7/13/11 Freiburg, Germany and meet my host family!

Today we left our hotel in the Black Forest and drove to Freiburg, Germany.  We took part in an unusual service project there.  We cleaned really old tombstones in a graveyard.  We worked for about 2 hours.  They made us wear these baseball hats that really made my hair bulge.  Cleaning headstones was kind of weird, but I enjoyed it.  My friend, Savannah, and I cleaned 4 headstones.  This is the first one.  It was for a boy who died in the late 1600's to early 1700's (I can't remember exactly).  Savannah took these pictures because I forgot my camera.

   

We used brushes and a teeny tiny bit of water.  We were told that too much water could ruin them.  I don't think that makes a lot of sense since it rains there, but I followed the directions!  Savannah and I also cleaned three more graves during our 2 hours there, a wooden cross, a girl with a pot, and a stone cross with roses.  Our local service project leader showed us a tombstone of a sixteen year old girl who died of tuberculosis.  It is well know about and written about in local print, but not very many people know it's exact location. 

We had lunch after that. I don't remember what it was though.

After lunch we got on the road and headed to Ulm, Germany to meet our host families.  It was a long bus ride and we were three hours late meeting our families because of traffic.  We arrived in Ulm about 10 pm and it was pouring rain.  I was paired with Sulvanna.  The dad, Harald, and daughter, Annika, were waiting to greet us.

Annika is on the left in this picture that Mrs. Bluhm took.

It only took 5-10 minutes to get to their house.  Once we got there I met the mom, Dagmar, and the son, Leonard.  Dagmar asked us if we wanted to shower, and we did.  Right after the shower we had dinner.  Dagmar made a pancake in chicken broth with noodles.  It was yummy!  Dagmar also asked us if she could do our laundry.  That was a big relief since I hadn't done any laundry yet and wasn't looking forward to hand washing my clothes in a hotel room!  I gave everyone their gifts that I had brought from home.  My mom had sent a picture book of Seattle and a glass trivet with a Native American sun that was made by a local friend of our family.  I brought silly bands and teen magazines for the kids.  Guess what?  They have silly bands in Germany!  Annika and Leonard liked the magazines though, and I saved the best gift for the next day.  We went to bed.  Sulvanna and I slept in Annika's room and she slept in the guest room.   I was very nervous about my home stay, but I was relieved once I met them.  The were very nice, generous, and welcoming.  More about them and pictures of their house to come.