Hello again. Now for a little bit more explination. The stories are not in the exact same order as the last post, so you might have to jump around a little bit.
1-"Some police talking to a street performer (on La Rambla).", "A flower stand on La Rambla.", "A pet stand on La Ramblas"
- La Rambla is a big street in Barcelona that has a walk way through the middle of it (the cars drive on either side), so there are lots of stands, street performers etc. There are flower stands, touristy stands, pet stands (where you can buy birds, small reptiles, and I think I saw rabbits too, along with their supplies), and artists. There were tons of street performers, some better than others. This particular street performer was in a black cardboard box, and when he heard money go into his bowl or if he heard a large group of unsuspecting people walk buy, his would open his box and laugh and evil laugh to scare the people. It was interesting. This picture is from the way back (I saw him in teh morning, and then on the way back to the university, i saw him again). I have no idea why he was talking to the police (since I don´t understand spanish, etc), but I personal theory is that someone complained that there was a scary guy jumping out of a box scaring people on the street. Ha.

2-"Just a part of one stand in the market off of La Rambla." - Off of La Rambla, there was this huge crouded market. There were fuit stand, meat stands, candy stands, everything imaginable. It was bustling with life (and tourists) and really colorful. Beautiful.

3-"Part of Will's University" - Pretty simple. The front of the main building of Wills´s University.

4-"One of the many many cats roaming the grounds of the University of Barcelona." - Will´s University (University of Barcelona, I believe) is absolutely covered in cats. This is just one of the 15 or so I saw during my visit (and that´s keeping in mind that I wasn´t at the University very often). They were adorable, but I can imagine that they can be a nusance when you are eating lunch outside.

5-"Will at Tapas place on the first night."- On the forst day in Barcelona, Will and I went to a Tapas resturant. Tapas is pretty much like a buffet, but instead of filling your plate with spoonfuls or slices of food, most of the entrees are on little wooden skewers (like co-bobs) and the price you pay depends on the length of the skewer. It was delecious.

6-"Part of Parc de la Ciutadella" - In Barcelona, there is a Arc de Triumpf, and near the arc, there is this park. It was tropical feeling with all of the palm trees (there are no palm trees in Potsdam). There was even a little lake (in the picture) and a giant fountain. The fountain was under construction or getting repair or something of the sort, so it wasn´t on. It was quite a nice park, and there were a couple of museums on the side, but I didn´t have time to visit them.

7- "The highest point of Parc Guall (you can see the whole city from up there)", "Me next to the el Drac (in Parc Guall)" - I used to think that Potsdam was the park capital of the world (we have roughly a million lakes, castles, and parks). This park beats them. It was a huge park, and in it, there was a hill, and on the top, you can see all of Barcelona and the surrounding area. It was breathtaking (both literally and figuritivly (the hill was steep, so once you get to the top, you are a little out of breath)). Will, correct me if I´m wrong, but Dahli? decorated and designed the park. Everything way made out of stone, and there were abstract balonies and beautiful hand painted ceramics (every one different).

8- "Sagrada Familia (a church)" - One of the famous churchs of Barcelona.

9- "les fonts magics de monjuic" - Will and I went to a fountain performance thing. There was music, and the fountain was colored by changing lights. The one we went to had a sort of movie song theme. They played songs from Titanic, ET, and some other really well known movies. It was absolutly beautiful.

10 - "Will in front of a sculputre of the caselles in vila franca de penedes", "one view on the edge of vila franca de penedes" - Will and I took a trip to vila franca de penedes (Where Will did his exchange 2 years ago). We visited the Rificas (I´m not sure how to spell their name) (Will´s old host family), had lunch with them, wandered around the city, etc. It was relaxing and nice to see where Will had spent his year. We also went to visit some of his friends there. It was really fun.

Well, that explains the picture a little more. There were so many things in Spain (like soccer wall ball, going to the supermarket, school classes, etc), that I can´t possibly write about everything, but I think that is a pretty good taste.

The chorus in school is making a christmas CD, so most of my weekend will be spent in the school along with the rest of the chorus, singing for the CD. It should be fun.

I just found out who my next host family will be, and I think I´m going to meet them this weekend. I´ll be switching in mid-november.

SPAIN!!!

I'll write more later, with stories, explinations and such, but just for a little taste, here are some pictures from Spain...

Some police talking to a street performer (on La Rambla).
A flower stand on La Rambla.
Just a part of one stand in the market off of La Rambla.
Part of Will's University
Will at Tapas place on the first night.
A pet stand on La Ramblas
One of the many many cats roaming the grounds of the University of Barcelona.
Part of Parc de la Ciutadella
The highest point of Parc Guall (you can see the whole city from up there)
Me next to the el Drac (in Parc Guall)
Sagrada Familia (a church)
les fonts magics de monjuic
Will in front of a sculputre of the caselles in vila franca de penedes
one view on the edge of vila franca de penedes

I know! Two posts within an hour. Crazy. Well, I just noticed that I had comments (I know, I´m a little slow), and I´d just like to thank you guys for keeping in touch (Mary, Sahar, Rebecca, Leila, Colleen, Debbie, Meghan, etc). You guys are great! Have a great day (I have no idea what time it is were you (collective) are, so feel free to replace "day" with "morning", "afternoon", or "night").

