Experiences In Germany by David Kerscher

The things about Germany that impress me the most are your accomodations for the pedestrian and your concern for the environment. Every city is designed around public transportation. Traintracks, bike paths, and “Fußgängerzonen” are everywhere. I think that America needs to adopt this. Also, your concern for the environment is evident in everything that you do. The fuel-efficiency of your cars, the size of your cars, and the windmills scattered across the countryside, are all little things that make a big difference.

Report by Christine Stock and Ben Ruff

When we were in America, we went to Niagara Falls. We arrived in the evening so it was hard to see the sights then so we went the next day. It was very nice to see and experience this. At night, they had different color lights illuminating the Falls. We visited the shops and bought souvenirs.

When we were in Germany we went to Holland one day. There was a big beach and we were swimming in the North Sea. It was very cold so we didn't stay in the water so long. We visited the shops and bought some souvenirs.

It is a lot different in Germany when it comes to parties. There is a bigger opportunity to go to them here and you can drink. This is different in America because one isn't allowed to drink until 21.

Meine Deutschlandreise von Greg Wilkowski

 Deutschland war eine sehr tolle Erfahrung. Es gab viele Höhepunkte während der Reise. Unsere Ausflüge nach Köln und Aachen waren die besten, besonders die Dome [Köln / Aachen] dort. Ich finde es interessant, dass es viel Geschichte in allen Orten gibt, egal ob es sich um ein kleines Dorf oder eine Großstadt handelt. Auch habe ich das selbstgemachte Essen in meiner Gastfamilie genossen.
Ich bin sehr dankbar, dass wir uns mit einer sehr netten Gruppe austauschen konnten. Ich bemerkte, dass das deutsche Schulsystem sich sehr vom amerikanischen unterscheidet. Ich bin der Meinung, dass es sehr viel besser funktioniert als das in manchen amerikanischen Schulen. Dass in allen Kursen, anders als in US-Schulen, Diskussionen laufen, hat mir zugesagt.

Meine Reise nach Deutschland                     Frank Chenetski

Viele Dinge in Deutschland waren fremd für mich und meinen amerikanischen „Way of Life“. Das Unterschiedlichste  war der Alkohol. In Amerika muss man 21 Jahre alt sein, um Alkohol kaufen zu können, in Deutschland nur 16.Ein anderer Unterschied war das Mineralwasser. Wir sind es nicht gewohnt Wasser mit Kohlensäure zu trinken.

Und der letzte Unterschied war wirklich fremd für uns: Die Spritpreise! In Amerika kostet eine Gallone 1,20 € (Eine Gallone = 4 Liter), in Deutschland ein Liter 1,05 €. Das heißt eine Gallone kostet 5$!

Trotz alldem sind die Deutschen nicht allzu verschieden von den Amerikanern. Meine Reise nach Deutschland war eine Erfahrung für mein Leben und ich werde mich immer daran erinnern.

Unser Austauschprogramm in Deutschland und den USA  Michael Alek

Nicht zu viele Leute haben die Gelegenheit, in einem anderen Land zu wohnen. Aber für drei Wochen wohnten zehn Amerikaner und zehn Deutsche bei einem Austauschpartner, zuerst in Amerika, dann in Deutschland. Wir haben jeden Tag die Schule besucht, viele neue Leute kennen gelernt und jetzt können wir Deutsch und Englisch viel besser verstehen und sprechen. Wir kennen die Kultur von einander auch viel besser. In Deutschland sind die Autos, die Häuser und die Straßen viel kleiner als in Amerika. Deutsche und Amerikaner glauben aber, dass Deutschland viel mehr Geschichte als Amerika hat. Jülich ist 2000 Jahre alt, aber Toledo ist nur 200 Jahre alt.

Experiences in America von Christian Meeßen

American lifestyle is completeley different than life here in Germany. Almost every familiy has got 2 or more cars. You use them all day and it's normal to go for 2 or more hours in a car just to meet some friends for one day. Besides the fuel is much cheeper than in Germany (1,2 Euros for 3.8 liters). The school is also very different because you don't have a separate chair and table: in America, the chair and table are connected.

The people are very proud of the USA and a lot of them have small signs next to their houses with words like "We support Bush and our troops" and "Pray for our troops". Also I saw more American flags in 3 weeks than German flags in my whole life.

Trip to Chicago (by David Jansen)

 During spring break I made a trip to Chicago for three days together with my host family.

We left Toledo early on a Wednesday morning. On our way to Chicago we had to pay  for driving on the highway about five times, which cost between 0,50$ and 2$ and which I found quite unusual.

We could already see the impressive skyline when we were some miles away from the city. The most conspicuous building was the Sears Tower, the tallest building in Chicago. But the skyline looked even more imposing while we drove or walked through downtown of “The Windy City“.

Driving between the towers was like driving through a tunnel. First of all we went up the Sears Tower. From the 100^th floor we had a great view over the city of Chicago. We could see four different  US states. From high up we could see very clearly that all the high buildings were in the same part of the city. Besides we could see Lake Michigan, which was too big to see the other side. 

Another interesting sight was the Museum of Science and Industry. This museum was a huge museum with a lot of topics, for example agriculture, diseases and a big model landscape with trains. Moreover it was very interesting because we did not have to concentrate on information boards but we could do some hands-on activities or solve some riddles. The time in the museum went by quickly although I am usually not much interested in science and industry.

