Steel pan trip to Bamberg in Germany23/11/2007 - Simrandeep Kaur Billen |
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It was approaching 3:00pm so my dad and I set off. We went to the Gurdwara on the way, just to say bye and get some good luck. We tried to be quick but as we were getting near the school, we saw a coach leave and I panicked! My dad said, “Quick, get out, stop the coach!” I replied, “Don’t worry Dad, I didn’t know anyone on that coach therefore it can’t be our coach”. My dad said, “We’re late - you’re not going to make it!” I said, “I’m sure we will.” Did you know I was one of the early ones to arrive? When the coach came, we loaded our suitcases on. All we could hear was the normal parent routine: ‘Are you sure you packed your toothbrush? Did you put your money in a safe place? Make sure you look after your passport!’. At last, it was time to go and all the parents were just as happy as the children. Gee, I wonder why? I sat on the coach next to Hina; behind us were Jake and Luke and behind that was the rest of the steel band. We were waiting anxiously at this stage. We were really excited about going and I think we annoyed the teachers more than we needed to as we kept asking questions like ‘What’s the time? How long left until we get to the airport?’. We soon reached the airport and finally we stopped nagging the teachers! Clare and Miss Smith were our teachers. Clare, Paul Anderson’s sister, was more our friend than our teacher. She thought of a ‘numbers’ routine to check if we were all there - I was number 5! So every now and then, she would shout “One!” and we would go through our numbers. It was a very quick and efficient way of knowing whether anyone was missing. We checked in our suitcases and mine was one of the heaviest. I was a bit scared as I knew I was going to add a couple of gifts when I reached Germany, but that was a worry for later. After we checked in, we had to go through customs and a metal detector. I knew I was going to beep as I wear my Kara iron bangle. Luckily, the man on the other side realised I was a Sikh and simply smiled and said, “It’s your Kara, isn’t it?”. I smiled back and replied, “Yes”. After that, we were allowed to go shopping. Yeah! I went shopping with Hina and Chloe but we walked around with Imogen and Fizz too. We bought some pear drops for the flight as, from previous flights, I realised that if you suck on sweets it hurts your ears less. Hina and I bought ‘Ben and Jerry’s’ ice-creams which were nice. Throughout the trip so far, I forgot to mention that we were taking loads of pictures. I’d nearly finished my first camera and we weren’t even there yet. Finally, it was time to go to the gate. We reached it and took more photos, mostly as a whole group. We then decided where we were going to sit. As our seats were close together, we mixed them up between ourselves and sat with our mates. I sat in a row of three with Hina and Clare. It was fun and exciting as it was my first trip with Hina where we went abroad by plane. Our friend Jessica (also a member of steel pans) had never travelled by plane before. We were all worried for her but she was fine. Everybody’s ears hurt but the pear drops did help. The plane journey was only one hour and thirty minutes but it went very quickly. When we reached Nuremberg, it was really weird as we didn’t understand anything. As you might know, Miss Smith spoke German, so she knew what was going on – well, we hope she did! After the flight, we were escorted to the coach by Bertram. He was the man who had arranged most of the events for the Bamberg and Bedford twinning celebrations. We were all really tired (well, I know I was!) and slept through the coach ride from Nuremberg to Bamberg. The coach seated about 36 people but there were only 18 of us including the two teachers, so as you can imagine we all spread out. We left about three rows for the teachers, though, as we thought that they needed the most rest and peace. We then arrived at the Marianum (where we were staying). It was quite dark and quiet. Bertram showed us all the different social areas for our band to get together in but to be honest, I was so tired that nothing was sinking in. We then went upstairs and were shown our bedrooms. I was with Hina and Chloe. Because there were so many stairs and slopes (and my suitcase was one of the heaviest) we decided ‘Let’s drag the suitcases instead of lifting them’, which made a bit of a racket. When we got upstairs and into the room, we discovered it was a bedroom for six with only three of us in there, so this would be fun! Although we were all tired when we entered our rooms, once we’d turned on all the lights we were wide awake. We were all looking at each other’s rooms to see which was the best and running in and out of each other’s rooms. It was fun, but at the same time, most of us were unpacking and getting into our pyjamas. I had brought a new nightgown that was pink and made out of a really soft material. As I was ill, I was feeling a bit cold too so I put on a couple of layers to stay warm. At about 12:00 am everybody came into our room and we played ‘Spin the bottle’. Well, everyone else played - I just lay there on my bed watching; I was desperate to go to sleep. It finally came to an end at 2:30 am. It was our first night and we’d had lots of fun but at this point just wanted to sleep. So it was about 2:45 am and finally