2016 School Magazine

GERMANY AFFILIATE SCHOOL VISIT

Across a three-week period in the September holidays, seventeen girls from Years 10 and 11 toured Germany, accompanied by Ms Garson and Dr Johnson. After the cancellation of the French study tour, everyone was relieved to hear that the German study tour would still be taking place! We spent almost a fortnight billeting with students of BGGS’s sister school, Werner Heisenberg Gymnasium, in the little town Neuwied in Rhineland-Palatinate. We attended school with our host brothers and sisters, participating in German tutorials in the mornings and joining our host siblings for classes in the afternoons. It was fascinating to experience the differences between the Australian and German education systems, including the lack of school uniforms and the fact that many students finished school at 1.00 pm. The BGGS girls particularly enjoyed the freedom to

leave the school grounds whenever there was no class! The school is conveniently located less than a minute’s walk from a bakery, which of course sold excellent pretzels. After bidding farewell to our host families, the tour group travelled by express train to the capital city Berlin, where we stayed in a hotel for two days. There, we travelled Potsdam and the summer palace of Frederick the Great, visited several sites of the Berlin Wall, and enjoyed free time at Ku’damm, a 3.5km-long shopping mall. After Berlin, we flew to Munich, where we spent time in the city’s Altstadt, the castles Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau, and Marienplatz. We concluded our tour solemnly by visiting the memorialised Nazi concentration camp in Dachau.

HELEN YESBERG (11G)

CHINA AFFILIATE SCHOOL TRIP

In late September, twelve students and two staff had the incredible opportunity to visit China for a language and cultural immersion experience. The tour to China was an amazing trip that provided an insight for students into one of the world’s oldest and most fascinating cultures. After three days of travel through the Hubei Province and seeing the Yellow Crane Tower in Wuhan and the world’s largest hydropower station, the Three Gorges Dam in Yichang, we flew to Shanghai to start our week at our affiliate school Shanghai Number 3 Girls School. During our stay at Shanghai Number 3 Girls School we were stunned to see such a beautiful campus in the middle of busy Shanghai. At school, we got the amazing chance to experience morning exercises and classes with our Homestay buddies followed by afternoon cultural session. The cultural sessions were filled with exciting fan painting, martial arts, a trip to the Shanghai museum, singing well known Chinese songs and mandarin language studies. One night we cruised the Huangpu river watching the beautiful lights of the Bund. On the weekend we got to experience a weekend in the life of our Homestay buddies. All the girls had vastly different experiences from just relaxing at home with our host families to going to Shanghai Disneyland. After our stay in Shanghai we travelled by high speed train to Beijing. In Beijing, we travelled to Tiananmen Square,

the Forbidden City, the Summer Palace, Chairman Mao’s Mausoleum, Peking Duck Dinner, the Great Wall of China, the Ming Tombs, Hutongs, Rickshaw ride, the Temple of Heaven, the Lama Temple and a local family. On this trip, we also had the chance to try many new dishes that we would not be able to experience in Australia. Some of the group’s favourites were soup filled dumplings (shao long bao) and Kung Pao Chicken (gong bao ji ding). Without a doubt this tour was a life-changing experience for the girls and staff who attended.

HELENA PAYNE (11H)

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