Silke Reinartz -  Report

The experiences I made in America were very good. First of all, my host family in Toledo was very friendly to me. Chris, my exchange student and I had a lot of fun and we got on very well. So I had a great time in Toledo.

At our American partner school, St. Ursula Academy, I met very nice girls and now we are friends. To my mind, discipline in the lessons I attended  isn't so strict as at the German schools I know. Sometimes the lessons were very funny,  especially the German lessons.

I went on many nice excursions with my family, but the highlight was the journey to Chicago. My family, I, my classmate Nina and her exchange student  Jo spent  3 days in Chicago. I was suprised because Chicago is such a fantastic city. In this city I had a completely different feeling because of the special metropolitan atmosphere. The skyline of Chicago was great, especially at night. In the city centre was a very big park with fountains and colourful flower beds. It was nice to see Chcago with its great buildings, people and various objects of interest.

After this short journey I stayed in Toledo for one more week. In this week I went shopping, met friends and  went to school.

My trip to America by Nicole Griesche

When you look at a typical American day, you see that it is really different from a typical German day.

First most Americans don’t eat breakfast. Then your sixteen-year-old exchange partner drives you to school and everyone in school wears a school uniform. In the middle of the school day you have a break where you can eat lunch in the cafeteria.  When school is over at 3:00pm the free time starts. Mostly you only stay out until 11:00pm, because the shops stay open that long.  All the time you meet very friendly people, more friendly than in Germany. So you have a nice time on trips to baseball or football games.

I was really suprised  when I saw the houses which look like they are stolen out of a fairy tale. One reason why they can build houses like that could be that they have much more space.  Another thing which I remember is that American university buildings look like our churches [see image of University Hall at the University of Toledo].

Other big differences can be found when comparing the school systems.

In America you go to an elementary school for eight years. After that you become a freshman in a high school. After four years you can go to a university or college. Some people start work after school.

If you are allowed to go to a university or college is decided in a test which you have to take in the third and fourth years at high school.

Erfahrungen in Deutschland  Sean Parmelee

 Das Familienleben in Deutschland ähnelt dem amerikanischen sehr. In Deutschland ist das wichtigste Essen zur Mittagszeit nach der Schule, in Amerika essen wir hauptsächlich abends. Außerdem dauert die Schule nicht so lange wie bei uns.

Aber vor allem liebe ich das deutsche Bier. Hier darf ich schon mit sechzehn trinken und dabei schmeckt es noch besser als in Amerika.

My experiences in America by Maren Hochhaus

My trip to Toledo

Having arrived at Detroit-INTL, I was surprised of the height of Zack Hohl, my  exchange partner. I've been to America a couple of times before, but this trip wasdefinitley the best one.
Staying with the two families was fun. I spent the first two weeks at Zack's Dad's house. After 5 school days, spring break has started and we (Zack, his family and me) drove down to Florida. We stayed there for a week. My favorite activity down there was swimming and sightseeing. After spring break, I "moved" to the house of Zack's mom. Both of us had much fun. Unfortunately,  we had to get back to school, but it was kind of fun, too.

My favorite period was the German lesson with Mr. Schulte. The American history lesson was fun, too, even though everybody was sleeping. On some days we (all the German exchange students) went to downtown Toledo. It was exciting to walk through the "city center" and also to visit the main brach of the library.

Considering all those good experiences, I would immediately redo an exchange trip like this one. Especially with our chaperon Mr. Brodeck.

My trip to Toledo, Ohio, was a really great experience for me. I was impressed by the wideness of the country:

Distances are so huge in America!

In contrast to Germany, people often eat in restaurants, but Toledo is the city of restaurants as I heard, and some foods taste very good - especially Mountain Dew and Pop-tarts. I think I could eat tons of them.

The houses in Toledo are very different from German houses, and I find them nicer than most German houses. Often the houses have columns in front and are made of  wood. I found the university building strange, because it’s only about 100 years old, but it looked like an Irish castle from the Middle Ages.

In contrast to Germany there are three sports as popular as soccer: first of all basketball, which I played almost everyday with my host-student (I noticed nearly every family has a basket), next there are baseball and American football. The sport with the most difficult rules is baseball, I think, because after one (or two?) hours of watching a baseball game of the Mud Hens I still didn’t understand any of the rules.

The thing I’m still angry about is that I nearly got a “foul ball” (a ball which doesn’t reach its  target and flies to the stand). I saw the ball flying and I thought: Even if it comes down near me it will bounce up high, because it’s so fast.  But the ball hit a chair without bouncing. It was only 2 meters away from me, but I reacted 2 seconds too late, because in these 2 seconds a man had stood up and had taken the ball.

School was very different from school in Germany. The most important point for me was that the students there have  the same classes every day. I think if you are a guest-student that’s an advantage, because after one day you know where you’ve to go, but if I had stayed for longer time, I think that schedule would have been very boring. Apart from that I think there is a disadvantage, because you can only take 6 classes (in comparison to Germany where you’ve 10 – 12 different classes). The school days are  much longer than in Germany, too (they finish at 14.45) and the students have lunch there (it took me  2 weeks to understand that there are 3 different lunch shifts.  I always wondered how all 700  students can fit into such a small hall).