What? Arse-Monkey Castle?

That's right. You read that right. I was in Germany on an exchange, and it was great, and tiring, and great, and freezing. Oh, and did I mention that it was great? :)

Anyhoo, I'm back now, and I'm posting on a Sunday (yet again) and I will tell you all about the exchange. Those who are reading this and went on the exchange with me will know what I'm babbling about. If the title confuses you, keep on reading.

Saturday- Absolutely knackering. We had to be at the bus stop in school for 4:30. Then we drove for four hours to Dover. We took a ferry to Calais and drove through France, Belgium and half of Germany. We arrived some time in the evening, and for dinner we had Italian takeaway which was superbly yummy.

Sunday- Woke up at 9 in the morning, got washed and dressed and had some breakfast. My exchange person's sister had an exchange partner too, (a girl called Heli for short was my exchange partner) so Heli's sister, brother, Amy (the sister's exchange partner) and me took the dogs out for a walk.
Meanwhile, Heli was helping out at a smaller Christmas Market so we went there for lunch and looked around and had food. Good food.
Then we visited Heli's grandparents and went out for dinner. Italian, incidentally. :P

Monday- I went to Heli's first lesson with her, which was music. They were learning about Pink. It was really interesting. Then for the next lesson, the non-Germans went on a tour of the school. The lady recommended that we didn't use the school loos, saying that they were a bit... well. Nasty. It was break after that, and we had an assembly which told us about the different workshops and the teachers taking part. I picked drama, and everyone dispersed to the workshops.
We spent the first day playing icebreaker games, like Budge and Murder in the Dark. It was very funny. This year there were 28 people in the drama workshop, more than ever. And Dance which was one of the most popular usually only had 7 people. xD

Tuesday- More workshops, and we found out that we were doing a modernized version of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. It was to be presented as a TV show. I got the part of one of the four TV hosts. We started to work out the scenes, and rehearsed and rehearsed.

Wednesday- Oh, that was a gooood day. We spent the morning rehearsing, and after lunch we went swimming. For those who don't know, in Germany the swimming pools have epic slides and all sorts of cool things. The one we went to had 3 slides, 2 outdoor pools, a sauna, a jacuzzi and a lazy river. Really awesome. Don't worry, the outdoor pools were heated, but it was really weird because it was snowy outside, and your were warm and cold. Some people ran from one outdoor pool to the other in their swimsuits. There were snowball fights too. The slides are just epic, one was completely dark and there were lights. One the other you had to sit on a rubber ring, and you'd go super fast. :D
On the way home, one of the teachers made an announcement (with the aid of a microphone) about the trip on Friday. We weren't going to Frankfurt, because of the terrorism warnings. We were going to Aschaffenburg. But  sir didn't know the name of the place, and asked the German teacher what it was called, and she said it slowly and he said;
"So, we're going to... where? Arse-monkey Castle? What?" The bus' passengers were in stitches. (Arse in German is Arsch, and monkey is affen. Castle is burg, and that's why. :p )

Thursday- The day of the performance. We did a dress rehearsal and went home at lunch. Heli and I visited a friend of hers who had two exchange partners. An English girl and a French boy. We walked there, which was alright at first, but her dog had run away so we spent an hour and a half looking for it. But someone found the dog in the end, and we had pasta for lunch and spent a while there talking and having fun.

Friday- We went to Arse-Monkey Castle to go ice skating. I tried it, and hated it, despite my friends trying to encourage me.
Then we went to the awesome massive Christmas Market, and went shopping. I loved it so much. It was really cold, and it was really beautiful.
Afterwards, I went bowling with Heli and some other people. It was awesome.

Saturday- We had to be at the bus stop at 6:30, and there were lots of hugs and goodbyes. And we took the exhausting journey home, but we arrived two hours earlier than we should have done which was nice. And now I'm back home. I do miss the exchangers a bit. But it was so much fun. I recommend exchanges to anyone. They are awesome.

It's nice to be back home!
xx