July 2-free day

July 2, 2017

Today was a free day for all of us. We gladly took advantage of this leisure time to have a good rest after the long journey to Sachsenhausen Camp and Hamburg. Breakfast at hostel was also canceled so we lost our one last motivation to get up earlier, and buying some coffee and pastry at the café seemed a good choice. Many of us came down to the lobby at noon to work on the assignments, and we had a lot to catch up after the trip.

Afternoon was also free so I stayed at he hostel for a little bit and then went to check out the Brandenburg Gate and the parliament building. The place was full of tourists so it was kind of too crowded but the gate and building were really monumental. We had different plans for the afternoon, some people went to the flea market and had great time there, some went to their community partner, and some just stayed to work on the readings.

We met as a group at Maxim Gorki at 7:30pm to enjoy the play Winterreise. Actors from Afghanistan, Syria and Palestine presented things that happened during two weeks of winter travel by bus through Germany. The use of technology and projector enhanced their narratives. This creative way was really engaging to us as audiences and it was as if we were living in their stories. When demonstrating his story of fleeing Damascus to Italy, the actors used a phone with the character's photo displayed to represent the person, and changing the phone cases to indicate the change of fake identities. It reminded me of the film clips we seen on Monday's lecture. Even though the topics are different, the ways of representing separation, differences as "border", and to indicate feelings are very similar. 

Here is the end of second week, can't believe we are already half way through the program.

--Ying

At the lobby working on assignments

The play

Beautiful sunset on the way back to hostel