Sprachkurs and a New Friend

I'm writing this in the library, so I think the time is correct: 16:52 Dortmund time, 11:52 EST

Today was my first day in the Sprachkurs, and it was another adventure. There were students there from all over—America, Turkey, Mexico, Hungary, Korea, etc. and the instructors said everything in both German and English, so I felt a little bad for the students whose native language is not English.

It turns out that there are actually three different classes—a beginner's class (class 1), an intermediate class (class 2), and an advanced class (class 3), and we started by evaluating our German. First, we had to find a partner that spoke a different Muttersprach (native tongue), and then we had to ask them a few questions in German: What is your name? Where are you from? What are you studying? What do you like to do in your freetime? How long have you studied German? Then we had to introduce our partner to the rest of the class and tell them, in German, our partner's answers while the teachers evaluated our speaking abilities. My partner was Han-na from Korea, and she was very sweet. Then we had a short Aufsatz (writing assignment) where we had to state why we chose to come to Dortmund and what we hope to get out of the experience. At this point, we took a tour of the campus while the teachers read our answers and put us into the different classes. I was very excited to learn that I am in the third class, which hopefully means that I will be able to learn quite a bit.

I met a new friend while I was in the class: Stephen from Atlanta. He is in the third class with me, and he also lives in the same village (I don't know what else to call our little cluster of buildings) as I do. He's very friendly and it is nice to hang out with him because he also prefers to speak German when possible. Now I have someone to walk home with from the classes :-)

Tonight the new students are meeting at one of the student bars at 9:00. Apparently, it is really popular, and a lot of people are going to be there. I'm not sure yet if I am going because I am so tired—everything is so new that I really haven't started sleeping well yet, and I have class in the morning. We'll see how I'm feeling when the time comes...

Tchüss!