Lorraine's Current Whereabouts.

Hello everyone!

Merry Christmas! Happy New Year!

Sorry, I don't have the means to upload pictures right now and I don't know when exactly I will, but I just wanted to let you all know why I haven't been replying to your emails for a week...

I have been in Serbia! Belgrade, more specifically. A team of 10 students from Bodenseehof and 4 staff members all piled into vans and drove from Germany (16 hours! wow!) for a week-long mission trip. We worked with the Roma people (more commonly known as gypsies) who live in the absolute poorest parts in the city. We are talking, living in sheds made up of cardboard boxes and pieces of scrap metal. It was really eye-opening and really really really reminded me of my time in Mexico. Then we all drove back. Another 16 hours. Then I slept in a room at school, woke up early, and hopped on a train (the first of five) with my friend Owen to spend the rest of break with him and his family. And hopefully to learn some French!

I don't know how frequently I will be able to use a computer with internet, but I will be back at school and in the computer lab on January 5th!

More pictures of paintings.

More Pictures

You guys are all gonna get super pictured out. There's a ton more comin.

Lovely shot of Big Ben with Westminster Abbey in the background. Classic London!

This is my sing team! We are called The Mustard Seeds. We like to laugh. From left to right it's me, Jordan (went to London with me), Lisi (room mate from Austria), Peter (Kenya), Jenessa (Canada), and Caroline (Kenya).
This is my friend Audrey. Laying in the backyard. All the girls used to do this in clusters back when it was warm enough to be outside for extended periods of time without several layers and extensive physical activity. Super fun.
This is where I do all of my painting! It's actually supposed to be a tea room kitchenette, but I have sort of taken over and everyone just calls it the paint room now. I might have to clean up a little bit now though because they just installed sinks and counters and stuff so people might actually use the room more...bummer. The next pictures are all of paintings I have done since being at Bodenseehof. I probably won't make comments about any of them, but they are some of my favorites...

The Rest of London...

Ok. Sorry. Long time. Chord. Ugh. Still can't find. Borrow. *Sigh...

This is not in London. This is in my dorm. But I thought I looked like a rock star. Do I look any different from September?!

This is a nice little corner of Stansted Airport where our little gang spent the night. We all basically sprawled on the floor and on that bench. Not so comfortable, but VERY adventurous :-) From left to right, Aymee (Canada), Owen (Florida/France), Alex (Bellevue. Yes, WA), and Jordan (Minnesota).
We were about to cross the real live London Bridge and it got a little windy. Maybe I should go for a real mohawk next time... whaddya think Mom? ;-)

More with the London Bridge. Aymee, Alex, and I.

This is the kitchen of the little house we stayed in. Unfortunately, the hostel we had hoped for was out of rooms so they offered us some rooms in a house that they owned. It was being rennovated and pretty much in the ghetto of London, but it wasn't too bad. Pretty dirty, also not super comfortable, but again, VERY adventurous.

London, Part One

Tag! It seems as if I have temporarily (I repeat, TEMPORARILY!) lost my camera-computer-connector chord, so I am going to have to tell about and show pictures from my trip to London in a 3 or 4 part series. Hopefully by the time I have shared all the good pictures my travel buddies took, I will have found my chord and be able to share my own pictures :-)

So the picture featured above (wow. corny voice.) is me. Sitting on a HUGE statue. In Trafalgar Square. There is this giant tower thing in the middle, which you can see the base of in the background, and then these four identical lions positioned around it. At first I saw them from a distance and planned on climbing on their backs for a perfect picture pose, but it turns out that the back was just as tall as I am. That sort of put the caput on that plan, but this pose is a nice alternative :-)

There was an entire monument dedicated to the animals that have served in British wars. If you look close, you can kind of make out the words. I couldn't resist a picture ;-)

In Hyde Park (where the famous Peter Pan statue is!) there were TONS of birds gathering around the side of the river. We didn't have anything to feed them, but I was able to trick them into coming close. It was incredible how not-shy they were...a couple friends even touched them.

I was SUPER excited because we were sitting in Dominoe's Pizza, awaiting the arrival of our first real, thick-crusted, normal-sauced, extra-cheese pizza in almost 10 weeks!

Here I am with my friend Aymee from Canada standing in a real live authentic red British phone booth! It was kind of weird though because these things are ALL OVER the city, but I never once saw a person actually using one...hmm...perhaps they are more novelty-type items nowadays...

Sadly, all for now...but I will seach for more pictures on different cameras AND my own cable!

Tschüs!

!!!

I AM LEAVING FOR LONDON, ENGLAND IN 3 HOURS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Last week...this week...

Servüs!

