Tuesdays are so boring at school here...Me and Björn spent the first 4 blocks of 8 in the Bio classroom, me having no idea what was happening, till we looked into microscopes at plant shavings, which was kinda cool but i had already done it several times in Canada...nicht so geil.
German class was really funny. I fell asleep again, because we are dissecting a piece of German literature in a semidark classroom. all i understood from what the teacher was saying was at the beginning, when she was telling the class how hard the literature was. So natürlich, ich habe geschlafen. This is however not the funny part. It was funny how i slept. I had myself lined up with the girl in front of my, with her in between me and the teacher, effectively making me invisible to her. She knows me German is useless in her class, and she could see everyone else, so she did not even need to get out of her chair during the lesson. A well-laid plan. What killed it was how i ended up sleeping. I slept propped up on my hand, face high in the air, mouth wide open. good times. how i managed to stay balanced in my sleep in this position, i think is a wondrous act. the only reason i was caught sleeping was because some other guys were laughing at my position and the girl in front of me turned to see what was funny, moving about 3 inches. got a nice laugh out of the class...
*note* i am NOT deliberately antagonizing my teachers by slacking and sleeping in their classes. I am trying my hardest to stay awake ad attentive, but it's like paying attention someone telling you about the latest episode of the 'fuzz' channel, or what happened yesterday on the fireplace channel. 'OH MY GOD THEY CHANGED THE LOG!!'. good times. with this level of German, i am the 9 year old autistic child of the class. I try to not disrupt the others and i entertain myself in quiet ways, sometimes sleeping, sometimes drawing mazes in my graph paper, sometimes stabbing myself in the hand with a pen to stay awake...stuff like that. and yes, in Physics last week, it was necessary to stab my hand repeatedly with a pencil to stay awake (being very careful to leave no visible marks or permanent damage, and not breaking the skin...). we spent an entire class going over how horizontal velocity does not affect gravitational acceleration, which i understood from the demonstration at the beginning of the class. boring as hell, but fun relative to German class today. talk about diminishing returns...that only works for so long...
Latin however, was great. 'Ich habe viel mädchen kennengelernt, und sie wollen mir mit meine Deutsch helfen.' no idea if i said that right, but it was intended for my German speaking friends ;) . you understand. there are many nice people here, in some of my classes they even help me by teaching me German slang phrases in exchange for English slang. It' like a currency exchange, and i have a monopoly! Sehr geil!
After school, me and Björn got picked up by his cousin, to go to Oma's house for late lunch or early supper (at 2:30). I was expecting to spend a significant amount of time there, getting to know his Oma and cousin, but no. We walked in, sat down, ate, and left. ????. okay...i must have misinterpreted 'you're going to meet my Oma tomorrow'...cool. We had spaghetti, salad, and peach (something like yogurt but with large chunks of fruit?). it was good, but then we got up and left. Said goodbye to Oma, shoes on, bags up, and in the car.we were in there for maybe a half hour. at most. probably closer to 20 minutes...
Björn has an awesome cousin who exemplifies the German drivers stereotype, although i have an addition to make to that stereotype from my personal observations. They are fast yet careful drivers. They may go 50 in a parking lot at a crowded school (Björn's cousin this afternoon!!) but they are careful and mindful of their surroundings. and no, they won't run you down if you cross the road. they may get impatient and blast a horn at you, but no, they don't run you down with a big stupid grin on their face.
when i arrived here in Germany, there was a plate on my end table in my room, with candy in it. Yesterday, i almost had it finished, and i walked in today to find it refilled. how awesome is that?
i'm going to the movies tonight with Björn and the guys, 'keine mädchen T.T'. in German. This ought to be good...see how much i actually understand, hopefully it's an action movie. then you don't need the dialogue...
Wing T'sun yesterday, we did more takedowns and counters. I realized something that i really love about this martial art. it is very informal. we walk right in, calling each other by first names regardless of training time, joking around with the instructor by his first name. We begin the class with a single collective bow to a picture of the founders of the art, then we begin training, again with only names, no titles or anything. no sir. no ma'am. no master. no bowing, except at the beginning and end of the class. i love the formality of Taekwondo, but this lack of formalities is refreshing.
While on the topic of formalities, i think the teachings in the exchange meetings should be changed. I have used the formal 'Sie' tense one time, in the airport with Björn's mother. i have never heard it used by anyone else. Teachers are 'du'. Parents are 'du'. The only person i have heard referred to as 'Sie' was the principal, or whatever his job is, because he was the speaker's boss. it's all informal with my peers. Informal greetings walking into a classroom. Informal farewells when walking out. Vulgar greeting among each other. Normal stuff.

That seems to be about it,
leave a comment, i have only 2 and one was my reply to the first one.
i need souvenir ideas, some generic, some specific, sendable to here through comments or facebook, public or private.
vielen Dank, bis später!