Classes, Wonderful News, and Future Travel Plans

Hello Everyone! Thanks for waiting so long for me to update. I have lots of questions to answer and lots of stuff to talk about! First off, the semester has finally begun. This feels really weird, because I keep getting e-mails from Baylor people/groups that say things like "Don't study too hard for finals!". I wont be taking my finals until the end of July, and even then I only have two real finals, one for Written German and one for English Literature. For Oral German, I need to give a short presentation, and for the German Literature class I'm taking, all I need to do is print out my notes at the end of the semester and give them to the professor. I'm sure that sounds like the easiest class in the world, but its really hard to take good notes when your German skills are only at the intermediate level and your professor speaks at the collegiate level. I don't have this problem in my other classes because English Lit. is taught in English and the other two classes are designed for international students and the professors are really easy to understand. Fortunately for me, two of my roommates are also taking the German Lit. class, and they've offered to help me. It feels really weird to have each of my classes only one day a week and to have two days in the week on which I don't have class. Also, even though the semester is so short, there's plenty of holidays/breaks. If I calculated correctly, the actual amount of time I'll be spending in class here would be equal to a month of classes at Baylor. And this is a normal German semester! (They have a Winter/Summer semesters instead of our Fall/Spring semesters). One of my roommates was totally shocked to learn that we get a three month break in the summer!
Anyway, to answer Katie's question, a "WG Essen" is just a term we came up with to describe our monthly meal together. (WG stands for Wohngemeinschaft, the apartment/dorm type place we're living in, and "Essen" means "meal" or "food" in German). We decided to have a BBQ outside. More like the German version of a BBQ, which didn't involve BBQ and was a lot healthier. We had grilled pork steaks and turkey sausages, and a ton of grilled vegetables and a vegetable salad. It was really good and I got to practice my German a lot. My roommates kind of roped me into cooking Mexican food for them on Monday night. Every other Monday one person is supposed to cook a meal for the other five. In deciding this, they asked me what my favorite meal was, to which I promptly replied, "chicken enchiladas". They asked if I could cook Mexican food, and upon hearing my affirmative, it was five to one on who would be cooking on Monday night. So tomorrow, I have to spend my day hunting down Mexican food ingredients or similar things with which I can use to improvise. (Shopping on a Sunday is not an option in Germany).

On to my really great news! I just realized I've never mentioned this on my blog, but right before I left for Germany, I got e-mails from Dr. Good and Dr. McGlashan saying they wanted to nominate any junior German majors who wanted to go for a seminar called the Graduate School Experience in German studies at the University of Minnesota. They said the selection process was very competitive, only 15 students in the country would get to go, and if their nomination was successful the trip would be free, covered by a scholarship provided by DAAD. Anyway, I asked to be nominated and my nomination was successful! Yay! Unfortunately, my schedule is going to be a bit tight when I get back, because I'll only have two weeks before I leave for Minnesota, and then I'll get back from Minnesota two days before classes start at Baylor. Not fun, but it'll be worth it.
Anyway, do you remember that German Department scholarship I said I applied for? Well, anyway, I won it! I am SOO happy! I even won more than I won last year! (That could be because there are less German majors this year, but I'd prefer not to think of it that way). Anyway, I've been on Cloud Nine for a week now.
On a more upsetting note, I was forced to take an "Incomplete" for Independent Readings this semester, mainly because stupid Amazon.com just informed me that they recently discovered that they never had in stock one of the books I ordered. Mind you, they tell me this THREE MONTHS after I order it. ????? Anyway, I reordered it through Barns & Noble, and it should arrive next week. (Assuming it doesn't take them a ridiculous amount of time to realize they don't actually have it).

Anyway, at the end of May, there are no classes for a week due to some sort of Catholic holiday. (I think). Kandra and I have decided to travel together to the east part of Germany and to Austria. I'm SOO excited! Our main stops will include Neuschwanstein Castle, Innsbruck, Hitler's Eagle's Nest, and Salzburg. Unfortunately, we wont be going to Vienna. It was part of the original plan until we added up the cost and saw that would be going over our travel budget (even though we're planning on staying in youth hostels and living off of peanut butter and jelly). So we had to either cut out Salzburg or Vienna, and we both agreed to cut out Vienna. Oh, well. Hopefully, I'll get another opportunity in the future.

Finally to answer Jenny's questions. I've been thinking about going to Indiana for graduate school for a while now, I guess I just never mentioned that to you. Sorry. That's not set in stone, though. I also have a couple of other schools in mind and I've also considered applying for a Fulbright Scholarship. We'll have to see. And as much as I'd like to tell you that "Freddy" is some hot German guy I've met, the truth is that "Freddy" is my brother's online name. Please don't ask.

Anyway, that's all for now! I'll update soon!
Ciao!