Einschreiberekord an der Hochschule Heilbronn

Mit 1188 Einschreibungen für dieses Wintersemester haben wir den absoluten Höchststand an Einschreibungen seit Bestehen der Fachhochschule erreicht (bisheriger Höchststand: 1.045 aus dem WS 2004/05; Vergleichszahl des letzten WS: 968 Einschreibungen). 

Die Attraktivität der Hochschule hat sich für Schülerinnen und Schüler offensichtlich nicht verringert. Vor allem die betriebswirtschaftlichen Studiengänge konnten sich wieder über eine herausragende Nachfrage freuen. Sehr begehrt war wiederum die Tourismusbetriebswirtschaft. 1577 Studienplatzinteressierte bewarben sich auf die 43 Plätze. Bei dem Studiengang Betriebswirtschaft und Kultur-, Freizeit-, Sportmanagement in Künzelsau kamen 989 Bewerbungen auf 42 Studienplätze. Weiterhin waren die ingenieurwissenschaftlichen Studiengänge verstärkt nachgefragt. Hier war der Spitzenreiter wieder Maschinenbau mit 474 Bewerbungen.

Quelle: www.hs-heilbronn.de

HGT spendet für Kraki

Mal in eigener Sache, unsere geliebte HGT hat etwas vollbracht:

Die Hochschulgruppe Transportökonomie e.V. (HGT) hatte eine gute Idee: Sie riefen die Aktion "HGT-Truck" ins Leben. „Wir haben 100 Model-LKWs mit den Logos von unserem Studiengang und Studentenverein designt“, erklärt Benedikt Löhnertz.
Professoren und Studierende der Verkehrsbetriebswirtschaft und Logistik (VB) fanden ihre Freude daran und erstanden sie für 5 Euro pro Stück. „Von jedem verkauften LKW bekommt die Kraki einen Euro“, so Löhnertz. Da die Idee gefiel, ist bereits ein Großteil vergriffen und deshalb ging heute ein Scheck über 100 Euro an den Kindergarten der Hochschule.

Quelle: Foto und Text von www.hs-heilbronn.de

Back in da Bronx...

Ich bin wieder hier in meinem Revier :D
So, nach meinem kleinen schönen Ausflug in die elsässische Welt bin ich wieder hier im kleinen Heilbronn :)
Pünktlich zu meiner Rückkehr begann dann auch die Summer School hier in der Universität und das heisst: 28 Ägypter, 2 Polinnen, ein Spanier, eine Tatschekistanin und ein Mädel aus Brasilien!
Eine unterhaltsame Truppe, alle sehr nett, aber doch sehr anders als die Gruppe im letzten Jahr.
Besonders die Ägypter machen uns das Leben nicht allzu leicht. Polizeistreifen die wegen Lärmbelästigung ans Stuwo anrücken, 3 Krankenwagen in 2 Tagen (von denen 2,5 völlig unnötig waren) und ca. 20 000 vershoppte Euro später..... wir sind immer noch dabei :)

Bisher gab es das Standardprogramm: Stuttgart, Karlsruhe, Heilbronn rauf und runter, .....
Morgen geht es dann allerdings nach, man glaubt es kaum, STRASBOURG :D
Ja, wie erwartet, diese Tagestrip war mein Verdienst, aber rein logistisch/ökonomisch ist das die billigste und beste Variante ins Ausland zu kommen!
Denn wie erwartet sind die Ägypter wieder zu allem da, nur nicht für den Deutschkurs, der auch beständig geschwänzt wird :S
Nach tagelangen Planen, Verwerfen, Genervt-Sein und Handeln über Amsterdam haben schließlich die "Profs" der MIU eingelenkt und das Ganze beendet. Jetzt fahren wir nach SB und die Woche darauf nach München :-) Mir als absoluter Anti-Kiffer natürlich mehr als nur Recht *hehe*

Ansonsten wird es uns hier mit der Summer School schon nicht öde, einer der Studis hat sich mal dezent ein Augenbrauen Piercing stechen lassen, wird es aber kurz vor der Heimreise wieder rausnehmen, weil das darf er ja ansich nicht ... *mit den Augen roll*

Nun gut, wir werden sehen was noch so passiert :)
Das Koordinatoren Team Katha, Conni, Fabrice & Sina gibt sein bestes *haha*

Le temps me file entre les doigts...

...time goes by too fast. That was kind of my motto the last days in Strasbourg, unbelievable how fast the days went by. I still see me and my roomie Nora sitting in the kitchen talking about how long it feels to be here and *boum* there was my last day!
But let's go back and connect my thoughts to the last post.

