Because the schools in Germany have a shot summer break they have longer breaks during the year, like fall break! So directly following the exchange program with Latvia was the start of fall break, which is two weeks long.
During the first few days of fall break my family and I drove by autobahn to Bayern (or Bavaria in English). The Autobahn(Highway) was the real start to the adventure, I had only been on the Autobahn once or twice before and for only a short time. We left at 05.00am so we could avoid traffic, and we did exactly that! In the no speed limit zone we were able to hold about 200KmH(about 125mph), and we were mostly in the slow lane. It was pretty fun.
Bayern has a beautiful landscape, and it was really cool to see. We were in the Bavarian Forest in a condo type thing. Im not really sure all that we did, we tryed to see alot of things in only four days, I ate some strage food, saw some historic churches and buidings and also a castel city. so I took alot of pictures of the old citys and historic things. We spent a day at a glass factory I guess you could call it. I got a chance to blow some glass, and buy some cool things, like a beer boot! It was really cool to watch the people work with glass also, there were people hand crafting things before my eyes. We also went caving one morning which was also fun.
Hopefully I can get a few pictures up soon.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Picture text
The fist picture is the Metal recycling company in Latvia.
The second and third are on the East sea coast in Latvia, the first of the two is of some of my classmates searching for "luck stones". a Luck Stone has a hole all the way through it, and they are pretty often there, I found one, but I dont know exaclty how they are created.
Fourth is a wall on the side of some apartment buildings or something, but it said "NOOB" so I thought it would make for a nice photo!
The fifth is in Riga, we were in a church over the city and it is a cool picture from over Riga.
Last is a waterfall, and I think it is the widest waterfall in all of europ, but I dont know exactly where in Latvia it is... but I was there!
The second and third are on the East sea coast in Latvia, the first of the two is of some of my classmates searching for "luck stones". a Luck Stone has a hole all the way through it, and they are pretty often there, I found one, but I dont know exaclty how they are created.
Fourth is a wall on the side of some apartment buildings or something, but it said "NOOB" so I thought it would make for a nice photo!
The fifth is in Riga, we were in a church over the city and it is a cool picture from over Riga.
Last is a waterfall, and I think it is the widest waterfall in all of europ, but I dont know exactly where in Latvia it is... but I was there!
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Latvia
The last ten days I spent in Latvia. My class at school did a exchange program there, so the students we stayed with will come to Germany in April for about a week.
The trip was pretty evenful and I really enjoyed it, it was a real once in a life time thing. My class and I started out by taking the train from Westerstede(Home) to Keil: somewhere on the East Sea, then a 22 hour ship ride to Lituania then another two hours by bus to Leipaja, Latvia. Leipaja is about 12kilometers long and 5kilometers wide, and it sits inbetween a big lake. It has been part of the EU since 2004, and the people there have told me that that has only been a bad change, because the pay for work has been constant, but the prices of food and other things have been going up to keep up with EU standards. The population there is about 50% Russian and 50% Latvian. But they are no longer part of Russia so there are schools for only Russians and schools for only Latvians, and to get a good job you need to speak Latvian and have had gone to a Latvian school. My host Brother was trilingual (Russian, Latvian, and English).
So the real experance started on the ship, we had 22 hours by ship from Germany Lituani. It was a really cool alot of fun, and I got to know my classmates alot better, the most of the time we played cards and sat around and talked, but we also did some dancing and singing, sining in german is alittle hard but fun. When we got there the first real sight we saw from the bus was a group of shaks, maybe 50 or so, that were about the size of an american garden shed that seemd to be a naborhood. When we got there, it was better but still strange. Alot of 10 story apartment buildings that people lived in. - I think this is a good example of dont judge a book by its cover, because by the end of the week I had a great time.
The first day we had a shot presentation over Latvia and ist econemy and some stuff like that, after that it , Friday, was teachers day or something, but my host brother and I were ended up teaching 3ed grade kids math with some other exchange people. Was funny, mostly becaust at 8 they really dont speak much english and all communication was nonverbal or through translation of one of the older students. We made some crafts with the kids too. In the eveing we played some pool in a small "pub like" place.
On the second day we took a bus to Riga, the capital of Latvia. Riga has 40% of the population of latvia. We saw some museums and then wondered the city for awhile. We also got to go up in a church and take pictures from over the city.
