Shauna Harold, Year 11, was lucky to be chosen as part of a group of 17 German language students in WA to take part in the MLTAWA German Cultural Exchanges programme in 2011/12. I was also fortunate to be one of the two teachers leading the group. Shauna hosted her German student, Jennifer Dahm in July last year and then spent 5 weeks in Germany with her partner over the Christmas holidays. Shauna and Grace, also Year 11, will both host German students, Anna Uskova and Frederieka Fuge this year in July. Grace will travel to Germany as part of the programme during the coming Christmas break.
Mrs Anna Gow
Here are some snippets from Shauna's diary.
On Tuesday the 13th December we arrived exhausted in Munich but went straight into a tour of the town in our small groups. the Christmas markets were fantastic and the food there delicious!
On our 2nd day, we travelled by train to Salzburg in Austria. This is where Mozart was born and the Sound of Music was filmed.
On day 3 we went to Dachau to visit the first concentration camp started in Germany. It was a dark but interesting experience.
We then headed for Goettingen to spend the next 3 weeks with our host families, living the German way of life and going to school. We also had many interesting excursions. We experienced a real German Christmas and New Year with snow, fireworks and lots of different and delicious foods and drinks! Despite the cold, everyone was outside on New Year's Eve, and at midnight, fireworks were going off everywhere.
In the Christmas holidays, I travelled north to the Baltic Sea and into Poland with my host family. On January 11th, the group moved on to Berlin for 5 days. We had so much fun there! On the first day we went on a walking tour of the city with a very amusing and interesting guide. Later we visited palaces, museums, the German parliament and of course, many shops.
On the 17th of January we arrived back in Perth exhausted but very happy and with very heavy cases.
I would recommend this tour to everyone who studies German in years 10, 11 and 12.