One day I had some visitors in the Chateau - my grandma and her friend, living in our street. I have to say, those two are fitter than some of the 40 years old I know ;)
We did the full program, endless city tour, of the EU institution and downtown, good meals and all the tra-ra, it was just perfect :-)
And from what they told me I am good city guide and they enjoyed themselves a lot, so even better! Thanks for being there, grandma :)

The weekend of the 19th July I had again the urgent feeling to make some Party, which drove me all the way back to HN. Pretty cool coincidence that I could connect this with a working session in my house, together with Katha, Conni and Fab, to prepare the upcoming Summer School.
The 2kg of Spaghetti did their own to make it a good afternoon ^^
The evening was marked by the Sontheimer Stadtfest and a Sofa-Night. So at 8pm we - Stephen, Danii, Fab, Carl and me, made our way to the Stadtfest and had some beers and food, pretty nice.
Afterwards we met the whole bunch of people and took the bus to Sofa.
Pretty good evening, filled with lots of people and even more beers, but we had good fun!
I got home at 6am, having enjoyed the After-Party in Sofa and taking a Taxi Home. (Somehow I must have lost my Bank-Card at Stuwo, which by now has turned up to be at the police station, thx again to Christian!)

Next morning was of course very...annoying...getting up and driving back to Strasbourg after only 3 hours of sleep, but hey, France wanted me back :-)
I spent my day preparing the rooms for my students and at 5pm they arrived, the Davenport University was here!
4 boys and a lot more girls, they turned out to be pretty nice people, with a professor that spoke fluent German. Off we went to the house tour, the check-in and soon the famous BBQ. Tasty as usual, but at 10pm the Davenports had to say goodbye to their coordinatrice fatiguée, who preferred to go to bed ;)
Well, then followed some nice days, boat tour (for the 1000th time), some company visits and yet another day in Stuttgart to see Mercedes and the Daimler Benz Musem (Katha will relate with my boredom ^^)
After some good hours spent together, including having played a Davenport version of Jeopardy, Thursday was the day to say goodbye. After visiting the Council of Europe (for the 1000th), they hopped onto the bus and I made my way back to the Château (bye bye Davenports *wave*)

Friday was my last workday, very calm, I basically spent it with packing and cleaning. And then, at 6.22pm....................................Svenja arrived!! *juhuuuuuuuuu*
She finally made it all the way to SB to see me :-)
I took her back to my little castle and we went to eat in the Jardin the Pourtalès, the Winstub near the castle.
Some glasses of wine, a tarte flambée and a huuuge cup of ice later, we made it back to my flat to have some french beer ^^ But we didn't stay up too long, as Saturday was going to be busy.
Which means, we got up at 8.30 am, to be in the city center early enough. It was Braderie in Strasbourg! Means that all the clothes shops put up some stalls in one of the main streets of SB and basically threw their goods away - 90% off! Which is pretty cool, as there were already Les Soldes some days before. Fazit: I bought quite some stuff, and all cheap, Svenja unfortunately not. (But I hope you still had a good day!)
Back at the Château we cursed the heat, but nevertheless, we got into my car to drive back to HN. I did my obligatory round of saying goodbye, though I didn't really say "goodbye" (hate it) and just said "see you soon". I'll go back to SB for one weekend in the end of August, as they needed a coordinator for one group and I was interested...a last weekend in my cher Château.



Well, here ends my Château experience, time to get back to German life.
Fazit? Well, there is no real fazit or conclusion I can draw. It was a great time, having the students was like being with exchange students all over. My home and the city of Strasbourg is one of the best places to be, and I will definitely go back several times in my life. I got to know some great people, be it Germans, Americans or French (ya, NICE French People, one shouldn't believe it ;) ). Some of them will even make me go to the US in 2009, which shows how close we got.
Apart from that, living in France was not really different, though I know that this is mostly to blame on the fact that I lived in the Alsace region, which was German several times in History, so...
Nevertheless, I really liked my days there, i broke down some barriers in speaking French and...ach bla bla bla, it was an awesome time :-)

À bientôt et vive la France ;)

Comme le temps passe vite!

Wow, it has been long since I wrote the last time, at least it feels so for me.
Time to catch up a bit with what has been happening here. But where to start?
Guess chronologically might be a good idea....

As mentioned in my last post, I was waiting for the girls of the Potomac State University, West Virginia. They arrived on a Monday, the 16th of June. Straight from the beginning I could tell that they weren't happy with their tour so far. They had spent their first two weeks in Switzerland, with another coordinator. To sum it up: During several conversations I got the picture, that they hated their coordinator, because she seemed to hate them. Really weird, I dont't know what went wrong there.
Anyways, even more a reason for me to be a nice coordinator. First we did all the standard things, dinner at the "Jardin the Pourtalès", boat tour on the river Ill, than dinner with Tarte Flambée...and in between I showed them the whlole town, I guess I´m becoming a good Strasbourg citizen *haha*
Did I already mention that they were part of a "Hospitality & Agriculture" Program? You really could tell from the visits! We did a wine tasting, a beer tasting, an ecological farm and also a tasting of "Foie Gras", an Alsacian speciality, really expensive.
That is basically nothing else but stuffed goose liver, sounds disgusting but in my opinion it is nt that bad, tastes a bit like the German "Streichwurst".
This group only spent some days with me, before they flew off to the US again. But I think I did a good job in making them forget about the first, bad, part of the tour, they were all smiley when they left. My boss told me later on, that they called me the "Queen of Hospitality", guess I can be proud of that :)

Since than, the days got quiet here at the Château. We are only 3 interns left, as my roomie Natali left early, so I only live with Norah now, and she does an intensive course in French at the university. I´d love to take that one, too, but first of all I have to work and secondly it is 400€ for two weeks...never ever would/could I pay that!

