Wednesday, May 27th 2009 – The Grand Great Gatsby Gala

Last Wednesday our English classroom at Lafayette was transformed into a 1920s party ground and we celebrated the end of the school year – and our final project – with a truly grand party in honor of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s modern classic: “The Great Gatsby”. To read more about the Great Gatsby click here – just this much should be said here: it is a wonderful novel and absolute must for anyone who wants to experience the essence of American literature.

As any fashionable and good 1920s party should our party offered an entire buffet of food, some of it straight adopted from the 1920s. We also had high end entertainment with several shows, plays, silent movies and of course dancing lessons.

But enough of talking, just go ahead and turn back the time yourself to see, hear and feel the “Roaring Twenties”. 

Our servers - all dressed in classic black and white...

... and our buffet, with Coca Cola and original Dirt Cake - 1920s speciality that tastes way better than the name would suggest.

The first performance of the day: a very humorous and poetical summary of the novel.

Next my group performed a reenactment of a short but dramatic scene at the climax of the book when both men, Gatsby and Tom Buchanan fight for their love Daisy. Here: The great Gatsby (Wood van Meter, left) and Tom Buchanan (Tobias Bitzer, right) in fierce opposition. Nick Carraway starred by Tyler Stahl (far left) can just watch helplessly. 

 

Tom begging his sweet Daisy not to leave. Is he going to be the tragically defeated husband? ...

... No! The end of the story: Tom victorious and Gatsby - devasted.

 

 

Our team of actors (from left to right): Bethany Kirk, Tyler Stahl, Katelyn Yohe, Tobias Bitzer (Wood van Meter is missing).

Me with my English teacher Mrs. Brown - thank you so much for a great year!

Saturday, May 23rd 2009 – A trip to Mammoth Cave

Last Saturday I went on another trip together with my local coordinator Stephanie and two other exchange students: Raed from Tunisia and Nick from Bangladesh. After spending the night at Stephanie’s farm in Casey County we left in the morning for Mammoth Cave close to Glasgow, KY, which is a United States National Park and the longest cave in the world, it is also a United Nations Natural Sanctuary and a truly interesting place to visit. 

 

But before we got to the cave we had yet another highlight on our tour of Kentucky: We stopped in the little town of Hodgenville, Kentucky, where some 200 years ago, on February 12^th 1809, Abraham Lincoln was born in a one room log cabin on Sinking Spring Farm. Most people usually connect Illinois, or maybe Indiana with Lincoln, however, he was a Kentucky native and is supposed to have said once: “I, too, am a Kentuckian.” So of course, as visitors to Kentucky, we had hardly any other choice then to visit his memorial in now La Rue County. The memorial was constructed in the early 1900s and features a rebuilt Log Cabin enclosed by a monumental temple similar to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C.

 

After exploring the memorial and this impressing historical experience in blistering hot May sun we moved on to Mammoth Cave (thankfully we had AC at 86 degrees). The cave is a major visiting spot for tourists from places as far as China and India and when we got there the area was already quit crowded. Yet, despite our large sized group we had a pleasing tour through the cave which was especially welcome to us since the temperature inside the cave was some 30 degrees lower than on the outside.

 

After touring the cave we wandered around the outskirts of the Mammoth Cave National Park for a bit to get back warmed up, then we started back home for Lexington ending our day trip with a delicious – and nutritious- dinner at Rafferty’s. 

 I

Prom at Lafayette

Yesterday, May 9, 2009, I had my long awaited Prom at Lafayette High School. For the American teenager Prom is THE event of their High School Career, sometimes of their entire life. Girls spend hours at hairstylists, make up studios and of course picking and putting on their dress. Boys have to wear a tuxedo with either a vest or a cummerbund. As you can see the event is very formal and as mentioned it has enormous importance, many await it for years and start planning months in advance. I didn’t go that far, but as an exchange student experiencing the United States of course I had to participate in this time-honored tradition.

Together with my date Heepke I h had a wonderful time - we met at 6 p.m. and I finally got home at 2.30 a.m. the next morning, or something like that. Here's a brief outline of our activities and of course PICTURES - a more elaborate report will follow at a later date.

