#56 - Ruhrsee

This weekend me and a couple of friends decided to go on a small trip. As one of them was told by someone at their univeristy about a place with lakes and lovely scenery, we decided to go to Ruhrsee.Although the weather was not the best (and thankfully it didn't rain) it was still a really nice place to visit. What I noticed the most was how quiet it seemed to be in the area. Just looking around makes you feel peaceful.

Ruhrsee is a small village on the bank of a river, which connects several lakes. We took a boat trip along one of them to a dam, which looked very interesting. It also had what looked like steps for a giant going down the side. Also, in the After higher area of the water stopped by the dam (I don't know the technical name for it) you could see the sun reflect in the water, and as it wasn't too bright and also because there were clouds, and also due to the stillness of the water, it looked as though there was something under the water glowing.

Going back and quickly having something to eat, we got on another boat and this time headed in an opposite direction, passing sailing boats and people swimming. Although the bus ride took almost 2 horus to get there, it was worth it. Perhaps I will visit there again for a week on holiday in the future, and swim and sail in the beauty!

#55 - Berlin Weekend

As part of an excursion with the summercourse, I went on a trip this weekend to Berlin. I had never been to Berlin before, and so I wanted to see it as I had the chance.

On Friday morning at around 7am we left on the bus. The journey to Berlin took about 10 hours, so it felt very long! We arrived at our hostel in the east of Berlin which was actually quite nice. After a few rules from the hostel we shared out the rooms.

On Saturday there was a meeting at Checkpoint Charlie and then a tour organised for the afternoon. I missed otu on both of these due to getting lost on the train and then not being told where the meeting place for the tour was. Nevertheless I wandered around Berlin's 'centre' with a friend and saw most of what we wanted to see, and had fun too. In some ways I think going by ourselves was better, as we had more freedom than we would have on a 3 hour Stadtrundgang.
On Sunday we decided to go to Berlin Zoo. It is very big, and as we had no map of it we got lost very easily. It was quite relaxing to see all the animals, and in the Aquarium it was interesting to see the fish and other water creatures. Unfortunately my battery in my camera ran out just as we arrived at the aquarium so I have very little photos of that!

In the end we ended up having to rush both the Zoo and Aquarium because we were going to join the 4pm boat tour organised for us. Of course we missed this too, so spent a while sitting around Berlin Dome while a small brass band (possibly from a school) started to play music. We eventually met up with the others who went on the tour and followed them (lead by one of the teachers) onto the train and to another part of Berlin. I do not know why we went there, as it consisted of an hour or more just walking around the streets. The only sights to see were Turkish restaurants and the odd quasi-interesting poster on the side of a building. So after reaching a U-Bahn station, I left the group, and because it was getting fairly late evening, went back to the hostel.

Monday morning we had to leave our rooms by 10. As the bus was arriving at 13, I went on a small walk around the area. We headed along the main street just to see what was there, and eventually found ourselves exploring a cemetery, which sounds really grim, but it was actually really interesting. There were of course headstones there, but a little further in and under the older trees and plants were big family graves. It also turned out that the little church in the middle I wanted to take a look at was not a church at all but another big (and no doubt expensive) family tomb!

The bus ride back to Aachen was so long and uncomfortable. It didn't help that the woman in front of me put her seat right back as far as it would go, basically giving me no space to sit. She didn't even lay back on the seat, but she led on the bottom part of it across 2 seats, so why she needed the extra flatness I do not know! And when she wasn't laying down, she sat upright and read magazines!

#54 - Maastricht

On the weekend I went with a small group of us from the summer course on a day trip to Maastricht. It doesn't take very long on the bus, and the return ticket only costs 5 Euro so it was quite cheap!

Maastricht Main Train Station

Maastricht as a town was very nice. There are quite a lot old building facades and the river is also a nice sight. The weather helped a lot by being very sunny and warm! We took a walk around the centre and town area, looking at the lots of shops they have. Most of them are quite expensive though so nobody bought anything!


We did have some waffles there, and they were delicious! I asked for a chocolate one, and basically to make that you take a normal waffle and push chocolate sticks into the middle of it, and the heat from the waffle melts it a little after a while. The smell of them as you walk down the street is amazing!

#53 - first week of second month in Aachen

The new classes began on the 3rd of September. That also happened to be my birthday. What a lovely way to celebrate!

There are much less people on the course this year, and almost everyone will be continuing to study in Aachen or another german city for a semester or longer (as part of ERASMUS etc). There are a lot of French here! There were none last month.

The course seemed to have given up using the language grading system for classes (for example, I was in M2 which is basically middle level). Instead we have groups - gruppe 1, gruppe 2 and so on up to gruppe 5. I was placed into gruppe 4 even though the course directer said she would put me into Oberstufe, but today I switched from Gruppe 4 into Gruppe 5, which is much more of my level and similar to university now (reading texts, listening exercises etc).

There are a few more people that have stayed from the first month into this one than I had originally thought! It helps a lot to already know some people, so I don't have to completely have a new circle of friends/acquaintances.

So far the course is going well, there are no problems. I am going on one of the excursions offered for this month, as the other two are the same as in last month. On Friday morning I will be leaving (with a surprisingly small group of students) to travel to Berlin by bus. I think the journey is about 10 hours, so it seems further from Aachen than Paris! I do not yet know what the course is planned to offer in terms of tours or activities for Berlin, but we will be there a few days so it should be a good time. I am looking forward to it, I've not been in Berlin before!