Hello! Last weekend, I went to an Apple Festival (more like a Middle Ages type thing, but with more apples). It was fun and there were lots of little kids running around with their families. School this week is fantastic because a lot of the teachers are acting as chaperones on class trips, and in Germany, when a teacher is not there (sick, etc), there is no class. They have subsitiutes in other grades, but not in 11th, so since my Earth Science teacher, my chemistry and math teacher, my chorus teacher, and my history teacher are gone, I have a much lighter course load. Today, for example, I would normally have math, chemistry, theater and art, but I just had theater and art. That meant that my schoolday didn´t start until 13:45, so I had some time in the morning. I had gotten some carrots earlier because I missed them and had a little carrot craving, but I had gotten too many and at once, so my host mom left me a note saying that I would have to eat them soon or else they would go bad. Since I had time this morning, I decided to make a carrot cake, so I checked to see what ingredients we had (or what I could find, at least), went to the grocery store to pick up the things we didn´t have, and made a cake. It was quite fun. It was a little extra moist in the center, but it turned out ok. Tomorrow, like today, I only have two periods of class. Oh, and another reason why the past couple days have been especially good: I CAN VISIT MY BROTHER IN SPAIN!! My school has break next week, so I´m planning on going on a little trip TO SPAIN to visit Will. I can´t wait!

Pictures!!

Here is a link to a photobucket album I made of just a sampling of the pictures of the past month and a half. I´ll just type the descriptions here because clicking on every picture was taking too long (this computer is not really fast). Ok, keep in mind that they go backwards chronologically. I´m describing them, though, as they are. Ok.

http://s216.photobucket.com/albums/cc200/pearlmmb/

1.The end of the hike we made on the last day of the Rotary weekend (we had to cut through a field to get back to the hostel).
2. Our chariot (boat) that we took to and from Neuropin (I spelled that wrong)during the exchange weekend. (Our youth hostel was across the lake from Neuropin)
3. Some of the exchange students while waiting for our tours of Neuropin to start.
4. There was a weekend Topfermarkt where a street in the Hollander square was filled with stands like this selling stuff made out of clay.
5. One of the student run stands at the School festival at the beginning of the year.
6. My dinner at the big music festival I went to on my fist or second weekend here.
7. A stand from the Renaissance-y part of the big music festival
8. Some kids playing a game at the joint party for a cousin of a friend of Ilka´s and some other kids. It is their first year of school, so they had a party.
9. Neuener Tor (right by my house)
10. The street across from school
11. A castle that looks like a big english country house in the Neue Garten
12. Every chimney (of the castle above) has a different pattern. And there´s a lot of chimneys.
13. The same castle.
14. The view from my window
15 - 19. A panaramic-ish view of my room (the sofa turns into a bed)

The Rotary weekend was fantastic. Last weekend, the school chorus practiced on saturday and sunday. On saturday evening, two friends from German class at the Volksholzschule and I payed 5 Euro (a special) to go to pretty much every museum in Potsdam. We went to a history museum, the film museum, stopped by at a carnival that was across the street, then went to a small planetarium and a small art showing. Very fun.

Happy one month Anniversery! I´ve been here for a month now, and it´s been fantastic. The first Rotary weekend is this coming weekend and I am so excited. I can´t wait to meet the other exchange students from the area. And trade pins, you can´t forget that. I´m working on a presentation for that weekend (every exchange student needs to make a presentation about their country, themselves, etc), and on a presentation I need to give to the Rotary club soonish about Rochester, New York, and the USA. Yeah powerpoint!
On a slightly different note, I´ve noticed that Chuck Norris jokes are popular here now (they were popular in Brighton probably about 2 years ago). I was quite suprised. For example: When Chuck Norris falls in water, Chuck Norris doesn't get wet. Water gets Chuck Norris. If you feel so inclined, there are hundrends of them on the internet. I have heard these jokes more than one time, so I assume that they are in the upswing now. People at dragenboat (similair to crew) were telling them, and people at the Jugendkreis (youth circle (in church)) weekend I went to this weekend (singing, praying, playing games like volleyball and crab soccer, eating, etc).
Another random point, in gym, every friday, we run about 3.5ish km around a pond in the Neue Garten. The past two times have been practices, and I think the next time is the real thing. It reminds me a little bit of cross country, except shorter. Fun times.

Hello everyone. I still haven´t figured out the whole photo post thing yet, but I´ll keep trying. So, last weekend, there was a school festival (medium sized), a clay-ish festival, and a nice bike ride. On Saturday, I went to the school festival (the 11th graders job was to set up). There were different stand for different grades, like a baked good stand, a jam stand, a make your own lip balm stand, a mixed drinks without alcohol stand, a fortune telling stand, a face painting stand, and so on. It was fun. At the same time, practically across the street, the clay-ish festival thing was going on. There were 2 or 3 streets full of stands on either side with stuff made out of clay (pots, vases, plates, little animals, etc). It was held in the Hollander section of Potsdam (the houses built for the Hollanders to live in so that they would move here and work). The biking was on Sunday. It was beautiful. Potsdam is practically an island (it is surrounded by lakes, rivers, and canals, the first two created by the ice age), and we rode on the edge of a couple different lakes and rivers.
Last wednesday was the first day of chorus. We have chorus every wednesday. When I first agreed to be in it, I was a little sceptical of my ability to sing in a chorus, but after that practice, I remembered how much fun it was to me in a musical group. We practiced a christmas song made of of many christmas songs (it was in english, but most of their other songs are in german). This chours is a really good chorus. They´ve won competitions and last summer they went to Rome ( I think they go somewhere exciting every summer). We´ll be making a christmas CD and selling it around christmas time. The people in chorus are really nice too. It´s easier to have the chance to get to know people there because in class, the only time to freely talk is before and after the lesson, and during break.
Well, that´s about it for now. I´m going to go and try to get the pictures of of my camera.