1. After dressing all up at home my host parents took me to Heepke's house, where I met her parents - and her of course.

2. Together we drove to Ashland, the estate of Henry Clay in the heart of Lexington. The area has a wonderful park where we all took our pictures. Many more people were there, too, and we met some friends.

3. At Ashland we left our parents and went to a restaurant in downtown Lexington, called the Metropol, where we - Heepke, two of her friends and me - had a delicious dinner.

4. When we had eaten it was about 9.30 p.m. - officially prom starts at nine but no one shows up till about 9.30, so when we got there at 9.50 we were just right.

5. Till Midnight we stayed at Prom, danced, looked at everybody else's dresses and tuxes and enjoyed ourselves a lot.

6. At Midnight Prom was over and we went to a After Party, where we sat together with some friends and ended that wonderful day in a relaxed mood.

It was a wonderful day and the pictures will just prove it, everybody who comes to the US from abroad should experience Prom - it is a great, unique experience as distinctly American as Burgers, Cadillac and the Statue of Liberty.

A weekend in mid-April

It has already been a while, but this weekend in mid April was a very busy and interesting one: As one of my band comrades put it when I told him about it: “You did more in a weekend than I do in a year!” And indeed it felt a little like it. Here’s a little overview over my numerous and often very interesting activities.

Friday, 04-17-09

Yes, the business started already on Friday afternoon. The weather was gorgeous and I got to enjoy it for a while, till my host-grandma, as I call her – my hostdad’s mum – picked me up. We went straight from Lafayette to my “hostaunts”, where every Friday afternoon the family comes together to catch up with the latest news. A very nice habit as I thought and indeed it was very enjoyable; and with Pepsi and Ham and Cheese sandwiches I had a great time.

Around six we went from the aunts to downtown Lexington thereby passing the new UK coach’s 2.5 million Dollar Mansion on Richmond Road. It was impressive. This evening was completely devoted to art: Every few months Lexington organizes an event called the “Gallery Hop” at which all the art galleries open their doors and welcome interested folks for free art and appetizers. We went to see one of my classmates perform a Musical Hit – it was very well done. Also we looked at some arts done by students, some works were just incredible considering that they were done by people younger than myself. We also went to another art gallery and met some friends there, overall it was very pleasant.

Finally William had to be put down and we started for home, but the day was far from over for me. I had promised one of my friends to show up at his performance at Battle of the Bands, a student band contest at Lafayette. And so I had no choice but to go there, even though my head was already aching and I wasn’t exactly in the mood for hard rock. I pretty much got blown away by the music and especially the loudness and didn’t hang around too long – I pretty much left right after my buddy was done playing figuring that this had been enough suffering for my usually so stoic soul.

On the way back home we had to stop at Mc Donald’s drive through and I had to get some fries, a Big Mac and soda which I all consumed on the way home or at home while listening to my hostdad’s (his name’s Greg by the way) more moderate Rock music. Sitting comfortably on the couch I slowly recovered and an Ice cold Ale 8 did the rest. After a good night’s rest I’d be ready for new enterprises in the morning…

Saturday, 04-18-09

Getting up around 9.30 I still had some time for breakfast and a shower left before the hurry of the day started.

First I went with Greg to the Hair Salon and got a very necessary haircut (it was after all only the second one since I’d been here), we also went shopping but I pretty much only got some flowers, but more about that later.

Back home, we did a quick wardrobe change for the next event – something I had been waiting for quite some time: We, my hostmum (Susan), Greg and I went to Keeneland, the local horse racing course.

There was already a big amount of traffic going towards the race course and the entrance was completely full of people, after all we’re in Kentucky, where horse racing is THE sport. We got into the stadium just in time to see the first race start – it was an amazing thing to watch, not only how fast the horses were racing along the track, but also how excited and passionate the crowds were cheering for “their” horse (or rather the horse they’d bet on) to win. After this first taste I was ready to bet some money as well – or to let Greg bet the money for me since gambling is illegal for minors in Kentucky. So we went to see the horses for the next race being presented in an area in front of the stadium specifically designed for this purpose. Based on my first impressions and without much further consideration I picked two horses to come in first and second (there’s a special term for that which I don’t remember right now) then went on the visitor’s podium to watch “my” horses. –

Of course I didn’t win, but I did fairly well and got excited enough to bet some more. First I tried some Kentucky Burgoo though, a kind of stew and Kentucky specialty which is always served at horse races, it was pretty good! After that I bet on another race and I would have won a whole bunch of money (like 80$) but because of some unfortunate mistake when we were placing the bet we didn’t actually place it, and so there was no money. Nevertheless it was a great experience that just made me want more and I consoled myself fairly easily about the fact that I didn’t win, just by looking at all the women’s hats.