the lights were out and we were falling asleep! That’s it for today but there’s just one problem: we have to meet for breakfast at 7:45 in the common room and that’s only 5 hours away! Will we make it? Read on……. Well, you won’t believe we actually managed to get up! Well OK… we cheated… I took my alarm clock! I was clever and put it on the table next to the window, which meant I would have to get out of bed to actually switch it off. That would mean I would have to wake Chloe and Hina up. This was a difficult task, as they didn’t get up until the 3rd time I called their names. Anyway, as we got up we got changed and brushed our teeth. Then we met everyone outside in the common room. We called it the common room but it was really a corner outside the dorms with two or three sofas. As we waited for Miss Smith and Clare, we saw that Mr Horton and Luke’s dad Steve were there! We said good morning but it seemed as though they wanted to reply good night and go back to sleep! Steve and Mr Horton drove the van here so if we were tired from all that travelling, you can probably guess that they were shattered. So we went downstairs but had to wait a couple of minutes as the tables were still being set up. Chloe and Hina chose me to look after the key. That was an easy job for me as my handbag was so big I could probably fit anything in there. Finally, we were allowed to go in. There was a table of four in the corner but I was the fifth person, so Miss Smith kindly set up another space for me so that I could sit with my friends. I sat on a table with Hina, Jessica, Natalie and Niamh. On the table behind me were Paul, Lewis, Joe, Steve, Clare, Mr Horton and Miss Smith. On the table next to us was the rest of the band: Fizz, Imogen, Jake, Luke, Alex, Hannah, Chloe and Emily. For breakfast that morning, we had a wide range of options including: bread, cucumber, cheese, ham, and a selective range of cereals with milk. Next to the milk was a range of tea bags like: Earl Grey, green tea, cinnamon tea etc etc. After that, there was a big bowl of yoghurt with chocolate chips on top - if you wanted the chocolate you had to be quick otherwise everybody else would take it! After breakfast Mr Horton would tell us what was planned for the day and what we needed to wear for it (formal or informal - mostly informal). Mr Horton said that today would just be a relaxing day so that we could get to know the area and hotel a little more. We were allowed to go back upstairs to our rooms and get changed if we needed to before meeting back downstairs in half an hour. This gave us enough time to get some money from Clare. Clare was in charge of money and passports, so whenever we wanted money we would get it from her. I think most of us took out 20 euros on the first day and spent most of it. We then locked our rooms and met downstairs. Mr Horton and Miss Smith led the way and the rest of the band followed. On this walk I made one mistake - I wore heels!!! They kept getting stuck in the cobbles, which was so frustrating. Take my advice and remember to wear trainers. To make matters worse, I had brought my trainers to Germany; I had just left them in the hotel! Anyway, as our hotel was on a hill we either walked down or up the roads – none of the roads we walked on were flat. There was a massive bike lane that led to the town centre. We had to walk on the left hand side as the right hand lane was for cyclists only. I think some people didn’t understand that as they still walked in the bike lane. When we finally reached the town centre, we realised that all the cars were driving on the right hand side whereas we are used to seeing them drive on the left. I actually felt like picking the cars up and turning them around, but we slowly got used to the idea. So when we crossed the road we still looked on the left hand side although the cars were coming from the right. Some members of the band really didn’t take any notice of the cars as they crossed the roads. The teachers noticed this and warned us all that a little situation like that could become quite critical. I loved Germany for one main reason: that nearly every fifth car on the road was a Smart car. I love the two-seated Smart cars. I made up this joke when I was hyper: “What do you call a clever car?” - “A smart car!” Don’t you just love that joke?! Well… it was funny at the time. When we actually went shopping, we had to stay in a group of at least three. So I was normally with Chloe, Natalie, Niamh and Hina but sometimes the whole group would shop together. We went into most shops just so that we knew what was in each shop, really. That way, if we had to come again we would know which shop we had to go to if we needed anything. So we knew where the food shop was or the teddy bear shop, or, most importantly, the shop that sold still water. Most, or in fact all, of the water we were served was sparkling. I don’t think many of us liked it. Most of us questioned the teachers as to why such water was served but they didn’t have the answer to our question. As we walked further on, I remembered that Eid was coming up on either Friday or Saturday and I didn’t know if we would get a chance to come to town before then. So I asked to have a private chat with Natalie and explained how I wanted the whole band to get a present for Hina and sign the card I had brought for her from England. I found a shop that sold jewellery