On Sunday it was saved for a family day, but we all ended up at a paintball part in the city. This was the bestpaintball I have ever played. The paintball guns were not top of the line, but the games were amzing, both the German and Latvian class were playing, wich made it even more fun. The park was huge and that day we were the only ones there. We started with a basic game, they are there we are here go get them and hide behind random things, broken buildings tires what ever. Next we played VIP and we had to get our VIP to a point and aslong as they made it there we were ok. The second round of VIP I was the VIP, this is where it gets intresting. Cars, I was in a car with two other guys and the other team had another car too. My car got roadside bombed on the other side so the driver "died" and me and the other guy in the car had to defend me while in the car waiting for other people from my team to come and get me to the helicopter. -It was more than your avrage game of paintball, and it was great.
On Monday we saw the Olympic training center in the city, it was pretty impressive, but only a short tour. It was also pretty new, so alot of rooms were empty, but they had alot of big plans for it. Next we saw "Liepaja's Metalurgs", this is a huge steel recycling compay that makes mainly metal bars for construction and exports to over 20 countrys all over the world. It is also over 50% over Liepajas econemy. It was really cool, alot of fire, liquid metal flowing.
One The last two days we traveled around latvia to see the other stuff there, and worked on some projets to show our partents on the last evening.
I also note that since I was with the german kids every day and chatting I think fluently in German, and I am fogetting to think in English as time goes on.
Hopefully I can get a few pictures online soon.
The trip was pretty evenful and I really enjoyed it, it was a real once in a life time thing. My class and I started out by taking the train from Westerstede(Home) to Keil: somewhere on the East Sea, then a 22 hour ship ride to Lituania then another two hours by bus to Leipaja, Latvia. Leipaja is about 12kilometers long and 5kilometers wide, and it sits inbetween a big lake. It has been part of the EU since 2004, and the people there have told me that that has only been a bad change, because the pay for work has been constant, but the prices of food and other things have been going up to keep up with EU standards. The population there is about 50% Russian and 50% Latvian. But they are no longer part of Russia so there are schools for only Russians and schools for only Latvians, and to get a good job you need to speak Latvian and have had gone to a Latvian school. My host Brother was trilingual (Russian, Latvian, and English).
So the real experance started on the ship, we had 22 hours by ship from Germany Lituani. It was a really cool alot of fun, and I got to know my classmates alot better, the most of the time we played cards and sat around and talked, but we also did some dancing and singing, sining in german is alittle hard but fun. When we got there the first real sight we saw from the bus was a group of shaks, maybe 50 or so, that were about the size of an american garden shed that seemd to be a naborhood. When we got there, it was better but still strange. Alot of 10 story apartment buildings that people lived in. - I think this is a good example of dont judge a book by its cover, because by the end of the week I had a great time.
The first day we had a shot presentation over Latvia and ist econemy and some stuff like that, after that it , Friday, was teachers day or something, but my host brother and I were ended up teaching 3ed grade kids math with some other exchange people. Was funny, mostly becaust at 8 they really dont speak much english and all communication was nonverbal or through translation of one of the older students. We made some crafts with the kids too. In the eveing we played some pool in a small "pub like" place.
On the second day we took a bus to Riga, the capital of Latvia. Riga has 40% of the population of latvia. We saw some museums and then wondered the city for awhile. We also got to go up in a church and take pictures from over the city.
On Sunday it was saved for a family day, but we all ended up at a paintball part in the city. This was the bestpaintball I have ever played. The paintball guns were not top of the line, but the games were amzing, both the German and Latvian class were playing, wich made it even more fun. The park was huge and that day we were the only ones there. We started with a basic game, they are there we are here go get them and hide behind random things, broken buildings tires what ever. Next we played VIP and we had to get our VIP to a point and aslong as they made it there we were ok. The second round of VIP I was the VIP, this is where it gets intresting. Cars, I was in a car with two other guys and the other team had another car too. My car got roadside bombed on the other side so the driver "died" and me and the other guy in the car had to defend me while in the car waiting for other people from my team to come and get me to the helicopter. -It was more than your avrage game of paintball, and it was great.
On Monday we saw the Olympic training center in the city, it was pretty impressive, but only a short tour. It was also pretty new, so alot of rooms were empty, but they had alot of big plans for it. Next we saw "Liepaja's Metalurgs", this is a huge steel recycling compay that makes mainly metal bars for construction and exports to over 20 countrys all over the world. It is also over 50% over Liepajas econemy. It was really cool, alot of fire, liquid metal flowing.
One The last two days we traveled around latvia to see the other stuff there, and worked on some projets to show our partents on the last evening.
I also note that since I was with the german kids every day and chatting I think fluently in German, and I am fogetting to think in English as time goes on.
Hopefully I can get a few pictures online soon.
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