Today (2/9) marks the last day of my first week of classes. It was a pretty boring week, since most of my time was spent either sleeping or in class. I only went out one night this week, and the other nights I just spent at home cooking dinner, or hanging out in someone's room. Nothing too terribly interesting. But I'm sure some of you would like to hear about my classes (or at least now feel obligated if you've already made it this far into the post).
So, right now, my schedule is:
Monday:
German 9:00-12:00
Modern German History In European Conext: 13:30-16:00
German Cinema Before 1945: 16:30-19:00
Tuesdays:
German: 9:00-12:00 (these days are typically excursion days, and aren't every week)
Wednesdays:
The Human Condition & the Totalitarian Experience: 16:30-19:00
Thursdays:
German: 9:00-12:00
With the exception of Mondays, it's not too bad a schedule. I know a few people who have these huge gaps between their German class and their 16:30 class, so I'm really glad I don't have any of those! Though Monday is a killer. I made the rookie mistake of not bringing food with my this week. On Monday, my internet still wasn't working at home, so I used my hour and a half break to catch up on blog posts/emails/etc, without thinking about the fact that I had to be in class for another 7 hours... I was so hungry by the time I got out of class, my stomach had literally inverted. Mo told me I looked disgusting haha
Anyway, onto class details. So, from what I can tell, for each class (not German) I have to do some weekly thing (turn in a paper, take a quiz, etc), give a presentation on the reading, take a midterm, write a term paper, take a final, and go on & write about two excursions. That's kind of a lot. While almost none of my professors can agree on how many class meetings we have (somewhere between 10 and 14), it still doesn't seem like enough time to get everything done, while still having an amazing time and being able to travel. I think these four days out of the week are just going to have to be exhausting, and anything I can't finish during those days will have to come with me when I go places!
My German class is great! Our teacher is crazy, and enthusiastic, which is awesome. She always looks so shocked and impressed when we actually pronounce something correctly on the first try. And she never makes us feel bad when we can't figure out how to say something. I think the best part about her teaching style is that she shows us where in our mouth or throat the sound is supposed to be coming from. It's beyond helpful! We've only had two classes, and I already feel like my comprehension - though not necessarily my speaking - has increased dramatically. I even overheard and understood my first all German conversation the other day! (One woman was thanking the other for the cake, and the 5000 calories, and then they said goodbye to each other. Twas awesome)
My Professor for History is kind of difficult to understand. The class seems as though it's going to have some great content and be an interesting and new view on German history, but it is really hard to understand the professor. But, he's aware that his accent is not so great, so he's totally fine if we ask him to repeat things, or explain further. The other issue with that course is that I'm not sure if we're supposed to be taking notes on what he's saying, or what's on his slides. They don't always mesh up. Oh well, hopefully the reading will help to supplement anything I might miss in class.
Cinema seems like it might be an interesting course... maybe. I'm not sure. I really don't like cinema classes. I love learning about movies and watching them, and seeing the reflections of society come across on screen... I just cannot for the life of me write papers about films. My academic papers are always so matter of fact and argumentative, but film papers are all about analyzing the film and agreeing with the argument that such-and-such was reflected in such-and-such a scene. Or at least that's been my experience. The good news is that I've already seen a few of the films we are watching, and have even written papers on a few, so hopefully it won't be too hard a course. Also, it's my last class of the day on my hell days, so by that point I'm normally too tired to pay too much attention, so it's probably a good thing we'll just be watching films. The professor is a really cool, excited German guy. His English is much better than my history professor's.
Totalitarian seems like it is going to be a wicked interesting course. The professor is this really old guy, who used to live on the East side of Berlin while it was still divided, and his parents had first hand experience of living in a totalitarian state, so it sounds like he's going to have some fascinating insights. He reminds me a lot of my professor from Santa Cruz. Really slow and boring to listen to, but once he gets to the point of his story, you're really happy you stuck around to hear the whole thing. The class is probably going to be pretty easy for me, since it is basically a summation of all the things I've been focusing on for the last two years. But this is the first class where there has been a distinct combination of psychology and history. It's my first psychohistory course, I suppose.
For all of my classes we have to go on excursions, which at first sounded like a drag, but now that I know what they are sounds interesting! Here's a quick list/description of each excursion (I put links to the websites on the ones that I could find):
German (on these ones we are limited to only speaking the German we know - no English!):
- History City Center (we did that today... a scavenger hunt around the historic district, all in German!)
- Ikea (we have to approach people and ask them about furniture or something)
-Kreuzberg
- Walking tour of Friedrichshain/Kreuzberg
-Eating at a German Restaurant
- Breakfast - absolutely no English - at my teacher's house after the final
History:
- German Historical Museum
- German Russian War Museum
Cinema:
He didn't go into too many specifics, but I know we'll be going to a museum (probably the Film Museum at Potsdamer Platz) and going to a cinema.
Totalitarian:
- The German Resistance Memorial Center - where my professor works!
- The Topography of Terror Memorial Center - if you haven't heard of this, go check out the website. It's insanely cool! I've been wanting to go since I heard about it a few months ago :)
I think most of those websites have an English version, if you don't speak German. I'm so excited for all of these excursions. Most of them are places that I wanted to go regardless, and so it's kind of nice that now I don't have an excuse for not going.
So yeah, that's my school work. A whole lot more work than I had anticipated, but I'll take a tip from Tim Gunn and make it work :)
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