dear ankita

The last two days have been FULL of field notes in my head because I’ve had the chance to tour the city, but I am in no mood to write it down for some odd reason. One of the other interns has been keeping a journal for a long time and shared some words of wisdom with me yesterday: never force yourself to write when you don’t feel like it. If you have a daily journal but don’t feel like writing on some days, then just don’t do it. Simple advice but one that didn’t occur to me. So I am going to take that advice. Plus I have a 45 minute tram journey to my workplace tomorrow, so I’ll have time to jot down some notes then. 

Field Notes

Day 2:

• Today I had an orientation/ workshop with all the other interns for us to all get to know each other, talk about our expectations and fears, as well as get some tips and insights as to how we should conduct our workshops for the children we are going to teach. We have interns from Russia, Canada, USA, Ecuador, Macau/Hong Kong, Singapore, China and more. It’s a pretty cohesive group so far. I am especially impressed by the inclusion of Macau because I’ve lived in Hong Kong for so many years and Macau is a boat ride away, but I have never met anyone FROM Macau.
   
• The workshop today took place in the most beautiful outdoor seating, under a tree. There was a nice red brick wall where we stuck up all our notes. It was seriously nice; and you can see point 1 of my Day 1 field notes. The Germans are particularly fond of the outdoors. I wish I had my cameras but I didn’t, and I don’t know why I didn’t think of taking photos with my phone. Anyway other people took photos so I’ll post them up here if I get to see them. 
   
• I’ve done workshops like this with AIESEC several times already but the setting of this one made it that much more awesome (together with the fact that Germans are prompt and don’t waste time… cannot say the same for HK folks unfortunately.)
   
• I am in diary heaven over here. I mean, the cheese is a given but the yogurt selection in Europe is also remarkable. I know this sounds odd but it seriously is.
  
  
• The Eurovision is awesome and a lot better than American Idol, even though we all know that AI stopped being cool about 4 years ago (Sorry Ryan). I don’t know if I find Eurovision cool because I’m here, just like how I sometimes think the overly dramatic Indian soaps are acceptable when I am in India because I can understand how they relate to the general public. Anyway, I really like the one from Spain. That girl can give a good performance while singing magnificently. 
  
  
  

Field Notes

Day 1

Arrived in Koeln and these are the things to note:

• People here sit in the park and read like it is nobody’s business. In the world that I grew up, people talk about reading in the park but nobody actually does it.
• Old (big) men think it is the most natural thing to take their shirt off and tan anywhere their heart pleases.
• This city has lived up to its reputation of being “young” because the vast majority of the people I’ve seen out and about seem to be under 25.
• I saw a Pope… or THE pope? today at the big Cologne Cathedral (Dom) and joined the crowd in taking photos of him. The Cathedral also happened to the first thing I saw in this city when I stepped out of the train station yesterday. Talk about being mind blown.
• The sun doesn’t set here until 10pm and when it does, it creates the most beautiful sky of purple merging into orange hues, and reminds me of a morning dawn than a sunset.

packing

Packing my suitcase and forgetting the following:

• Large temperature range (my GCSE teacher would NOT be proud)
• I will be in one place for 6 weeks hence need to look somewhat decent and put together
• Travelling like a cliche-college-student-goes-to-Europe for the remainder of my time - aka taking the train and hostel-hopping

All these points somehow contradict each other.