the beginning of the LiederKurs

This has been a pretty good week!!!  I can't believe how fast time has flown by.  It has been pretty cold and rainy here, but I am not complaining because it makes riding the bike a lot easier.  We have made a point of eating a lot of German food because we realized we don't have a lot of time left, and damned if we've been eating soup and pasta every day for the past 2 weeks.  I have two restaurants that I frequent, and they know me and what I like to order at each of them (at Deutsches Haus, always a grosse ApfelSchorle and Saurbraten; at 7 Kreutz Gasse, always a grosse ApfelSchorle, Kartoffel und Lachs, and the most delicious Apfel Strudel in town).  In other news, I fell down the stairs at the theater the other night on the way into the backstage, and luckily Sam was there to catch me, but I have major leg bruises.  Oh well.  We have also begun BergStadtFest this week, in which I am consuming my weight x 800 in calories every day, all day.  There are all these vendors with so much food, much of it fried... and of course, the beer!!!

Friday, June 19

 

Today was our premiere of Bastien und Bastienne!  We had our final dress/tech rehearsal this morning from 10-12, and then I went back to the Apoteke to get some more medicine, and Kaufland to get some more bread and soup (lunch every day, basically… I have realized that I live in Germany but never get to eat at German restaurants anymore, so I am going to make a point to do that, and nobody can say nothing about it!!!!).  Then I came back and put my hair in pincurls and went to German class from 2:30-4:30.  Katherine and Hartmut drove us to Leipzig at 4:30, and we picked up the Rebers in Leipzig at 6:30 (Susan is leaving to go back home, so they are staying in Leipzig for the weekend before she leaves).  We got to our performance space around 7pm.  It was an art gallery and was filled with really beautiful photographic and other visual art- drawings and paintings.  Our stage was about the size of the living room we have staged everything in, so that was okay, and the audience was a full house of about 30 people.  The man who owned the gallery was a photographer and he took all of these pictures of us, including profile shots, which was weird but I hope he gets some cool shots out of it.  The show went pretty well, only a couple of mistakes, and we were very well received!!  We did the typical 800 bows, and they gave me beautiful lilies.  Then they had a small Italian reception, with light Italian fare and wines…. We had wonderful cilantro cheese cubes, melon balls soaked in raspberry sauce, and a couple other really flavorful items.  I also had my first glass of wine in a couple of weeks… haha.  Wine is good for the voice, really.  We finally made our goodbyes and got home around 12:30am, only to find out we had to be on a bus tomorrow morning at 9:00am for the dress rehearsal for the choir concert tomorrow night!!  Oh well.  All in all, it was a great evening.  The show was a lot of fun to finally perform, and luckily my voice held out very well, except for a couple spots where it came off because I was a little sick.  Oh well!  It was fun!!!!!  I am happy!!  By the way- Pyramis also had their premiere tonight, but poor Sasha got REALLY sick overnight (apparently we all sorta have the same thing?), so she had to go onstage to pantomime (apparently pantomiming is the thing here), and Dorothy sang her aria from offstage.  Their show went very well, I hear, so great job everyone!!

 

Saturday, June 20

 

Today was an interesting day.  So, we all found out on the way home from our respective premieres last night that we were to be on a bus at 9am for a chorus rehearsal for the choir concert.  Not exciting, but fine, we’ll do it.  So we get to the Schloss, where we are supposed to be, and it is totally empty.  No bus, no people.  We stand around, not sure of what to do (it was Shem, Abby, Lainey, and me… didn’t know where anyone else was), and we actually heard the 9am church bells ring, so we knew we weren’t late.  We finally got ahold of Sam (Matt didn’t answer) and he said the bus was already en route.  We were pissed!!!!  So, we took the day, did a couple of errands, and then the 4 of us had a nice outdoor lunch at Deutsches Haus!!!  It was a wonderful day!!!  Then we did get on the evening bus to go to the actual concert (not sure where it was, but it was an hour away?) and sang the Tannhäuser chorus and the first movement of Carmina Burana with the orchestra.  All of those millions of hours of rehearsals for 10 minutes of being onstage.  It was also freezing and raining AND I lost one of my new birthday earrings, BUT I got to talk to Andi on the phone for a full 30 minutes and it was glorious!!!!  These things always work out. J

 

Sunday, June 21

 

Today was a completely, totally, and wonderfully free day.  All we did was have Tosca tonight!  We had our third Tosca sing because the second one got sick too.  We got up late today, ate food, and watched Doubt in the afternoon.  It was awesome.  It was also Father’s Day, so I called home and said “Alles gute zum Vatertag!” and it was good. J

 

Monday, June 22

 

Today, we had our first German Lieder class with Eckart Sellheim.  We did a little bit of scheduling things and then read the original German poetry to our lieder that we will be singing this summer.  Then, we had Bastienne, German class, and then Bastienne again.  I am really going to enjoy working with Sellheim.  He is totally cool, probably from working so long in academia, and he makes me want to be a good musician, which is always a plus and not always something you get from your professors (and thus far in the program, where we have memorized Tosca and memorized Bastienne and haven’t had any real artistic opportunities).

 

Tuesday, June 23

 

Today we had a class with Eckart in the morning from 10-12:30 in which we learned about German vowels.  We also did some IPA.  I thought I was done with IPA drills, a-thank-you!  But I flew through it and only had a couple of mistakes, so I suppose it was time well spent.  I will do it for Eckart because he is cool. J  Then we had another Bastienne rehearsal (we are getting Alex back into it after he has been so sick), and then we suddenly were announced that we had another Sellheim class in the afternoon (which was annoying, since we were planning on having some actual free time, but we’ll do it for Sellheim).  Then we had another Tosca tonight, and it was still the Polish Tosca (our third one).  Apparently Kat is aiming to sing it again on Thursday, so we are excited!

 

Wednesday, June 24

 

Today was a very good day!!  The first thing I had this morning was my first individual coaching with Eckart Sellheim in the SenateSaal, at noon.  I sang Beethoven’s “Kennst du das Land,” which is a Mignon lied.  I really enjoyed singing with the Forte Piano, and coaching with him.  We talked about making each stroph (it is a modified strophic song) different, but only slightly, since Beethoven did a pretty bang-up job of making the piano part slightly different each time.  It is a beautiful, beautiful song.  We will work it again tomorrow and also start Haydn’s “The Wandering One.”  After that, I stopped at Back Factory and brought home some lunch, and then we had one more Bastienne rehearsal.  We put up the show tonight in Dresden, and that rehearsal helped get it all together one more time.  I did not go to German today, since we rehearsed until 3:30 (German starts at 3) and we were leaving at 5 for Dresden… I needed that hour and a half to get ready both physically and emotionally.  Sometimes, we all find it important to schedule in our own personal times when we are disallowed from having them.  So, we left at 5 (as usual, we were late, and didn’t leave till closer to 6) and arrived in Dresden to sing in another art gallery.  It had very good acoustics and really interesting paintings, and they gave us a little bit of money again!  Always a surprise!  We all got pretty Gerber daisies, too.  And we had 4 bows AND we sang an encore!  It is so nice to feel so appreciated… I think these audiences we’ve had have been major arts supporters, so they really enjoy coming to hear some musical art, so it is so nice to sing for them.  My voice crapped out on me a little bit because I’m still coughing, but alles okay.  Then, we went to this great restaurant called the Pulvatorum, which was a little touristy but I had this DELICIOUS veal dish, with a cream sauce and mushrooms and onions all over rice.  You don’t realize how much you miss rice until you’ve only eaten potatoes and pasta for a month!  Kind of the opposite of camp, where a lot of rice happens. J  We got home around 12:30 and we get to sleep in tomorrow!