Free time gave me the chance to go home and spent some time with my parents and with my friends in HN. And I saw the semifinal and Final on German ground, which was also worth the trip. We might not have made it to win the cup, but hey, we were Finaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaale :-)

Mondays it was time to go back to the Château, with a drop-off of Nicole at the Airport Baden-Baden, really sad moments, as she left after spending one year here in HN (I miss you sweety!!!!!).

Since then, I spent my days working in and around the Château. It is mostly about taking care of individual guests, sometimes a birthday party or similar things. We also had a big wedding, actually yesterday night, really cool, with fireworks literally in my garden, and a burning heart in front of the Château, beautiful!

When I am in the office, I do a lot of computer work, organizing programs again (as I did my first 3 months of internship, back nearby Stuttgart).  I like that work, too, it's really challenging right now, as I try to get a group of students into the Milan Fashion week, and even with me speaking some Italian and all my Italian connections, it turns to be hard. So far I would say it is impossible, but you never know...

So far for now, I´ll go and relax a bit now, all Emails are answered, and for today all guests are settled. It`s two more weeks till the next group arrives, but in case there is anything interesting, I will let you know :-)

À bientôt!!

Es ist vollbracht...

Tagelanges Hin- und Her, telefonieren mit der HN Stimme, der Hochschule und so weiter....hier ist der Artikel über die Erasmus-Sache (für alle die nicht auf dem Laufenden sind, der Artikel erklärt alles):

Heilbronn - Interkulturell, international: Mit diesen Attributen möchte sich nicht nur Heilbronn schmücken. Und dann das: Eine Gruppe von 15 bis 20 Austauschstudenten aus dem Ausland wird am Einlass der Heilbronner Diskothek Barococo angemacht, nur nach langem Hin und Her hineingelassen.

Sina Krauß, Studentin an der Hochschule Heilbronn, ist dabei und vermittelt. Die Runde aus Franzosen, Engländern, Spaniern, Russen und Bulgaren darf tanzen gehen. Beim Bestellen an der Bar allerdings der nächste Dämpfer: Als die 22-Jährige als Dolmetscherin vermitteln will, bekommt sie zu hören, sie solle ihren Mund halten und sei hier unerwünscht. Beim nächsten Besuch des Barococos ohne die deutsche ehrenamtliche Betreuerin werden die Austauschstudenten abgewiesen. Die Begründung: Es seien nur „deutschsprachige Gäste“ erwünscht. Sina Krauß wendet sich empört an die Heilbronner Stimme: „Und dabei sprechen die Türsteher selbst mit Akzent.“

Sind Heilbronner Türsteher ausländerfeindlich? Diese Frage wirft die 22-Jährige nun auf. „Man sollte glauben, dass sich Heilbronn weltoffener zeigt.“ Auch Gudrun Heller, Leiterin des akademischen Auslandsamts der Hochschule Heilbronn, sieht darin eine „schlechte Referenz für die Hochschule und die Stadt“. Jährlich betreut sie rund 100 Austauschstudenten. „Es gab schon Probleme, dass diese nicht in Discos rein kamen. Das waren meist afrikanische Studierende.“

Repressalien

Heller vermutet allerdings, dass sie von der Mehrheit der Vorfälle gar nichts erfährt. „Denn die jungen Leute denken sich, es bringt eh nichts oder fürchten Repressalien, wenn sie etwas sagen und sie dann gar nicht mehr in die Clubs reinkommen.“ Der Betriebsleiter des Nightclubs Barococo, Thomas Pfäffle, wehrt sich gegen die Vorwürfe, seine Türsteher hätten ausländische Gäste rüpelhaft behandelt. „Ich habe sie gefragt. Sie können sich an keinen solchen Vorfall erinnern.“ Und: „Die Aussagen der Dame sind nicht überprüfbar.“

Den Vorwurf der Ausländerfeindlichkeit sieht er aber insbesondere durch das Engagement der Disco bei der Student’s Tour entkräftet. Seit Jahren lädt das Barococo – wie andere Heilbronner Lokale auch – die Studienanfänger bei der Kennenlern-Tour zum Feiern ein. „Warum sollten wir das tun? Um sie beim nächsten Mal nicht reinzulassen?“ Dennoch überraschen die Vorwürfe gegen die Lokalität den Ordnungsamtsleiter Bernd Werner nicht. „Wir wissen, dass dort ein Türsteher im Einsatz ist, der unfreundlich sein muss und Gäste verprellt.“ Seine Erfahrung auch im Bezug auf andere Lokale ist: „Wenn sich jemand mit Klagen an uns wendet, sind es tatsächlich Ausländer.“

Rein rechtlich kann jeder Chef bestimmen, wen er in seinem Club haben will und wen nicht. Werner betont aber: „Wenn uns eine eindeutige Diskriminierung bekannt wird, würden wir einschreiten.“ Im Fall Barococo sucht seine Mitarbeiterin das Gespräch mit dem Betreiber.
Quelle: www.stimme.de

La petite détective

What a funny night, Sina played Sherlock Holmes...

