Christmas

Hi there :)

Looks like you had a lot of fun on Wednesday :) I love the little film :)
Today would be my last school day, but because I have the final rehearsal for the concert with my orchestra I'll miss my lessons. It's such a shame ;)
The last few weeks weren't really excinting. But I still did some things :)
A lot of my free time was filled with baking.
I made a lot of Swiss christmas biscuits, but I tried a english tradition as well; Mince pies.
I don't think they are really the way they should be, but you can eat them and they are not too bad ;)

Now I wish you merry christmas and a very happy new year :)
I'll see you soon :)
Lena

Dear class mates abroad
We are celebrating our "Wiehnachtshöck" at the Spinnerei with mister Werner. At the beginning the two children of him were here too and miss Geisser of course (our German-teacher). We were bored and  so we began to dance a little bit XP I hope you will enjoy it. We wish you all a Merry Christmas and a happy new year.
Cheers Danilo and the whole class G2B
<33333333333333333333

We miss you!!!!!!

http://host-d.oddcast.com/php/application_UI/doorId=1177/clientId=299/?mId=54139513.2

Hey There!

This are the delayed news from last week (2nd- 6th of December).
Monday was as boring as usual. But Tuesday was horrible! Because on the afternoon we had a English test and afterwords directly a 90 minutes math test about trigonometric functions. The results were disastrous. The average was a 3.1. (AWESOME!)

In the evening the Chinese people(haha Jana, Poorvi & Nicole) had a cinema night with the Kanti Baden (they were soooo looouuud -.-).

In English we read the 3rd chapter of our book Animal Farm.

On Thursday in history class we got a very lovely text about Ludwig XIV's health.
Here a little taste of that: Well his doctors thought that it was very dangerous for a king to have 100% healthy teeth. So they took all of them out and broke jaw twice and a piece of palate followed the teeth... (Delicious!)
And that wasn't even the worst part (but it was very interesting).

So now we wish you a lovely stay & bon appétit!

-Jana & Alexandra

George Milton

George

appearance:
small and quick, dark of face, restless eyes, sharp and strong features

small, strong hands, slender arms, thin and bony nose

personality:

smart and intelligent, sensitive, caring, distant, adapting, no trouble maker, careful, protective
→ his behaviour is bipolar: he's short-tempered in general but with Lennie he's patient as soon as it concerns very serious issues.

Lennie and George grew up together and he started to take care of him when Lennie's aunt Clara died. George is like a big brother to Lennie even though he's sometimes mad at him because Lennie often gets into trouble. He's constantly trying to keep Lennie safe and one of his biggest desires is to make their dream, to own their own farm, come true. The first time we hear him telling Lennie the story about the dream it sounds like a fairytale, but later on, when it seems to come true, he starts telling it in another way.
In the group of the „underdogs“ (Crooks, Lennie, Old Candy) he's kind of the boss who's telling the others what to do and what (not) to tell. This responsibility is kind of forced upon him.

relationships

-Curley: distant, weary, careful because he knows that he could get into trouble with him

-Curley's wife: no big interaction
-Slim: admiration, understanding without many words, respect, trust
-workers: the closest “friends” they could get in their situation

One day when they were young, George told Lennie to jump into a lake even though he knew that he didn't know how to swim.
Then, as George realised that Lennie's in serious danger, he jumped into the water too and saved him.
Lennie didn't understand, that he just got into trouble because of his “hero” and he was so thankful that George started to feel guilty. Maybe this is a reason that he still feels responsible for Lennie. He probably searches a way to make up for what he has done.

It could also be possible to connect this situation to things happening in the current time.
For example after George was screaming at Lennie and Lennie proposed to leave and never come back, he replied in a way as he would be afraid that something's going to happen to Lennie just because of him.

→ page 20: “ I want you to stay with me, Lennie. Jesus Christ, somebody'd shoot you for a coyote if you was by yourself.”

Also the relationship to Slim is special. He seems to be the first person after a long time, who's really listening to him. And probably he's the right person for George to tell his story, because he doesn't receive any cynical comments from him. It's just important to him not to keep everything in his own mind because there's so much he's worrying about that it would drive him crazy if he couldn't get it off his chest.
Slim's the one who takes on his burden.