 

Thursday, June 25

 

Today was Abby’s birthday!  It was a good day.  I got to sleep in a little bit, and then I had lunch with Eddy at the Mensa.  I had some kind of battered fish and potatoes.  The food isn’t great there, but it only costs about 3 Euros, so whatever.  Plus it was good to hang out with her!  Today was the beginning of Freiberg’s BergStadtFest, which of course is the yearly celebration of the town that happens in every town.  The whole town is closed to autos and there are all kinds of vendors- arts things, food, hats… everything.  I had some delicious QuarkKrapfen, which are basically like hushpuppies but sweet and flavored with vanilla.  Man, I could eat those things all day!!!!  We had German this afternoon and I left early to go to my coaching with Eckart at 4:30.  Then I rode back home to pick up my stuff for tonight and then we had Tosca at 7:30.  For dinner, I had my delicious leftovers from last night.  Tosca was very good again, and for Abby’s birthday we did some BergStadtFest things and hung out downtown.  The cool thing is that it is totally legal to drink outside here, so it feels weird but cool to just walk around with a bottle of beer in your hand.  I also bought a crepe at one of the vendors.  It was filled with apples and bananas and was AWESOME.  I could also eat one of those every day. J

premieres, rain, hail, crazy times

It is so hard to get onto the internet here, so I am so sorry I haven't been updating the blog very well!!!!  I have been keeping the journal, so here you go!!! 

Thursday, June 11

 

I don’t have much to write about today since it was a normal (boring) full day of rehearsals.  More from this weekend!

 

Friday, June 12

 

Today was a dark day in the theater because Tosca opens tomorrow.  Therefore, we had Bastienne ALL DAY, which is fine because we open in a WEEK.  I am a little bit freaking out.  Tonight we went to Chemnitz to see Anatevka, which is Fiddler on the Roof.  It was really, really good.  Dorothy knows someone in the cast and her father, so then we hung out with them in the theater’s Kantine until after midnight…. Which means we still had an hour drive home… and by that time we were starving so we stopped at MCDONALD’S on the way home!!!!!  I had a Hamburger Royal TS (same as a QP with C!!!!), Kräuter Kartoffeln (basically steak fries with chives in them), regular Pommes (fries), and a Fanta… with ICE.  It was a huge day.  We got home around 2am, but it was worth it.  Tomorrow is going to be a very long day!!

 

Saturday, June 13

 

So, today was the Premier of Tosca!!!!!  We coached the Bastienne this morning, and then went over our arias with Dr. Reber.  The premier was an amazing success.  SO much applause, and Christian and Katarina did a fab job.  Then, we American students got to sing at the after-party.  It was interesting because we had to sing into a microphone….. so I got thrown off a couple times aiming for the mic, listening to the keyboard, and all around just being cold AND distracted…. But it was still really fun.  I sang Marietta’s Lied (Die tote Stadt) and Jewel Song (Faust).  I think I did a really good job. J  Dorothy got up there and announced us all, and told them how old we were and that “even though we’re young, we’re working hard” or something like that, which was mildly embarrassing, but whatever.  After I finished singing I chugged 2 flutes of champagne, tee hee.  It was wonderful to get to congratulate everyone.  Actually, the whole Opening-Night process here is really great.  I got to the theater for my makeup call and everyone is just “Toi, toi, toi”-ing everyone else.  Apparently the culture here is that you can ONLY reply toi, toi, toi when someone says it to you, and NEVER say “Danke,” and never say it to anyone who is not going to be onstage.  So, when the makeup lady says it to you, you are supposed to just smile back.  Very interesting.  Even between scenes, if you run into someone you haven’t seen yet (as in, after the thing starts), you still say it.  It’s a really very friendly night.  We also had a minor disaster because the tradition here is the same as at home- opening night cards, etc., and Dorothy had told us she’d get some for us to give out (which we could have done ourselves, but she said she’d so it, so we counted on that)…. And she didn’t.  So we quickly had to throw together some origami figures that Matt made, and we signed them, and passed them out.  They were well-received, but we still felt (again) like chumps.  Oh well.  After the party was over, I went to play pool with Daniel, Sam, Michi, Lulu, and Matt.  We got in at like 2:30am but that’s okay because we get to sleep in tomorrow!

 

Sunday, June 14

 

Today we got to sleep in until 11 and it was awesome!  We left for Dresden at 1pm and made it there by 2ish.  We walked around for a long time, just acting like tourists, and went into this beautiful church called the Frauenkierche…. Which is this huge dome, and the Americans totally bombed it out, and then the Dresdeners picked up all of the stones and rebuilt the thing to the EXACT specifications as the first time.  The inside was beautiful and I was totally moved by it.  This woman started singing Ave Maria in there.  She kind of sucked, but it showed off how cool the acoustics were.  Then we sat at this outdoor restaurant for dinner, and I had pasta with salmon filets and lemon dill cream sauce.  It was amazing.  I also had a water AND a large Coke Light…. Two drinks in one meal, and one of them was .4L!!!!  I was SO hydrated!!!  Haha.  These Europeans and there non-drinking-at-meals.  It’s crazy!  Then, we got up and walked around a bit more, and then sat back down at another restaurant for these huge, giant, beautiful, and delicious ice creams.  They were seriously the most beautiful things I have ever seen.  I got a Kiwi Sundae…. Kiwi ice cream, with whipped cream, pieces of kiwi, and kiwi flavored sauce.  It was amazing, seriously.  Everyone got something different, and they were all beautiful.  We acted like idiots and took a million pictures of them, but whatever!  Then we went to the SemperOper and saw Il Barbiere di Siviglia (Rossini).  I actually own the production on DVD, so it was cool and also a little disappointing since I had seen it before (I own the Madrid production, but it’s the same).  The singing was really fab, though.  The tenor was AMAZING.  Not once did he biff ANYTHING.  The freest, most agile voice I have heard in a long time.  Rosina took most of her embellishments down, which either means she didn’t want to sing high OR the conductor could have wanted that, I guess.  I still like hearing high notes, though.  The whole area was beautiful… right on the Elbe River… and we had a great day because we actually got to be on our own and just enjoy ourselves.  We even got home before midnight!!

 

Monday, June 15

 

Today was another one of those northern European days where you get 4 different weather patterns every hour.  We saw bright, hot sunshine, 95% humidity, sideways rain, regular rain but with big drops, hail, and mist all in the afternoon today.  It started off as a good day, though, because I actually got to sleep in until 10am.  I have been battling a cough for about 5 days now- it started off as a sore throat which I thought was a reflux thing, but now I have a stuffy nose, drainage, and coughing.  It is uncomfortable, and the Apoteke is not open on weekends, so hopefully I will get to go into town tomorrow to get some meds.  But actually getting 10 solid hours of sleep last night was so great!  So I woke up, studied my Bastienne (I am FREAKING OUT), had lunch (soup and a roll…. They have these delicious half-baked rolls here, and you stick it in your oven for 5 mins and it comes out warm and delicious, plus these soup packets that you just add boiling water to…. Awesome!) Over lunch I also watched a little bit of Paul Blart: Mall Cop, which is one of the wonderful AMERICAN movies I got for my birthday!!!!  I am watching them slowly to prolong the joy of actually having entertainment in English.  Then, we had our first three-hour German class.  Apparently for this course to be approved by JMU, we had to have 60 hours of German lessons, so for it to all work out, this week we have 3 hour lessons every day instead of 2.  Let me tell you…. Three hours is ROUGH.  We can barely make it through 2.  Luckily, Frau Heineke is super cool and plays games sometimes.  Today we filled our last 45 mins by reading German poetry and figuring out what it means.  She is also really sweet because she came to the Tosca premiere, and then stayed for the party to hear us sing!!!  It was really special of her to come.  So, German was done at 5:30, and then I watched a little more Paul Blart and had some tortellini and Gemüse (vegetables) for dinner.  We started Bastienne rehearsals at 7pm, and (I’m not sure if I’ve written this before?) our Colas has been really sick for over a week- Strep Throat, or something- so he can’t sing, so we’ve had to hire out a Colas.  He is a real German singer from Chemnitz.  He is about our age, and is perfectly nice, but I started getting more and more frustrated tonight because what was originally a rehearsal turned into Martin giving us diction coaching.  Which is GREAT, of COURSE I want to be understood…. But he is now the third person to give us notes, and is therefore the third dialect we’ve been told to use.  He told me that he did not understand one single word of any of my arias tonight.  I was super frustrated!!!!  I am working hard.  He told me everything I did was too legato…. Which is hilarious because nothing I ever sing is legato ENOUGH.  So, I was pretty glad when that tortue was over at 10pm.  The problem is that our show goes up FRIDAY, which is in three days.  THREE.  And NOW we are getting diction coachings??  Just in time to be freaked out about not being able to re-learn everything I learned “wrong?”  I am not memorized on my dialogue at all.  Freaking out.  I have it about 50% learned.  I know what I’m saying in English, but I just can’t make the German words come.  And since we are doing this for a German audience, it has to be perfect, and I can’t fake anything, so….. freaking out.  On top of the cough, and not really being able to sing, and getting no sleep so no time to heal….. freaking out.