I spent my evening sitting in the castle's TV room, watching a bit of Dr.House. Around 9pm I decided to walk down to the kitchen to get some pieces of Baguette (yah, there are several advantages of living in a hotel). I took the keys out of the reception and walked over to the kitchen. Suddenly, standing in front of the (locked!) kitchen door, I heard noises from the inside.
Scary, seeing that there are only two ways to enter the kitchen and both are locked by a key of the reception. Unless someone invented Beaming or "Walking-through-walls". So I was wondering, how the hell someone could have gotten into there. Seeing the fact that I was alone in a 300 year old castle, I thought I should check. So i surrounded the castle and looked through the window. In my mind, ideas of how to react if it was a burglar that broke in, or whatever....
Once I reached the back of the Château I sneaked around the corner and looked through the window and I saw.....le concierge - the janitor! *haha*
A big yellow lightbulb flashed on over my head and I realized, yah, he had a general key too.

And he obviously had the same idea as me, a late-night snack. Still I don't see why he had locked the door, but at least I know now that I wouldn' t have to turn from Sherlock Holmes into Superman...woman :-)

Neuer Standort SHA

Mal wieder was aus der Rubrik "News in HN"

Stadt und Landkreis Schwäbisch Hall und Unternehmen aus dem Raum Hall, Hohenlohe und Crailsheim setzten sich massiv für den Standort ein und bringen über einen Zeitraum von 15 Jahren gemeinsam 11 Millionen Euro für Studienplätze auf. Die Bausparkasse stellt zudem das Gebäude zur Verfügung und garantiert eine kostenfreie Nutzung für 15 Jahre. „Bereits im Herbst 2009 sollen die ersten jungen Menschen in Hall Betriebswirtschaftslehre im Bereich Vertrieb studieren können“, so Rektor Jürgen Schröder. Um den Anforderungen der regionalen Wirtschaft gerecht zu werden, soll es drei Bachelor - Studiengänge für 105 Studierende geben, weitere Inhalte stehen im Augenblick noch nicht fest. „Mit der neuen Außenstelle wird die Hochschule Heilbronn insgesamt gestärkt. Ich bin froh, dass wir die Hochschulinfrastruktur der Region Heilbronn-Franken nun gemeinsam ausbauen können“, sagt dazu Aufsichtsratsvorsitzender Oberbürgermeister Helmut Himmelsbach.
Quelle: www.hs-heilbronn.de

What´s next?

Alors, temps de quitter ma coquille et de continuer la vie normale...les hommes ne méritent pas la tristesse d´une femme, c'est ce qui se dit. (et je parle pas de l'amour ^^)

Today I got the Itinerary for the next group, ironically another WVU university, which will arrive on Monday. They are students of Tourism Management & Agriculture, c`est à dire, a program 100% different than the ones I did so far...
Included in the program are several dinner/lunch, the Casino in Baden Baden, wine tastings, visits of an ecological farm and a ride along the wine route...looking back on what I did with my groups so far, this looks kind of stupid, but I think it will be nice, for a change...
Plus it is all girls, that`ll be interesting...I guess those who know a bit about me realize, that I get along a lot better with guys, but hey, they`ll get their try!! ;)

PS: Is des net n bescheuertes Foto? Aber ich hab festgestellt, Plastikflasche oder net, ich mag des Bier :D

They are gone

It started at 4 am and lasted until 12 pm...and now they are all gone, back to the US.
If I thought it had been good the last days...the last 2 days brought us even closer together. I made it all through this night without sleep so I could spend as much time as possible with them...Jack waited with me till 4 am, we´ve been sitting near the campfire and talked...once he went to bed it was time to wake up Russel and Dan and the leaving began.
We even played "Stand by me" that night, Josh, Jack, Russel & me, standing there and listening all quietly...
And now? I am sick, I lie in bed and hate everything and everybody...worse than I expected it to be...saying goodbye was like in a bad movie...i didn't want to let them go and they had their concerns about leaving too.
I will miss them, I will miss them so much, miss hanging out with them, miss them telling me that they love me (^^) and even more miss hugging them and talking and and and...

Damn it, they are gone :(

PS: For those who wonder what has happend the night we went out for the game & party: We had a blast :D Schnaps, wine, some more schnaps and hundreds of beer ^^ definitely my drunkest night since I came here to Strasbourg!! Awesome fun, even more since some actually forgot how they made it home (in a Taxi with me *haha*)

PPS: Jungs auch wenn ihr das nie lesen können werdet, naja Jack vielleicht, ihr seid unglaublich, ich vermisse euch, es tut weh zu wissen dass ich euch erst nächstes Jahr sehen kann...Aber immerhin bin ich dann nicht mehr euer Koordinator und dann sehen wir, was passiert! ;-)

Can someone explain...

...why my boys of West Virginia can't stay with me?