The later afternoon I spent at my Prom Date’s house meeting her parents and talking with them about Germany since they had emigrated from there a couple years ago. It was a very pleasant experience and gave me an opportunity to freshen up my German a little. The evening was rather unspectacularly spent with a very dry and dull Latin translation nothing worth wile of further mentioning.

Sunday though still deserves some lines in this report, even though the weather alone wouldn’t justify any report of this nasty and rainy day at all. This Sunday I went on a trip with some other exchange students and my local coordinator Stephanie.

After Stephanie had picked up me and some other exchange students – from Tunisia, Thailand and another one from Germany – we first stopped at the best Donut bakery in town, where I sponsored a dozen donuts, which kept us fairly well fed until we reached our first stop: Berea

Berea is a little town in central Kentucky most renowned for its College that teaches students in all kinds of practical arts and craftsmanship. At an artisan market just off I-75 we got a first taste of the Berea offerings and a very nice choice of Kentucky products. The prices were a little on the high end and so I ended up buying only some Ale 8 suckers which feature the original taste of THE Kentucky soft drink but are easier to transport.

Later we went to downtown Berea where we saw some more stores and spent some more money. We gazed at the traditional quilt art of the area and also visited the historic Boone Tavern, however, we didn’t eat there.

Since we still had time after a short lunch we decided to go another hour farther South and to see the renowned Cumberland falls, also known as the Niagara of the South. They are some 60 or so feet high waterfalls and the only ones in the western hemisphere where one can see a moon bow, a rainbow with moon light. Of course since we got there during the day there was no moon bow. The falls were very impressive and pretty anyway and the whole area just gave us a very nice taste of rural South Central Kentucky – I liked, I guess I’m just the rural kind of guy.

On our way back home we stopped in Corbin, KY. Where more than five decades ago Col. Harlan Sanders, then only Harlan Sanders and a gas pumper on the local road, opened his first restaurant of a soon to be empire: Kentucky Fried Chicken. After taking the commemorative pictures and visiting the little museum, we did, what makes the most sense to do when visiting the first KFC: We ate, and, boy, it was good.

From there we concluded that we had seen enough for today, it was getting late and so we went on our way back home. After enjoying the Kentucky countryside some more we were welcomed back to Lexington “The horse capital of the world”.

A great day was over, and we even got some sunshine at the very end and had just learned again: Kentucky is a great place to live and there are many things to explore – you just have to go out and look for them.

My new surroundings

Two weeks ago from today I moved to my new home, still in Lexington but in another neighborhood. It is a very nice place to live, not only the family is great but also the house and the neighborhood itself as the following pictures will easily proof to you.


Our house...


... and our street: we live on a quiet, dead end street with not much traffic going on.


The view from the backdeck is fantastic: Right behind our house there are some really big houses, and I mean really big houses: three full stories. Can you see how tiny the white car on the right of the house looks?


The view more from a distance, it's a pretty new neighborhood, about 4 to 5 years old.


Dusk over the neighborhood, the deep hanging clouds reflect the red sunlight and create a beautiful scenery. Not only on the houses...


... but even more on the rolling hills of Central Kentucky. Just right outside the window of my room. Ain't that pretty?

CBYX meeting in Indianapolis

Just yesterday I went to a very interesting meeting: Four members of the Bundestag (the German parliament) had come to the United States to meet with members of the CBYX program (my exchange program) to talk about experiences, good things and problems that had to be resolved. The meeting was organized by the German Consulate General and held in Indianapolis, IN. My hostfamily had to work and was therefore not able to come but fortunately I could get a ride with the hostfamily of another German exchange student of the same program who also lives in Lexington. The ride was very nice, about 3 hours and I got to see one more state where I had not been before. Overall I have been to 10 states now; I’m collecting them pretty quickly! Finally we arrived in Indianapolis; we didn’t have to wait long till the meeting started.

