My trip to Germany (Kassel)

Hello everyone,
Today I’d like to tell you about my trip to Germany. Last week I went with my wife and son to Kassel, which is a city in the centre of Germany in the Hessen region. We were taking part in an exchange group visit with the "Pendle-Kassel Community Exchange". This was a great opportunity to visit the town once more, meet with our friends from the German side of the group and to stay with these families in the city.
The Pendle-Kassel community exchange has been in existence for 26 years and my wife is the chairperson on the English side. Pendle is my home region which comprises of 3 towns. Together, these towns make up the same number of people as those who live in the city of Kassel – around 150,000 people.
The idea of the exchange is quite simple. Each year a group of exchange group members will travel to either Germany or to England. This year it was our turn to visit Kassel. Each group has about 50 members. This year 32 members of the group travelled by aeroplane (Air Berlin) from Manchester to Kassel. We stayed with "host families" (called Gastgeber in German) who were all so kind as to welcome us into their homes to stay as guests for 7 nights.
So that we don’t abuse their hospitality (in other words, so we don’t take too much of the families’ time) each day of the week we take part in activities or excursions. Some of our hosts will organise these activities or act as guides on the excursions. This way, it allows our hosts to still go to work or do things that they need to do and also gives us (the visitors) chance to see more of Germany and German life.
The exchange started in 1981 between a school in Pendle and a school in Kassel. At that time, it was just school children and teachers that took part in the exchange. Later, the exchange group opened up a welcome to parents and their friends. Now it is open to anyone who is interested – of any age. In reality, this means all ages from quite young children with their parents through to quite elderly people. I like this aspect, because it allows different age groups to do things together and this is quite a rare thing in my country these days. Where there are young children visiting, these children will stay with a parent, although when the children are a little older, they may stay with a family on their own.
It is also an opportunity to develop language skills (for those who wish to) and to discover more about German way of life, peoples’ interests and hobbies, food and drink and well as to see some of the sights.
Each day in Kassel is an opportunity to get to know our hosts better and make friends at the same time. For those visiting for the first time, the first few hours after arrival are be the most difficult. Even though it may seem daunting, it always seems to work our well and soon the new people make become friends. Even language difficulties are not such a problem because those who take part do so volutarily and they will try hard to make sure that visitors are comfortable and feel at home.
A lot of communication can be done by guesswork and even by gesturing and language difficulties never seem to hold back people from enjoying themselves. Of course, quite a number of the German people speak some English and this helps the English people enormously. Some English visitors speak German as I do, and of course this offers many opportunities to experience another language in a "real-life" situation and a chance to learn and share language.
The visit then becomes almost like an activity holiday. Each visitor is free to take part in the organised activities – such as an organised walk, a visit to a museum or a visit to town for shopping.
The programme this year was very well organised. We had a couple of free days with the families to decide what we could do together and then each of the other days, there were excursions by "Reisebus" (which is a tour bus) to visit interesting places.
The excursions took us to: Eisenach and Wartburg (in the former East Germany where Martin Luther translated the Bible)
Wiesbaden near Frankfurt – to visit the regional parliament building and go shopping in the town.
Willingen in Sauerland where we visited a church that is now a restaurant and had a trip on a chair lift used for skiers in winter.
We also visited the famous "Herkules" monument and park just outside Kassel which has some marvellous "wasserspiel" or water games twice per week. http://www.wilhelmshoehe.de/home.htm
We also had the chance to look around Kassel. I particularly enjoyed a visit to a Flohmarkt (garage sale or flea market)
One thing that must be said is that good friends can be made during this visits. Me and my wife stayed with a very nice family for the first time in 2001 and since then, we have visited a further 3 times with this year’s visit making it our fourth visit
On the Thursday morning we visited the "Rathaus" (City Hall) for a chance to present the mayor with a small gift.
On the Saturday evening everyone met at the school hall for a party night. This was a great chance for everyone to discuss how well the week had gone, and to thank all those who had worked hard to prepare the excursions and also it was an opportunity for giving presents. Later in the evening there were some music, dancing, food and drink for all.
The final day (Sunday) gave people chance to say their individual thanks and to get their suitcases packed and then later in the day we were off back to the airport (Paderborn) for the flight back to Manchester.
Of course, before we left, we invited the German members of the Exchange group to come over to England next year and to spend a week in our region. This is planned to take place in May 2008 and my wife and I will be happy to welcome our friends once more to stay with us.
This exchange is a great way to make friends and understand people from other countries and long may in continue!