 

Tuesday, June 15

 

Today we had Bastien in the morning and then a Tosca matinee at 2:30.  Our Tosca, Katharina, is sick, so they hired a cover to sing the Tosca from offstage, and our director Judica went onstage to pantomime it!  I have never seen anything like it!  She didn’t know the words, so she didn’t even try to lip sync- she just acted.  It was amazing, and still SO moving.  It was as if she had all these thoughts that she couldn’t communicate, and they were amazingly communicated just in thought.  Does that make sense?  It was amazing, seriously.  Then, we had to go to a party at the TU for international students, and these high school bands were playing, and then Dorothy wanted us to awkwardly get up there and sing opera arias…. But Alex and I were sick, Shem, Matt, Sasha, and Lainey were at Pyramis rehearsal,…. So that left poor Abby and Martin (our Colas cover from Chemnitz) to sing.  Oops.  Luckily, there was free food and we drank, so all was okay.  Plus Daniel came along, so I was happy.

 

Wednesday, June 16

 

We had a delightful morning to get to sleep in a little bit today, so I slept until 10 (which is helpful because I am sick!) and then got up to study and finish memorizing (haha) my Bastienne.  Then we had German from 2:30-5:30, a dinner break, and then Bastien from 7pm-10.  Actually, I skipped German today because I am really sick, and the Pyramis people had rehearsal…. So Abby had to go to German by herself today.  Oops. J

 

Thursday, June 17

 

Today we rehearsed Bastien from 10-3 in the Freiberg Theater, which was awesome, but I had to leave halfway through to go to the doctor.  It was my first (obviously) doctor’s appointment totally auf Deutsch, and I survived!  She is an ENT, and she scoped me and said my voice is fine, I just have an infection, so she painted some Grenchen Violet (??) in there to kill it.  She also prescribed me some awesome cough drops that have anesthetic in them.  So I called Dad to tell him, and told him I still had a cough… and he diagnosed me with Bronchitis.  Awesome.  So he is mailing me an inhaler and antibiotics, but since German customs is closed over the weekend, it’s not getting here until Monday.  Until then, I will continue with my aspirin/pseudoephedrine regimen and wait.  I feel okay, I just have this big cough in my chest that often keeps me up at night, so I have to sit in the steamy bathroom for a while.  But I am okay.  I have been totally marking my Bastienne for a few days and am just saving it all up until tomorrow night.  Usually this plan works for me, and my adrenaline holds out and I sing okay, so I’m sure I will be fine tomorrow!  We also had a Tosca performance tonight, and Katharina is still sick, so the Tosca cover actually sang it onstage tonight.  She was fabulous and the show went well.  They even had to add extra seating.

 

Friday, June 18

 

Today was our premiere of Bastien und Bastienne!  We had our final dress/tech rehearsal this morning from 10-12, and then I went back to the Apoteke to get some more medicine, and Kaufland to get some more bread and soup (lunch every day, basically… I have realized that I live in Germany but never get to eat at German restaurants anymore, so I am going to make a point to do that, and nobody can say nothing about it!!!!).  Then I came back and put my hair in pincurls and went to German class from 2:30-4:30.  Katherine and Hartmut drove us to Leipzig at 4:30, and we picked up the Rebers in Leipzig at 6:30 (Susan is leaving to go back home, so they are staying in Leipzig for the weekend before she leaves).  We got to our performance space around 7pm.  It was an art gallery and was filled with really beautiful photographic and other visual art- drawings and paintings.  Our stage was about the size of the living room we have staged everything in, so that was okay, and the audience was a full house of about 30 people.  The man who owned the gallery was a photographer and he took all of these pictures of us, including profile shots, which was weird but I hope he gets some cool shots out of it.  The show went pretty well, only a couple of mistakes, and we were very well received!!  We did the typical 800 bows, and they gave me beautiful lilies.  Then they had a small Italian reception, with light Italian fare and wines…. We had wonderful cilantro cheese cubes, melon balls soaked in raspberry sauce, and a couple other really flavorful items.  I also had my first glass of wine in a couple of weeks… haha.  Wine is good for the voice, really.  We finally made our goodbyes and got home around 12:30am, only to find out we had to be on a bus tomorrow morning at 9:00am for the dress rehearsal for the choir concert tomorrow night!!  Oh well.  All in all, it was a great evening.  The show was a lot of fun to finally perform, and luckily my voice held out very well, except for a couple spots where it came off because I was a little sick.  Oh well!  It was fun!!!!!  I am happy!!  By the way- Pyramis also had their premiere tonight, but poor Sasha got REALLY sick overnight (apparently we all sorta have the same thing?), so she had to go onstage to pantomime (apparently pantomiming is the thing here), and Dorothy sang her aria from offstage.  Their show went very well, I hear, so great job everyone!!

another week.... time flies!

Sunday, June 7

 

Today we had a glorious entire free day!!!!!  We slept in and then went to the Theater to practice some music.  Then I had a birthday dinner date.  Good day. J

 

Monday, June 8

 

Today is my birthday!!!  The whole theater sang Happy Birthday to me at rehearsal this morning!!!!  We were getting set for our first entrance, and the Assistant Director said “Amanda, come here for a minute?” and I thought I was in trouble so I went running out to the stage and suddenly everyone started singing!!!!  Of course it was in beautiful operatic harmony.  Birthdays are a big deal here, so EVERYONE came up and hugged/kissed/shook hands with me…. The directors, the principals, even the costumers and dressers!  And Gundy… the 90-year old ex-dancer who is now in the chorus and who is openly gay and HILARIOUS gave me a little extra-special hug…. Haha.  It was seriously awesome.  As awesome as getting sung to by the men staff at camp is…… this was an excellent substitute.  We had a good rehearsal and then we came home for Bastienne and German class.  Dorothy announced that two out of the 7 of us would be getting an agent audition this week, and that I need to lose 20 or 30 pounds before I should even try to be a singer.  This unsolicited advice was given in front of other people, in front of a director whom I had just met.  I found it incredibly rude, distasteful disrespectful, and it is going to take some time for me to trust or respect her again.  I will continue to regard her politely, but she is no longer my friend.  Everyone ELSE has been SO sweet to me today and it has really been a wonderful day!!!

 

Tuesday, June 9

 

Today we had Tosca in the morning and then a lot of Bastienne stuff.  The schedule is pretty much the same all week…. Tosca, Bastienne, German, Tosca.  Tonight I went over to Sam’s house and he played his guitar for me, which is pretty much my favorite thing in the WORLD, so it was again a really awesome night.  It was nice to have a relaxing night.  By the way, Dorothy offered voice lessons to us today (I did not take one) and she apparently told Lainey in her lesson that I (yes, she brought me up again!) am “very close,” if only I could get my WEIGHT under control.  Schlamper!!!!!

