Two Weeks?!

Yup, TWO WEEKS.


In 2 weeks I will be living and going to school in BERLIN.


That's just crazy! It still doesn't feel real.


I cannot believe something I've been waiting for for FOUR years is just 14 days away. It's crazy when something you have wanted for so long is actually happening, since you have wanted it for so long it almost seems like it is never going to happen...but low and behold it's actually happening! I guess the whole story of me wanting to study abroad in Germany can be traced all the way back to one day when I was 11 years old and in 5th grade. Back when I was in 5th grade the 6th grade foreign language teachers would come into your class and give you a little presentation on why you should take their language next year. I was all set on taking French, just like all my friends were planning on doing. I knew that my 2 older brothers took German but I was all set doing what my friends were doing. Then the German teacher came into the class and gave her presentation. After she was done she came over to me and said, knowing that she had taught my 2 brothers, "So, you're going to take German next year right?" And I was all, "Uhh no I'm totally taking French". So the first day of 6th grade rolls around and I come to discover that she had actually put me into her German class! How dare she! I was not cool with that. Little did I know...


...That a few years later during my junior year of high school I would still be taking German, loving it, and be about to embark on a summer exchange trip to Germany. The trip was needless to say the most amazing experience of my life and I knew when I returned after 7 weeks that I hadn't had enough. I knew that I wanted to study abroad for a year in Germany and become fluent in the German. I knew that I wanted it and that I would make it happen.


So, flash forward to Fall 2009, I'm in my second year at Northeastern University and starting the process of applying to study abroad for the 2010-2011 academic year. It was....a looong process involving lots of paperwork, online forms, language evaluations, and trips to my homies in the  NEU study abroad office, and LOTS of questions to my all-knowing brother Tim who did the very same program I'm doing. The program I chose is not a part of Northeastern's study abroad programs, seeing as all of their programs are only a semester long and none of which are in Germany...umm what?! So, I had to get the program approved, make sure that my credits would transfer, explain why I wanted to go to Germany in the first place, and whatnot. It all paid off when in March I got a letter in the mail saying, "We're pleased to inform you that you have been accepted into the IES Abroad Berlin Language & Area Studies Program..." YESS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Tim kept telling me that it was a no-brainer I would get in, but of course I had my doubts. I had not taken a German class since 2008 when I was still attending ASU and my German is nothing short of rusty (to get into this program you have to demonstrate that you have some ability to speak the German language, seeing as all of your classes are in German...and luckily I have retained enough of this ability over the two years!).  So it was official, I'm going to Berlin!!!!!!!!!!!


Since March I've been counting down the days, reading everything I can about Berlin, getting lots and lots of helpful advice from Tim, getting scared, getting nervous, getting extremely excited, and basically just being in awe that I'm moving to Berlin for a year! Berlin, the capital  of Germany, a city that when I was born was divided by a wall, a wall that kept people from leaving that lived in the very area where I will be living this year. Crazy!!!


So, it's down to 2 weeks. I found out I will be living with my host, Natascha and her 7 year old son Anton. Natascha is an actress and loves to do yoga (yay!) and bake/cook. I'll be living on Karl-Marx Allee in a building called a "Stalinbauten" (basically these were enormous apartment complexes that the Soviets built in East Berlin that were designed to all look the same and look very bland/Soviet-ish. They look better now though!) Natascha is the granddaughter of one of the architects who designed Karl-Marx Allee. Pretty awesome if you ask me! I can't wait to meet her!

So, 2 weeks until I begin the adventure of a lifetime! I cannot wait!! Bis dann!