Sonntag, 24. Februar 2008

Jurastudium-Update

So, this is ages old, but I have gotten more good news from law schools. I have been accepted to Berkeley, UVA, and UChicago. So that means I just need to hear from Stanford and Yale. I'm expecting thin envelopes from them, but it's all in God's hands. I have already been blown away by my six acceptances and can only give Him credit for my good fortune.

I'll also most likely be heading back to Harvard in less than a month for the admitted students weekend, which is conveniently taking place during the first week of my spring break. After which I go to LONDON for nine days. SO excited. Already practicing proper pinkie placement while drinking tea!

Dienstag, 19. Februar 2008

Handball Spiel

I forgot to mention that I finally achieved something I'd been wanting to do since encountering several enraptured German men in our hotel bar in Munich back in January 2007: attend a handball game. The Berlin Fuechse (Foxes) played MT Melsungen (a town somewhere in Hessen known for its spa I guess). I really should have looked up the rules before attending, because I kinda had a hard time figuring out what was going on the whole time. It was kinda like a mix between soccer and basketball and hockey. I'd say it was a bit more physical than basketball, and the players seemed to be fouling each other all over the place without penalty, but not as brutal as hockey because they weren't wearing pads and there were no walls to be checked against. The goals looked like they do in soccer, although a bit smaller. They played a zone defense too. Oh, and they even had cheerleaders called the Titans! I suggest reading the Wikipedia article for more info about the sport.

Frightening half-fox, half-man.


















Melsungen on offense, the purple-and-yellow-clad Fuechse on defense. These guys had mad hops. I think my favorite player was the goalie.

Sonntag, 17. Februar 2008

Bloed

In reading the Wikipedia entry on Norma more closely, I just realized that we left the theater at intermission, rather than at the end of the play. I was wondering why it was so short and why everyone was sticking around to eat and drink. What threw me off is that we clapped for the people after the first act--they came out on stage and everything. I guess it was because the first act was so good?

Sigh. Silly, silly Meghan.

Ein neues Update

What a week it has been! Early this morning I sent a friend off after she stayed with me a few days. We studied together in Dresden this summer, and she comes from Japan and speaks no English, thus requiring a solid weekend of conversation only in German (I've written about her before--we stayed with our friend in Darmstadt back in November). I do just fine speaking in German, but when you spend three days with someone who also does not speak it natively, it can be quite taxing. I think it's also the cultural aspect too--she's never heard of a lot of things that I would reference culturally, that we Westerners just take for granted (that Germans would definitely understand). Anything from politics to TV to religion. Anna and I were talking about how it could be that someone would be so good at German without knowing any English--do you think it's worth it? I think practically speaking, no, but on the other hand, my years of linguistics has caused me to be a bit disapproving of the whole English-as-a-dominant-language thing (although my English as a Global Language seminar this past semester has caused me to rethink my previous positions on a lot of linguistics-related issues--I'll talk about this in a later post).

Regardless, I had a pretty enjoyable time with Yumi, and I think a lot of this actually has to do with the fact that she DOES speak German. We were able to go to a couple museums that are really only accessible to people who speak German, and thus they were new experiences for me. Having visitors can sometimes stink because you have to do the same touristy things with all of them, but with her I could do more. Also, having visitors means spending more money, but I suppose in the end it's all worth it!

We visited a great museum dedicated to people involved in the resistance movement under Nazionalsozialismus, with a couple rooms dedicated to Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, who will be the focus of a new Tom Cruise film about a plot to assassinate Hitler (Tom Cruise filming the movie here in Berlin caused quite a stir because Scientology is not officially recognized in Germany as a religion and people are very wary of it). We also visited the Topography of Terror exhibit in the former death strip between the two walls, which provides a great look at the terror that occurred in Nazi times. For the past ten days or so, the Berlinale has been going on, and we wanted to see a participating movie, which proved rather hard to do--the movies sell out right away, it seems--but we got a ticket to see a documentary called East West: Sex and Politics. Sounded pretty interesting, and all I knew was that it was going to be in Russian, English, and German with English subtitles. It ended up being about the fight for a gay pride parade in Moscow in 2007. Would not have been my first choice for a movie, but I did find it really interesting, and I think the mistreatment the gay people in the documentary received was totally unfounded and an affront to democracy (which Russia definitely does not have). Yumi slept through the whole thing, so you can tell how much she liked it--but who can blame her when she doesn't know English?