After a good lunch with some delicious cake for dessert we had several hours of constructive talk with the members of the parliament, so did our host parents who had accompanied most of us to the meeting. Many students told of great experiences and were very happy with their year but some others told stories which were very scary and frightening and those in particular just proved to me again that, even though I might have some problems, overall I am having good experiences and there are no real reasons to complain.

The best thing about the meeting (even better than the food) was that I could meet with some of my friends from the exchange program again whom I had not seen since I had arrived in Kentucky in August, that was just great and of course very emotional. The time was far too short to do all the talking that we would have liked to do but we will meet again at the end of the year, and hopefully we will than have more time.

After some very interesting, happy and exciting hours, it was time to go back down south to Kentucky and we could get some more impressions of the Indiana countryside (No.1 flat as a pancake; No.2 farms, farms, farms). The beautiful spring weather just contributed to a great day that truly enhanced my spring break.

Spring in Kentucky

Just about a week ago spring was starting to be around here in Kentucky – sure we had had some nice days before that, but with temperatures around 20+ degrees Celsius spring is definitely here now and so last week I went on a little exploration tour in the neighborhood to capture the signs of the coming spring. And to make my dear family and friends in Germany or elsewhere a little jealous for I’ve heard that their weather is a little less pleasant. Some pictures now to give you an impression what spring in Kentucky is like:

In the backyard of our neighbors I spotted the first blooming tree ...

and in front of our house I found already a blooming rhododendron .

Just across the street the first big blooming tree, looks great, doesn't it?

A little down the road: A blooming magnolia, how beautiful!

I went on a short walk and on my way back I even detected the first green - on some bushes just a few houses away from where I live: Spring is finally here, and it's wonderful here in Kentucky!

Midyear Meeting, Louisville

It has been already some weeks ago, but I think it still might be interesting for y’all to see what happened during my CIEE midyear meeting in Louisville on March 6 and 7.

So the first thing that is worth mentioning about this meeting is that even though it is called a midyear meeting it actually is NOT a midyear meeting. Midyear of our program was sometime in January and the temperature in Kentucky at that time was somewhere around negative 10 degrees (Fahrenheit!) and we had an ice storm that was pretty nasty. So our Local Coordinators wisely decided to postpone that whole thing until the weather was a little more merciful thereby accepting the fact that it wouldn’t be a true midyear meeting any more…

So anyways our meeting was in March and our Local Coordinator Stephanie Weber took us there; us that’s Raed from Tunisia, Nick from Bangladesh and Ann-Kathrin from Germany. Oh yeah and me, of course, I am from Germany, too (for everyone how has still trouble figuring that one out). The location of the meeting was the illustrious Galt House a hotel right on the Ohio waterfront in downtown Louisville and so in the morning of Friday, March 6 we were allowed to skip school and made our way to Louisville.

The city of Louisville, named after one of that whole bunch of French kings whose name was Louis (I think it was Louis 14 but I wouldn’t bet a penny on it) is the largest city of Kentucky, having a population of about 550 000. It’s most famous for its Kentucky Derby the big thoroughbred horse race on the first Saturday of May that starts the US Triple Crown racing season. The city is also located on the Ohio River and the industrial heart of Kentucky while many Kentuckians see the cultural heart of the state in Lexington. The city lies on the utmost edge of the state and the land on the opposite side of the River already belongs to Indiana. But

enough of dry facts!

We were pretty much the first people to get to Louisville and so we checked in and with quite a gaze enjoyed the spaciousness of our suites. Finally everyone else got there to and we started having very long conversations with our friends whom we had not seen for the last couple months about pretty much everything important – and unimportant.

Our first stop was already a favorite for me: Lunch. And it got even better for since my arrival in August I had been desperately trying to visit KFC or Kentucky Fried Chicken after all I figured it would be a shame to live in Kentucky for almost an entire year without ever eating at KFC. And so, even though several people had warned me of the rather dubious quality of the food at the first, but not last, fast food restaurant that emerged from Kentucky I lined up for KFC. I got myself a classical chicken sandwich and that one was actually pretty good, a little salty, but besides that I liked it and just got my love of fried chicken confirmed.