 

Wednesday, June 10

 

Today was a pretty normal day…. Tosca, Bastienne, German, Tosca.  I went out to a student party in town for a little while.  There are MANY heisse Jungen in this town.  Where have they been all my life????  Haha!

a whole week!

Sorry it has been so long!  I haven't gotten internet in a week!  I have put some photos on my facebook, but here is my blog update so far.....

Friday, May 29

 

Today was a pretty normal day- Tosca in the morning, then Bastienne, then German class.  Tonight we saw Monteverdi’s The Return of Odysseus  at the Theater and it was very good.  The show had been running for a long time, and this was the last night of it, so they were pulling all kinds of hilarious gags.  Since we consider them to be our friends, we loved watching them!  Catarina- our Tosca- was hilarious.  She played Minerva.  The whole thing was set with bright colors and Elton John-style huge sparkly sunglasses, and the gods (Minerva, Zeus, Poseidon) had these huge billowy sparkly shirts and sunglasses.  The chorus was funny because there are some HUGE divas who somehow always manage to make their ways up to the front of the stage.  There is this one Bari in the chorus- Gunther (we call him Gundy)- who used to be a dancer and is so funny to watch because he moves like a dancer but he’s just so awkward dramatically.  Love it!  Of course our friend Sam is up there and we always cheer for (and laugh at) him.  He is a tenor and they always stick him in these ridiculous toga outfits…. Minimal clothing.  Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.  Haha J. 

 

Saturday, May 30

 

Today we got up and had Tosca from 10-10:30 in the church, just for us and the KinderChor.  Then we came back to the house and hung out for a bit before leaving at 1:30 for our first away concert in a small town called Klosterbuch.  We did the 2^nd half of Bastienne and the three of us each sang 1 other aria.  The other 3 students (and also Susan Hurley, who is in town) sang 2 arias/songs.  We sang in this beautiful little church that was built in 1400… for an audience of about 7 (appreciative) people.  It went very well and amazingly the Bastienne wasn’t a disaster.  We wore our costumes which made all the difference, I think.  I sang the Jewel song and I liked how it went.  Then they invited us for GluWein, which is this hot alcoholic beverage which everyone loved except for me.  I don’t enjoy hot alcohol- same with Sake- but I drank it and it warmed me up!  It was cold and rainy that day.  They also made us hot Goulash soup, which was basically a hearty vegetable soup with chicken and beef in it.  We were starving and it was delicious.  On the way home, we stopped at our friends’ art exhibit, which was mixed media and very modern and kind of weird.  I am more into classical art, and this exhibit had giant cocoons hanging with mirrors, and flashing lights, and the like.  I enjoyed the multiple-exposure photographs and some of the more classical pieces the best.  We finally made it home and had the night off, which was welcome!

 

Sunday, May 31

 

Today we got to sleep in and it was awesome!  I slept until 11:15ish and then the girls took a road trip up north to Seiffen, which is a little town where they sell little Christmas trinkets and decorations and things!  I did some major souvenier shopping.  As much as I hate riding in the car, the countryside was beautiful and it was really cool to go through all the little villages.  It was colder since we were more up north, but it was so beautiful.  I just loved little Seiffen!!  Then we came back and went to the Teater to see Zar und Zimmerman, which was an operetta that is famous in Germany but pretty much nowhere else.  It seemed to be a lot like the movie A Night at the Museum, where all the museum people and paintings came to life.  We love going to these shows because we’ve gotten close to the other chorusters and the principals as well, so we feel like they’re our friends up there.  When curtain calls come, we cheer obnoxiously and loud (like Americans) and it makes them all smile.  Hey, what’s the theater if it’s not fun, right??

 

Monday, June 1

 

Today was another German Holiday (their Pentecost) so there were no shops or anything open.  We changed our schedule around and had German class from 11-1, then I coached the Bastien from 1-3 (?) and then hung around until our masterclass with Mark Elliott, one of Dorothy’s friends from her past life in the opera here.  I sang Embroidery and it went really well and I enjoyed working with him a lot.  I am going to sing again with him tomorrow.  Then…. I finally got to see Daniel again!  We went out with all of my friends to get some beers because tomorrow is Alex’s birthday and it was fun.  J

 

Tuesday, June 2

 

Today is Alex’s 21^st birthday!  I coached the Bastienne with Dr. Reber in the morning and then had a lesson with Mark Elliott in the afternoon.  I sang the Jewel Song and then Marietta’s Lied for him, and he really liked me again and had really good things to say- no technical corrections, mostly just dramatic/interpretive stuff, which is good.  He was giving a lot of technical advice to some of the others in our group but I guess I did okay!  After that, we had Tosca (of course) and then went out to Sam’s house to pregame and then to the Tivoli club to celebrate Alex’s birthday for real.  It was a very fun night and we felt like we did Alex’s 21^st right!!!

 

Wednesday, June 3

 

Well, today was off to a rough start after last night.  We had left our windows open so I was freezing all night but couldn’t get up to close them!  Our Bastienne coaching this morning was a little rough.  I was just tired, which is my own fault, but at least it was fun. J  I also had to coach the Bastienne diction with Dorothy, which made me want to jump off a building because yes, I realize I’m not great at German, but I felt like I was making interpretive choices that she did not agree with and it was causing a little bit of tension.  We both want it to be a good show, but I wanted a little bit more license than I was allowed.  We coached all the way until about 2, and then had German from 3-5 downtown in the SenateSaal, which is one of the academic buildings where we actually get internet.  We had to have German there because Dorothy had scheduled us a tour of the building (it is historic) from 5-6 pm.  This actually kind of ruined our night because we had the photo dress for Tosca from 6-11pm….. so, no break from 3-11pm.  The tour ran late and we entirely missed our makeup calls, which once AGAIN turned us into those American chumps who do things incorrectly in the theater.  We didn’t get to the theater until 5:50 pm, so we had to just throw on our costumes and hope for the best.  We felt like idiots because we were reprimanded when we got there for being over an hour late (we were called at 4:45 to start makeup!).  Dorothy had said she had taken care of it all, but we looked and felt like idiots and we were kind of pissed about it.  The run went well, and it is going to be a good show, but today was not a great day administratively.

 

Thursday, June 4

 

Today, amazingly, I actually got to sleep in a little!  My first coaching wasn’t until 10:45am, so that was cool.  The Bastienne music is going well.  I am not memorized on everything (out of 16 pieces in the show, I sing on 12 of them, including 6 arias), and we are apparently giving it concert-style on Saturday.  We are supposed to be off-book, and I have been cramming, but I’m not sure if this is really going to go well.  The dialogue coachings are going fine- I can say everything with flow and feeling, but I am nowhere close to being memorized.  I am a little stressed and it is making me a little sick to my stomach.  We also had Tosca tonight- just a run of act 2, which we all thought was going to end pretty early, but we actually ended up having to stuff many times because the orchestra kept playing too loud, and the chorus was too loud, and we kept getting moved around everywhere (lots of different offstage positions) because the chorus here doesn’t know how to sing quietly.  We ended up getting out around 8 and then went to dinner at one of our favorite restaurants, which we can’t remember the name of.  I had this DELICIOUS dinner of Kartofel, Lachs, und Gratin…. Which was potato chunks, salmon, and covered in cheese (like potatoes gratin)….. It was AWESOME.  This place also had the BEST Apfel Strudel we’ve found, so we go there all the time.  We had the night off after that, so we hung out for a while and played a couple of card games since we knew we get to sleep in a little tomorrow.