June 11 is getting closer and closer and all I can think of is not having them leaving me :(
Yes, I am quite emotional right now, but this has never happend in this way before and I can't explain it. The problem is: we all get along too good! Tonight we will go to town to check on some bars to see the French Soccer Match and to have some beers...I can see big celebrating coming, since they all wrote their finals today.
Let's see how things turn out, as for me, I hope for time to pass as slow as possible. They keep asking me if I will miss them and I just stand there and don't answer, because I can not put it into words...
I can't explain what's happening here right now, but this is so much more intense than it normally is...but it is awesome!
I love them, they are the best that could have ever happend to me here in my internship and the Château will definitely not be the same without them...
I'll keep you updated, though I will probably not leave my bed anymore once they are gone...

Encore ici - Encore heureuse

Salut à tous!

Finalment, je peux ecrire un peu plus sur mon blog...il y a quelque jours que j´avait eu un peu de temps libre...

Hach, I love to write and even more to speak it!! I am definitely better in speaking it, when I don't have to think about accents and "s-endings" and stuff :o)
But I can feel me getting better, although it is probably just due to the fact that I keep losing the fear of speaking French...! :)

Well, apart from that, life is as busy as always over here! I arrived home yesterday night at 2 am from a trip to Luxembourg and Brussels with my West Virgina Boys & Girls.
We had some awesome days the last weeks, my group is just awesome, Jack, Josh, Scott, Jess, Russel, Will... we are definitely connecting! These days really felt more like holidays and party days, than work (I worked a lot though).
Let´s recap it a bit...

Since they are students of Political Science and Law, we had the typical visits that I had with the GSU as well: Council, Parliament, EU Commission...and I again liked it! Especially the Court of Human Rights is so good, I could hear 20 speeches there and it would still be cool!
And at the Court of Justice in Luxembourg we even got to hear a case! (The EU Parliament against some MEP (Member of Parliament) that was said to have "misused" some fundings.)
Apart from that, we spent several nights in the Pavillon and the Lounge, together with lots of beer and wine. We also had 2 Barbecues and might even have a third one (it is just way too good!)

Thursday night we arrived in Brussels, checked in and went straight out for some fun night. First laughter (although a mean one), when we walked over a street. The traffic lights just had turned green and I started walking. Looking to the left I saw a car speeding at me and jumped back on the sidewalk. The woman in the car stepped onto the break and the car stopped and *CRASH*.....the next car crashed into her. One could say that I caused a traffic accident, although it of course was not my fault at all...green lights mean "go" in Belgium, too.
We went to the famous restaurant street in Brussels downtown and had a delicious dinner!! Escargot as entrée, poisson avec des frites (Fish & French fries) & Dessert...with it 2 beer and 2 glasses of wine for 18€!!! That's so cool about that street, you negotiate with the waiters and before there aren't 2 free drinks per person on the table, you don't go in! It is so crazy, you really need to see it!! I love this city!

Afterwards we went to a bar, where they had live music and quite some people were already there. (well...it was already 12am, so... ;) )
We drank some beer (15€ for a "Maß" *ouch*) and danced, and sang and....it was gorgeous!! We had so much fun and we all loved each other *hahaha*
At ~3 am we walked back to the hotel, a bottle of wine in our hands. We were about 5 peoples left, but 3 of them went to bed, 2 were tired and Jess was sooo bad...she made good friends with the toilet that night *haha*
Me & Jack stayed in the hotel bar and had some drinks (I know it sound like a cliché but it´s not the way you might think!)
At 4.30 am I went to bad, just to get up at 7.30 again! *mdr*
Thats the way it is, when you are coordinator!

Off to the commission, than some free time in city center, later on to the European Council...oups no...this visit couldn't take place because my colleague in the head quarter had made a mistake in the Itinerary and so we arrived one hour late... o_O
After I put my students onto the train to Amsterdam we went home...7 hours in bus...uiuiui!

Yah, and here I am again, back in my beloved Château, sitting in the TV room and enjoying the European Championship (Suisse - Tchéquie = 0:1) *olee olee*

Oh by the way, we had some huge thunderstorms here in the Château, and as u might know, I looove thunderstorms! But here...it was cool while it was going on, but afterwards there was some cleaning necessary! 12am at night...and some rooms were flooded! And Sina was walking around, in a summer dress, soaking wet, but I enjoyed being in the rain! Some time later we had dried all of it, at least as good as possible, and I went back, to sit and celebrate with my boys.

The plans for the coming days?
Well, tomorrow will be relaxed again, my students have to study, since they have the finals on Monday...Then we have a visit to the French-German Collaboration Center in Kehl. Monday night, there might be another BBQ . And on Tuesday, the final night of my WVU, I will organize a Beach Party here in the Interaction Park, where they will also get free alcohol...hui that'll turn out to be interesting ^^
And as I mentioned, they will leave on Wednesday. I don't even want to think about it, knowing they will leave is like a shadow all over this day, but hey, I am sooo happy to have met them and I will stand 15 times in front of the Château, being sad that they leave and waving with my tissue...mais je n'ai pas d'autre choix!

What is left for me to do: Here are some pictures!



À bientôt!!

