The ‘informal goals of an EF language course’:
Don’t leave without:
Eating local- Being amazed
- Exploring your city
- Get out of town
In addition to that there is also a cultural checklist:
New food- New architecture
New friends- New pastimes
- New clothes
- New greetings
I’m going to stay here in Berlin for two weeks, and on that occasion I’ll do my best to complete all the ‘EF goals’ as well as the cultural checklist. Here is my experiences of ‘Exploring the city’ and ‘Getting out of town’.
The beautiful church of Dresden in the old city centre
This saturday my friends and I were on an excursion with EF to the beautiful city of Dresden. Dresden is a city in the eastern part of Germany, with stunning old architecture dating hundreds of years back. The school had arranged the trip, so we travelled in a rented bus to and from the city. In Dresden we got a guided tour – first by foot then by bus – before we had four hours of pass time. My friends and I had lunch, bought an ice cream and went to visit the old city church, before we returned to the bus to Berlin.
The view from the old city, across the river to the new city
On Sundays, the shops in Berlin are closed (with the exception of a few here and there) which took my friends and I by surprise. We had made plans for meeting up and visiting markets, eating lunch and shopping around the town of Berlin, but due to the somewhat cold morning, it got down to two very short visits at two markets. We had a lovely lunch at Vapiano at Potzdammer Platz, before we travelled with the U-bahn to the East Side Gallery. Luckily the weather got a lot better in the afternoon, so we stayed by the Spree and East Side Gallery to relax.
From the left: Tomáš, Maja, Klára and Marina
With Monday, our last week of our language courses in Berlin officially started… And it is weird. The time here has passed so fast, and we don’t really want to part with each other, the school and Berlin. Because we have so many things we want to do before we head home, the past few days has been packed with shopping trips and trips to cafées, and it has just made the time fly even faster. Wednesday evening we all went to the Mall of Berlin to have dinner, and to the Sony Center to go to the cinema and watch Ted 2. Even though they dub everything dubbable in Germany, it was possible to watch the movie with it’s original (american) audio, and I must admit that even though I didn’t think it would fit my sense of humour, I actually quite enjoyed it. A lot. I found it hilarious, and (based on the laughter of my friends during the course of the movie) I am pretty confident that I’m not the only one.
Klára, Tomáš and I in the cinema
Dinner at the Mall of Berlin on Wednesday
Because our courses ends today, yesterday we had dinner at the Mall of Berlin for the last time… For now at least.
Panorama of the East Side Gallery
