A Test and Final Debriefing

Wednesday, March 30^th

Today was the day for our final test in the German class. Our instructor informed us several times yesterday not to worry about it (after he told us we were taking the test a day earlier than planned!). Basically, it was explained to us as pass or fail… so none of us worried about it! It went well, and with a final homework assignment, we were out for lunch.

I took a small trip through Neumarkt during lunch and hit up Aldi to test out the bottle recycling machines. Germany is very environmentally conscious. It is a very encouraging thing, and an example I personally think we need to better follow in the United States. Trash receptacles EVERYWHERE give room for cardboard, plastic, paper, and glass. When purchasing any glass or plastic bottle for beer, wine, water, or pop, you can receive a refund for the empty bottle. This is widely taken advantage of for two reasons: 1) the refund is substantial… for a 69 cent bottle of water, one can receive a 25 cent refund! …and 2) the recycling and refund are conveniently located right inside your local Aldi! Check out the picture below! Two giant machines were inside this particular Aldi. You simply place your empty bottle in the opening and the conveyor system starts. The machine uses a laser to inspect the bottle, and when approved, the bottle moves through and is registered/counted/crushed by the machine. You just keep adding bottles until you are finished and hit a green button at the end. It then prints you a receipt to take to the register for the refund. AWESOME! For my 8-pack of water (purchased for around 3 Euros), I received a 2 Euro refund!

The final portion of the day was the important part. We made a final trip to Bonn to visit GIZ for our German employment orientation. Since we are obviously not German citizens, we need to fill out residency forms, foreign tax forms, and employment forms. These will be our tasks upon arrival in our cities and towns. Lastly, we received instruction on applying for a band account in our respective cities and towns. It was a decent amount of information, but our program coordinator was very helpful and made it clear she would be available by phone or email if we needed anything throughout the next six months of our stay. We closed the evening with a visit to a Bonn brauhaus for dinner. With full stomachs, we said our final goodbyes to our coordinator and called it a night.