George symbolises the perfect “mouse”.
Under all the other workers he nearly seems to be invisible, he doesn't get into big trouble and he's just like everyone else. A part of the big mass.

Lisa, Nicole

Carlson

Carlson is more of a "flat" character than a "round" one (If you don't remember: at the beginning of our first year, we talked about different types of characters. There were round = usually major, important characters where we see a lot of different facets and flat = usually minor, secondary characters with one particular character trait). He doesn't really play a central role in the book and therefore he doesn't appear a lot. I found precisely four scenes where Carlson played a part . Not the best circumstances to write a 1 1/2 pages long essay about him, right? Just kidding, I decided by myself to write about him, because after finishing the book, I saw Carlson only as a ruthless dork and I was kinda interested in if there is more behind this guy. Due to the lack of information in the book, my text is mainly based on these few scenes where Carlson plays a role, and a lot of interpretation from my point of view.

The first time we meet Carlson in the book is when George and Lennie just arrived at the ranch and were talking with Slim. Carlson asked Slim if he could give one of his puppies to Candy because the dog Candy had right then was really old and stank, he also wanted Slim to convince Candy to shoot the old dog. Not a nice first impression, right? This scene shows that he hates that dog and tries everything to get rid of it, only because it stinks. This is a very egoistic and ruthless behaviour.

The second time we meet Carlson is when the dog gets shot. He talked so long to Candy until the old man gave up and had to agree to kill his dog. When Candy told him he couldn't shoot it, Carlson offers to shoot the dog by himself. To reach his goal, he would do everything. He doesn't understand the relationship between Candy and his dog, he doesn't understand Candys emotions, he just carries his own point.
Carlson got his Luger, a pistol and probably his most precious property and dragged the poor dog out of the barn. At least he promised Candy: "It won't feel anything". But if he really meant it that way, or if that was just an empty promise to calm Candy down a bit, we don't know.
When Carlson dragged the dog out, Slim even had to remind him to take a shovel with. I'm asking me if Carlson really planned to just shoot the dog and let its dead body lying on floor. He didn't plan it through, he just wanted to get rid of his object of hate as soon as possible.

In the very last scene of the book where George killed Lennie, Carlson appears once again and we get another impression of this guy. George just shot his friend Lennie in the head and of course feels horrible right after. But Carlson, he doesn't care at all. He just asked George if Lennie really had his precious gun, "Did he have my gun?".
And when Slim took George away to help him to get over the incident, Carlson was standing, not comprehending anything and said to Curley, who also didn't understand anything: "Now what the hell ya suppose is eatin' them two guys?"

He totally doesn't get Georges emotional state and how he feels. It seems like he never had a friend, has always been alone and never felt friendship. Carlson is a perfect example for what being a lonley worker in California turns you into. A cold-hearted and emotionally blunted.

I hope I could give you an impression of Carlson,
My-Nhien

Of Mice and Men – by John Steinbeck

Slim

Slim is a worker on the ranch, he has almost the same position and influence as the boss' son. He is a jerkline skinner, that means he is a mule driver. He seems to be “The Prince of the Ranch” (36) .

Slim is a person of extraordinary appearance. His face looks ageless. He could be 35 or 50. He is the most cultivated worker on the ranch. His hair is black and long and he has it combed back. Because of how tall he is he has a certain majesty in the way he moves. His hands are large and lean. With his blue-jeans and his short denim jacket he integrates himself in the workers group, but he isn`t like the workers of this ranch, he is sensitive and understands people and their relationships between them. Steinbeck describes him in a very fascinating way, because he steps out of the limited third person narration and gushes when he describes him. Slim works with animals and is master of non-verbal communication. He is able to empathise with others and this gives him a certain trustworthiness.

Slim is a character who never changes through the entire story. He always is in peace with himself, no matter what happens. His tone was friendly. It invited confidence without demanding it (36). This shows how engaged Steinbeck is to give us a good image of Slim and how Slim has the possibility to infect people with his confidence. People feel better when they spend time with him. As said, the glorification on page 36 is really extraordinary in the whole book.

Slim is the one who takes the right decisions and always stays calm.