 

Friday, June 5

 

Today, our first coaching wasn’t until 11am, which was awesome!!!!!  Then we had a break, and then a Bastienne diction coaching with a German director named Janni, which was way better than coaching with our professors here because she is (obviously) a native and could help with actual inflection and speech as opposed as to fighting over interpretation.  The Pyramis cast has the weekend off, so Matt and Lainey went out of town, and Bastienne gives our premiere tomorrow in Leipzig.  We have the night off tonight, so we are hanging out and are going to watch either Star Wars IV or Men in Black…. Original English speakers dubbed over with German.  Hopefully Mom and Dad will send me some movies soon because not having American TV is awful!  We have a TV here but there are tons of annoying ads (remember those ads that are like “Dial 4567 to get a funny joke in your inbox every day!)…. And these are in German, and they are awful.  We have watched the Simpsons in German a couple of times, and luckily the language on that show is simple enough that sometimes we can ACTUALLY understand what’s going on. J  I haven’t been writing very interesting posts lately, so I have decided to write some things I have discovered lately:

1.  I am getting pretty good at this language!  I can order at restaurants now, and I can say what I want to eat and drink, and pay, and everything.  I am also doing very well in the grocery store and have learned a lot of food-related vocabulary…. Like produce, types of soup, types of pasta sauce, etc.

2.  It has been very cold here this week- probably around 60 Farenheit? But it has been very windy and minimal sun, so when you’re riding your bike downhill into town, you freeze your fingers and ears off!  It makes the ride back uphill much better, though…. Remember a couple of weeks ago, I’d ride back up to the apartment and have to shower again??

3.  The living situation here is a lot like camp.  I have a roommate, and we have to share space.  There is minimal decoration and amenities.  We have no air conditioning, so the windows are always open, which is nice because we get to smell the fresh air.  There are specific times in the schedule for eating and minimal downtime or time to yourself.  I really miss camp, especially right now when the staff is in Orientation and having so much fun.  I also miss the Christian fellowship there.  I have wanted to go to church here, but I am turned off by not knowing the language OR the customs for religious services here.

4.  Besides being the loved/hated “Six American Students” in the theater, we are acclimating well, all things considered.  We know our way around, and the Principals like us and joke around with us.  We know where the callboard is and have our own dressing room (yep, us 4 girls with the 2 guys in a room the size of…. The “big” dressing room on EB2).  The dressing rooms here though have beds in them, so you can nap between scenes?  I guess these people have to spend all day here sometimes because they live in neighboring towns, so they get to hang out in the dressing room during the day.

5.  Laundry here is interesting.  The machines are in German, of course, and take over an hour.  The dryer is also broken, so everything has to get hung up on the lines…. Nothing like using a crunchy, line-dried towel!!!  Never take your delightful Bounce pads and dryers for granted, people.  Haha.

6.  I know I said up there that I am doing well in the grocery store, but I forgot to mention that groceries are bought on bike.  So whatever you buy must fit in your backpack or the plastic grocery bag you must BUY from the grocery store for 6 cents.  Also, nobody takes Visa here, so I have to pay cash everywhere, which just freaks me out.  I also keep forgetting the exchange rate, so I find a 3.50E bag of cookies and think it’s great until I realize it’s actually 5 dollars.  Whoops.

7.  Clothing…. My clothes are the first thing that give me away as an American.  (Unless I speak first.  Then it’s my accent).  Everyone here A) wears the same outfit 2 or 3 days in a row and B) it is usally all black or VERY muted colors.  I tend to wear dark pants (capris usually) and a bright top and I stick out like a sore thumb!  I have stopped caring, because I’ve adopted the mentality that… I’m an American, and this is how I dress, and you need to get over it. J  I might have to go buy some Euro shoes, though, because they have cool shoes here.  And mine have all given me blisters.  And I just want some new shoes.

8.  Music…. So at Tivoli this past week, it wasn’t  DJ, but instead it was a band.  They actually were playing really good covers, but it wasn’t exactly the type of music I like to dance to.  It was ridiculous things like “Walking on Sunshine” and even Grease’s “Summer Lovin’.”  Seriously???  And the Germans were EATING it UP!!!!  They also always play the German folk songs that make everyone jump and down and spill their beers everywhere, which is great fun unless you are 5’ tall and get elbowed in the face by rowdy Jungeren!  It’s okay.  I can’t even compare it to bands at home because the covers this band played were just so OLD to us, but the Germans love it.  It’s like they’re 10 years behind in their pop music.

9.  The theater… we have been to see every performance the Theater Freiberg has put on (they use the same principals in everything, so the Tosca also had to sing Minerva in the Monteverdi and other things like that)…. But when we go, we get REALLY stared at by the theater crowd.  Like they stare us DOWN.  I am honestly getting tired of it.  It is possible that many people still have a sour opinion of Americans (or even just non-Germans) after all of the wars they have been through in the last 100 years, and we American Students represent bad things?  I’m not sure.

10.  Speaking of the war, and things like that…. It is clear that the East Germans still have a mentality that they do not like to break rules.  It’s like they are afraid of breaking them, or even don’t know HOW to break them.  If the crosswalk sign is red, they WILL not cross, even if no cars are coming for miles.  They even get upset if WE cross against the light.  That is why they are also quiet in the theater audience- they think it’s breaking rules to make too much noise during the curtain call (which is why we also get stares when we are clapping and screaming loudly for our friends up there).

 

Anyway…. This was a pretty good update.  I am going to study a little music and relax for the rest of the night.  Ciao!

 

Saturday, June 6

 

Today we gave our first premiere of Bastien und Bastienne!  We left at 12:30 and traveled to Lauenstein, which is very far east…. And in fact, to get there, we traveled along the Czech Republic border for a little while.  Lauenstein is this small town that is built around a really old castle.  The performance space was about the same size as the salons that Mozart would have known.  It was beautiful, with the castle’s coat of arms on the back wall, and beautiful stone work in the ceiling.  We were very well received, too!  We got the typical German 8 bows, and they gave us roses, AND we sang an encore!  It was awesome!!  We wore our little costumes and it was a lot of fun.  We took a lot of pictures so I will post those soon.  We also saw our first live deer on the side of the road- a big female.  There was also a bike race going on, and we felt so bad for them because it was raining and the hills were those horrible slow-grade ones that never give you a break.  They also fed us dinner there, and I got Hacksteak with mashed potatoes (the other choice was schnitzel, which I need a break from).  It was sehr gut.  We came home around 9 pm and watched Star Wars, Episode 4 dubbed into German.  I couldn’t stay awake for it… long day!  I am looking forward to my birthday on Monday- I hope to have a good meal with my friends.  Tuesday we have plans to go out.  We are entering Hell Week for Tosca, since the show opens this weekend, so there isn’t a huge block of time to have a party or anything.  Monday, for example, we have Tosca from 11-2, German class from 3-5, and then Tosca again from 6-9.  At least it’s a fun day, and with no homework or some horrible job I have to go to…. This trip is more vacation-y than being in school, even though we claim to be stressed out, all we do is sing and learn German.  I am learning a lot about the German culture, especially East German culture, and it is very interesting and exciting.

rain on bike = not pleasant

So, if you have never had to ride a bike as you ONLY means of transportation, you are in for a quick surprise the first day you have to ride to work in the RAIN.  It is COLD.  You get soaking wet, your butt is wet from the seat, your fingers and ears freeze off, and there is nothing you can do about it.  It has rained a couple of days this week and I have NOT enjoyed it.  It's hard to tell what's better- ride the bike in and get wet, or walk in and probably still get wet but at least you get to hold an umbrella.  Anyway, the end of this week has been pretty good since I met this little deutsche Jungelein (that is probably very incorrect German, but I don't care).  Enjoy!