After seeing the film, we went to the Staatsoper and saw Norma, which is an opera by Bellini. Wikipedia says it's two acts, but there was only one at ours. Anyway, we sat in the second row with great views for only 12 Euro. It was quite good, and thank goodness for the German Obertitel or I wouldn't have had a clue what it was about.

Facebook was quite helpful this week--I saw that a friend from high school had posted pictures from Berlin, and it turns out he was working here for the Berlinale, so I got to meet up with him and reminisce about life at SM. He also updated me on what everyone was up to, which is good because I have barely kept in contact with anyone from high school. But yeah, if it weren't for the wonder that is Facebook I wouldn't have known about him being here. That Facebook is both a blessing and a curse.

This week was the last week of classes at Humboldt. I had to give a presentation in my German class, and I chose the topic of prostitution. I chose it because I live near Oranienburger Strasse, which is quite a nice street with lots of bars and restaurants, but with a ton of prostitutes at night. It's totally not a seedy area, which is what I always thought prostitute areas would be like. Anyway, I learned quite about about prostitution in Germany--for one, it's legal and they pay taxes. In Berlin they pay 30 Euro a day in taxes. There are approximately 400,000 prostitutes in all of Germany, and anywhere from 100,000 to 200,000 are illegal and Frauenhandel--I totally forgot the English word for it--forced prostitution? Quite sad. I focused a bit on the World Cup in 2006--"Frauen und Sex gehoeren zusammen"--and also on the legislation that 'legalized" it--I say "legalized" because it wasn't really illegal, it was just considered as immoral and thus there was no state support. But with this law, prostitutes can receive health insurance and social security. Quite a different world than in the U.S.

Also, this week I talked about the election in my after-school English lessons, and one of my students is an Iraqi, and boy does a lot of vitriol spew out of her mouth! It's quite interesting to hear her perspective as an Iraqi, but I hope that is it informative for her to hear MY perspective as an American, because I don't think she has a good opinion of the country, or the government, at the least. She also asked me what I thought of "the Jews," because don't they run the U.S.? She also said that she knows the Holocaust was bad and all, but why doesn't the world focus on all the people dying in the Middle East and in Iraq and Palestine in particular? I was kinda shocked, because she really sorta came across as being anti-Jewish in her tone. But that shouldn't be too surprising, since most of my students have never even met a Jewish person and seem to be wary of Israel and the whole at-odds thing between Jews and Muslims in the Middle East. She also asked me questions about Christianity, such as how people could call God Father when he is not really their father, and why Jesus just didn't get himself down off the cross if he really was God. Kinda caught me off guard, and now I am doing a lesson on religion tomorrow since they seem really interested in learning about it. It's actually a lesson on religion in America, but I imagine I will have to go over the basic tenets of Christianity since they appear to have not a clue about it. I can't blame them, but I sure can lament that fact. And here's to hoping that they learn something tomorrow!

I guess that's all for now. Looking forward to my mom's visit next weekend and starting Alpha course this week! Will try to update again soon!

Samstag, 9. Februar 2008

A Wee Trip to Ireland

(OK I wrote this 8 days ago, my apologies--a lot of it, like the last part about the weather being good, is totally irrelevant, because the weather now one week later stinks. Although the post date probably says 2/9, I am actually posting this on 2/17. Will try to post pictures here later.)

