Saying Goodbye

Today we had to say goodbye to our host families... it was a lot more difficult than I had expected! This morning, Uschi (our nickname for Ursula, our host mother) helped us get everything packed up and fed us breakfast. We got special chocolate sweet bread, since it was our last morning. hahaha! We said goodbye to Steffi and Dirk at the house. I got their email addresses so we could email them once we got back to the States. I was just glad no one was sick from the Mexican food that we had cooked! It was sad to say goodbye, but I knew it would be harder to leave Uschi and Saskia at the train station.

Then, Uschi amazed Kristen and I with her strength as she lifted our HUGE bags into her tiny car. Then we squeezed four people in, and headed to the Hauptbahnhof. I felt like a family of clowns. Our little host sister, Saskia, rode with us also. She and I became very close over the weekend, so she was kind of sad that we were leaving, I think. Once we got to the Hauptbahnhof, Uschi and Saskia walked with us all the way to our meeting point. Then, we had to say goodbye... Saskia hugged me like four times before she left. Uschi wrapped us in a big comfy bear hug before leaving. Kristen and I couldn't say thank you enough. She was great! Watching them walk away was really sad, because I didn't know if I would ever see them again. They just did so much for us in the five weeks that we were in Germany. They will never know how much we appreciated their hospitality. We are going to send flowers though!!

So, now it's off to Berlin for our final days together in Germany... I can't wait to experience Berlin, but I am also excited that we are going home soon!