Wednesday, May 27

 

Today the girls had Tosca rehearsal from 10-11am and then a little bit of free time.  Then we coached with Dr. Reber for a bit, had German class, and then part of our group went to Dresden to see Midsummer Night’s Dream with Mendelssohn’s incidental music.  I had little interest in seeing it, plus there was only room for 3 of us to go, so I stayed home and practiced music with Abby.  Then, Abby, Matt, and I went out to the club Tivoli with our German friends and…. I met this guy.  His name is Daniel, he is German, and SO heiss!  So now we are “friends” and we had a good time tonight and some sweet texts sent when we both made it home. J

 

Thursday, May 28

 

Today was a little rough.  Ich habe kater (I have a hangover).  We made it in around 2:30 last night, but the sun comes up at like 4:30 am here (and sets at like 10pm, seriously), so I woke up a lot this morning.  We made in to rehearsal from 10-12, then had lunch, then attempted a Bastienne coaching with Dr. Reber, although we were not in the best shape… haha.  We then had German class from 3-5 and then a full stumble-through of Tosca in the space (which is actually a decommissioned church called the Nikolai Kierche).  The singing is very good, but the concept is very strange and modern.  Whatever, there is actually not a lot of singing for the Damenchor (female chorus), so I just hung around after we were done (the Herrenchor still sings in Act 3, so I waited for them to finish).  Then we went for beers with the director, GMD (General Music Director Herr Maestro Horstmann), the Scarpia, Cadaverossi, and Tosca, and Matt, Alex, Sam, Sam’s boyfriend Michy, and me.  They think we are funny when we attempt German, but they are nice about it.  I also got a couple of sweet texts from Daniel, and I am going to see him again Monday since he is going home for this weekend.  Tee hee. J  We got home around 12:30 and hit the hay pretty quick!

Week 2 begins

I am currently in the Uni Cafeteria (the Mensa) with Matt.  We are being typical Americans and facebooking/emailing during our lunch and not ACTUALLY talking to each other.  But the Mensa is one of 2 places we actually get internet, so we are taking advantage.  Today we activated our student IDs here so we could pay for our own lunch in the cafeteria (they don't take cash) and later we will join the Uni gym to meet more Deutsches Jungelein!  Here are my journals for the past couple days:

 

May 25

 

We had the day off of Tosca chorus stuff because that is their one day off a week!  We got up at 10:30 and hung around, and then I spent all day nursing a headache and doing laundry…. Awesome!  Then we had Deutsch class from 3-5 per usual, in our apartment, and then we had some coachings with Dr. Reber for a concert we are giving this Saturday.  We are apparently supposed to do do ALL OF BASTIENNE, but I am pretty much only going to give my first aria and pooooosssibly the final trio.  I will make up for it by singing a BEAUTIFUL Jewel Song and Embroidery Aria.

 

May 26

 

Today we had Tosca from 10-11am and then had our first Doners for lunch!  A Doner is a gyro.  It was delicious and I will eat one every day.  Maybe twice a day.  Haha.  Then we (the girls, since the guys were in rehearsal) met up with Dorothy and we rode our bikes 8 miles uphill to the Computer place.  We were very schwichy (that is not a word, but I am using it anyway to mean DRIPPING WITH SWEAT) and we FINALLY GOT INTERNET!!!!  Yay!  Of course my computer battery died after 30 minutes because I’ve been using it so much without plugging it in but it was SO GOOD to get on Facebook and have a whopping 26 notifications!  I also had 20 emails but they were mostly spam, boo!  It did feel very good to finally get online, though.  We have to use the internet wifi on campus, since we don’t get it in our apartment, but we can also use it in the SenateSaal, which is one of our rehearsal spaces that is close to the Theater, so that should work out pretty well.  It rained today, but thunderstorm with hail and everything, so we hung around inside and then went to the Theater to see a straight play called Der Hauptmann von Koerpernick.  It was in German and is about a man who doesn’t have a passport since he has been in jail for 15 years, and spends the whole time trying to get one, but he can’t get a house or a job until he has a passport and can’t get a passport until he has a job and a residence.  The first act is very sad because you just feel so sorry for the guy.  Then, the second half, he finds an Army Officer’s uniform, pretends to be a Captain (Hauptmann) und orders everyone around.  He is eventually found out but is given a passport and finally the play ends on a more happy note.  To be honest, I dozed during the first half, but the second half had a lot more physical comedy so it was funnier and I stayed awake.  Then I ate dinner with Sasha and Lainey and we had Omelett mit Champignons, which is clearly an omelette with mushrooms!  I also had my new favorite drink, an Apfel Schorle, which is basically sparkling apple cider.  Ist sehr gut!  We had to go back for Tosca rehearsal in the performance space at 5:30.  We are actually performing in a decommissioned church that is across the street from the Theater and is actually owned by the Theater and used as a performance venue.  I need to finish memorizing that chorus music!  It’s in Italian, and isn’t hard, but I just haven’t really gotten it 100% down.  After that, Abby and I rode our bikes home and it started to rain again, and now we are hanging around and are probably going to go to bed soon to listen to the rain and catch up on rest.  Tomorrow there is a big party at Tivoli, which is the club we went to last week on Man’s Holiday night.  We might go, because we like Eddy, and because she has a new guy for me to meet, YAY!  Haha.  I told her any guy she has for me must A) be cute and B) speak English.  Haha.  Things I have noticed lately:  the curtain calls at shows are HUGE productions.  Everyone in the cast gets several individual bows.  The company gets several bows.  Just millions of bows and hours of clapping.  I wondered who said “hey, I’m going to slam my hands together and make it be a happy noise!”  Seriously.  My little mitts can’t handle it.  Also, I am getting really good at numbers and every day in the Kantine at the Theater (yea, it’s a real theater, with a whole café underneath because it’s COOL and actually wants to FEED its people), I order something different and have to pull out the right amount of money.  I can do it if they speak slowly aber nicht if they speak normally (zu schnellen!).

First post!

Hello!  I have created this blog to journal my activities during my time in Germany this summer.  Enjoy!

May 15

 

Today I departed for my summer trip to Europe!  Andi took me to the airport in the morning for my 12:20pm flight.  I flew from Phoenix to Cincinnatti, and I got to ride first class so it was awesome!  I had a Reuben sandwich for lunch on the plane.  It was a good flight, and when I got to Cincinnatti, I hung out in the Delta Crown Club lounge for a little bit and then headed over to my next flight- Cincinnatti to London-Gatwick.  I also got to ride Business Class in this one, which was awesome because it was an overnighter.  We got almost full-sized down pillows and comforters, and our seats went back to about 160 degrees!  The flight attendant was passing out mimosas as we were boarding, and she accidentally dropped a whole tray of them on the woman next to me and me!  We didn’t get very wet, but the floor in front of us and our pillows and blankets did, so she got us new ones.  We had red wine and filet mignon for dinner, and then an ice cream sundae.  I watched the movie Milk with dinner.  I then went to bed and the flight attendant woke us up for breakfast.

May 16

 

This was an overnight flight, so new day!  I had horse-food cereal and fruit for breakfast, which was pretty good.  We landed and I had to go through customs, and the man had a full conversation with me hammering out details of why I was here, for how long, etc., and I really thought he wasn’t going to let me enter!!!!  Luckily he did, and I picked up my bags and then waited for about 25 minutes for my driver to come pick me up.  Matt and I were supposed to meet up at our hotel- the Holiday Inn Heathrow- so that’s where my driver took me, and I checked in.  Unfortunately, there was no reservation for Matt at all…. And as it turns out, there are THREE Holiday Inn-Heathrows, and Matt and I had booked ourselves into different ones!!  So I checked into mine and took a nap.  I then talked to Mom and Dad and told them what had happened (I called them when I landed at 4am their time also), and they let me go to the hotel Matt was at and just pay for both rooms so that we could be together.  So I moved over there, met up with him, and we went out on the town in London!!  We went to a delicious steak house for dinner and then hit up about 3 bars before going to the famous G-A-Y bar.  We got wristbands there to be able to enter G-A-Y bar’s corresponding dance club, Heaven, and went over there….. and got pretty drunk and danced until 1am.  We did have a flight to catch the next day, so we called it a night at 1.

