It's almost there!

Christmas (Eve) is only one night away!! :) It's amazing how fast these last days went by!

I've had a great time celebrating my 21st birthday. On Friday morning I was still in Chemnitz where I invited my friends for a birthday brunch - which went from 10:30 am to 2 pm and was awesome! :) On Saturday I was home and celebrated with my family and some friends who I invited in the evening. I liked it a lot!
Yesterday and today I did some stuff for school (well, for NMUN actually), and so that passed by very quickly too.

A few hours ago my mum and I have decorated our Christmas tree. And tomorrow'll be the big day :)
In the morning I will go ice skating with my best friend Anne, her sister and her grandad, that's been a tradition for a long time. In the afternoon we will go to church, and then in the evening, maybe, there'll be some presents giving and receiving :)
It'll be weird this year because my grand parents who are usually with us for Xmas are on vacation this year - so it'll just be the four of us plus Sascha.

Here are some impressions of Christmas decoration in Germany:

These are only typical in the Vogtland area where we live.

I got this for my birthday from my grand parents.

Gettin' ready for Christmas

The year's about to close... I'm in my last week of school for this year! :)
There has been a lot of work lately, but this week will not be as bad. There'll be some Christmas presents crafting and cards writing which I'm very much looking forward to!
On Friday I will go home and spent Christmas with my familiy, before going on skiing vacation to Austria with many friends during the New Year's week! :)

Can't wait for all that!

A few impressions of Advent in Chemnitz:

Having a great get together Friday night in our kitchen - with Christmas cookies, oranges, tea and the typical German Christmas drink "Glühwein" which is spiced hot red wine.

Typical German decoration in my window (actually these light arches are only very typical in the area I'm living) - this is my Xmas present from my grandparents which I got earlier so I can use it during Advent season.

Typical American decoration :)
(unfortunately I don't have a fire place but it looks good at the door, too!)

Snow!

Hello everyone - Winter's here!

On Friday it started to snow - and it hasn't stopped since! Well, it's not very much snow, about 1-2 inches, but still it looks nice and white :)
The best thing is that it has't gotten above freezing point yet, so it's not all wet and muddy.

There is this thing I have to show you! Somewhere in Chemnitz they are building a garage (repair shop) and next to it a Subway restaurant. In Germany when there is a building site there always is a sign in front of it stating what is being built - and that's what I found:

Isn't that funny? It's so terrible with all the English in the German language - and they are not even capable of a correct spelling!

National Model United Nations (1)

Have you ever heard of it?

NMUN is the world's biggest simulation of the United Nations. It takes place each Spring, when about 4 000 college students from all over the world meet in NYC for a week to become "diplomats" representing "their" country in the world organization.

My university, Chemnitz University of Technology, has taken part in NMUN since 2004. And there is a Delegation 2009 - and I am in it!!

When I heard about the project in summer I was really excited - just imagine all the experieces one can get by participating! I applied, and after an interview and stuff, I was one of the 11 students of this year's delegation!! I was so happy!

And this is how it works: (because it's not just great experience and everything, it's also a lot of work!)
Each delegation represents one country in the conference. But not their own - as you can imagine! In July we came up with a list of countries we would like to represent: 1st choice Israel, 2nd South Africa and 3rd Iceland. We mailed that list to the NMUN head quarters in NYC where the country assignment takes place. We received answer on Nov 1 (not that long ago yet) - and now we know: We will become ambassadors for the country of Israel!
And this is the time now, where the real work will start: We have two important things to do:
1st: We have to get to know how the UN and the committees we will be in work, we've got to learn how you have to "behave" (saying things like honorable chair, or fellow delegates etc.) and how to write resolutions. (Of course this will all be in English, so that's just another challenge - even though that won't be that difficult.)
And 2nd: We have to plunge into information about Israel: In April we have to know basicly everything about our country - history, politics, culture,........
I am not exactly sure how that will work in practice, by I will keep you updated as soon as I know!

