the beginning !

Two warnings should front this entire blogging-operation: 1. I’m not naturally funny and 2. (as anyone who has ever sent me an email or facebook message knows) my ability to stay in contact via the internet is appalling. Nonetheless, I’m going to give this the good old college try, and you’ve been warned.

I’m going to Germany for (almost) SIX MONTHS! To study at the Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen. And I’m jackeddddd about that. To bring you up to speed, I’m a German major at WashU who plans on applying to PhD programs for German next fall, meaning this semester abroad and a good dose of lit and history classes auf Deutsch (in German) are exactly what I need. Unfortunately for me, I’ve been chilling in Cleveland for about seven weeks rediscovering TV and novels auf Englisch, and my semester in Germany doesn’t actually start until April 11. Wish me luck on getting back into the school mode when that point comes.

Until then, fun fun fun in Germany! My favorite part of the last two months here in Cleveland has been receiving emails AUF DEUTSCH (you will learn German from reading this…get excited) from REAL GERMANS about ME BEING IN GERMANY (ie, boring paperwork stuff from the Uni). This, however, highlights one of my favorite things about Deutschland – every little boring thing is an adventure because I’m doing it in German.

Before I can be in Deutschland describing those foreign-language adventures to you, I’ve two more thoughts. First, I made two New Years Resolutions: 1. to learn German (realllllllly learn it, ie, no longer struggle just to complete reading for classes back in the States, crank out papers, discuss everything under the sun with native Germans, usw (etc)) and 2. wear earrings every day. Priorities, people.

Second, I’ve always felt as though I’ve lived in a big city, even though I just mean Cleveland and St. Louis by that. Basically these two lovely places have major airports, and the thought of having to go more than 30 minutes from home for an airport is strange. But, I’m shipping off to a little town called Tübingen (that’s south of Stuttgart in Baden-Württemburg), which doesn’t have an airport. And we’ll see how many Gleis (tracks) the Bahnhof (train station) has… scary. But here goes. Hillary tries a small university town!