love,

                                                    Disgruntled international student

The Computergrafik course I'm taking is going.... ok... Learning the different animation techniques is the next step in the learning process, but currently we're learning to calculate matrices and how transformations effect the movement of an object being created. The programming is done in OpenGL, I still have to figure out how to work this stuff on my Mac, because apparently Apple has this complicated "screw you" vibe they give whenever I want to program code! GET IT TOGETHER APPLE!

Later that day Dawn and I went to Tübingen for a German Meet 'n Greet hosted by the Deutsch-American Institute in collaboration with Rent-An-American. This event had a few booths from different nearby organizations including a Theatre that caught my eye. We learned about the history of the D.a.I. and then split off into groups where each group had at least ONE American. There was such a shortage of Americans that some groups were stuck with all Germans and didn't get to fully benefit from the exercise and games we had. We were given a quiz and had to do a sort of scavenger hunt as a team, solving questions from the presentation given about D.a.I.

It's funny now that I think about it, because I didn't even want to go at first even though it was MY idea to go and I was the one who mentioned the event earlier that day haha. I guess laziness had kicked in or something, nonetheless I'm so glad I went otherwise I wouldn't have met some really cool people.

My group ended up winning 2nd place which was a free 1yr access Bibliotheksmitgliedschaft (library membership) to the libraries they had at the cultural institute. You could tell that the germans there were REALLLLLYYYYY wanting some Americans to befriend and also practice their English with. The 4 girls in my group were so nice and friendly and we got along so well. Don't ask me how I did it, but I now have all 4 of them as my tandem partners. We're working out schedules as I type this and should start sometime next week. 

Between having four tandem speech partners, more day-to-day interaction in classes, my German language course, and my own independent self-study, I should be on the road to being fluent in no time!

One of the girls I will be tandem partners with was born in Germany, but family is originally from Turkey and she's even agreed to teach me a little Turkish as well as German. I'm hoping to be able to utilize it when I go to Istanbul next month!

Am Freitag

No classes on fridays so I went on yet another hiking adventure with Dawn and Ashley. There's this gigantic hill in Reutlingen? I guess you could call it a hill since its not big enough to be a mountain. Either way, I was exhausted and sore from the gym combined with all the dancing from Wednesday that by the I got back to my room I just crawled in bed and was dead to the world.

Although I did go back to the gym later and worked out for like a solid hour later that night. I have to stay fit and lose all these kilos gained from Brotchen und Bratwurst!

Am Samstag

This morning was the Intercultural training with Rent-An-American and surprise surprise almost all of the PPP'ers from this region were in attendance. (Minus Jenny, miss you girl!) The 6 of us sat, chatted, and watched what led to be one of the funniest training sessions I've ever seen unfold. The first few hours were so smooth and filled with general "what is culture?" related stuff and activities (some of which we had all already experienced over the past few months being here). After lunch things just got BETTER. There were a large group of American exchange students from Cali and they were... Ugh. I can't even put it all into words. I may just end up doing a video on this because trying to be descriptive through written words would do it NO justice. After the session was over we left with a better understanding and more of what to expect out of the program, Also it was so fun seeing Chelsea, Louise, and Andrew again! 

Dawn, Me, Chelsea, Ashley, Andrew, Louise. Team Baden-Württemberg!

So... that was my week. Next weekend I'll be going to Saarbrücken to kick it with Alex. On the 7th of November I'm designated as DJ for the party our floor is throwing that everyone is invited too. So nervous, I hope the people like my music mixes and selections. I've kept an ear out for the type of music the people here listen to and I think I'll be fine. I just don't want to be "that" guy who plays crappy music at a club, because I'm always talking about those guys whenever I go to a weak party. The weekend after is a trip to Paris, France with another awesome PPP'er. So many exciting things in the works for the month of November. Until next time...

Bis später!

Sei ein Man!

One of the techniques I've used to help me be more comfortable speaking German is through some of my favorite Disney songs. Now everyone knows I love me some Lion King and Little Mermaid, but LISTEN Mulan takes the cake when it comes to catchy Disney songs. A few months ago, I found this on YouTube and it's been quietly stuck in the back of my head. I thought it'd be cool to share. Hope you enjoy it.

Mulan: I'll Make a Man Out of You,

Translated in German with subtitles. 

Stuck Between A Rock & A Hard Place

We're now entering the 4th week of the university phase of the program... I can't believe it. It's really been 3 frickin' weeks since I started this wild maze of confusion. Each day goes by faster than I'd like it too. Pretty soon it will be Christmas and I won't know what to do with myself. so many places to visit, so much ground to cover, so many Christmas markets to go to, and it seems to be so little time. I honestly don't know which way is up..

Endless pop-chats and reading countless FB statuses have led me to believe that some of the other participants are JUST now starting classes at their university this week or have just started last week, meanwhile I'm well deep into the curriculum with no more than an inkling of what's going on in my classes. I'm taking a total of 4 courses: Informatik I, Einführung in die Informatik, Deutsch A2.2, Computergrafik. I'm also taking a little lab for programming on the side which I guess would bump that number up to 5. 

Here is where the trouble lies....

When I was at Alabama A&M, understanding computer languages came somewhat easy to me. C++, Java, and the experience I've had with C# in my internships have been drilled into my brain for the past 3 years or so. Now that we're learning Python programming, it feels as if I'm starting from scratch...

Although I'm familiar with the some of the concepts and getting a program up and running, my will to actually replicate a program has diminished. It seems that my Informatik class is where I'm tested the most. Every Tuesday & Thursday morning I sit in the classroom eyes wide like a hungry puppy trying to absorb everything that's being said by the Professor (it'd be nice to mention that this course is taught in complete German and nothing but). I understand learning a new language is difficult, but learning a new language while ALSO trying to learn a new programming language is like 10x's harder! It's like a... 