In December we will then take part in a "practice simulation" in Germany to get to know what it will be like in NY (even though the conference in NY will be much much bigger!).

Somewhere around Christmas we will have to write so-called Position Papers, which state Israel's opinion on the various topic's we will discuss in the conference. So these are the position we will be defending in NY.

And finally: The NMUN-conference in New York City.
The conference will be held April 5-9. The opening and closing ceremony will be in the General Assembly Hall at the UN headquarters!! (Last year the students were greeted by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, but we don't knwo if we will be that lucky, too.) The simulation itself will then be at the Sheraton Hotel.

Oh my gosh, that will all be so exciting!!
I hope we can cope with all the work and will do well!
I will keep you updated on it, as soon as we have some photos I will upload them too!

(And those of you who are capable of the German language can also visit my other blog anika-goes-uno.blogspot.com which I have devoted to the NMUN project.)

Back in Chemnitz

I am finally back in Chemnitz! "Summer" break is far too long here in Germany - at least for my liking. But school will start again tomorrow, finally! :)

I have moved into a new shared appartment! We are 4 students who each have our own room and we share a kitchen, the bath room and even a balkony :) It's great because I am living together with a good friend from college now!
I was looking forward to moving because it meant buying furniture and making my room nice and everything :) My parents and Sascha helped me a great deal with that, I am very thankful! Otherwise it hadn't become so nice so quickly!
Here are some impressions:

Looking into the Room.


At the left side: my very nice biiig desk and my bed.


To the right: Cupboard and stuff.


My bed and many photos (by now there're even more!) :)


View from the other end of the room.

I have met many of my college friends already and we are all glad being together again! I hope it will be a good semester, but I'm pretty sure it will! ;)

If I don’t forget I will post some pictures of Chemnitz and my university. It's very neat at the moment – fall's coloring all the foliage – very beautiful! (If the sun is shining - which she was all weekend!) I had a friend from home visiting me this weekend and we took long walks out in the parks, it was very very nice!

Vacation in Austria

Sascha and I have spent 7 wonderful days in the Austrian Alps.
When we were younger, both of us went on hiking vacations with our families. At some point that hadn't been interesting to us anymore. So it has been quite some time that we haven't been in the "Mountains" (except for skiing vacations) and we thought it would be great going there again.
And it was! :)
Unfortunately the weather was not our best friend, but we have made the best out of every day! Enjoy a few pictures of our vacation:

We have rented a little appartment for a week.

Great breakfast every morning :) (Note the bunch of flowers - Sascha gave it to me!)

That was how the weather was for the first 3 days: no sun at all, a little rainy almost all the time, and clouds hanging very low so that we couldn't even see the mountains!

Meeting cows along the way...

... and even more ;)

Some impressions of a typical Austrian village:


Yeah - on our 2nd day there was snow down to an altitude of 4600 ft (we lived at 3950 ft)!

We went to Bischofshofen to see a big ski jump - it was fascinating!

Sitting at the start - it was very high!

And that was only at the right (!!) one!
Oh my gosh, I could never go down there!

Another day... still snow... but we still went hiking!
Here: Anika in Winterwonderland! :)

The sun was missing... we still had fun! :)

I have never before built a snow man at 6500 ft!

The next morning... I woke up and there was NO CLOUD at the sky, I could actually see the outline of the Alps!!

Well, not exactly as it is supposed to look at this time of the year, but still amazing!



Hiking in fresh snow.



Beautiful!

We made it to our first peak!
(Were we met an Austrian guide who was with an British guide book writer - very cool!)

Marvelous view!

Relaxing and enjoying the view.

Our last morning: clouds in the valley, but not up at the mountains!

These summit crosses are great, they represent the achievement of having reached the peak!

That way, that's were we need to go!


Clambering up to our last peak...

We've made it!

That's a nice spot for our lunch break :)

That's were we came from.


Well, much too soon our week of vacation went by and we had to head back home... but it has been a wonderful time and we may go back to another hiking vacation next summer!