 

May 17

 

I am starting a new day’s entry here because, well, last night ended at 1am.  We caught a cab and tried to get back to our hotel…. And there was this HUGE wreck on the highway we needed to take, and we sat there for an HOUR.  And the cabbie left the meter running the whole time!!!  I would have been set with my last GBP’s I had left- about 60- but with the meter running, we got back to the hotel and it was 78 pounds.  Matt had to run in to the ATM to get cash out, and the cabbie left the meter running AGAIN, which ran it up 2 more pounds, bringing us up to a grand total of EIGHTY pounds.  In case you aren’t familiar with the exchange rate, it is about 1.69, so our cab was like a hundred and thirty dollars.  Unbelievable.  We got to bed at about 2:30 and left the hotel around 9:45 the next morning to catch our 12:10 flight from Heathrow to Dusseldorf.  We were both pretty hungover so ALL we wanted was some delicious McDonald’s…. but when we got there we had to check in.  So, minor fiasco with my check-in.  Apparently, if you travel inter-Europe, you are allowed 20 kg’s of luggage…. TOTAL.  I had two bags which EACH weighed 20kg.  So I had to pay for my extra bag.  Not just the normal Delta $40, or $100….. I paid 180 BRITISH POUNDS.  Once again….. nearly 400 American dollars!!!!  What else could I do?  Had to have my luggage…. Super annoying that nobody (travel agent of doom) warned me about this!!!!!  We finally made it through security and… no McDonald’s to be found anywhere.  We settled for gourmet pizza, which did the job just fine.  Our flight to Dusseldorf was bumpy and we were a little nauseous, but it was only 55 minutes or so so we made it.  We then flew to Dresden, and we both totally passed out for the 2 hours.  We landed, got our luggage right away, and were met by Dorothy Maddison, the director of our program.  She was there with our driver, Peter, and another singer, Abby, who is a student at JMU and is my Bastien.  She is very funny and we had a great car ride from the airport to our apartment.  We made it to the apartments and Alex, a baritone, and Lainey, another singer (don’t know what voice type???) were already here.  We got settled in from about 6:30-8:15 and then headed out for our first true German meal, at the Schwanenschlosschen (Swan Castle) Restaurant.  We had to order in German!!!  It was really stressful!!!! I ended up with Freiberger local Bier (sehr gut!) and Rahmschnitzel (also sehr gut!).  Rahmschnitzel is schnitzel (basically a fried pork steak) covered in creamy mushroom sauce with vegetables and potatoes.  It was soooo good.  Peter our driver is trying to learn English as we are attempting German, and we got a little tipsy, and it was great fun.  It is also the time of the Spargel festival, which is this white asparagus.  I do not like normal asparagus, but this stuff is pretty good!  It is thicker and longer than green asparagus, and much more tender and sweet.  And covered in Hollandaise sauce, it is very tasty!  It is also our conductor’s favorite food.  (The conductor is Dr. Reber, yay!).  We are now back in our apartment (I am sharing a room with Abby, and Lainey is in the single room.  We all share the kitchen, bathroom, and living room, and we have a TV!  The boys are up a floor and they don’t have a tv, so we hung out in our apartment a lot today).  I am liking everyone a lot so far, we are getting along great!  The town is bigger than we all expected and is BEAUTIFUL with old architecture, rolling hills, and cute brick buildings.  Tomorrow we rent bikes and buy cell phones, which are very exciting things.  I am excited to get a full night’s rest!

 

May 18

 

Today was a big day!  I accidentally woke up at 6am because the sun had come up, and I got up and had a salami sandwich and an orange.  I went back to bed at 7 and woke up at 9, and then got ready and we all got together at 10am to fill out some paperwork for our apartment HausMeister (the super).  Then we left in search of bicycles and cell phones.  We went to three different cell phone stores to find the best plan and ended up all going back to the first place because it had the best rates for a phone you could change the sim card in for every country AND cheap rates for calling the US, calling each other, and texting.  Then we went for the bikes.  The bike place had about 9 bikes for us to choose from- and we were a group of 7.  I of course had a difficult time finding a bike small enough for me, and the smallest one they had is too big.  I went out back to test it and I had a really hard time, since it had been 10 or 15 years since I had ridden a bike.  I am VERY sore tonight after riding the hills all day, on a bike that is slightly too big.  Every muscle has been stretched to the max and my seat bones will probably never recover!  Haha.  We also had lunch down in the town center, and I had a little margherita pizza and a Frankfurter, which was a hot dog wrapped in a cheesy crossiant.  Delicous!  I also had a European Cherry Coke, which tasted nothing like American Cherry Coke, but it was still good.  After we had been downtown a while, we went to the grocery store- KaufLand (Shopping Land, literally)- and bought stuff to make a potluck dinner.  I bought a razor, shaving cream, a toothbrush, and body lotion…. And shredded cheese.  We had pasta and sauce, and I brought the ever-important cheese!  WE also had some wurst, garlic bread, green beans, wine, and cheese and crackers.  And Kinder chocolate for dessert (Kinder mit Milche, which is a chocolate bar filled with sweet condensed milk, which is tasty).  After dinner we rode our bikes to the theater (Middle Saxony Theater in English, don’t know how to say it in German yet) and watched their rehearsal for Tosca and then met Jan Horstmann and Urika (?), the conductor and director of our program!  It was cool.  We are going to be singing in the chorus of Tosca and our first rehearsal is tomorrow night.  We told him we are keine Noten (without sheet music) and he is going to give it to us when get there, so my sightreading skills will be put to the test!  The theater is cute and small.  The whole town is beautiful and a typical small European town, just what you’d imagine, with cobblestone streets and a main pedestrian street with a piazza (German word for that????) with a fountain.  Kind of difficult to bike around but SO pretty.  So far the people have been friendly.  I don’t know how to say any numbers yet, really, so I have to have them point to the little screen on the register when I pay (trust me, shopping in a German supermarket was tough!)  Oh- earlier, we also had our first German lesson!  How could I forget???  We spent the first hour at a lunch place with two German students and our German teacher, Frau Heineke.  I pick up languages fairly quickly, but since I know keine Deutsche (no German!) it was slow going.  I can say a few things, like “Ich heisse Amanda” (my name is Amanda); “Hallo!” (hello!); “Ich mochte ein Bier und auch die Rahmschnitzel” (I would like a beer and the Rahmschnitzel); and a couple of other things that I’m too tired to remember right now.  After lunch we went back to the classroom and had a lesson, which was scary because she wanted us to introduce ourselves and I literally know NOTHING to say, so it was hard.  I hate that feeling- wanting to communicate but just having NO vocab to do it.  I could have answered her in English, French, Italian or Spanish, but not German.  Boo!  But we got textbooks and I am going to study up and I’d like to be able to speak to someone semi-intelligently in 2 weeks.  It was a long but exciting day, and I bet I’m going to be very sore tomorrow from the bike riding, so I am going to go to bed soon.  Tomorrow we go to school to officially register for classes (we are actually registering at the University as International Business Students since they don’t have a music degree there!).  So far so good! 