Written by Danilo and Jonathan

Curley's wife

Hi all! How are you guys abroad?
We are fine and working in English class at the moment. We (Rahel and Poorvi) have analyzed the character of Curley's wife in our novel Of Mice and Men. Now we have to write a small blog post about her.

First of all, we want to describe her personal appearance. Here is a passage when she first appears in our novel: "full, rouged lips and wide-spaced eyes; heavily made up. Her finger-nails were red. Her hair hung in little rolled clusters, like sausages. She wore a cotton house dress and and red mules, on the insteps of which were little bouquets of red ostrich feathers." (33-34) In general, she is described as a pretty woman. She knows that she is beautiful and likes to show off by dressing up even though she is in the middle of nowhere on a farm.  In short, she is a young, attention-seeking woman.

Now to her character: Because of her youth, she doesn't have a lot of  experience and is rather naive. You can see that when she decides to marry Curley even though she doesn't know him at all. She just did it out of impulse because she was angry, like a child sometimes does. Another example is, when she talks about her dream: She really thought she would receive that letter from Hollywood and would be in the movies. Anybody with a common sense would see immediately that the guy promising her that was lying. By pouring her heart out to Lennie, she also reveals that she's very lonely and desperate. She doesn't have anybody to talk to and Lennie was the next best option. With different words, how desperate do you have to be to confide in a mentally retarded person?

Finally, we can say that in the social hierarchy, she is above the workers but below Curley - but in maturity-wise, only Lennie (with a mental disorder) is lower than her. As her name is never mentioned, we think she is a substitute for women with the same fate.

Greeeeeeeetings from the beautiful KSWE <3 <3 <3 haha
Poorvi & Rahel

Crooks

Crooks

Crooks is the black stable-hand. He is very lonely because he is a „negro“ and the other workers totally ignore and reject him. That's why he normally hates it if other workers come into his room, the place where he can relax and hide and where he feels safe. He withdraws because he thinks: „What others do to me I'll do to them.“

So when Lennie comes into his room he wants to protect his own little realm and tries to throw him out. When Lennie doesn't want to leave he invites him in and they start talking. But as soon as he realizes that Lennie is mentally inferior, he starts to exploit this to his advantage. He tries to make him feel as lonely and lost as he feels all the time, so he tells him that George wouldn't come back. At first he enjoys Lennie's fear. But when Lennie is freaking out and gets mad, wanting to attack Crooks, he has to admit that he may be superior to Lennie mentally but when it comes to physical strength he is absolutely inferior. Immediately he tries to appease Lennie to save his own skin.

At this point you see that he doesn't know anything about human connections. If he had known how Lennie would react when he heard that George was in danger he wouldn't have made fun of him.

Crooks is one of the saddest characters in the book because he always experienced the exact opposite of love, sympathy and friendship in his whole life. So the bound between Lennie and George amazes him and he is a little jealous of that.

Crooks has accepted his destiny as a negro because he knows that he doesn't have any other choice. But when Lennie tells him about the farm Crooks sees a person who tries to change his own way of living. But Crooks got too pessimistic in all these years to believe that fairy tales like the plan of Lennie and George can come true.

Alisha & Alexandra

Lennie Small

Lennie is a huge man with a not remarkable face. He has large and pale eyes. He walks bent over like a old man. It doesn't fit with his body. His movings are like the one from a bear. He has much muscles and can't control his strength. When you look at him you see a man who is very strong but you wouldn't think that he is mentally retarded and his behaviour is like a child.

We can see that he is not that bright because he forgets everything and his thoughts are the same like that one from a child. He always wants to touch what he sees and likes. That's because Lennie and George often get in trouble.

He has a big dream of a farm with alfalfa for the rabbits and a lot of other animals. To petting animals he likes very much even if they are dead. He can't feel the tenderness of the animals and so he kills them often by mistake. George has always to tell about the ranch. It was just a dream of George and Lennie but Lennie told everyone because he can't have secrets.

In the beginning of the book, he was very dependent on George and he just did what he was told. But during the book he gets more independent.

George told him not to speak to Curley's wife but he didn't listened to him and started to talk with her. During the conversation she allowed him to touch her hair. This leads to the catastrophe because he can't stop and she started to cry. He gets panic and kill her by mistake. He broke her neck. So he had to leave the farm because Curley wanted to kill him. Thats why George searched him in the bush and killed him finally. 

