YA: Hi Ho, It's Off To Work I Go!

I knew this whole Germany thing would pick up as soon as I started work. Knew it, knew it, knew it!

I’m only three days in, but I’m really enjoying this job. Everyone at Heinrich-Heine is so lovely: the teachers, the pupils, the secretaries, everyone. I’ve seldom had a welcome like it (staff room announcement followed by the German version of the round of applause ie. banging your knuckles on the table) and all are being extremely patient with my stilted German. I’m in the process of making friends with a German girl from Bochum who’s on work experience before she goes back to uni and today, after a Klasse 5 lesson that I had sat in on, the tiniest girl came up to me to say “I wish to you a lovely rest of today!”. It was so cute I nearly died.

My first day was something of a whirl. First of all, despite a reconnaissance mission the day before to locate the school, I still managed to get lost on my way there. Fortunately, I was only a couple of minutes late, but I must have looked somewhat of a sweaty and bedraggled state when I arrived, wheezing, at the gates.  Once I’d got my breath back, I was launched straight into a meeting with the Headteacher, a nice jovial man who chatted to me about Duisburg and the Studentenwohnheim and how I was settling in. After that, I got the grand tour of the building and was introduced to so many different teachers that their faces and names are a blur. As the day trundled on, I was informed about the Stundenplan and the coffee machine and handed my very own set of keys to the classrooms and staff room. I was also told in very-rapid German detail (and then again in English when I was discovered to be engulfed in bafflement) that I am to be tutoring the Cambridge English Exam groups, so no pressure there then. In addition, I also sat in on two classes, a Klasse 9 group and a Oberstufe bilingual history class where, even though I do history, I was lost in the discussion of the advent of modern democracy and could only really offer my input on source analysis. By the time I got home at five, I was knackered.

Because I hadn’t had to arrive until 10 o’ clock on my introductory day, I was vastly unprepared for the chronically horrible 5am wake up that occurred the next morning. I didn’t actually have to start until 8.15, but a 30 minute walk to the Hauptbahnhof, a 5-10 minutes train ride and then another 10 minute walk on arrival in Oberhausen are a substantial commute, though I have subsequently discovered that I can get a later train which will get me in on time, allowing me to sleep to the vastly later time of 5.30. Whoopee. I am going to have to train my body clock into these early starts because at the moment I’m crashing out at midday.

Anyway, blurry-eyed and messy-haired, I made it in. What followed was an immensely enjoyable day of mostly working with Klasse 6. Klasse 6 have been learning English for a good year (not counting whatever they learnt in the Grundschule) so they’re doing interesting subjects whilst still being young enough to have retained their youthful exuberance. I did confuse some poor kid by trying him to get to join two clauses with “but”, however other than that the day went very smoothly, and I made a mental note to try and have at least two Klasse 6 groups in my regular Studenplan when I eventually get round to writing it. Even the hour long wait outside the Studentenwerk just to hand in my Miete-Formular didn’t put a damper on my mood.

And my good mood has continued to today. I met the worst class in the school (apparently) and they’re still much nicer than my old Year 8 Curriculum Group at Secondary School, so that’s a win for Deutschland. I learnt the alphabet with Klasse 5 and we played “You Hear, You Say”. The sun has been shining, I found soy sauce in Kaufland, I’ve had a delivery of some beautiful flowers and I cooked a magnificent stir-fry, even if I do say so myself. I'm seeing people tomorrow and Saturday, and I'm just about to book a flight home for the Herbstferien.Yeah I'd have to say,that today, sat in my newly bloom-adorned room, life is looking good.