À propos...

I never showed you my favourite house-...hm....castle-mates!!
They are small, young and I loooooooooooooooooooooooooove them!!! 

Luna

Her son Leo

There is also a really huge cat, called Rocky, but he is so shy, no way of catching him in a picture....

And last but not least: Sina!!


:)

Fête de la Musique

Le 21 juin prochain c’est la Fête de la Musique ! Les rues, les terrasses de cafés et places de votre ville vont accueillir de nombreux chanteurs, groupes et orchestres. Qu’ils soient amateurs ou professionnels, pour la fête de la musique ils envahissent les rues pour partager leur passion et faire bouger la ville au rythme de leur musique.

Kurz gesagt: We will have a big festival here in Strasbourg, as for all France at this day, where the whole city will be covered by musicians...June 21!!
I am sooo looking forward to this!

Bienvenue à West Virginia University!

The last days I have been hearing the following words all day:
Sina, I love you!
Sina you are so awesome!
Sina, where have you been all my life?
Sina, will you marry me?
 
No, I have to disappoint you all, I did not find a cute french guy that wants to spent the rest of his life with me (unfortunately...)
But I got a new group of students here in the Château, 11 guys & 2 girls, quite cool group. We spent some time sitting & drinking & celebrating in the gazebo so far, but of course we also did some business and politics! Un bref apercu:

- EU Parliament Strasbourg

- EU Council

- Court of Human Rights

- Police Head Office Offenburg

- Civil Court Offenburg
- Musée de l'Alsace historique 
.
.
Here are the most recent party-pictures:





I can see fun days coming up!^^

À bientôt!!

Petit mise à jour

UPDATE: The next free days are June 7-8 and June 13-15 as well as June 22...
Nicci, Peter, french girls, Marcel & Co, Mom & Dad, the English...whoever feels like, come along ;)

Visit of Katha and Conni

Thanks to the religious holiday in Germany, Conni and Katharina had the time to visit me in Strasbourg, wohoooo!
They arrived at 11 am and we started with the guided tour of the castle. I think they liked the castle itself, my appartment a bit less, as I said, it is not the newest ;)

Than we went of to the city center, taking the bus and the tram. We did the whole tourist program, including the Cathédrale, Petit France, le quartier des tanneurs, les institutions européennes and a dinner in a restaurant *yammi*.
It even got really excitante during the evening, when we tried to get the train/bus back to the Château at around 9.30 pm and we had to realize that there was a "grève", a strike! Stupid french public transfer! After all the mess with my train in Belgium here the next strike and again ony for the one single day I would need it. For obvious reasons we could not get a taxi, so we went into a hotel and he called us one. For suprisingly little 14€ we made it finally back to the Château...a last short talk with the girls and they went back to Germany, to have a very short night ^^

Thank you soooo much for coming around girls, really meant a lot to see you here in my little kingdom and one of the most beautiful cities of the world!

À bientôt à tous!

It´s been some days....

...but here we go again!
Just arrived yesterday night back from Paris!!
Now you will think: Paris? Was that planned? And the answer is: no! But let me start a bit earlier:

May 16 we had our day trip tp Frankfurt, to visit the "Deutsche Bundesbank" and the "European Central Bank"! Having left at 7:30 am we arrived punctual at 10 am. All dressed up! We looked like the biggest bankers and we really felt like it! Walking through the streets you couldn´t tell us apart from the big players of all the banks...even more since we were stressed too, not to be late for the appointment.
First of all we heard a lecture on the issues and tasks of the Bundesbank, including the explanations of the European Money System and the introduction of the €. Very interesting, my Economics Professor would be proud of me! (Well, actually he is, I had to give him a short feedback about my internship and he wrote back: "So much Economics, very good" *wohoooo*)
Plus I am now provided with more give-aways (I get them during every visit^^) including the annual report and many books on money policy which normally would cost lots of money! My "Finance-major" heart was singing! :)

Afterwards we went for a short lunch and than to the ECB. Very big and impressive buidling that made us feel even more comme des hommes d'affaires!

We finished the day with a dinner in the "Lorsbacher Thal", très délicieux!!!

Saturday we than went off to our 4 countries in 4 days plan. We started in Germany, were we visited the Burg Eltz in Münstermaifelden. Very impressive bus ride, German landscape definitely is beautiful (well, I knew that before but my studis were impressed ^^).
Shprt stop-over for lunch and than we headed off to Trier! Everybody was sleeping, except: ya, except me! As usual, no sleeping for Sina on the bus and i don´t think this will ever change...putain!
Once we arrived in Trier we checked into the "Warsberger Hof", were I ran into the first big problem of the trip: The rooms....The Warsberger Hof is a youth hotel, and the rooms were really nice. BUT: They only had single rooms with shared baths on the floor. This is perfect for our students but absolutely inacceptable for professors! So I went to the reception and complained, because sth different had been agreed upon. There they told me, that the whole hotel had no private baths! Bastards! My students were on a guided city tour so I had time to figure out what to do. After talking to Uli, my boss, we ended up with making the Profs use the shared baths for this one night, but the company would pay the dinner for the night.
Next morning it turned out that David (Prof. Pitts) changed the hotel in the middle of the night, which was due to an allergic reaction to his room and not the baths...weird evening!!