and stones (not any old stones, special colourful stones) and wanted to have a look in there. I knew I couldn’t afford any of it as it was like 150 euros per necklace and I had only brought 60 euros. But anyway, the lady told us to go upstairs and when we did, we realised most of the stuff was cheaper. Obviously, Hina ran for the elephants, as she loves them. Natalie and I looked at each other and realised that was the perfect present. So we looked for the cheapest elephant, which was green (her favourite colour) and only 16 euros. We worked out that everyone would have to chip in only 1 Euro each. We told everyone else who was in the shop that we needed to go to the toilet so that Hina wouldn’t get suspicious. We ran downstairs and found the boys, told them our plan and they all gave us a Euro each. We couldn’t find the girls and therefore decided that Natalie would buy the elephant and we would get the 1 Euro from everyone later. And that’s exactly what we did. Even at this point we wanted everything to be a surprise so I made Hina look at some more elephants whilst Natalie quickly paid for the elephant. We managed to hide it in our bags and move on swiftly to the next shop. The next shop we stopped at was the chocolate shop called Hussle. We loved that shop, as there were lots of sweets and chocolates. There were things like chocolate champagne, chocolate hearts, and best of all chocolate smart cars!! I knew I had to spend my money wisely therefore I couldn’t afford the chocolate car but I did buy other chocolates for my aunty and uncle and a chocolate football for my brother. I still didn’t know what to get for my parents. After visiting a couple more shops, we had to head back to the hotel, which we called home. We said, “We have to go back home now”. On the way back Chloe, Natalie, Hina, Niamh, and I bought ice-creams for only 60 cents and they were lovely! As we walked, I was struggling again because of my shoes. To get back to the hotel it was uphill and that made matters worse as I was tired from walking around in the shops. When we reached the hotel, it was time for lunch. Clare, Hina, Miss Smith and I were the only vegetarians so the “waiter” would put a separate dish for us on the table. We had noodles today so we just shared with the people from our table. After that, we had this vegetarian pie, which was very nice, and at the same time very healthy. We also had salad as a side dish but not many people ate the salad. Well, our table did. For the vegetarians most of the food was salad and vegetables but it was all fine. After lunch, we just did what we wanted, to be honest. Most of us played basketball. Just outside the Marianum was a basketball court and Alex had bought a basketball from town so we played with it. Soon afterwards, we had dinner, which was also very nice, and also a three-course meal. After that we played ‘Mafia’ with Clare - it’s a really fun game provided everyone is quiet and concentrates. We played until about 10 and lights-out was at half 10 but we didn’t try to sleep until 12. We’ll have to get up early again so “Good night!”. We had to wake up early again and were slowly getting used to this. Just like normal, we would go downstairs and sit for breakfast. Today we had bread, cheese, and salad. We had this for breakfast every morning. It was quite nice and filling and would keep us full until lunchtime. As per usual, Mr. Horton would stand up and tell us what was going to happen that day. Today we were going for a formal lunch. It was a champagne reception. We were told to wear formal clothes but we were also told to keep our most formal clothes for tomorrow. I forgot to mention that last night at dinner Mr. Horton gave us all these bright yellow t-shirts that were given to us by the Bedford Borough Council. The Bedford Borough Council logo was on the t-shirts. So although Mr. Horton told us to look formal, we as a group decided to wear the yellow t-shirts. We decided that, as we had all got the same t-shirts, we would therefore in a sense look formal. We all went back up to our rooms after breakfast and got changed into black trousers and yellow t-shirts. Hina didn’t pick one up last night so we had to look for the teachers and explain that she still needed one. We finally got hers and she changed and then I locked the room and we were ready to set off. As the teachers approached us, they realised that we were all wearing the same and said it looked really nice. Now as you can imagine the name ‘Silver lining’ didn’t fit the image anymore, so during our trip in Germany we named ourselves the ‘Biddenham Bumble Bees’ from then on. Just like any other event that was held, we had to walk down there. It was okay this time as the hall wasn’t too far away. When we got there, we found that downstairs they had this place where you could leave all your stuff and take a token with you so that you didn’t have to carry your coats around. When we went upstairs, there was a table full of drinks that we all picked up and the teachers made sure that no one picked up the champagne. Of course, they were allowed to and did! We all had either coke or juice. As we walked into the main hall, we discovered that everything was set out so perfectly - not one table was different from the others. The tables were covered with white table clothes pulled together by a red ribbon and in the centre of each table was a red rose