Of Mice and Men: Candy

Candy is the oldest worker on the farm, tall and stoop-shouldered. He is a swamper and does the cleaning. Actually he isn't able to work properly on the farm like all the other guys, because he lost his right hand. So therefore he is in a very low position in the hierarchy of the farm. Candy is a kind of on the same level as Crooks. He isn't a nigger, he is allowed to sleep in the same bunkhouse, but still he isn't integrated on the farm, because he is handicapped and old and not one of the good workers. He doesn't have any human friends, but he has got his old dog. Carlson thinks it stinks and is of no use anymore. But for Candy it is the only friend he has, otherwise he would be lonely and completely on his own. Carlson wants him to shoot the dog, but Candy doesn't agree, because it was the best sheep dog he ever had. In the end, Candy gives up and lets Carlson shoot his dog. Later he realizes that it was a big mistake not to do it on his own. It was his friend and it didn't deserve to die this way and be killed by a stranger. He is very sad about this, but then he hears Lennie ask George to talk about their dream again.

From this moment on, Candy is happier, because he believes in their dream and that he can have a better future on his own farm. He has an agreement with George and Lennie that he can do the cleaning and help them to feed the animals. For this service he is allowed to live in peace and respected on their farm. If everything goes perfectly well, George, Lennie and Candy will have the money soon. But then Lennie breaks Curley's hand and the future of the three guys is unsure. When Lennie kills Curley's wife everything is over for Candy. His only worry is the dream and not Lennie's life. He isn't scared that Lennie will get lynched by Curley and the other guys, he can think only about the dream. Candy is very selfish in this moment and then George tells him that the dream was just to make Lennie happy and give him an imagined future. It was never supposed to become real. Candy is sad and the only thing he can do in this moment is to watch George leave, in search of Lennie.

Maybe it is unfair of Candy that he acts like that. But it's also understandable. He is old and lonely. Nobody really seems to like him. He isn't accepted as a member of the group, he is just tolerated as the guy who does the swamping on the farm. The only possibility to escape from this unpleasant situation is to flee in another and better life somewhere else. This dream was with Lennie's and George's dream so near and almost reached, but now it is gone forever. He won't be able to change his life now and has to live as the swamper on the farm for the rest of his life.

Xenia, Noah 

Christmas is coming! (:

Hi, I just got the e-mail from the Volleynight. Are you playing? Hopefully better than last year and have fun!

Happy 'Samichlaus mit Grittibänz'

I'm now enjoying my vacation since more than one week. Because I'm an exchange students I only had to take the English test and so I can just enjoy life (:
I met up with all the other exchange students, because they all have nothing to do. With them we still speak English, because no one really speaks Icelandic, except the other girl from Switzerland and till now we still speak Swissgerman together, although it might work better to speak Icelandic :D

on the countryside

Over the weekend I was in another city (8000 inhabitants) visiting someone I know. It was really nice and I also got to know a little bit of the countryside, what I love.
It's not that easy for me, to go to the countryside on my own. It is not far at all, but there are now buses driving to the nowhere and I'm not allowed to drive.
But the Advent is also nice here in Reykjavík and I really enjoy walking through the city and search for Christmas presents, although I never have enough time for that, there are so many other things going on. I also got to know a lot of (Icelandic) Christmassongs, which I'm going to sing on different concerts with the choir. With the violin I also play on a concert from the music school.

Christmas in town

 I wish you all merry Christmas and a happy New Year!

movie night

Hi all! Alisha and Poorvi here :)

We will tell you all about our little movie night we had with our Miss. I'm sure you can guess which movie we watched ;) of course it was "Of Mice and Men"

Here's a picture of the cover :) (btw: George - the guy on the right - has a role in CSI: New York) :P
After our Economy test on Wednesday about accountancy (Buchhaltung), we all went to the english class room. Some of us had ordered pizza and Miss had brought us some home-made muffins and popcorn. We had lots of fun!!

In our normal english lesson we started our new novel "Animal Farm" after having discussed the cover and the content of it.

Have a nice day!! ;)
Alisha and Poorvi <3