Sorry, no recent (decent) pics to share, but I did just finish up a fairly busy (and fairly wonderful) week here at Bodenseehof. Every autumn Bodenseehof has a week of school-wide outreach where everyone in the school is basically put into teams (such as our sing teams and drama teams) and scattered all over Germany to put on English camps, youth group events, and evangelical programs and, well, this past week was it! I (along with my sing team, The Mustard Seeds...for the parable, hello!) was assigned to stick around school and help put on an English camp called 5 English Days. It was for students from the ages of 12-15 and was a nice break in the monotony of 7 straight weeks of lectures. We were able not only to tutor the kids in English, but also sing worship songs, give testimonies, share about Jesus and the Bible, and best of all simply make friends with them. We actually expect a bunch of the kids to show up for Bodenseehof events later in the year and since we are neighbors with a few of them we are planning on doing fun stuff in town with them like going out for ice cream and going to concerts (have any of you heard of Boss Hoss?!). Overall, it was a really great week, hopefully just as great for the kids as it was for all the staff.

AAAAANNNDDDDDDD...

THIS WEEK I AM GOING TO LONDON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I leave on Thursday evening with a few friends and will be there until Sunday evening. It will be a pretty quick trip, but we have all kinds of exciting things planned and it should be a very grand adventure...look for the pictures!

Bellinghamsters, you will never believe this!

So. Big news. Yesterday I woke up, looked out on my balcony, and IT WAS SNOWING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wow. Just had to get that one off my chest. And it's not like it was blizzarding or anything and nothing really stuck, but it was exciting to experience the lovely little flurries. Especially since I have never seen snow in October before. Hopefully this winter will be a doozy! :-)

And some MORE pictures...

This is Daniel! He is Swedish and he is the assistant cook. He is wonderful and makes me special vegetarian food on a daily basis. I love him!

Here I am sitting in the Honeycomb, which is what we call the 'cafe'...it is where students maintain their sugar levels as well as read, play games, do puzzles, just hang out...y'know. It's the happenin' place.

Artistic picture (by Owen) of me on the job...

More pictures...

Here I am with 2 of my 3 roommates...on the left is Emily, who was born and raised as a missionary kid in Kobe, Japan...in the middle is Lisi, one of two Austrians at Bodenseehof as students this year. We took a series of Crazy-At-Neuschwanstein pictures but this was definitely my favorite.

I said 'Nice picture' and this is what they gave me. Thanks guys. On the left is Owen and on the right is Alex, who actually lives in Bellevue. Poor him, I know ;-)

See what I mean about the eery fog effect?

Some more of the lovely fall colors...

Wow I'm a Procrastinator.

This is the front entrance of my beloved Bodenseehof...the entrance to the administration building, anyway. Technically the admin. and dorm buildings are one connected by a hallway, but whatev. :-) Once you go through these front doors there is a LOOOONG hallway and everthing sort of stems off of it (first office, then kitchen, then dining hall, then open lounge and bathrooms, then Honeycomb (cafe, which I work at!), then lecture hall, some storage rooms, and at the very end is the dorm building. I live on the third floor on the back side. I'll work on getting some more pictures of the building though.

The school has canoes and kayaks available for all the students to use so a group of us went out for a ride. Although the Bodensee is really super huge (WAY bigger than Lake Whatcom), it is really rather shallow until you get 50-75 meters out.

On the walk up the hill to Neuschwanstein we passed this little waterfall. I thought it was quite picturesque!

Even with all the fog, the castle was still pretty impressive. I didn't go inside this time, but still felt pretty small and insignificant standing next to it. The creepy, medieval castle effect was definitely enhanced by the cool, clammy whiteness as well ;-)

A little taste of the fall colors...through the fall fog :-)

Neuschwanstein...for the second time...

Hey there everyone! I just got back to school from our trip to Schloss Neuschwanstein! I went to the castle in July with GAPP, but it was still pretty cool to go back. The weather really didn't cooperate though. TOTAL fog. As in, when we hiked up to the suspension bridge where all of those magnificent postcard pictres are taken from, you couldn't even see 10 feet in front of you...oh well! It was still nice to be there with all my new Bodenseehof peeps and to be able to do some more hiking around than last time. Here are some more pictures...enjoy!

So actually they will be in the next couple of messages. Cause it's dinner time. And I'm hungry!!!!

Getting some feedback...

Hello All!

I am really ridiculously busy at the moment (essay due, reading assignments, knitting circle, German classes, working in the school's cafe, leading a sing team, y'know, the usual ;-) ) but I wanted to pose a question just really fast:

What do you guys want to know about me and me-living-in-Germany?!