 

May 19

 

Today was another big errand-running day.  We met at school at 11am to start to fill out paperwork for our health insurance and student IDs.  It was a lot of walking and visits to many offices and the bank and we finally breaked for lunch at 12:30.  We ate at the Mensa, which is the University’s cafeteria, and we chose between four “Essen” choices- four meals they were offering today.  I had a fried fish filet, the “tater tots” (some kind of Pommes, but not sure what they’re called), plus a chocolate pudding and water.  It was fun, we all ate in the cafeteria with our new friends Connie and Eddy (Constanze and Edith).  Then we went to a Kaffee Haus to fill out some more paperwork and have an Eis Kaffee (mit Hasselnuss) and it was delicious!  Then Abby and I went back to our bikes while the others shopped around for Euro clothes.  Abby and I got a little lost (we called it “Sight-seeing,” but….) and then I rode my bike all the way to our apartment all by myself and didn’t get lost!  Big day for me!  The hills on the way home from campus are a bitch and I came home and had to shower when I got back because I was POURING sweat.  Then I got to practice a little bit, which was good!  Everyone came back and then we left for our first Tosca rehearsal!  I am singing Sopranista mit Abby and Lainey and Sasha are singing Sop II.  The rehearsal was all in German, but Jan Horstmann said a few things in English for us.  The woman next to me- Urka I think?- was very nice and spoke English and was helpful in finding page numbers, telling us when it was just Altos singing, etc.  I really enjoyed the rehearsal.  We also met Sam (last name?) who actually did our program 2 years ago and stayed in Germany and has been here since!  We had dinner with him at an outdoor café and then he showed us his cute apartment which is about 100 feet from the Teater.  Then Matt, Alex and I met up with our friends Eddy and Connie and played pool and drank all night.  They had invited a LOT of their friends- many cute boys!!!!!!- who all spoke English.  We had an excellent time!!!!  They are having a party for us tomorrow night at Eddy’s house so we are excited.  On the way home, I broke my bike, but it turned out that the chain had just come out of gear, so Matt fixed it for me.  IT would have been a long walk home!  We made it home right at midnight.  Tomorrow we have Tosca rehearsal, then Bastienne rehearsal, then maybe some Essen (food), and then a German lesson, and then another Tosca rehearsal, then party!!!  Big day tomorrow, but filled with things that are way more fun than sitting around waiting for insurance cards.  Tschüss!

 

May 20

 

Today we had to get up for Tosca rehearsal which ran from 10-12.  Abby and I had lunch at the Back Factory and ate it outside at the Ober Markt, which is an open-air market.  People sell fruit and flowers, and there is an ice cream stand as well as clothing/handbag stands.  We don’t really know if the food there is more or less expensive than at KaufLand, and we also don’t know if we’re supposed to haggle, which would be very scary since I am still quite tentative with numbers.  Abby and I then rode our bikes to KaufLand to pick up some food, especially for tomorrow, which is a national holiday day, and everything is going to be closed.  I picked up some pasta and sauce, Bratwurst, cereal, and a couple of other things.  It wasn’t bad getting it home on my bike since I also bought a BASKET!!!  Excellent day.  We rested for a couple of minutes at home and then headed back into town for dinner and Tosca rehearsal.  The Tosca rehearsal was in their Black Box theater (they call it an Experimental Theater Space) and it is very fun to attempt to decipher stage directions that are in German.  After the rehearsal, we were invited by the Director, KappellMeister, and some of the principals to go out for beers, which was fun.  The Cavaderossi is this huge Italian guy, only 31 years old but amazing!  And he is HILARIOUS.  They all speak excellent English (Except the Tosca, but I think she was just also timid) and we had fun joking around.  They have sort of learned our names, which is nice.  THEN, we had excellent plans with the Germans to go out to this club for a party/dancing because tomorrow’s the holiday so we all get to sleep in!!!  We met up with Connie, Eddy, and their friend Patrick at the Mense at school and then walked to the club, where we drank and danced until about 2:30.  It was  LONG ride home, but not so bad with a little vodka in us.  We met all sorts of people and (of course) were stared at all night.  At one point, I was outside with Eddy and her frined Eric, and these German students kept looking at me over Eddy’s shoulder, so I finally looked them in the eye and said Hallo! And they laughed and were embarrassed.  That’s what you get for staring at me!  I wish I could wear a sign that says “If you want to practice your English, come talk to me” instead of just being stared at nervously.  Oh well.  It was a REALLY fun night and we will probably be paying for this for a little while.

 

May 21

 

Today was a German holiday (Man’s Holiday, left over from Socialism, where they worked every day), so everything in the city was closed.  We thought we’d have a lovely day off, but no!  We woke up around 10, talked about last night again and how awesome it was, and how hungover we were, and then went downstairs for German class with Frau Heineke in Dorothy’s apartment.  It was MUCH better having German in a close setting, so we could actually hear Frau Heineke and actually catch individual words.  We hope to convince everyone to have class there every day instead of at school in that echo-y Physics classroom.  After class, we came upstairs to our apartments for lunch.  I cooked linguini with tomato sauce and Bratwurst with my roommates, and the boys made some kind of delicious potatoes and eggs dish and they brought it down and we all ate together.  IT was soooo good.  Then we went back down to Dorothy’s to watch a movie of the live play we are going to see next weekend.  The play is called the Captain of Koepernick.  The movie was horrible and boring, in German with English subtitles.  We were all struggling to stay awake but most of us slept on and off throughout the film.  Then Alex, Abby and I tried on our Bastienne costumes and they are really cute!  I guess the era is Classical?  I have a corset and a white wig and petticoats and everything.  Then we came back up and had a little nap time, which was NOT long enough.  We had to get back up at around 6, at which point I had dinner with the boys and then we all went to the Symphony concert downtown.  The same conductor (Jann Horstmann) conducts the orchestra concerts as well as the operas, and the same orchestra plays all of these things too.  It was an excellent concert, in the church where our Tosca is going to play.  Then we went out for dinner/drinks with Herr Horstmann and I had a Fanta, a grosse stilles Wasser, and an Apfelstrudel.  (I had made a decision to give my body the night off from alcohol!)  The Apfelstrudel was delicious, of course, and had this yummy custard sauce with it.  We were at the restaurant until about 11:30 and then made the trek home and went straight to bed.  Some cool observations as of late:  we are starting to run into some of the same people, mostly musicians from our ChorProbe and Tosca, and even instrumentalists.  They all recognize us as the amerikan Studenten, which is fine, since that’s what we are.  But they do recognize us individually too, so when we walk to the theater, the door person buzzes us right in now so we feel cool!

 

May 22

 

Today was the beginning of the weekend!  We woke up and had Tosca rehearsal 10-12 like normal, then I had my first Bastienne coaching with Dr. Reber, and then German from 3-5 at school, and then I was done for the day!  I walked around downtown a bit and then headed home to hang out.  The girls cooked dinner together, more pasta, bratwurst and zucchini.  It was good to have the night off.  Dorothy and Dr. Reber rented cars for our weekend trips, so we got to go to KaufLand in the CARS and buy all sorts of heavy and bulky stuff we couldn’t bring home on our bikes.  It was awesome!

 

May 23

 

Today, Dorothy let us skip Tosca rehearsal and sleep in.  We left for Leipzig around 1pm and it took forever to get there because there were Staus on the Autobahn (a Stau is a big accident that can be miles long because the Autobahn goes so fast that you don’t see a wreck in front of you until you’re pretty much in it).  We made it to Leipzig around 4 and walked around a bit and then ate at the restaurant where Goethe did a lot of his writing.  I forgot the name of it.  We also went to the ThomasKierche, where JSBach is buried and had written some of his music.  It was very cool!  We went to the Leipzig Theater then to see their production of Carmen.  IT was VERY Euro.  Modern setting, stuffed animals, and a man throwing glitter…. Plus child molestation, pole dancing and weird things.  The singing was VERY good, though, so it was really good to hear.  This show was originally written with spoken dialog instead of recit, and they did all the spoken stuff into microphones on the side of the stage, as well as hand-held mics, in German.  It was really disjunct from the beautiful singing, which sounded wimpy (of course) compared to the huge over-amplified microphone speaking.  But Carmen had a beautiful voice, so I enjoyed the show.