with red rose petals around it. In the centre of the room was the table overflowing with food. It looked really nice. As I walked in, I recognised a few people - like my neighbour, who was there on behalf of the Bedford borough council, and the father of one of the students from school. It was quite weird seeing people you recognised there because as soon as we had stepped into Germany we didn’t recognise anybody else except of course our own group. There was a speech that we all listened to. At first, we didn’t understand anything but then luckily the man translated everything he’d just said and we could now understand everything that was going on. After the speech, we were allowed to go and eat. It was fantastic as there was a wide range of options for the vegetarians too. I loved the pumpkin soup best. After the lunch, we were going to the town centre to play steel pans there. Most of the people we had met during the morning were going to come and watch us at the town centre. We were going to play in front of the statue of Neptune, as we liked to call it. I say that as we later discovered that wasn’t the correct name for it. All the other performers were there too: the country dancers, the Morris men, and the choir. We were all from Bedford or near Bedford so we all spoke English and got to know each other. As we set up the pans, people started to form a circle around us, wondering what was happening. Bertram explained everything in German and then translated everything in English and again that way everybody understood what was going on. Well, we played first and like any other gig or performance we had played at we nominated Natalie to introduce the band and the forth-coming songs. So we played and after each song, we had a massive round of applause. It really got us in the mood to dance and what better song to express that than ‘Surfing USA’? We loved it, the teachers loved it and most of all our audience loved it! After us, the other performers had their time to perform and all of them were really good. In the evening Mr. Horton said we were going to a ‘merry-making place’ - we didn’t really understand but all we knew was that it was informal. So when we all got ready the two taxis filled up. The two taxi drivers were Marcus and Zuhrin. Hina, Alex, Luke, Mrs Smith and I had to wait for one of the taxi drivers to return, as there was no space. So Mrs Smith sat on the steps waiting for the taxi driver to return as the rest of us played basketball. It was really fun actually. I’m better than I thought I was!! Soon the taxi arrived and on the way we all got hyper - we couldn’t stop laughing. Luke said that he thought I was weird, as he had never seen me laugh so much. I laughed even more! We soon arrived at the place, which looked like (and sort of was) a bar or pub. We all had drinks (well, coke) and that made the whole band hyper except for Emily, who was feeling ill. Soon the band played a few songs and the dancing began. We all danced to start off with and then most of us went outside for fresh air. There was a massive window so we could still see what was going on inside. Paul managed to eat 14 cubes of sugar!!! We had dinner here too; it was quite nice as it was different. The rest of the band had pork I think. After that, some of us joined in the dancing with the Morris men. It was fun! Some people did country dancing and we listened to the choir too. I did some country dancing - it was really fun but at times got complicated as the girl next to me didn’t know what she was doing and it made it look like it was me who didn’t know what I was doing. But anyway, it was fun. One man did this dance that we called the slap dance that was funny; he kept shouting “Yeee haaa!”. It was really good, and some of us managed to learn it. We soon had to go as it was getting late. We left the hall and went to the hotel. When we got there we were so tired from all the dancing that we fell asleep - had no other choice really. It was Saturday morning - Eid today. Chloe and I both said “Happy Eid” to Hina. Soon after I had brushed my teeth, there was a knock at the door. It was Natalie, who wanted a word. I stepped outside and winked at Chloe, which meant she had to try to keep Hina inside the room. Natalie explained that she still had to get the card signed by the teachers and would knock on the door as soon as she’d finished. Hina and I had already planned to wear suits for this occasion. Not suits as in tie suits; this was suits as in Asian clothes. I was wearing orange and Hina wore black. It was fun dressing up. Anyway, I ran out to see if Natalie had finished signing but she hadn’t, so I came back into the room. The reason we were rushing was that we wanted to give it at breakfast. So I had to stall time. I asked Hina if she wanted a hand straitening her hair. She said yes and kept asking if it was done yet, so I kept saying, “No, you missed a bit!”