There are all kinds of things I could post on here, but I don't want to post things that are just going to bore everyone out of their minds. So comment me back and ask questions! Give suggestions! Anything you guys want to know, just ask!

Tschüs!

Lorraine

Reminiscing

I was just going through all the random pictures left on my camera from this summer and found this one. It was taken on a camping trip that Hannah, Tanya, and I went on at the end of August and just made me smile. We were standing on the banks of the Skagit River, in Lyman, Washington (if you have never heard of this town, no worries. No one else has either!) and the sun was shining and we were all in really good moods and like was just grand.

To Hannah and Tanya: I hope you are smiling right now just like me :-)

More Photos...

We (Lorraine, Owen, Daniel, Audrey, Justine, Stephen) had just walked FOR AN HOUR to get into town...and then we collapsed in this lovely park. And Lorraine made exhausted faces.

A nice building on the promenade (if you think that is spelled wrong, that's because it's in German)...right along the edge of the Bodensee.

In town (Friedrichshafen) there is this tall observation tower that goes out over the water and lets you look at all of Friedrichshafen and across the lake into Austria and Switzerland. Yesterday when a group of friends and I walked (FOR AN HOUR!!!) into town we climbed up to the top and got this lovely view, stretching from Friedrichshafen, which is the main large town, and down the coast to Fischbach, the smaller town where my school is.

On Friday night, we had what was called 'International Night.' Each country had to somehow represent itself and do some sort of presentation for the rest of the students and staff. The Americans decided to make a movie joking around with all the stereotypes of each individual state. I'll see if I can get a copy of the whole thing to post here. Anyway, these guys (left to right, Owen, Daniel, and Eric) were representing Texas (even though Daniel is the only one actually from Texas). Let's just say, it was a hysterical movie clip involving Texas-hick accents, oversized bellies, and the stars and stripes being replaced with 'ONE BIIIIIIG STAR RIGHT IN THE CENTER!!!'

This is one of my three roommates, Lisi. Sie kommt aus Österreich (She comes from Austria). I kind of caught her off guard :-)

Message to Dad: Check your email!!!

A Couple of Pictures...

So on Saturday I went on an AMAZING hike in the Swiss Alps with all my new buddies...and we saw amazing sites like this. Seriously though, absolutely no picture in the world could really and truly convey the absolute wonder and awe of the place we were...

Again, amazing views...this is looking out over Switzerland in the direction of Germany.

The further into the mountains we hiked, the more intense everything became...and this one was only about half way through the hike. It took us about 3.5 hours to get all the way to the top and about 3 back down...

This is my bunk...complete with my perfect quilt!

P.S. Next weekend our group is all going on another outing to Schloss Neuschwanstein...even though I went there in July, it will be really cool to see again. AND we are hiking up into the mountains around the castle to get some aerial views...and some postcard-esque pictures!

P.P.S. If any of you out there are blog-deficient, but have email, you can shoot me a message at:

fast.lorraine@gmail.com

Hausaufgaben 101

One word: Hausaufgaben.

Translation: Homework.

I have officially been assigned AND completed my first homework. Super exciting, I know! :-)

Anyway. It was exciting because on Monday, 'normal' life at Bodenseehof began. Or, as normal as it can really be at this point considering we are all still getting to know each other and the rules and everything. The schedule was completely normal though. Here is how the average week day goes...

6:30-7 Wake up
7:30-8ish Breakfast
9-Noon Lectures (3), coffee breaks, etc.
12:30-1ish Lunch
1ish-5:45 Free time (supposed to be used not only for liesure, but also for homework)
5:45-6:30 Dinner
7:15-9 Lectures (2)
9-10:30ish Free time
10:30ish Bed time

So yes. I am going to be totally on this schedule before long. On weekends it's different obviously though. We have almost every single Saturday completely off and on Sunday we have a required church service in the morning with nicer meals (lunch and dinner) and usually some kind of service later in the evening.

So Bodenseehof is definitely a 100% full time kind of thing, but when you're here it really is the only way to go. You are all together all the time because the facilities triple as your school, home, and church. There is no running away. No hiding. No getting lost. No being left alone. No being overlooked.

Perfect and terrible at the same time...

Die Sonne sheint noch. -Sophie Scholl

I have good news!!! Today, the sun rose and started to shine and I can officially say that I am ready to shine with it. The past few days have been really hard for me what with being tired and sick and lonely and whatnot, but God has done a mighty work. I got out of bed this morning and did not feel tired, but refreshed. Was starving (this is a good sign, don't worry!), not indifferent about meals. Was chatty, not quiet and loner-ish. My adventurous and fulfilling life at Bibelschule (Bible school) in Germany has officially begun!

