Blaubeuren

A Week in Blaubeuren

 

            So yesterday I came back from my weeklong excursion in Blaubeuren and it was surprisingly very fun.  Before I went, I had images of this being a small farm type area and that we would be locked up in a barn for a week; this was not the case. The hostel, which we stayed at, is owned by University of Tuebingen and the rooms were nicer than the one I have in the college. The food was also amazing since it was all homemade including the cheesecake that they served the first day there. There was never a free moment at Blaubeuren either. We were in class until 12:30 and then we had excursions, presentations, and plays after that. Here’s a break down of what I did and my impressions of it:

 

Monday:

            Monday was the day from hell. Not only did we have a huge grammar test that morning but also it was my group’s day to present our project to the entire Deutsch Kompakt class. We were also casted in roles for plays that we were going to perform on Thursday. All of it turned out to be fine…I got through my presentation (although I was very nervous) and I also did pretty well with the test.

 

During our one hour of free time, A couple of us went on a walk through the town. It is very tiny but by no means rustic or quaint. It is actually a famous town since it has a boarding school there that Hesse attended. The church is also quite famous and we toured both of these places on Tuesday.

 

While we were there, we were expected to speak German the entire day. There was to be no English spoken at meal times or any of the excursions. Although we cheated quite a bit and practiced our “Danglish” skills quite often, I do feel as if my German has improved from this week. I can carry on a conversation somewhat although it is still very simple and my grammar far from correct

 

Tuesday

            On Tuesday, we toured the high school and the church. We started with the school where two students were matched up with four or five of us I was in a group with only my friend Chris and therefore we had (I think) a much better tour than they other groups because we could talk with them more one on one and they were able to show us more places.

            The school is actually built into the cloisters in Blaubeuren. It is directly connected to the church, which is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. I’ll post some pictures of these places as soon as I can!. The school is a boarding school and both teachers and students live in dorms. The girl’s dorms are actually in the cloisters. The teachers have more apartment style rooms since they also have families.

 

Another interesting part of the school is that it also houses a bar for the students. Since the drinking age in Germany is 16,  they can have a pub in a high school. We actually went to this pub Thursday night and tried to talk with some of the students but it is a small place and it was too loud and crowded to really talk to anyone.

The curriculum of the school is also the quintessential classic education. It consists primarily of music, history, literature, and language. This school is supposedly one of the premier institutions in Southern Germany and students have to pass an extremely difficult test to get in; they take Latin, Hebrew, and Greek and have music rooms in their dorms.  I’m not sure how much science or math they took but these subjects were clearly not the focus of their education. all in all, a very interesting place.

 

That afternoon, we visited the church and hiked to see the ruins of an old castle in the black forest. The church was amazing and the alter was made from solid gold. It used to be a Catholic church but it was turned into a Protestant one during the reformation. There is no mass held at this old church, however, because they are afraid about it being damaged. There’s another room in the cloisters where the students and other people in Blaubeuren can attend mass.

 

After we finished that tour, a few of our tutors took us up the Blautopf. This is a beautiful hike through the black forest and the path ends with the ruins of an old castle. It is incredibly difficult walk uphill since there is no pause or flatland but a direct hike up. It was worth it however. I forgot my camera for this trip but my friends took so many pictures that I’m going to nab some of theirs when they post them.

 

Wednesday

 

            We went to Ulm on Wednesday and it is a really neat place. It is much bigger than both Tuebingen and Stuttgart but it has the same feel of an old German town. Ulm is most famous for the Ulmer Munster which boasts of having the tallest church tower in the world. It is a Catholic Church and it is somewhat imposing with its gothic style and somewhat gaudy decorations. It is also incredibly frigid inside but mass is apparently said there every Sunday.

 

The church tower has 768 steps and if you pay 3 euros you can attempt to climb all the way to the top; if you make it, you can see the alps. A bunch of people in my program (including me) decided to try and surprisingly enough we made it up every single one of those stairs. There were two breaks, one when you hit 300 stars and the other at 500. It was exhausting and you get extremely dizzy since it is a spiral staircase with no banister; it would be a hard way down if you tripped and fell. The view from the top is worth the effort. I had trouble breathing however, since the air was so thin. My legs, after I climbed back down again, felt like jelly and it was somewhat hard to walk. I really felt it in my knees and I’m thankful that they didn’t give out since it felt like they were about to buckle at any moment.

 

After we were finished with our tour of the church and the rest of the old city, we tried to find something cheap to eat. Most of the sit down restaurants in Ulm are incredibly expensive but supposedly very good; they have a lot of schwabish food, which is spatzle, etc. Ulm is directly in the middle of Schwabish country. Schwabish people are very interesting since they have their own form of German. Many of the words are different and most other Germans look down on them since they believe them to be lazy or slow. Whether that is true or not, I have no idea but I do know that they are incredibly hard to understand. We met a couple Schwabish  people and there was no one in my group (including the tutors) who knew what they were saying.  My group sampled the cuisine at a German fast food place where we learned that ketchup does not come with the meal but you have to pay extra. They, instead, give you a type of soy sauce for your fries. Kind of weird, but not too bad.

 

Thursday and Friday are kind of a blur. It mostly consists of doing homework, packing, and leaving for Tuebingen. On Friday, we had another potluck dinner. It has sort of become a tradition for us to have one of these every week. Last week it was hosted in Fichtenweg, although not in my particular kitchen and this week it was held at my friend’s Sam’s apartment. She lives in one of the newly renovated dorms and has a very nice kitchen. It’s the beginning of a nice little tradition since people are starting to get to know one another and bringing stuff to dinner is not as expensive as going out.

 

 

Today I meet my German mentor. Her name is Carla and she seems really sweet. We are going to get coffee and she gets to help me with my German while I help her with her English. I’m really excited for this but also somewhat nervous.  Oh well, wish me luck!

 

Tschuss!