. Finally, there was a knock on the door and I let Hina out. Everyone complimented our outfits and went downstairs. Hina and I walked in a bit late and everyone shouted “Happy Eid!” to Hina. She liked it. After breakfast, Mr. Horton said we could go to town. We gave the present to Hina and she loved it but Alex and Jake said they wanted a word! I started walking backwards for a joke as though I was scared, little knowing that the stairs were right there! I fell and the worst thing was that my camera flashed, which meant I had taken a picture. Alex and Jake fell on the floor laughing - I was already on the floor and joined in laughing too. As Hina and I went into Jake’s room we asked what that blob was on the table and he told us it was Luke’s chocolate. I felt sorry for Luke - he had brought that for his sister and left it in the sun and it had melted! Aaawww! Okay, it was really funny at the same time. After that, I changed to go to town. I brought some presents, including two mugs - one for my mum and one for my dad. On one of the mugs it said ‘Mama is die best’ and the other said ‘Papa is die best’. I hoped they would like them. I also brought some pencils and gifts for my friends. When we came back, we played Mafia, 21, and a couple of other card games. After that, we had to get ready for the really formal occasion. We thought yesterday was posh, but today was just really posh. We played steel pans as everybody entered. Loads of people took pictures. It was the same people we had met for two days in a row. It was fun but nobody clapped - I think it was a bit too formal. So we started clapping and then everybody joined in. We all looked really good – well, that’s what people had been saying to Mr Horton. It felt really good that we were playing at such a posh place. After that, we all sat down near the back. We took loads of pictures. Then there were more speeches. To be honest they were a bit boring, but even so we continued facing the front as though it was interesting, which some of it was. Imogen fell asleep at the back. The Bedford chefs had arranged the food. We thought this would be fun but the vegetarians only had salad for dinner. Well, at least it was healthy. After that, some other people did a performance. Some of us had to wait ‘til last again but the rest of the people went home. One man was really happy as England was winning the rugby. As soon as we got in, we changed our clothes but didn’t want to sleep, so the lights went out but we were still talking. It was Sunday morning and our time in Germany was nearly over. We were going to church today. We all had breakfast and went up to the church. Again, we had to walk there, but it was worth it, as the church looked amazing. It was really nice and stood very tall. Some people went inside and went to the service while the rest of us went sightseeing around the church. It had some amazing scenery. We took loads of photos. We waited at the back of the church for the service to be over so that we could go to the castle. As soon as we had finished in the church, we went to the castle. It was really nice there too. Some of us went to the back of the castle where there was lots of grass. We covered Hina in grass and filmed her getting up - it was really cool as it looked like she wasn’t there and then all of a sudden she appeared from the grass. We played and sat around for about 30 minutes. Bertram had kindly paid 1 Euro each for all of us to go in there. After that, we went to the café next to the castle, where we all had ice cream and/or coffee. I just had ice cream, which was really nice. We were all really hyper and were telling jokes to each other. When you talk about them afterwards, they’re not funny, but they were at the time. Luke and I had a long religious discussion and I wasn’t hyper anymore but then Emily told me some jokes and we all started laughing! “What do you call a man with a hedgehog on his head?” “Mr. Horton!!!” Isn’t that the best joke ever?! Okay, how about: “What’s brown and sticky?” “A stick!” That made us laugh all night. As we made our way back to the hotel, we had dinner. It was really nice. It was a vegetarian Shepherd’s Pie. Everyone else had pie. After dinner, we were free to do whatever we wanted. It was about 10:10 and Hina, Luke and I were still playing basketball. It was getting hard as we couldn’t see much but it was fun. Luke plays better in the dark than he does in the daylight. Soon Natalie and Niamh came out - they played for a bit and then Luke taught me some Karate. After that it was getting cold and we went inside – well, tried to. We didn’t have the key and tried knocking on the window, but the teachers couldn’t hear us. I came up with a plan: I told Luke to ring his dad. That’s what he did and we were allowed back in, yeah! We went in and Mr. Horton had a pack of cards. He showed us a magic trick - Hina and I thought we had sussed it out but we didn’t - it was really frustrating, but it was such a simple trick. So we all did some tricks. Some were really good. After that, everyone came down and we played Mafia. It was good but again it only worked if everyone was quiet (which they weren’t). We played two games and then went to bed. We sat for a bit, ate snacks, and chilled but then we were tired and went to bed. As per usual, the alarm went off at 7:15 and we all got changed. Chloe was feeling a bit ill today. We all dressed in our Biddenham bumblebee outfits and made our way down to breakfast. Breakfast was normal and afterwards Mr. Horton told us the plan for the day. We were going to play for a school called ‘Clavius Gymnasium’. The school looked good from the outside and it was even better inside. We went up five flights of stairs and entered the assembly hall. We realised this was where we were going to perform. It was a nice hall except for the fact that we were supposed to bring heavy pans up these stairs. We