I had my first rotary orientation day yesterday. In the morning I had to get up particularly early, eat breakfast and head down to the Hauptbahnhof (the main train station in Braunschweig). I then got onto a bus in front of the train station, bought a ticket then immediately got off and walked into the station. When Silke (my host mother) and I got to the platform my train was already sitting there so I said goodbye to Slike and hoped on. It was about 10 minutes before the train left the platform. The train was really comfortable, the seats were like pretty reasonable front car seats. In fact the train was actually far too comfortable, as it pulled away from the station my eyelids started to become heavy. I struggled for a while to stay awake as I really didn´t want to miss my stop but it was an uphill battle and soon I was dozing off.
I awoke as the train was leaving a small town and a twinge of fear hit me, I was really hoping that I had not missed Gifhorn however my prayers were answered when at the very next station I spotted a Gifhorn sign on the platform. So I got off the train and left the platform and my sheet of instructions said that there was a blue and yellow bus that would take me from the station into the centre of the town. I found the relevant stop and spent quite a while trying to understand the timetable. When I did manage to work it out I found that the next bus wasn´t for 45 minutes and to make the situation it had just started to spit in addition the the already strong wind that would only pickup during the next half hour.
After around about half an hour huddled in the corner of the bus shelter a grey haired man wearing a rotary jacket walked in front of me and I sat up and he said "Andreas?" and so I was introduced to Ekkehard Musick (the district coordinator for inbounds). We then waited together for the other exchange students coming by train who all arrived on the same train from Hannover about 5 minutes after me meeting Ekkehard. Ekkehard then gave me a lift into town (I didn´t have to catch the bus after all).
After a short tour of Gifhorn we arrived a hotel called Deutsches Haus. Inside we were show the room that we would have for the day, inside was a long table some chairs and a data projector and the final new exchange student (most countries send and receive exchange students in the middle of the year, so in the group at the first orientation there were 4 Australians and 2 Argentinians). We then sat around the table and went around and quickly introduced ourselves (name, host club, nationality etc.) after we finished this Ekkehard began his presentation on Germany, exchange, advice etc. When he had finished telling us about the reunification of Germany an extremely delicious lunch of spaghetti with blue cheese sauce was served. After lunch Ekkhard talked a bit more and then he took us on a guided tour of gifhorn which is an extremely pretty old German town. The tour ended in the ice-cream parlour and a particularly delicious chocolate milkshake for me. Then the host sister of one of the attending exchange students gave us a lift back to the train station and I caught the train home.
I awoke as the train was leaving a small town and a twinge of fear hit me, I was really hoping that I had not missed Gifhorn however my prayers were answered when at the very next station I spotted a Gifhorn sign on the platform. So I got off the train and left the platform and my sheet of instructions said that there was a blue and yellow bus that would take me from the station into the centre of the town. I found the relevant stop and spent quite a while trying to understand the timetable. When I did manage to work it out I found that the next bus wasn´t for 45 minutes and to make the situation it had just started to spit in addition the the already strong wind that would only pickup during the next half hour.
After around about half an hour huddled in the corner of the bus shelter a grey haired man wearing a rotary jacket walked in front of me and I sat up and he said "Andreas?" and so I was introduced to Ekkehard Musick (the district coordinator for inbounds). We then waited together for the other exchange students coming by train who all arrived on the same train from Hannover about 5 minutes after me meeting Ekkehard. Ekkehard then gave me a lift into town (I didn´t have to catch the bus after all).
After a short tour of Gifhorn we arrived a hotel called Deutsches Haus. Inside we were show the room that we would have for the day, inside was a long table some chairs and a data projector and the final new exchange student (most countries send and receive exchange students in the middle of the year, so in the group at the first orientation there were 4 Australians and 2 Argentinians). We then sat around the table and went around and quickly introduced ourselves (name, host club, nationality etc.) after we finished this Ekkehard began his presentation on Germany, exchange, advice etc. When he had finished telling us about the reunification of Germany an extremely delicious lunch of spaghetti with blue cheese sauce was served. After lunch Ekkhard talked a bit more and then he took us on a guided tour of gifhorn which is an extremely pretty old German town. The tour ended in the ice-cream parlour and a particularly delicious chocolate milkshake for me. Then the host sister of one of the attending exchange students gave us a lift back to the train station and I caught the train home.
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