Next morning we continued our trip to Brussels. Of course we used the geographical chance to stop in Luxembourg pour profiter de la essence à très bon marché...1,20€ per liter of Super!!
Finally we arrived in Brussels and got of the bus at the Hotel Aris. The bus went back to Germany and we went to the reception. The nice lady looked at me and said: "Vous n´avez pas la reservation pour l´hôtel Astrid, mais pour l´hôtel Aris...Obviously we were in the wrong hotel! Grande merde!!
Meant we have to take a nice walk through Brussels, 16 persons with oversea luggage, funny picture! But finally we found the right hotel and checked in...3 stars and all the comfort I wanted, super! ;)

We had a nice guided tour and afterwards dinner in an awesome street, a very narrow street with ~60 restaurants, I loved it!!! We went there every night in the end, although my bank account is now crying...uiuiuiui
Next morning we were scheduled for the NATO, to learn all about this institution. Located like you would expect it (all the security stuff...) we entered and heard 3 speeches about all the tasks and goals of the NATO.

Afterwards we took the bus to the "US Mission to the EU" which is, very very easily spoken, a kind of embassy of the US, that doesn´t deal with the country of Brussels, but with the European Union. First I thought it would be boring for me as EU citizen but it turned out to be awesomely interesting! I need to find a German equivalent, when you sign up for 2 years with them they take the first year to train you in any language you want to specialize on, très cool!
For the night we went to this really cool restaurant street again and ate the best food I had in a long time! Plus: I tried Escargot (Schnecken), for the first time in my life!! First a bit afaid, it turned out it tastes very good!
Afterwards we went to "Le Roi" and had some beer, Kingsize! (~! Liter)
We ended up being 5 students and the two professors David and Deon. As they got tipsy (they really can't stand beer), they decided to go to a table dance bar...And the profs were the first to go!! So i showed them the way and finally got convinced to join them. I personally stayed only one hour and drank a beer for 10 € (!!) while talking to a nice swedish guy. But than I left home, around 3 am, knowing we had to get up early...
The next day was also quite political, we went to the EU Commission and the EU Parliament. Both speeches were quite interesting, too, I am definitely une experte on the EU now!

The actual plan for the afternoon was to bring my students to the train station and to put them in a train to Paris: Tintin!
There was a train strike in Belgium, so no train to Paris for them, plus no train to Strasbourg for me...uiuiuiui! So it got really busy and we organized a bus to take us all to Paris. From there I wanted to take the train to Strasbourg then.
5 hours in the bus later we were stuck in the parisienne traffic and I was damn afraid of missing my train! It was scheduled for 8.24 pm and I didn´t arrive at the Gare de l'Est before 8.10....Which meant kick-assing several people at the ticket office, running along the platform...and I actually caught my train!!!! Once i was sitting, I heard a french announcement, telling me to come to the platform again...of course the whole train was staring at me...Turned out I lost my bank-card after paying in the ticket office...thank god someone found it!!!
So I sat down to drive home. The seat next to me was, literally, filled by a fat guy (and I can may say that!!!) eating first chinese food, than a Burger, than some Ice and finally he had a beer with some chips...incredible, he was eating for 1 hour!! Thank god I had my music to drown out the smacking...I really turned into a fan of the music of "Cali", check on the net if you have time!!

Well, and since 11pm yesterday I am back in Strasbourg. I already miss my studis, they were awesome!! Well-educated, funny, interesting and party-liking people! Also the professors were so different from what you would find in German professors...I am 100% happy with this group! Whatever comes next can NOT reach up to them! As expected, saying adieu to them sucked but as I keep saying: "You always meet twice in life!"

Now I had a free day today, tomo Katharina and Conni will come and visit me *juhuuu*
On Saturday the my next group, West Virgina University, arrives, to do a study abroad program on "Political Affaires in the EU", we´ll see how they are!


To finish: some random pictures of the 2 weeks with the Georgia State University:




Here sth for the girls ;)


I'll miss you a lot people!!!!

In diesem Sinne: À++++

Et patati et patata...!

Salut!

It's thursday night and I am already in bed to get enough sleep before leaving tomorrow morning...it'll be a day-trip to Frankfurt! We're visiting the "Deutsche Bundesbank" and afterwards the "European Central Bank", tres cool!

In the evening we will round up the program with an organized dinner of Schnitzel, juhuuu good old German food :D

But the past days have also been great fun, in a way I sometimes feel more like being on holiday than actually working ^^

Me & my group get along perfectly, they are awesome guys, although I sometimes can't do anything but laughing...Their ages range from 20 to 45 (only students) and in a way you can really tell that. I talked to some of the girls the other night and they were telling me like: "I want to fall in love in Paris" or "I want to have a hot affair in Europe" and I was just sitting there, laughing inside and wondering how childish this all sounds...they act like Germans do when they are 16 or sth ^^ Might sound negative but isn't meant that way, they are just Americans, different culture!

