Check Out My Flat

So first I thought I might tell you a little about Freiburg. It's in the southwest corner of Germany, and apparently it gets the most sun of any German city. Which helps explain why it has rained everyday so far. Yeah. But I guess you're kind of supposed to expect that in Germany. It is only about 15 miles from France and maybe 40 miles from Switzerland. It is a moderate-sized city with about 200,000 people or so. It has a very low crime rate, and a rather high population of minority groups. It has intensely good public transportation. Not that I really need to use it that much because most things are within walking distance. I'm in the dorm closest to the classroom center, so it's basically just a 10 or 15 minute walk (so 10 for me). So I don't really use the trams that much. But they are super nice and easy to use.

Freiburg is also an extremely green city. They are known for being leaders in reducing energy use and recycling. And their recycling system is intense. They sort EVERYTHING that they throw away. One bin for garbage, one for plastics, one for biowaste (though not in urban areas), one for paper and cardboard, one for bottles, one for brown glass, one for green glass, and one for clear glass. I think I hit them all. Anyway, you get the point. And apparently German flatmates get tired of Americans that don't know how to properly sort their recycling/trash. So I'm trying to do it correctly. Anyway, I thought that might just give you a little context for the city I'm staying in.

So here is my flat:

This is looking inside the entrance of my flat. To the left is the hallway where all the bedrooms are, and to the right is the kitchen, which you have to go through to get to the bathrooms.

This is the kitchen.

Another shot of the kitchen. The hallway to the bathrooms is in the back left corner.

Yes, we have two fridges. But we have seven people total, so it's kind of necessary.

These are the bathrooms. There are two of them. The middle door is a mystery locked door. I have no idea what's in it.

This is one bathroom. It's basically a sink, toilet, and shower crammed into a space about 4 feet by 4 feet.

I guess this is like the beer corner or something. It's where my German flatmates keep all their beer anyway.

This is my room.

This is my bed.


That's me chilling at my desk.

So yeah that's that in case anyone is interested.

Last night after dinner, I chilled in my kitchen with a bunch of German guys my flatmates had invited over. We ate hamburgers and had a beer. They all spoke pretty decent English, so they included me in the conversation whenever they could.

Then this morning we began the intensive phase of our German class and "integrative seminar" at 9:00. Which basically is just two hours of German every day for two weeks, followed by an hour and a half of this political science seminar that everyone in the program has to take. We even have class tomorrow (Saturday), but that's only because we're still in the intensive phase. Then we have a hiking trip in the Black Forest on Sunday. I'm definitely looking forward to that. And I have homework to do tonight for both German and the seminar. Wunderbar...