Ich spreche ein kleines Duetsch. Spreche Englisch und Spanisch.

This morning, I went back to the place I volunteered at on Tuesday (the Vineyard DaN) and took an hour and a half German class. Now, I can say the days of the week, I can count to twelve, I can say "my name is", "I come from", "I live in", "I am...years old", (the numbers are rather difficult for me after 12, though), "I am not married and I have no children" and I can ask those questions of others. I also know how to say a few other random words, but I don't understand the grammar structure at all. I attempted to write a poem in German, anyway. I sent it to my friend who speaks High German (which is, apparently, really different than Swiss German) so I guess we'll see if what I pieced together in German is what I meant in English:

Heilig

Bitte, Herr und Vater:
Hilfe.

Ihr lebendes Wasser:
gnade.

Licht sie von Ihr Liebe,
Nicht unsere eigenen Wege (I had help with this line!),

Finden Sie uns, Vater:
Ihr stimme.

I took the bus there and back all by myself; I really like figuring out public transportation. They've really got the public transportation system down really well here. Everything is electronic - from the little ticket machine at each bus stop, to the screens at each stop that tell you the next four buses arriving and when they'll get there, to the screens on the bus that show a map of the route and the name of the next stop in red at the top. So, really, I don't have to speak a lot of German to get around here; I really want to learn, though. It's not like Ireland, where you've got to tell the driver where you want to get off and then watch feverishly out the window for a street you may or may not recognize! I also learned a lot of other things: like the "Bernese Mountain Dog" is a Swiss Dog - "Bernese" meaning - from Bern (the capitol of Switzerland). I also learned that the people the group I served with works with in give clothing, food and German lessons to are not just "foreigners" - they are refugees, mostly from war-torn areas of the Middle East. Whoa hey.
I spent a lot of time in "the office" today, doing some "catch-up", too: labeling pictures of my train rides from the map of Switzerland (I took over 400 pictures each day I took a train tour), journaling, writing postcards, reading another of the letters I received from loved ones back home (I got 20 in total), and, in general, thinking and attempting to pray/study the Word. It is a lovely day outside (nearly 90 Degrees Fahrenheit if I did the conversion correctly) and I don't have too much longer here in Switzerland, but I really did need the time. Tomorrow, Anita suggested that her, Lionel, Kai and I go to the biggest circus in Switzerland - it's coming to Bern for two weeks only starting tomorrow! - with the kids, then ride up a cute little train on this mountain by their house, and then, go to this new, has-got-it-all shopping center. So, my last day is going to be relatively full, I think. After another lovely dinner that Anita made, a bunch of people came over for a political advocacy meeting to raise awareness about a Christian group to help alleviate world poverty - the Sturmer's host this thing (for those that don't spreche duetsch) but it was all in Swiss German so I continued my catch-up (gosh there is a lot of work to do to properly document a trip, let alone all the other spiritual/emotional work going on here, t00). Matthias is leaving for a hiking trip early tomorrow morning so I don't know when I'll see him again! Of course, I never really thought I'd see him again when Mark and I ran into him at the Philly airport over a year ago, either, so you never know. :-).

I'm really wanting to do a bit of "taking stock" of my trip, too - a lot has really changed (in me) even in the short month and some I've been here (and it's continuing to change quite rapidly, though some of the main "issues" remain constant - or are even getting bigger...at least that's how it feels). It's actually hard to imagine that I'll be home in less than three weeks. Not that my life really settles down much: I'll be living with my "parents" for 5 days, then off to summer school for two weeks on Blakely Island with a possibly retreat to Chicago straight from that, then, a week of working full-time (we'll see), and then, fall quarter starts. Somewhere in there, I need to find a new place (in Seattle) to live, get my textbooks and collect my kitty from his "baby-sitter"...