I also have a sailor with me and a Army guy, both married and ~30 years old, but I really enjoy hanging around with them, finally some grown up talking ;) (Daniel left, James right)

When it comes to visits, there of course have been some the last days!

We did a very nice boat tour of Strasbourg, all commented by headsets. We had "Tarte Flambée" which is typical for Strasbourg. Of course we visited the famous cathédrale of Strasbourg, which is just beautiful and fabuleuse! (Check this link, with the GUY singing it is really giving you goose skin!

We also started the political part of the tour, means we visited the Council of Europe and today the Court of Human Rights. Everybody was all dressed up in suits and we felt pretty important! Really cool experience, which gave me lots of background knowledge about the EU and its institutions!

And we had awesome fun visiting the Kronenburg Brewery, guided tour of the old brewery and later a beer tasting, all for free at 2 pm *hahahaha*

Further, I had my first French lesson. We have a 22 year old guy that comes once a week to teach us French (the language :P). He has a high hourly price, but it is worth it, one hour of pure French is so refreshing! And I really feel how it is coming back, the "francais fluide" ^^
We also played a bit of Boule, cool game and I am actually not bad in it ;)

Monday night we had a small party, because we had 30 guests of a Handball Team here in the Château!^^ Very cool, me and some of my students joined them around the camp fire, some beer and some wine....I ended up sitting there with one of the player, Ralph, until 7 am, when it was all light again and we decided to start the cleaning *haha* I really seem to get the "Hotel-Owner-Heart".

Oh and comme j'ai parlé du congé....:


À plus!!

La première semaine...

Bonjour Bonjour!!

Just à cet instant je suis assis avant mon ordinateur portable, je fais le lézard en écoutant un peu du Mickey 3D et je mange un baguette...c´est classique 8) !!

Days are passing by here quite fast, even though they feel kind of endlessly...Yesterday we left the Château at 8:00 am to go for a day trip. I arrived back at 11 pm, so you can imagine how happy I was when I entered my flat: “Hello my best friend bed, I have missed you so much!”
But I guess I start just on wednesday, when my first own student group arrived, well, first non-Erasmus group! Picking them up was scheduled for 3.00 pm and the bus driver, Karl-Heinz, arrived to meet me at the Château at 12.30 pm. Obviously quite too late, so all the way to Frankfurt we were in a hurry and I was, literally (!) screaming at stupid drivers causing traffic jams or only speeding 120 km/h. (Which is stupid because the bus can´t go faster than 100 km/h but well, sometimes it is fun just to be a bit short-tempered. ^^
When I arrived at the Terminal the group was already sitting and waiting! (merde…)
But they were quite cool, obviously their plane was early, so I blamed it all on that *haha*
After getting on the bus there was my general Bla-Bla, “Welcome to Europe, I will be your coordinator……”. To make time pass faster I taught them some basic words like “Merci” or “Bonjour”, although I was quite tempted to tell them that the French word for ´Please` is “Putain”, but than I reconsidered and decided to be a good coordinator :o)

After arriving at the Château I checked them into their rooms and gave them a guided tour of the castle. And already than it was time for the Barbecue scheduled for the night. It was an incredible experience! The picture of course could not capture the atmosphere, I really hope I can show you that once! Several courses of grilled food: fish, sausages, vegetables, cheese…Perfect! And all that around the camp fire with some beer, formidable!

Thursday was early getting up, to prepare breakfast for the groups and the other guests. Therefore I was in the kitchen at 6.30 am. Afterwards we got into the bus and drove over the border to Kehl, neigbhor city of Strasbourg. We had a company visit with the Köhler Papermill, where we learnt all about making paper in 2 hours, including a plant tour, quite nice!

Later we went to Freiburg, to visit Pfizer, a pharmaceutical company. (One of their most famous products is Viagra ^^).
Here again, plant tour and lots of presentations, par example about Lean Management.
This took us until 5.30 pm, when we finally went for the free time in Freiburg City Center.
My first stop was at a pharmacy, because, comment pourrait-il en être autrement, one of them is already ill, this time the professor. So I provided her with all my medical knowledge and got her some really good drugs!

All in all, we finally arrived back home at ~11 pm. But (they) we are students, so we had a glass of wine in the backyard before I went to bed.
Today was lecture day, so a bit more calm, but still, I am running all the time. They are a lot like Erasmus students, just a lot less independent. “Sina, I need a phone card,…Sina, which bus do I have to take?... Sina, there is no energy on the third floor *oops*”
But hey, as you know I like that. ^^

To finish, two another anecdote out of my "french life". I tried to order pizza :D :D
Since the students didn´t have organized dinner that night we orderd pizza for them, and I was up to call Pizza Hut. I made it all the way to tell him who we are and what we want. Than I was waiting to hear "à apporter" or for deliverance. But there was no "apporter" but sth else, so I had to switch to German for the last 2 sentences. It turned out that the word I needed was "venir chercher", I will not forget this ^^

Alors, now I will go to prepare the third room in our appartement, the son of my boss is staying two nights with us...just hope he is nice...

À bientôt!!!