The Goodbye Party

Storytelling is like a giant secret being whispered faster and faster

In Block B on Thursday, September 26, we went to Storytelling in Mrs. Friant`s English AP class.

Storytelling has a long tradition in Upper East Tennessee and it`s appreciated by many folks and teachers at DB.

Librarian, Mrs. Cynthia Ryman, introduced us to the heroes` journeys in three very different stories.

The Six Swans by the Grimm Brothers is about a girl who wants her six brothers to be turned back into humans. To achieve this aim she has to suffer and go through six years of silence.

Mutzmag is about life in the Appalachian mountains.Mutzmag, the protagonist, has to fight against an evil witch and get rid of a dangerous giant. By using a jackknife and her wit she eventually  gains gold and personal independence.

The third story that was told to us, Savitri and Satyavan(India), deals with devotion and persistence, life and death, happiness and sadness. Savitry follows the God of Death to the “land of dead” and masters both her secure life and the world of uncertainty.

We really liked the stories and appreciated that we had the opportunity to listen to this interesting presentation.

“Myths inspire the realization of the possibility of your perfection.”

Daniel, Sebastian, Jonathan, E. Schwarz

 

David Crocket vs. Dobyns Bennett

Saturday, 9/21/2013

To support our High School football team we went to an away match against David Crocket High School in Jonesborough. When we got there the Stadium was stunning. Even on an away match the tribune was full of Dobyns Bennett fans. As soon as the match started the band was playing motivating and exciting songs to support the team. And it worked! Right in the beginning the team got a huge advantage with a big yard win. Dobyns Bennett football team was dominating during the whole match. The half-time score was DB 61:0 David Crocket. We saw some great catches and tactics by the team which resulted in a huge score. The final score was 61:7. 

We learned the rules of American Football and what is happening on the field to understand the way teams are playing. 

We had a great time visiting and supporting our team. The way a High School football match is going on is really  exciting and as soon as you are in the fan block you are already involved in a spectacular game.

Mikail

Mountain Dew Monday

We visited classes today. I went to the Culinary Art Class from Ms. A. Knott in the A block. She was very strict to her students but not to us Germans. They usually go to the kitchen but not on Mondays. After that, we met for Home Room in the library. We exchanged experiences, that we made in the different classes. I went to the Mandarin Class in C block. There were only 4 students in the class, but it was still a lot of fun. I learned the numbers from 1 to 99. In D block, I went to the Fiber Arts class. They did a lot of practical things there. We don't have that in our school :(. I think it's more interesting than our German Arts classes. After school I went to Taco Bell with my exchange student. I really like the price game there. It works like this: you have to throw a dime or a quarter onto a plastic platform. If you can do it, you get a meal for free. I like especially like the Mountain Dew from Taco Bell. I wish we would have that in Germany. After that my exchange student had to do homework, so we hung out at his house. We went to an Italian restaurant in the evening, because it was his mum's birthday. The food was good, but not as good as the German Italian food. 

Jonathan

ADO on air at DB

Listen to the radio interview!

Welcome to Fiber Arts - prepare to dye!

At 6 a.m. I took a shower and ate my sweet cereals. Then we got into the car and picked up the friend of my host Harmony. We arrived at DB at 7:45 a.m.. We had 5 more minutes to be on time to Harmony's English class. My "Fiber Arts" class started at 7:45. I love this class, because I met really nice people, the teacher is very easy-going and we don't have these kind of classes in Berlin so it was really interesting for me. Today I dyed my sweatshirt with the "spiderweb" technique. Frau Wolf also decided to attend that class. She first watched us and learned about the different ways to dye the fabric and did her own Shirt after that. After Fibre Arts I had Philosophy which was pretty interesting. We sat in a circle and talked for example about what beauty actually is. Everybody introduced themselves which was really kind. It is called "Southern hospitality". In Block C I bought my lunch and went to the library. Obviously you can read a book, use your laptop but also classes like the computer course use the library. In Block D I went to ROTC with some other Berliners. ROTC stands for Recruit Officer Training Corps and in this course the students tak about military plans, learn about important military people, learn how to march and they also workout in every course. Every Monday the students have to wear their ROTC uniforms. I finished school at 2:45 and me, my host and some of the Fibre Arts students went to an icecream parlour.