Back In the Saddle...

I arrived here at the school, but it was definitely a harder trip than it had to be. I almost missed my connect from Philly to München (ah! üäö!!!) and then when I got there, my luggage didn't. So I have been living without baggage for two days. Then I got on the S-Bahn to München Hauptbahnhof on an ICE train. Alone. I was impressed with myself, but rather lonely. Then I sat by some really nice old German men. When I got off to make it to my connect, however, I found out that my train was like, an hour late. So I asked someone (a German, who should have known the train system) which one to connect with and they told me the wrong one! Lame. So now I was in some weird little hodunk train station in Germany, already an hour and a half behind schedule and with no idea where to go. I asked another person then and they told me ANOTHER wrong train. Thanks dude. So I was on one late train, two wrong trains, and 2.5 hours late before I finally arrived in Lindau, the city where I was supposed to meet my new buddy Jennifer. Before I could get to the hotel, however I had to find a taxi in a deserted part of town with a freshly-dead cellphone. That was an adventure. Basically I just started walking and hopedHopedHOPED that I would run into someone who knew what they were talking about. Eventually I ran into a taxi man (slash car :-) ) but then the ride to the hotel costed more Euros than I actually had. I must have looked like I was about to die or something though because the driver said he would do it for whatever I had. Vielen dank Herr Taxidriver! So after a lovely taxi ride across town, I finally made it to Jennifer and our hotel. Gottseidank.

Today went much more smoothly though! I woke up nice and refreshed, ate a nice continental breakfast of German fare (bread, cheese, fruit), and showered! (After my 36-hour day, this was much-needed) Then we hopped on a taxi, a train, and a bus, and were picked up at the bushaltestelle (bus stop) by some Bodenseehof people! Yay!

I have officially been at school for 3 hours and am very comfortable, if only slightly tired. I am in a room with only 4 girls instead of 10 (woohoo! this will be VERY beneficial to Lorraine's sleep habits!) but have only met one of my roommates so far...her name is Elisabeth (Lizzy) and she is from Austria and she is lovely! We seem to get along really well so far...introverted, love to laugh, are dreading all the school work we are about to start...y'know...so so far everything is good!

I love you all and miss you too!!!!!!!

P.S. I'll post a picture or something as soon as I take one :-)

This is where the Germany blogs begin...if you are looking for pictures of my trip for the month of July, go to where the pictures start and work your way back up the page.

Another outing our group went on was to a place called Salzbergwerk. It was a salt mine and before we were allowed to go down inside the mine, everyone had to put on these ridiculously attractive jumpsuits :-) I must say, I felt like the 8th dwarf.

At another Biergarten, but this time near the salt mine where there was a very lovely little lake called Koenigsee.

Each year at the end of the school year, Ernst Mach holds what is called Sommerfest (Summer Fest) for all of the students and their families. There is music and dancing and all kinds of foods, drinks, and desserts and is pretty much just an all-around good time. We don't really do school things like this unless you count band barbecues or something...so I thought it was really fun! The highlight for me was that some German guys in my exchange group had formed a band and were allowed to play a set. I expected them to bust out something more traditionally German (techno, anyone?) but then they started playing and it was JACK JOHNSON!!! With a cute German accent!!!! Needless to say, it made my year.

More Sommerfest pictures...with my crazy Britt and Coleman friends :-)

Kathrin didn't tell me, but Sommerfest continued LATE into the night...CRAZY late into the night...emphasis on the crazy!

Laura, Laura, and I waiting at a bus stop before our tour of Munich...

A rather famous location in Munich called Karlsplatz...all of the really famous places in the city are kind of right next to each other so you can walk between them all...the historic district, the main shopping place, the food market, everything. It's my favorite part of the city!

LoveloveLOVE this picture. Another one of the famous Muenchen Loewen (Munich Lions), this guy is one of two standing guard over a major historic Stadttor (City gate)...the eyes get me every time.

We had kind of bad luck with rain, but it was ok cause this time I was prepared with my umbrella!

The entire group (Deutsche und Amis...Germans and Americans) went on an outing to Schloss Neuschwanstein, Neuschwanstein Castle. If you don't quite recognize that name, it is the castle that Walt Disney modeled his fairytale castle from. Even with the lousy weather, it was still really crazy to see. Inside it was even more dramatic and glamorous because Koenig Ludwig (King Ludwig), the builder and primary inhabitant of the castle, was extremely eccentric and was actually even insane. (No really. Clinically insane.) He had FAR too much money to know what to do with and went all out on the castle...crazy art, huge tapestries, ornate carvings, with jewel tones throughout. Whoa.