Liebe readers (if you still exist), apologies for not posting in a while. Rest assured, I will not update you in usual detail about what I have been up to, like birthday parties, sweaty bars, and three trips to a cheap Mexican burrito place that is conveniently less than 5 minutes on foot from my apartment. I had two visitors (plus my mom was here) at the same time a couple weeks ago, although only one stayed with me, and I did lots of touristy things again. But it was fortunately the Lange Nacht der Museen, which means lots of museums were open from 6 PM to 2 AM for only 8 Euro, and there were lots of special events and exhibits. In addition to visiting the Musical Instrument and Film and TV Museums, I also got to listen to concerts at the Berliner Dom (and climb the Dom itself) and watch a laser show at a planetarium in PBerg that I never knew existed. My nerd self was totally happy.

Just four days after my friend Sandy from Heritage visited, I went to Belfast to stay with her for three nights. She's getting her Master's (in American History, ironically) at Queen's and there were really cheap flights, so I figured it was worth a trip. Belfast is a very small city in comparison to Berlin, and I'd forgotten what it's like to walk everywhere. I took a bus tour and got a pretty good sense of the city--saw the Parliament, City Hall, all the political murals on the Protestant Shankill Road and Catholic Falls Road, and the brand-new Ikea!

We also visited (London)Derry further north, and I was surprised to find one of the best museums ever--the Tower Museum. We got a private tour of the museum by a lovely old man who was so enthusiastic and passionate about informing people about Derry and Northern Ireland. I loved hearing his stories about the Troubles and finding out about mass emigration to the U.S. There wasn't much else to do in Derry besides walking around, but all-in-all it was a lovely city! I should mention that the weather was not that great--it had even snowed the day before in Belfast, so our bus ride up to Derry was more white than green!

I then went down to Dublin by myself and spent the first day getting lost and exhausted in a city that is much bigger than it looks yet is still relatively small. I went to the Guinness Storehouse, which is fun but still not as awesome as the Heineken place in Amsterdam. I managed to drink the taste-test beer, but couldn't bear the thought of drinking a whole pint, so I gave away my free ticket to someone much more appreciative of the black stuff. I also got to go to the National Museum, which had a fascinating exhibit on bogs and what kinds of things are found there--jewels, silverware, butter, and even well-preserved bodies! I stayed in a hostel that night, but the next morning I met up with my mom, who just arrived on a trip. She had to sleep, so I hit St. Patrick's and Christ Church alone. Very beautiful churches with interesting displays--especially enjoyed learning about Jonathan Swift, who was Dean of St. Patrick's. I also visited the National Gallery of Irleand, but I've lost most of my enthusiasm for art over the course of the past few years, I think. My mom and I then got to see the Book of Kells at Trinity College, which is beautiful. I can't even fathom how someone drew those huge, intricate, fancy letters.

I left for Berlin early early early the next morning, and now I sorta have someone else staying with me--Anna, who I know from German and CF at Harvard, had my keys while I was in Ireland and has spent a couple nights here because her great-uncle lives in the 'burbs and doesn't have Internet. It's nice to have someone from Harvard here--someone who understands my frame of reference a bit better than other "Amis" and a lot better than non-Americans.

Lent (German Fastenzeit, or "fasting time," see how literal Germans are!) started on Wednesday, and although it is just Saturday, I am already wanting to break my fast and eat sweets and drink soda. It doesn't help that I was just given a bunch of chocolate by a couple people, and I also have a half-drunk bottle of Coke sitting on my desk. Oh well, I suppose it is a very, very, very small price to pay considering Jesus's sacrifice.

I have to prepare lunch for 10 at church tomorrow, in addition to preparing a presentation on the German welfare system for my German class on Wednesday. But the weather is gorgeous outside (who woulda thunk that I would consider 50 degrees and sorta sunny gorgeous?), so I'm gonna go take a long walk to the Brandenburg Gate and do some shopping.