「「「Language Inception」」」

I sit in my Informatik classes trying to decipher what the teacher is saying as he speaks, ALONG with translating the technical terms used in the example. Seeing that I'm the ONLY american in the class, I get too nervous to attempt to ask a question, because I mean... I wouldn't even know what to ask, so instead I just sit still and give awkward, spaced-out looks as I try to understand what's being done...

 

No one's perfect. Which is why I think it's just a typical human trait to make mistakes. My BIGGEST problem since arriving to Reutlingen is avoiding making mistakes by just not even attempting to be put in the situation at all.

Wait. That sounds AWFUL.

Awful, but true. I have had a buttload of things going on in my life and back home so my stress levels have been fluctuating like crazy. One of my main frustrations here in Deutschland is that I can understand the German language when it's spoken to me (context is everything), but ANSWERING? PFFT. F THAT. Over the past few months I've realized how aggravating it is when you want to express yourself verbally or convey a point but can't. I have all the intention of trying to ask questions and get to know the people in my class, but once it's time to communicate I morph into Helen Keller. This whole concept of "you're a student in this class, but you're not here for credit or grades just participation" is so tiring. So when there's homework, do I do it? Or when there's an assignment due do I just look at it and....

One of my professors has been posting Gruppenübung (group exercises) these past few weeks for the Pratikum Informatik I lab that I take for programming on Wednesdays.. Although he told me this part of the course is totally optional, I still haven't built up the courage to ask to be in groups because I mean... maybe it won't be worth it because I'd be just riding the coattails of the students who actually need the grade. Each class the professor has us partner up and work on a practice problem together. The moments leading up to it are so nerve-wrecking.

Now I admit this isn't every single time, I've had my good days, my bad days, and my AWFUL days. Since being here I've had really great help from some of the other students in my classes. I've made friends with majority of the people on my floor. I've gone out almost every weekend with them since I've been here and it's been AWESOME. Even this past Saturday after I hiked for like 6hrs through these huge mountains and such, I still was able to find the energy to go out and dance the night away with them. Dancing has been my stress reliever. When you're caught up in how much fun you're having all of your doubts seem to fade away and your troubles seem meaningless.

This past weekend, Dawn, Ashley, and I ventured to Bad Urach and climbed some unbelievably high mountains and saw some of the most amazing scenery since my trip to Liechtenstein (the country). Of course I'm not the nature-going/hiking type. Mainly because I seem to never be prepared with the right equipment or get tired easily from being out of shape (Also walking 8km nonstop is not on my Amazon Wishlist). At one point my calves were blazing and I'm sure they have doubled in size since then.

Sidenote: my Windows Phone, which I use for picture taking and filming is KAPUTT. I don't know what happened, but after Wasen/Volksfest, the screen wouldn't light up anymore. So it may be awhile before I can make a good video with added clips from my next adventures/trips. That being said, these photos were provided by my homie Dawn Noyes. You can keep track of her travels here. ^__^

Photo bombin' the hell out of Dawn's opportunity to make a classic Windows Desktop photo

Recreating a scene from 127 Hours, I bet my arm tastes delicious.

Don't.. go.. chasing.. waterfalls..

Just stick to the rivers and the lakes that you're used to...

I had to hit the Shaq grin/pose, I was feeling extra excited about this waterfall.

 

almost bust my ass on these slippery steps.

Sun beaming, light hit just right, looking like The Chosen One

I'd think someone got this from Pinterest/Tumblr if that wasn't me in the pic lol

The view from above. That small patch of grass in the middle is where we hiked from!

A week ago I went to Wasen, which is the mini-Oktoberfest in Stuttgart I discussed in my last video blog post. It was a full day of crowds, food, and of course BIER! I had a blast, but not many photos were taken seeing that by the time 5pm hit I was only functional enough to produce these:

All of Reutlingen University was in this tent

Ela giving you that sexyface, haha

My crappy ass-tastic Käsespätzle

Colin's half a chicken. You can see Chelsea creeping on his chicken, we both tried a piece and it was so delicious it instantly made me regret ordering the Käsespätzle.

Chelsea (the sneaky snake), Colin (the luck of the Irish), Sam (Alaska), and I. Prost!

Today was a day of achievements. Survived 4.5 hrs of my Einführung Kurs (introduction course) and decided to actually get some sh*t done that I've been meaning to do. Finally did some shopping, got out and about through town and interact with a few people auf Deutsch "alone" might I add, and I even was able to open a gym membership with McFit. Contract ends June of next year which means I'll be able to workout at any McFit gym in Germany for the remainder of the progam year. I had my doubts at first, but all I needed was my student ID, my verification form that I would only be here until July and the guy at the gym did the rest. That was a top goal on my to-do list believe it or not, having access to a 24hr gym whenever I want is definitely helping me to get back on the road to being fit and healthy again. 

Tomorrow's Tuesday which means I'll have to go to my Informatik class in the morning and shift my brain into Turbo.

I'll be sure to let you know how it goes. Now I have to get caught up on The Walking Dead.

Bis Später!

Abenteuer Zeit!

I know it's been a lonnnnggggg time since I've made a video blog post and people have been complaining... Trust me, I get it. You want to know what I've been up to these past weeks and a standard post every once in awhile isn't going to cut it. I understand.

Which is why last night I spent hours putting together this vlog post of all of my recent trips and such since September 8th. It's a lot, so bare with me. If you can stick it out until the end and watch the entire 30 minutes of your favorite sitcom, then this should be no problem. At least there won't be any commercials interrupting you halfway through, right?

Enjoy!