Friday, 17 July 2009

My time in Queenswood

My time in Queenswood is over now, which I can't believe because the days passed so quickly. It was really a great time: I have made new friends, my impression is that my English has improvedbecause I spoke it almost the whole day, my class, the teachers and all AOs (Activity Organisers) were so friendly and funny. I even got used to the English weather, which is really changeable: you always have to pack a jacket, an umbrella, but also sun cream because you can't predict the weather for more than the next ten minutes :-)

Although I find it hard to say goodbye to evryone and although I can't imagine that I'll leave tomorrow, I'malso looking forward to see my family again. All the picture the others and Itook will always remain in my head as a rememberance of these two weeks...


Excursion to Windsor










Yesterday, all seniors took their academic excursion to Windsor. At first, we visited Windsor Castle, which was really impressive because of its size. I especially liked the state apartments and Queen Mary's doll house because one could really see the splendor of the castle. The doll house could almost have been a house on its own..... The same with the state apartments: there are more rooms than anyone would need in his whole life!!!! Everything, the china, the armours and the furniture is very splendid and impressive. Also the "rest" of the castle is just gigantic and still has the impression of a very strong fortress. Fortunately, we could also see the changing of the guards at noon. I can't believe how the guards can remain so still without changing their facial expression for such a long time while all tourists want to take photos.



Afterwards, we had time to visit the city of Windsor and go shopping there. Except from the castle, Windsor is a small town. Although I don't like shopping normally, I bought a nice tourist guide of Windsor Castle and an English historic novel about Katharina of Aragon because one doesn't have such a great choice of English books in Germany.

Tuesday, 14 July 2009

My life in Queenswood






So this is my daily routine: Getting up early at 7:30, two academic lessons after breakfast, followed by this e-comm lessons and a tutor group. There we prepare our performance for the farewell evening this Friday, but this is still a secret....... After lunch and a bit freetime, we continue with individual workshops, for example film or academic writing. Two further academic lessons conclude our school day. After dinner there are the pro-football lessons or the others can choose between different activities. Afterwards we are all exhausted and fall into bed.
Quuenswood is a great boarding school, as you can see on the pictures. It has a lot of different buildings, but also great green spaces to relax or do sports there. It is really how I imagined an English boarding school.
As there are many differnet activities to choose in the evening, I've tried some different kinds of sports. Badminton is my favourite freetime activity because I also do it at school and it's really fun. I've tried tennis for the first time in my life as well, but that's not my kind of sports, I recognized. Yesterday, lots of us went bowling, which I had never done before either. However, this worked better than tennis, I was satisfied with my first score. In the end, I even succeeded once in hitting all ten pins at one time!!!!

Blogs of my class mates

http://mervequeenswood.blogspot.com/
http://pascalequeenswood.blogspot.com/
http://qmaurice.blogspot.com/?zx=ed2c59004e7e0caf
http://albyqueenswood.blogspot.com/
http://albertogatqueenswood.blogspot.com/?zx=7b5ce37e890dc2a3
http://lambertqueenswood.blogspot.com/
http://franky-thandie.blogspot.com/

Monday, 13 July 2009

My weekend

This Saturday, we went to London again and did some shopping in Oxford Street (mainly post cards). The greatest thing about the day in London was the musical "Billy Elliot" in the evening. "Billy Elliot" is a story about a ten-year-old boy having a great talent for ballet, but living in a coal mining area, so that his father doesn't want him to dance. In the end, he accepts the boy's interests of course and Billy can go to the Royal Ballet School in London. Especially impressive was the young actor of Billy Elliot, who is already a very good ballet dancer. In the end there were even standing ovations for all the actors and dancers. After a short night (we came back late from the musical), the Sunday was mostly relaxing and doing some sports.

Friday, 10 July 2009

Photos from our excursion to London



















The photos show the changing of the British Museum, the changing of the horse guards and the House of Parliament and Big Ben.

My excursion to London

Yesterday, my class and me went on the seniors' excursion to London, which was fun. At first we had a guided walking tour of London, where we could see Westminister Abbey, House of Parliament and Big Ben, Downing Street (with barriers all around unfortunately) and Buckingham Palace. The most impressive thing about the tour was the changing of the guards at Buckingham Palace and the horse guards changed as well. It's quite astonishing that the horses remain standing still for such a long time although all tourists want to take photos. Our guide told us some very interesting stories, e.g. about Oliver Cromwell's head once being spiked up on the House of Parliament or the secret room in the Treasury, where Winston Churchill secretly directed the army during the second World War.
After a small lunch break, we visited the British Museum. As it's so large, we concentrated on one room, for me it were the Egyptian sculptures, where I had to answer some questions. Especially the sculptures of all the pharaos are soooo big and have been existing for such a long time now......