Kohana (Year 9) reflects on her experiences during the recent Year 9 German trip to visit our exchange partners at the Goethe Gymnasium Ludwigsburg.

On the weekend of early December, 30 year 9 pupils went on a snowy trip to Ludwigsburg and Heidelberg. We stayed in einem Hotel (which is a hotel!), and over the course of the weekend we explored Ludwigsburg, visited our penfriends, and also went to the great historical Heidelberg Castle!

On the first day (Saturday), we woke up to a beautiful view of the snow that had fallen that night, so it was such a delight to walk through an authentic German city to the Ludwigsburg Residential Palace, or Residenzschloss Ludwigsburg, which is one of the largest baroque palaces in Germany! We were guided all around the palace and shown numerous paintings, sculptures and opulent rooms dating back to the 1700’s. We were taught about the importance behind this palace, how it survived through history relatively unscathed, which, personally, I found quite fascinating. We also learned how it used to be a former hunting lodge, where Duke Eberhard Ludwig (Louis in English) laid the first foundations to this palace. I particularly enjoyed seeing the Schlosstheater (palace theatre) in the eastern wing. With almost intact stage machinery and stage decoration, it is one of Europe’s oldest theatres, and it was surprising to know that it’s still used!

Afterwards, we continued walking and reached the Ludwigsburg Christmas Market! With tons of food delicacies including traditional German Bratwurst (sausages!) and Kartoffelpuffer (potato pancakes!), which were both complete favourites in my group. Furthermore (aside from the food), there was a lot of Christmas market shopping to do! We all thoroughly enjoyed spending some of our time there.

The favourite part for a lot of us, however, was visiting our exchange partners at the Goethe Gymnasium later that day! As we were welcomed, with some biscuits and sparkling drinks (I noticed that Germany really likes sparkling drinks!), it dawned on us that we were part of a programme that dates back almost to the end of the Second World War, when two really brave Jewish women who taught at the two schools established this exchange. It was an honour being part of this special occasion, and we shall be celebrating its 75^th anniversary in 2024! While we were sitting and listening to speeches from both Frau Venter and a teacher from the Gymnasium – Herr Kellermann, I thought about how fortunate we are to have been a part of this programme and how grateful we should be for it. I was so excited to meet my pen-friend Emilia, and we talked constantly about all our interests – we have so much in common! To be honest, I think we were all a little bit taken-aback about how good they were at speaking English, but we’ll get there with our German someday!

The day after, we hopped on a few trains and reached Heidelberg. We were told beforehand that it wasn’t bombed during the Second World War because of its natural beauty, which I found quite surprising! But, regardless, it was correct. The city was extraordinary, with the Christmas markets being full of good food and stalls and while we were roaming around, we got to see the famous Heidelberg University and its library, which was one of the oldest in Europe! After going on an info-treasure hunt researching the city’s landmarks, we went on a Seilbahn, which is a funicular railway. It was some of ours’s first time going on one of these, and it was so fun to go on! It took us to the Heidelberg Castle, which had so many beautiful views of the city and the river Neckar. We ended our visit by visiting the Deutsche Apothekenmuseum, which was, inherently, a museum for the history of pharmacy in Europe. It was quite interesting to learn about the different types of medicine used back in the olden times.

We all had so much fun in Germany, especially in visiting our new friends, which we will be sure to keep in touch with. We learned a lot of German as well, even while ordering food or by buying things at the stalls, as the locals were so nice and helped us the best they could. A massive thank you to Frau Venter for organising the trip, and to Frau Pampus, Ms Hickman and Dr Browning for accompanying all of us. We had such a great time, and we will remember this for many years to come.