Jagoda

Making "Spaghettieis" in the World Language Club

An ice-cream that looks like pasta with tomato sauce and a meatball on top? That must be a German tradition. It is! Wednesday afternoon about 45 students came into the World Language Club to try this strange German-Italian desert that has been invented in Mannheim in 1969 and everybody seemed to really enjoy it.

Howling with the Wolves at Bay's Mountain

On Tuesday we made a trip to Bay's Mountain. First we met up at the DB school bus station at 9 o'clock. When we arived, we had a barge tour for about an hour. A female guide drove us across the lake and showed us the ' home ' of beavers and imitated the howling of a wolf which was replied by wolves. 
After that we went to the planetarium to see a 'show' that ended at 11:30 am. Then we had the choice to go hiking with Mr. Schwarz or to relax with Franzi, who was injured on the rafting trip, and Ms. Wolf. At 13:40 the bus picked us up and drove us back to school .

Melina

My first Wednesday in Muricaa

The most interesting course on my third school day at Dobyns-Benett was the cooking in culinary arts. The selfmade pancakes were very tasty and tasted even better than the ones my mom makes. However, my day started with a tasty breakfast from my host mom. Two bacon strips, chocolate pancakes with raspberry jam and orange juice. That is my normal portion of calories for a day. Today that was only my breakfast. After pushing the dogs off of my bed, I finally got ready for school. I left the house with my lunch box that has been prepared the night before and went to the car. I met Daniel inside of the band building and we went to culinary arts. In the culinary arts class Daniel and I were flipping pancakes and eating tasty monkey bread. In block C we gave our presentation about popular kinds of sports in Germany. We started with introducing ourselves and then we spoke about Soccer, Volleyball, Basketball, Handball and Ice hockey. Afterwards we enjoyed our lunch and went the math class, which was not as exciting. When I arrived at home, my exchange student, his dad, and I went disc golfing. It was a lot of fun :). Throwing a disc towards a target, which is more then 200 feet away can be hard. Especially when it's your first time. But I got taught the proper techniques of throwing a disc. After getting taught, we went home to eat supper and then we played pool. I lost two times in a row against Adam :( . This was my first Wednesday in Muricaa.

Friday at the Middle School

When I woke up on Friday we decided that I am going to the Soccer tournament  with my exchange students. When we went to school I decided to go and try out the course "Criminal Justice". It was really interesting and I thought that it would be a good class to have in Germany. Then we met in front of school and we went to the Robinsons Middle School. There we met several children of different grades who asked us lots of questions. Some were very weird questions for example if we had WI-FI in Germany or how many seasons we had.

We went back to DB school after that and had lunch, which was again really good. Then some of us decided to go to ROTC where we met the nice Coach. We  got an impression of what the airforce could be like and got t-shirts for free :D . 

Then I left with my partner and after a quick stop at home we went to Greenville by car. On our way there we passed the Appalachian Mountains and had a really good view. 3 hours later we arrived at the hotel and where very hungry so we went to the local mall and had a delicious Panini. Later we planned the rest of the weekend and went to sleep.

Daniel

Hier noch ein paar gereimte Zeilen:

Ich werde euch erzählen über den Freitag 

Den Tag, den jeder mag 

Bilder gibt es auch dazu 

Liest es euch durch - Nur Zu ! 

Der Freitag begann sehr früh

Kam aus meinem Bett mit viel Müh 

Machte mich bereit für einen kalten Tag 

Das ist was ich gar nicht mag 

Wir entschieden das ich zum Fußballturnier fahre 

Und meine Sachen in einem Koffer soll bewahren 

Trafen uns im German Room 

Gingen rüber zur middle school 

Haben viele Fragen gestellt bekommen 

Und sie entspannt entgegen genommen 

Manche Fragen waren so banal 

Antworteten mit sehr viel Spaß oft mal

Mit vielen Eindrücken zurück zur Schule 

Lasst uns bloß in ruhe 

Gehen zum lunch in die Cafeteria 

Es ist alles so groß - heilige Maria ! 

