01.11.2013 00:55
At first: Happy birthday Jana.
Today is Friday, so I had to go to school. Getting up at 5.30 a.m. is hard and this is maybe the only thing I won`t miss when I am back in Germany. The day started like a normal school day, but then there was an announcement: Teachers, please read your emails. It didn`t seem like there was something special about it (sometimes the teachers get phone calls during their lessons, too). But then the teacher suddenly locked the door (usually the doors are not even closed) and covered the window of the door with white paper. He told us to be quiet. I asked my host student Salena about it and she told me that this was a so-called “Lock down”. Later I found out that it was only a drill, but normally there is a “Lock down” when there is an intruder. They make sure that the intruder cannot come into the classrooms and that everything is dark as if the school was empty.
Later a friend of Salena picked me up and took me to the culinary class. This is a class where students learn how to cook and they also run a restaurant called “Le Gallery.” I had to wear this typical white jacket and a chef hat because I wanted to help to prepare the chicken wings.
Later in Calculus (there is no subject called Math as they separate it in different subjects like Geometry, Statistics or Calculus) there was a boy who wanted to ask me for my phone number, but he wanted to impress me by doing it in German, so he used his translator. The result was absolute nonsense: Kann ich dir einen Ziffern? And this was not the only stupid question we, the German exchange students, were asked here in America. Here are some more examples (some of them are really funny, but maybe we sometimes ask questions that seem as silly to foreigners…):
Habt ihr Autos und Handys in Deutschland? Habt ihr iPhones und Instagram? Habt ihr Pizza in Deutschland? Gibt es bei euch McDonalds? Sprecht ihr Deutsch? Wie lange braucht man mit dem Auto von Deutschland bis nach Amerika? Lebst du in einem Haus? Hast du eine Mutter/einen Vater? Kennt ihr TikTakToe? Gibt es Drogen in Deutschland? Sind Lenkräder in Deutschland auf der anderen Seite? Ach nein, das ist ja nur in Frankreich so. Wird in Deutschland Englisch gesprochen? Ihr benutzt doch eher Telefonzellen als Handys, oder? Ist Deutschland das Land, in dem Hitler lebt?
Back to Calculus: I really tried to understand what they do in Calculus, but I gave up. It was just like learning a new language…
Tonight we went to the football ground of the Giants, the football team of Ben Davis High. It was my first football game, so I had to ask lots of questions. It really is like in the movies: The football strip, the helmets and the cheerleaders. The aim of the game is to bring the ball to the end of the field. This is all you really need to know. Personally I would describe football as a situation where boys hit each other, it is painful and takes a long time because the time is always stopped when someone is hit etc. and this happens very often. That is why football games take hours! For me, the best thing was the performance of the marching band at half time. Salena is in drumline, so I watched her practicing nearly every day for the last two weeks, and I REALLY LOVE IT!!!! This is something you really have to see. They are so AWESOME!!! By the way: the Giants lost the game. Here are some photos showing the football game and catching the atmosphere in the stadium:
At the end of the day, Salena, some friends of her and I drove to the Indy Screampark. There we went through a big haunted forest which was full of dressed up people trying to scare you, and they do a really good job! The different rooms you pass are decorated in the greatest detail. It is so much fun here!
Julia Rudek
