Frankfurt Mid-Year Seminar

So the CBYX program has an orientation, mid-year seminar, and end of year seminar for all the participants. I can't believe the mid-year seminar is already over. It was from the 16th to the 20th of January. That means I am over half done with my year in Germany. Sad face. The mid-year seminar was really fun though. It was in Frankfurt and the program paid for participants' travel expenses so we all basically got to go to Frankfurt for free. I had only ever been to Frankfurt when we landed in Germany but we were all quickly swooped away to our dorm building in the woods for our orientation seminar. So it was nice to be able to really see Frankfurt. It is the only city in Germany with actual high rises even though it only has a couple. Even Berlin does not have high rises. We had to arrange and plan our own arrival but we all had to be at the hostel at 3pm at the latest. We stayed at the Haus der Jugend in Frankfurt. It was a pretty nice hostel and it was probably the only one that could accommodate all 75 of us at once. The building looked like it could hold a lot of people. It was four to a room so not what you would call private but it was clean and we all had our own bed. The hostel was also very close to the nightlife. Haha not sure if the program planned that or not. My guess is not.

Frankfurt is so cool. The Main river runs through it and there is an island in this river that is home to all these geese, ducks, and swans. It was so cool to be in the middle of the city and to be able to fall asleep to the distant honking of the geese on the island.

The seminar takes place so that the employees in charge of our program can touch base with us. The first night consisted of a welcome and an Italian dinner. The Italian dinners in Europe are better...just want to put that out there. The next morning we were split into 3 groups and we basically had a sharing circle where we all shared where we were living, where we were going to school, and if we lived with a guest family. We then got stickers and we got to rank different aspects of the program and then we discussed why certain things were maybe better than others. Overall, we were all having a positive experience with the program. Once were were done with that, we had the rest of the day to do what we wanted. I opted to just walk around a bit. That's what is so nice about going somewhere you have never been before. A simple walk is so interesting and fun...and it's free. This particular hostel was also capable of providing breakfast, lunch, and dinner so we didn't even have to worry about meals.

Wednesday we were split up into 3 predetermined groups. Art and Media, Transportation and Finance, and Politics. I chose Art and Media because I really did not have interest for the other two groups. My group got to go to a museum dedicated to film and photography that was walking distance from the hostel. The museum was really interesting. We got to see all the different developments that the world of film and photography went through. We even got too see one of the original costumes from the Alien movies and a mock up of Darth Vader's helmut that was used in the original Star Wars movies. The museum also had this really cool installation. It consisted of 3 projection screens that all played a different movie clip at a time. All 3 clips had a unifying theme. For instance, if it was a dancing theme, all three different movies had characters that were dancing to the same tempo so if you played appropriate music it would look like they were all dancing to the same music. Super cool. Later that day, the Art and Media group went to the ZDF studios. ZDF is one of the biggest German television stations. They also go by 2DF because ZDF stands for Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen which means "2nd German Television" so they have the liberty of swapping the Z and 2 since they stand for the same thing and look so similar. Technically this television station was in Mainz but it was very close to Frankfurt. ZDF has stations all over Germany but they are based out of Mainz so it was a real treat to go the the main station. We got to see some stages and control rooms. ZDF's motto is "Mit dem zweiten sieht man besser" which means "with the 2nd, one sees better". So they are saying you see more with their station. Also, while you are saying this you have to hold your middle and pointer finger over one of your eyes. I know it sounds corny but it was pretty cool. Check out the video below if you want to know what I am talking about.

ZDF is also known for these little people called Mainzelmännchen. Between the commercials and the shows on all ZDF stations, they play a little 5 second clip of these little guys doing silly things. The Mainzelmännchen are named so because they come from Main and "männchen" means "little people". They have been on the television station since 1963 so many Germans remember growing up with them as a child. They have grown and evolved through the years but one thing has still remained the same...they are silly little buggers. It is also worth mentioning that I have NEVER seen a Mainzelmännchen clip twice. Never. Take a look below.

A studio at ZDF.

This is where they draw the lottery numbers. So cool!

Me and Det at ZDF. Yes, the name of this Mainzelmännchen is Det. Mit dem zweiten sieht man besser!

On Thursday, all 75 of us got to see the GIZ tower in Frankfurt. You see, CBYX is the name of the program in America but GIZ handles everything on the German side. GIZ stands for Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit and it means Society for International Cooperation. They handle hundreds of foreign relation programs and the CBYX program is just one small part of what they do although they treat it with great importance. While at the GIZ tower we got to see some presentations on what kind of work GIZ does and we also got to hear a member of the American Foreign Service speak. She talked about what her job was like and what she had to do to get a job with the Foreign Service...it does not seem easy at all to get a job with the foreign service. If you don't know at least two languages fluently, you basically have no chance of getting a job. You also need to know an obscure language like Hungarian or something. It sounds so hard to get hired by the Foreign Service.

When we left the GIZ tower we went back to the hostel for a short while. That night GIZ organized for us to see a musical at the Englisch Theater in Frankfurt where all the musicals were in English. It was "The Who's Tommy". If you have never seen it, it is super weird. All the songs are from The Who. It is basically the story of a boy who witnesses a murder and internalizes it but becomes deaf, blind, and mute as a result. It was so strange but I love musicals so I enjoyed it. Here is a clip from the musical where they use the song Pinball Wizard.

As soon as the seminar started it was over. Friday morning we were done and we all headed out. Some people like me headed home and others went on little weekend trips.