My fellow CSV crew.

Here is a photo of all of us who are here at Lancaster... Pili, Charlotte, me and Annika.

Annika and I have been really getting on lately and hung out mostly all day today even though I was on duty with Charlotte. She's so hilarious. We talked a lot in the past about Germany and the US, WWII, American vs German culture and the difference in language. She speaks nearly perfect English but said today that she wants to develop an English accent instead of an American one (PSH!). I spoke a little bit of German to her today and I did okay. I said "die katze ist auf dem tisch," which means "the cat is on the table," and she responded with "Very good! Now you can go to Germany." Ha. She said that I speak German in a really sing-songy way and she said that I need to say it harder and that English is a "round language." It makes sense though when you hear her speak German. I told her today that we don't talk from the back of our throats and she just laughed.

The funniest difference I notice when she's speaking English is that she can't tell the different between a V and W sound and she often mixes them up. She was talking about an "Irregular werb song" for a long time and I had no idea what she was saying until finally I figured out she meant "verb" not "werb" and it was a song they used in her English language class. She also talks about her football (soccer) games and says "It was us wersus Lonsdale," which means "us vs. Lonsdale." I taught her the American alphabet song and she was actually quite thrilled about it. She said when she took Charlotte to class later that day she sang it the entire way there... haha.  When she says the letter V though, she says "wee" and it took forever for her to be able to do the correct pronunciation. She kept saying, "I can't tell the difference between the two sounds!" which is really weird to me, but then again, English is my first language.

Annika just finished Gymnasium in Germany which is (kind of) equal to high school. Their school system is way different than ours. She is 20 now and graduated this summer, which is normal. She's taking this year in England to improve her English and decide what she wants to study at Uni. She said she probably will graduate from uni when she is about 26, which is normal in Germany. She's from a town near Frankfurt and I told her I was going to come visit sometime and she said, "as long as I don't have to pay for your plane ticket." Haha!