NEWS
FROM GERMANY TO THE GREAT PLAINS
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MARIAH HOUSTON
T
Exchange trip offers Americans and Germans the experience of a lifetime
ossing and turning in and out of sleep on a 10 hour plane ride to Germany, five Free State students and one Lawrence High student departed on a five week journey full of soccer spectation, schnitzel and expanded frames of reference. The group landed at the Hamburg Airport, scanning the crowd for their German host families. “I hopped off the plane, and I had no idea who [Julius was] and who I was supposed to look for,” junior Harrison Miller said. “It was definitely kind of shocking, but the day I got
there was my birthday actually and we got home and they had a nice little breakfast for me and some gifts.” German exchange student Julius Herold hosted Miller over the summer in his hometown of Eutin. “So the first night was very strange because I knew one wall behind me there was sleeping a completely strange person,” Herold said. “We know each other now, and we are just the same person.” Herold is now experiencing the ‘strangeness’ of being immersed in American culture.
“It’s a little bit different, not only a little bit, because everything is different,” Herold said. “The school is different. The look of the whole country is different. The houses are different. For example, I said to Harrison that everyone in Germany has a hedge in the front of their house, and you guys just have grass which is so strange for me.” Despite the anxieties of being in a foreign country, Herold believes the personal growth he will experience will make the trip worthwhile. “I’m going to be more confident after this,” Herold said. “I’m starting to speak better