Besuche Kunst und Deutsch 

Wieder Fragen von allen Seiten - Mensch !

Nicht vergessen zu besuchen die Armee 

Die tut momentan aber keinem weh 

Noch schnell zu Pals 

Essen bis zum Hals 

Es ist so heiß 

Davon niemand zuvor weiß 

Im Auto auf dem Weg nach Greenville 

Wie das Schicksal es will 

Denke über das Wochenende der anderen nach 

Hoffe sie erzählen mir davon danach.

Daniel

First impressions

Monday, 16th of September,  was our first day at Dobyns Bennett Highschool. In A-Block, the first lesson, we met in our German room and discussed the programm of the following days. This was the time when we first met other students of DB and got the chance to talk to them. All of the people were very interested in us and asked many, but also weird, questions. After the meeting we were supposed go into the classes of our exchange students. It was so impressive to walk through this huge school. It was so different to the Albrecht-Dürer-Gymnasium: so many rooms and floors that you could get lost in the building. Luckily some nice students prepared a guided tour through DB for us so we could see all the parts of the building. All of us were shocked how big their school was. We saw the gym, the school pool, the football field and tennis court and of course all of the classrooms. We could even visit some classes which was very interesting because they are so different to the subjects in Germany. Probably the most confusing thing: cosmetology, a class were you learn about hairstyling and how to give somebody a manicure! Something our school would never have as a subject.

After a day full of new impressions of people, classes and places we finally went to the homes of our exchange students. Everyone of us just went to bed and fell asleep straight away.

The Welcome Party

On Tuesday our second day at DB started. We all were excited about meeting the American students again and choosing new courses to attend. We got to know more about the school system by talking to many students which were very nice and excided about meeting some Geman students.

In the evening we had our "Welcome Party" at Maggie Biggs' house. Before having dinner Franzi gave everybody a tour and showed us around the big and beautiful house of her exchange student. Everyone had to bring some typical German food which he/she cooked before with the host family. After having some food in the amazing garden many people decided to jump into the big and warm pool. The sitting and eating turned into a fun pool party. Although there still were many people sitting around the tables everybody had a lot of fun and the chance to talk to all the participants of GAPP he/she didn't know so well yet. After turning up the music the atmosphere became even better and we all enjoyed sitting together and talking to each other. About 11 PM everybody left the house and drove home. It was a beautiful day and the beginning of a wonderful trip.

Laura & Franzi

Playing with Airsoft Guns

On Sunday we had some time to spend after breakfast, so we went outside into the woods to play with air soft guns like "real" Americans. There were a lot of guns we could choose from: from a sniper rifle to a carabiner rifle. We had a lot of fun, even though we missed our targets all the time. But when we got hit, it hurt a lot more than expected. My clothes were really dirty afterwards because I sat down in the mud and ran through the bushes. It was really exhausting and we all needed to take a shower. For us Germans it was a new experience, because in Germany it is not allowed to have those guns until you're eighteen years old and have a special permit. Even if you are old enough, it is still a bit weird to have those guns. But it was a lot of fun and we are all looking for to playing paintball.

Rafting down the Nolichucky

On Saturday, after a relaxed week, we had an exciting and adventurous white water rafting trip down the Nolichucky.  First we met at 9.45 a.m. and listened to one of the guides. He told us what we should and shouldn't do and how we should react in case of falling into the water. Somehow all of his sentences seem to end with "...or you will die". Then we got our equipment (life vests and paddles) and were taken to the river by bus. We have been rafting for almost four hours till lunch and two hours after lunch.  During the first part of the trip we got wet and many of us fell into the water. Most of us were afraid of falling into the water but it wasn't as bad as we first thought. Lunch was so delicious because all of us were so hungry by then. But at the same time it was not really cosy because at lunchtime it was raining even harder. After lunch we continued our trip down the river. First we didn't want to continue because all of us were so wet and cold but in the end it was fun.  Our guides were really cool and kind. They pushed us into the water for fun and we really enjoyed ourselves. All in all, it was an exciting day because we had the opportunity to see the beautiful scenerey and to do something active.

Navssika