Tuesday, August 30, 2005; 03:27 PM
Herzliche Grüsse von Berlin!
I made it to Berlin safe and sound this morning around 8:45 AM. Everything went very smoothly - surprisingly so, for my first time travelling alone. The plane rides were long, but not unbearable - the flight from Houston to Newark was rather interesting as we had to make a detour to fly around Katrina; as I had an eastside window I could see the huge front of clouds that outlined the chaos beyond. I also saw the New York City skyline for the first time ever, which I wasn't expecting, as I had never really considered how close the city was to the New Jersey stateline.
Upon arrival in Berlin, I found a fellow IES student at the luggage claim, and since we both didn't feel like hauling our suitcases through the subways, we decided to split a taxi, which turned out to be a good deal. Despite the warnings of my city guides, the taxi driver was quite friendly, and attempted to communicate to us in his broken English in exchange for our broken German. We got to the IES Center just minutes after they opened; there were only about three other students there. Immediately we were thrown into a rush orientation - all in German. I met the staff and student assistants, received my Handy (cell phone), keys, and of course gratuitous packets of information. My student mentor Nikolas, who is a really nice guy but a bit difficult to communicate with, took a group of us out to get bus passes as well. My fellow students here seem pretty cool so far - there are varying degrees of German proficiency, but everyone seems eager to speak it when they can, which is a good sign. The staff all speaks German, but I was relieved to find that I could understand most of what they were saying throughout orientation. Speaking back was another matter entirely, but it's only the first day.
By now, nearly all the students have shown up, and all we can do now is wait until our host families arrive at five this evening. Hopefully there's not much delay, I could really use a shower!
The weather is: warm and sunny