After lunch we went to the “Louisville Slugger Museum” a factory with a museum where they produce “sluggers”, baseball bats, in a very traditional and exact way. It was very interesting to watch how out of a massive block of ash wood or maple wood in just a few minutes a perfect bat was created. And after all I even learned a little more about baseball but still I think that it is one of the weirdest sports that you can encounter in the US, the only thing that I pretty much know about it is that you have to hit the ball, drop the bat and run. It was still interesting though and I even briefly considered buying a real, big sized baseball bat, however more for the fun of it than for playing. But when I heard of all the challenges that such a “deadly weapon” poses to the average air-traveler I put my plans aside. In front of the museum a massive, ginormous baseball bat invites everyone for posing and we took a pretty neat group picture there, then we went back to the hotel.

After a short hangout and room distribution at the hotel we went back on the streets and went to Fourth Street Live, the notorious entertainment area of Louisville that, according to our indigenous guide, became impossible to visit after 8 p.m. Fortunately it was prior to 8 and so we could have some fun looking around and then went to the Hardrock Café where we not only got a great dinner with excellent burgers but also saw some impressive Elvis Presley and Ringo Starr clothes and a guitar that looked more like a machine gun than a music instrument.

Finally after a lot of fun and laughing we went back to the hotel where we had long and interesting conversations about our experiences as exchange students, gave each other advice and just talked about a lot of things that affect exchange students in one or the other way.

We also explored the hotel a little more and hung out at one of the Lounges till like one in the morning until we finally went to get at least a little sleep.

The next morning we went to see the Frazier Collection of Arms. Hosted in one of the pretty historic buildings of downtown Louisville (some of the few buildings here that are actually dating back further than the 1950s) the museum gave an impressive look at the history of Britain on one floor (with original arms from the British Royal Armory) and an even more impressive one at the history of the settling of the US with original Winchester guns, Colts that were actually built by Mr. Colt and guns formerly owned by people as famous as George Washington and Theodore Roosevelt. Another highlight were two guns that belonged to Colonel George Armstrong Custer, the notorious and brutal U.S. Army leader who found a sudden and unexpected death when the Sioux around Sitting Bull destroyed his entire army at the famous battle of Little Big Horn.

After this excursion into US and British history we went back to today’s world to have lunch at a very nice little Italian pizza place almost next door. The food was great and it helped at least a little to handle the fact that the meeting was already over and after everyone had filled their stomachs with pizza, pasta and chocolate cake we told each other good bye and went on our way home.

It was a beautiful day and because Stephanie had to do some other business in Lexington she wanted to get there last and drop of the two other boys at their homes south of Lexington first. So we didn’t go back the straight way on the Parkway as we came but we took a sort of semi-circle-like approach going south first, then turning east and finally turning north. The way was as long as the term describing it but it didn’t bother me, the weather was great, the sun shining I was in good company and got to see some more of the wonderful Kentucky countryside that was just revived by the first days of spring.

And then, all of a sudden, Stephanie asked, do you want to stop at the Jim Beam distillery? At first I didn’t believe what I heard, did she really mean the famous Jim Beam Kentucky Bourbon distillery that produced products that even my buddies in Germany knew (all too well). As it turned out she did, right of the road there was the world headquarter and largest factory of Jim Beam and of course we DID stop. There was even a very nice visitor center there, they showed an informative movie and after that we could even see one of the huge warehouses with all the Whiskey barrels. Of course we couldn’t buy anything but still we almost got drunk from the smell alone. And finally we even saw the original mansion of the owner’s family a nice southern style home that invoked dreams in me of life in the rolling Kentucky countryside with nothing to worry about than whether you were going to have very old Bourbon for dinner or just old Bourbon – ah sweet life. As I later said to Stephanie that stop made my day – and it really did.

After a lot of more driving I finally got home to Lexington, spring was just everywhere and I really enjoyed myself at my home \but still part of me was stuck on that ranch in the Kentucky countryside…