decided to make a chain, which made the process quicker and lighter. It took us about twenty minutes but we were finally set up. Soon afterward, we had one quick practice and, in a way, this was a performance to the children who had helped us to set up. After that, children started to come in and the hall gradually filled up with children. We did about six songs (some were repeated). I danced for ‘Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes’, expecting everyone to join in, but no one did. However, they all still enjoyed our music and expressed it through their clapping. After the performances, we quickly packed away the pans in order to go back to the hotel and have lunch on time. As you can probably guess, we had to walk back to the hotel. We were tired from all the walking inside the school and, of course, walking from the school to the hotel. After lunch, we had about five minutes to bring our entire luggage downstairs into a room to be locked up. The reason for this was that we were going to stay in another hotel that night. After lunch, Mr. Horton explained to us that a couple of days ago, our guided tour had been cancelled due to a misunderstanding. This meant that our guided tour would be held right now, and so we were to meet up outside. It was a fun tour and we learnt loads. The lady that took us around took us to a church where Henry and Cunigunde (a king and queen of Germany) had died. We were going to this new hotel in taxis with Marcus and Zuhrin, and again some of us were left behind. This time, it was Chloe, Fizz, Natalie, Alex, Niamh, and me. Alex realised that he was the only boy - it was funny. Soon Marcus arrived and we all sat in the car. Steve was following us with the steel pan van. Fizz asked questions like, “How do you say ‘gangster’ In German?” and, “How do you say ‘brap’ in German”. The replies were “Gangshta” and “Get low”!! We soon arrived at the new hotel, which looked really nice. We all got appointed to our rooms and there was a lift!! That meant no more dragging. Soon afterwards, Mr. Horton told us that he was going to take us out for a pizza, so we went walking again. On the way, he asked me to do this project and I said that I would. We got to the pizza hut and discovered that it was closed, so we walked back to the hotel. We had pizzas at the hotel and it was nice. We then went bowling. The hotel had a bowling alley and the teachers paid for us all to play, which was nice of them. Alex played bowling for the first time and played really well - he beat me! After bowling, we went up to our rooms, which was fun. There was a telephone in each room and we kept ringing each other. That was getting annoying when we were trying to sleep. Well, after the phone calls we went to sleep slowly. We really liked this hotel and wished we’d come here sooner. As I forgot to mention before, Steve and Mr. Horton had to drive back and so they left after dinner and before bowling. We got up early for breakfast again, but this was for the last time in Germany! We got changed and walked down to the bus stop. We were taking the bus, which was a nice experience. When we got to town, we did some more shopping, but it was really cold. We then had lunch in the café. It was really nice - I had pasta. The vegetarian food was the best decorated. It tasted really nice too. After lunch, we were allowed to do some more shopping but Chloe and I stayed with Clare and Mrs Smith inside the café, as we were really cold. After more shopping, we all met at Neptune again. From there we were supposed to go to the school for some lessons, but that got cancelled as the students were doing exams. From there we caught the bus back to the hotel. There was a fair outside the hotel but we weren’t allowed to go because of some rules and regulations. We thought we would go bowling instead but they were cleaning the lanes so we couldn’t play. We decided to play pool instead. It was soon time to go as the coach arrived. We all went and sat on the coach and said bye to the hotel. While we sat in the coach, we all listened to our mp3 players and put our music on. The time went really quickly and we soon reached the airport. We checked in our luggage and our hand luggage. When we went through security, my bag was asked to be opened. I had forgotten that my water bottle was in there and so I threw it away. When we sat in the aeroplane, I was really tired and fell straight asleep, so for me the flight went quickly. We soon landed at the airport. We got our luggage really quickly as well but had to wait for the coach, which had got lost. We waited and it soon arrived. We all ran onto the coach as we had been standing up for ages. I don’t think many people slept, as we were quite excited about seeing our parents. We soon reached Biddenham. It was raining heavily but we saw Steve and Mr. Horton trying to help the driver unload the luggage. We were all too busy trying to greet our parents. My mum came to pick me up. I hugged her in delight but I wanted to go back to Germany!! I knew we had to go school tomorrow but we didn’t want to. It was 10:10pm and I was really tired. This trip was really nice and I just want to thank the teachers and, of course, the parents who forked out enough money for us to have this wonderful experience! And a massive thanks to Mr Murphy for actually taking out time and teaching us how to play the pans! Thank you!! |
