hey!!!
i'm really sorry i havn't written in so long!
i'm now in atlanta georgia! back in the US!
so you missed uelzen and erfurt, germany, and hasselt, belgium.
uelzen was a cute little city in former west germany. the first day we were there we went to a concentration camp called bergen-belson. it wasn't what i expected, but it was so incredible to experience this. it was really strange because we walked down this beautiful path through the woods, and it was sunny and bright outside and the guide suddenly said "okay, this was where the outside wall was into the camp." i looked out and it was just a big field full of grass and even a few flowers. it looked like any other place in germany, except that this was an evil place full of hate. it really made you realize that horrible things could have happened anywhere, but they may have been forgotten. you could be standing in a place where people could have been massacred or beaten just because of what they looked like, or even no reason at all. there are places all around the world like that. its so hard to imagine...
i mostly did school presentations for admissinos during this week, but i was also in charge for a few days when the admissions coordinator had to leave. i was in charge of the vip tour for students on the show day and the entire presentation after the show! pressure pressure pressure.
also during the week i went to a town called luneburg. it was such a cute town full of very very very old buildings. something that makes this town unique is that it was built on a salt mine. that means that as the salt dissolves and leaves big spaces underground, the town sinks. there are buildings that are very very tipped because of this. in a playground for kids the city had a net put in underground so it the ground falls out from underneath them they'll be caught! crazy, huh?
for CI in this city i worked at an after school program for immigrant children who needed extra help because their english skills wern't quite as high as the other children. that was a lot of fun.
then we went to erfurt. erfurt is a beautiful city in eastern germany. for regional learning we got to plan our own day and a few people and i decided to check out a library at the university and look at their ancient books. they had a room where there were books clear back from the medival times. it was really interesting. there was also a floor just with books about different countries. there were so many different languages it was incredible.
for CI i cooked some traditional foods from lots of different countries. we made chicken teriyaki from japan, and potato ball things form sweden. i also made delicious brownies from the US. haha. we made a huge vat of potato salad and veggie salad. it was really yummy. for CI we all split up and did a lot of different things. some of us spray painted a gym wall at a high school with professional spray painting artists, some people made musical instruments, and one group wrote a song with local youth and they ended up playing it at our show. it was really really good. after all our CI's we got together for a party thing and presented what we had done all week. the point of the CI's was mostly to interact with the youth there.
erfurt was beautiful, we saw some very symbolic, old buildings, and a gorgeous cathedral. it was so much fun. we walked everywhere, on cobblestone and it was such a great experience. there was also a oktoberfest party going on in the town square with a carnival. there was a HUGE ferris wheel and it was super fun! :) i really liked this city.
i actually took a day or two off with a 3 other "uppies" to go home with one of our cast mates. we all missed the first 2 days in belgium, but had an amazing time in the netherlands. we stayed with johan and his family. his step-mom is iranian, and her sister was visiting that week from iran so they both made us a delicious iranian meal. it was great. it was really interesting, because johan's family obviously spole dutch, but his step-mom only spoke german, so pretty much the whole family speaks german too, but his step-mom had to translate into persian for her sister, and johan had to translate some into english for us. it was very very cultural. it was SOOOO much fun! haha. :D
the next day we did a school presentation at his old high school, and then we all went into germany to visit his dad's doctor office. it was really interesting! that night we all went grocery shopping and cooked something from our culture. sara from tucson made tacos/quesadillas, jonathan from sweden made this salmon on toast stuff, johan made tomato soup and i made brownies! we stayed up talking about TONS of stuff. SO much fun.
the next day we joined the cast in Hasselt, Belgium. it was good to see them. i missed them after only 2 days away! so in belgium i did more school presentations and promotion. we actually had a promo bus at this huge event for the equivalent of the MTV awards in belgium. FUN! well... kind of strange... there were drunk people everywhere, but we passed out a lot of flyers. a group of us also went to a big governmental building and performed at a black tie affair that evening. there were representatives for the king and queen there!
the show was amazing! we had tons of people for the backstage tour and LOTS of vips. we had champagne tables in the front and the elite from all the businesses around the area came to see if they'd like to sponsor UWP someday. it went SO well. we had 2 shows and it was a big success. we actually performed on the same stage the "MTV awards" were at the night before. i heard fall out boy and rihanna were there and performed on the same stage, but it may be a rumor. fun though!!! :D
for my host family day we went to this cute park with my host parents and their daughter and granddaughter. we walked through perfect leaves. it was so autumny! :) i loved it. we just walked around... played with melany (the grand daughter) and relaxed. good day.
now i'm in atlanta... i actually leave tomorrow... but the first day here we went to the Martin luther king center. that was really interesting! its so strange to see that all that happened so recently! then we worked with the boys and girls club in the area. it was fun to be with the kids there. they taught me some dance moves. it pretty much rocked my face. we had a show on friday. it went pretty well. on saturday we went to a hindu temple! it was SO gorgeous! there were 75,000 pieces that were all handcarved in india and shipped over here. CRAZY!! oh my goodness it was beautiful.
so here i am... packing... getting ready to go to winston-salem, north carolina; the headquarters for the 3 biggest tobacco companies in the US. it should be interesting!
hope all is well back home and all around. sorry it took me so long... and sorry there are no pics. my camera was stolen in sweden. :(
big hugs
--callie rae
