I guess this is a good way to tell about my struggles and achievements as an Erasmus student to those of you who are interested in knowing what´s happening in my life.

čtvrtek 30. července 2015

- I passed all of my exams!!! (I am awesome.)
- Room cleaned, windows washed, garbage taken out. First suitcase closed. The second one probably never will be.
- The weirdest things got left in my fridge --> tonights special: spinach, an egg, a piece of cheese and two pickles.
- Last night (~last goodbye party).

- Time to go home.

středa 22. července 2015

- Aufsatz & Konversation (作文と会話) --> passed!!! (grade: 1,7 :-D )
- succesfully (finally) de-registered from the City of Bochum
- picked up the certificates for my German language courses
  ...Catch-22: I need someone to put the credit points for these courses also in the system. (WHY just WHY don´t they do it automatically when so many people need it.) The teachers told me to ask at the administration office. At the administration office they told me to ask the teachers. (One of them has already gone on vacation for three weeks.)

UPDATE: One of the teachers answered my e-mail: I need to contact Mrs XX who´s in charge of that. So I did. Guess what... She´s on vacation until August 10.

On the plus side, I am not afraid of sending e-mails in German anymore.

(9 days)

pondělí 20. července 2015

- last lunch with my campus group. goodbyes with the nicest and most caring campus guides Joana, who´s going to Japan next semester and Bettina, who´s going to Korea for a year.
- last tandem session with Sayo, my best Japanese friend.


- first two japanese exams done. results by Friday. (fingers crossed!)
--> last (and the most difficult) step: Japanische Übungen (文法演習 - JCčka) and Japanische Syntax (統語論) on Saturday, wish me luck.

I definitely cannot say that I understand everything we learned in this Syntax class (yet). And it is kind of a bummer that RUB is the only university which uses this textbook and approach by Rickmeyer. BUT it looks like one of the very few approaches which could actually be applicable to Japanese grammar and work and make sense (!!). And that is REALLY cool. Maybe it will become a big thing one day.

11 days.

pátek 17. července 2015

- Awww yesss!! Feste und Feiern in Japan --> passed. (with an A!)
- Last school day in Germany. Ever.
- Remember when I wrote about my first day? How the caretaker went on holiday the week when all the students were coming to move in? Well, he´s done it again. We are supposed to set up a meeting with him about 10 days in advance so that he can inspect our rooms on the day we move out. But he´s on vacation since last week until next Wednesday - the middle of the week when everyone has to move out.
- The German language courses end this week as well as all the other regular ones. All the students (several hundreds) need to get a certificate which proves that they got the credit points. The person who is supposed to sign them all took vacation during the last week of the classes. --> every single student has to go the the secretariat next week to pick it up. (Plus the U-Bahn won´t work the whole next week so I don´t really know how I´ll get there.)
- Two weeks!

čtvrtek 16. července 2015

- Can I use a German-Czech dictionary during the exam?
- Haha, no.
- But it is a German-Czech dictionary. It has nothing to do with Japanese.
- No.

Thank you very much.

středa 15. července 2015

FOUR MONTHS.
- Last Sprachcafé, first goodbyes.
- "Feste und Feiern in Japan" exam over, results who knows when.
- Last kickbox training, I will miss that very much. I especially had a lot of fun with my fighting-partner Gönül. No one knows better than her how to motivate me to try harder.
- Planning a goodbye party so that we make sure that we have time to say goodbye to everyone.
- Next step: "Aufsatz & Konversation (作文と会話)" and "Textanalyse (読解)" - two exams in Japanese this Saturday.
- 15 days left, time to start to count down.

neděle 12. července 2015

trying to organize my study schedule and decide what to study first
- update on vocabulary:
(I know that it´s probably not interesting. But writing it down helps me remember these very useful words better.)

- vorangehen = vést průvod
- Papierfächer = vějíř
- Ernte = úroda
- Ahnen = ancestors
- Rachegottheiten = gods of vengeance = bohové pomsty
- rein = pure
- unrein = impure
- Hausalter = domácí oltářík
- Wesenheiten = beings, entities
- Tauziehen = tug war = přetahování
- Votivtäfelchen = modlitební destičky (?)
- Fluch = curse
- Segen = blessing


- thank -whoever is responsible for it- for wikipedia

kemari - traditional japanese football https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkzJSosn6Os

sobota 11. července 2015

- preparing for my Tuesday exam - Feste und Feiern in Japan
- my notes make perfect sense: "haramaki - traditional Kleidung, ale jinde jinak"
- new Vocabulary:

- Bestattungsfeierlichkeiten - funeral ceremonies
- Sonnenwende - solstice (slunovrat, I had to look that up in English too)
- Tagundnachtgleiche = equionx (rovnodennost) (sometimes I love German, it literally means day-and-night-the-same)
- Geisterwelt = spirit world
- Schrein = shrein = svatyně
- Tempel = temple = chrám (I never know what the difference is)
- Malvenblätter = hollyhocks (?) = listy proskurníku topolovky (?)
- Räucherwerk = incense = kadidlo

I have a little notebook where I write the words that I don´t understand during the day and then I look them up later. During the past months I repeatedly wrote down one word that I didn´t know and repeatedly kept crossing it out thinking I must have misheard.
- Verschleimung = mocouc congestion = zahlenění (I didn´t need this word.)
- Verschleifung = assimilation of voice = asimilace hlásek (I needed this one. Phonetics.)

pátek 10. července 2015

- German phonetics --> passed!

- Official international goodbye dinner is over.
(- Best part of the evening: Alejandro and Daniel were voted the best Erasmus couple.)



(I managed to sell my German texbook, yay!)

středa 8. července 2015

- successfuly signed up for all the classes I need next semester!! (for those who don´t know how it works in Olomouc - this is a big deal.)
- now I need to decide whether to drop Spanish, Korean or sleeping.
- German language course --> passed! It was the very very easiest exam from all the ones that I will have here but it is still a nice feeling to have my first four (!) credit points.

úterý 7. července 2015

Our university!

https://www.facebook.com/RuhrUniBochum/videos/866145106755401/?pnref=story

pondělí 6. července 2015

- first two (easiest) exams over, now let´s hope that successfuly
- next step: german phonetics on Friday!
- international goodbye party this Thursday. how crazy that we should start saying bye already.

neděle 5. července 2015


- Preparing for the tomorrow´s American literature exam:

A man said to the universe:
“Sir, I exist!"
“However,” replied the universe,
“The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation.”


(STORM. Finally able to breath again!)

pátek 3. července 2015

- Presentation in my Japanese conversation class is successfuly over, yay!
- First two exams on Monday, wish me luck.
- HOT.