I suppose the best place to start is with my 3-week internship at a local knife factory here in Solingen. In my school, everyone in the 10th grade is required to do a 3-week internship/work-shadowing at a business of their choice. I could have chosen not to do one and stay home, but that would have been boring, so with the help of my host family, I got a spot a company called Wüsthof (http://www.wusthof.ca/), which is owned by a Rotarian. It is a fairly world-renowned company famous for its quality knives. I did not really work in the section where the knives were made, but rather where the parts of the machines were made which would later be used to create the knives. For the most part I would watch the employees as they worked, and they would tell me what they were doing, but occasionally I would be allowed to operate a machine myself, which was always exciting and a little nerve-wracking, considering many of them cost more than 100,000 Euros. What I most enjoyed about working there was getting to know the employees. It was really fun and interesting to meet "real" blue-collar Germans, not just the people I meet in the Rotary/school/host family circles. They were all extremely nice, interesting, and funny, and they were all very good at what they do. Perhaps they weren't the most culturally or politically knowledgeable people (I had to explain to one of them that the United States and the United Kingdom are two different countries. A few others asked me if could speak both English AND American. They were impressed when I said I could.), but when it comes to their work, they are experts. They did some pretty difficult things, too, that I personally couldn't get my head around. I also couldn't believe the hours they worked. Well, I suppose they really didn't work longer in comparison to most jobs (one shift was from 7am-3pm and another from 2pm-10pm), but their work was so repetitive and dull - at least in my opinion. I had a hard time dealing with that for 3 weeks. I can't imagine working there for years like most of the employees have. Your brain must just turn to mush. So, major respect to factory workers. I don't think I could ever do that.
Right after my internship ended, I switched host families. I am now living with the Fischers. My host dad, Frank, owns a printing house (I don't know if this is the correct English word for it, I'm just translating directly from German!) which prints all sorts of brochures, packaging, labels, etc. for many different products and companies. My host mom, Elke, also helps out at Frank's company. The other day I discovered she is also a great painter, and has some gorgeous artwork hanging on the walls at home here which she painted herself. Unfortunately, she hasn't painted for a few years due to time constraints (she says she can't paint at home because she gets too distracted, so she needs to take some sort of course in order to actually get things finished). I'm trying to encourage her to start again, because she is really good! My only host sister is in Brazil on exchange, so for the first time in my life I'm an only child! There are some perks to this: for example, my room is on its own floor, so I have a lot of privacy. I don't really like being alone down there, though, so I spend most of my time upstairs anyway. While I was really sad to leave my first host family, and I miss them, I am really happy to be somewhere new. Something about the new environment makes me feel like I can start all over - that I have another chance to reinvent myself , or rather, let more of my true self out that has been there the whole time. It's a difficult feeling to describe but it's very good, and I feel very, very happy! It's great to have a change - my new host family is quite different from my first one. They go out to dinner often, and to very fancy restaurants where it matters in which direction you place your knife and fork when you are finished, because you could offend the cook (that's how fancy we're talking here. So, not Nina's or the Ontario). They also have VIP season tickets to the Leverkusen soccer team, who are ranked 3rd in the first Bundesliga in Germany (aka really good), and also the Solingen Volleys, a volleyball team in the second Bundesliga. I also really, really like their friends! Elke's birthday was on Saturday and they had a party, and their friends are just so nice and fun and lively. They all stayed until about 3am, and there was much dancing and talking and eating and laughing to be had. I also went running with Elke and her friend Sabine, who is quickly becoming one of my favorite people because she is just so funny and friendly and sunny. The weather was so beautiful - cold but sunny, with snow all around - and we ran through the woods and through fields and across streams as Sabine's dog, Freddi, ran ahead of us playing in the snow. It was so great. So, to sum this all up, I'm very satisfied with my new host family.
Because this is getting long and I have a life to live here, I'm going to end this post now and tell myself that I will write another one this week to talk about Karneval. Until then!
