Ich bin da!

This year is already showing signs of going by fast.  I’ve been here since Thursday morning, but it doesn’t seem like more than a day has gone by.

For anyone who might be worried about how I’m doing so far (Mom), let me say that I’ve only experienced wonderful things so far.  Well I guess that’s not entirely true; I did have a bottle of dish soap open up and spill all over my first set of German groceries… and I did have a bottle of beer drop, shatter, and spill all over my floor.  But that’s all water under the bridge now, or soapy German beer, as it were.  Bad joke.

Now for the good things:

~ My friends Sebastian and Mathias (the 2 guys that I already knew before coming here) picked me up at the airport and have helped me immensely in the last couple of days to get settled.  For instance, Mathias spent all of Friday morning in downtown Oberursel with Jeremy, a very nice student from St. Catharine’s Seminary in Canada, and me taking us to the bank to open student accounts, to an insurance office to get health insurance, and to the city hall to register as foreigner students.

~ I’ve enjoyed meeting a dozen or more students here already.  They definitely seem like a great group of guys.  On Thursday night, a group of people got together in the dorm’s common room to watch the movie Seven (Sieben in German), an awesome thriller with Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman.  I had seen it a few times before in English, so it was a fun experience to watch it here with the German voice-overs.

~ I had a Döner today.  It was five years since my last one, so the €3.90 (a bit pricey for a Döner) was easily worth it today.  Rather than trying to describe in detail what a Döner is, I’ll simply post this picture of one and heartily invite you all to visit Germany to partake of one.  I suppose it’s somewhat similar to a gyro, except way, way better.

~ I really like speaking German.  Other than with Jeremy and the St. Louis student Matthew and his wife Holly, whose German skills are still in their beginning phases, I’ve been enjoying speaking German all the time.  I’m a bit rusty, but it’s coming back to me quickly, and I’m looking forward to learning German as well as I possibly can.  Being a perfectionist has its advantages, especially when it comes to learning a foreign language.  I want to get it right! 

~ The campus here is beautiful.  It reminds me a bit of being in the woods of Wisconsin.  Check out the view from my room!

~ I got to see the SELK church today, which is right next to the seminary campus.  It’s a nice little building with a pleasant pipe organ that I got to play on today.  Next week they’re actually starting a €15,000 project to renovate the organ!  So that’s exciting.  I’m looking forward to going to church there tomorrow (there’s communion every Sunday - yay!)  It should be rewarding to participate in the German liturgy and hymnody and to hear Pastor Wenz (whom I met today) preach.

~ I like my room.  Here are some pics:  

Tune in next time for more.  You stay classy, America!

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"He cannot have God for his Father who does not have the Church for his Mother." - Cyprian of Carthage (d. 258)