28. – 31.08.2007: Austausch mit Jugendgruppe aus Belfast
Herumgeführt und eingeladen wurde die Truppe von Schülern der neunten und zehnten Klasse der Montessori-Schule. Lesen Sie den spannenden Bericht von Max Jambor.
Our exchange week with the Belfasters
report by Max Jambor
From 28. of August until 31. of August 2007, the 10th grade and some pupils from the 9th grade of the Montessori-School had an exchange week with twelve people from northern Ireland. I asked one of them how long it took and how they got here. They flew about two hours. The project is about divided cities. These people came from Belfast, a divided city because of religion. So they wanted to know how it was in Berlin and how we think about east and west differences today.
On Tuesday at two o‘clock we went to the FEZ Berlin to meet them our first time. We sat down in a circle and introduced ourselves. The Belfasters were a bit older than us. Most of them were sixteen to eighteen. It was really hard to understand them. They didn‘t talk as clearly as the people from Salisbury. We discussed about our cities and about east and west Germany. Also we did a lot of ice-breaking games to get to know each other. All in all the first day wasn’t that good as I thought it would be, still it was OK. On the one hand they were really nice people but on the other hand we had to communicate and it was still hard to understand them.
The next day we showed them our school. The Belfasters were really impressed concerning our schoolsystem. After that we did again some funny games. They showed a short film about cross-cummity work to us. Moreover we talked about these cross-communities and about differences. I started to understand them better. That‘s why I felt better and tried to talk with them. In the afternoon we went bowling in the bowling alley „Spreehöfe“. It wasn‘t really cumminicative, but nevertheless it was fun. In one game I scored 135 points. That was more than Fabian, so I was really happy. But concerning speaking it wasn‘t that good. I wasn‘t able to start a long conversation, but I thought the Belfasters did‘‘t want to talk with us either.
On Thursday we started our workshops watching our film „The Revenge Of The Nerds“. I think they liked it but not that much. After that we had a discussion about differences in our lives and so we came to the very interesting point religion. In Belfast every child gets baptisted. They are either protestant or catholic. Most of the Germans were neither protestant nor catholic, so the Belfasters wondered what the germans do instead of confirmation. It was a pretty interesting conversation. We also discussed the following topics: gangs in both of our cities, community and foreigner problems. In Belfast, community means more to the people. There was a war because of different religion-communities. But in this group were protestants and catholics together and learned to understand each other. It is a project called cross-community. It was a rather exciting discussion. After lunch we visited the Berlin-Wall. While we walked down the wall, I talked a lot to them. I think I had to describe the word barbed wire about ten times like that: long iron rope with many spikes on it! It was amazing! Later we went to the GDR museum, since it is on the times of Berlin were divided. But I didn‘t think that it was interesting for them, because they left after 20 minutes. This day was really good. I talked more than I had talked the days before.
On the last day, Friday we wrote this report. The Belfasters came at about five o‘clock. Before they arrived we builded up the BBQ. The problem on the BBQ was that the group was splitted up again. So I tried to speak with the Belfasters. Later Oscar asked me to bring him a knife, because he didn’t want to go to their table. I brought it to him, but I said that all the others are too afraid to come to the table. Next time Simon came to this table and Seamus did a loud „Grrrr“! In other words: we had to laught a bit. After BBQ we went to the football pitch and played a nice game. And, it was unbelievable, we won! At seven o‘clock they had to go. I got some MSN adresses and Scott wrote down a few links about Belfast. I left them at the tram.
In my opinion it was a good week. I know that it could‘ve been better, but there is still the week in Belfast to come. I‘m very excited to go there. At last I can say that I‘ve learned a lot about other people from an other country and I‘ve improved my English. They are nice people and I enjoyed the week. So our trip to Belfast should be fun!
I‘m convinced it will be...
Max Jambor klasse 10
3rd of September 2007
Fotostrecke
Mit der Austauschgruppe am S-Bhf. Köpenick
Impressionen von der East Side Gallery