My Erasmus Experience at Wilhelmsgymnasium

Hi, my name is Harry. I’m from Ireland and I participated in a one-month exchange between Midleton CBS Secondary School and Wilhelmsgymnasium, Kassel. I really enjoyed my time here in which I got to experience a new school system and compare it to the Irish school system. I saw some similarities and a lot of differences, for example, Irish schools start at 9:00am and finish at about 4:00pm and in Germany the schools start around 8:00am and mostly end at 1:00pm.

I also got to experience new foods such as Sauerkraut and Schnitzel, and saw different cities such as Dortmund and Braunschweig and I watched Bundesliga and Bundesliga 2 games in those cities. As well as that I joined a football team and I could compare our training to training in Germany and it was interesting to see the different skill levels of everyone.

My German has improved incredibly. I had difficulty with listening and understanding before coming and now I feel very comfortable with listening and understanding and after the exchange experience I now know where I’m going to have difficulty in the future: for example, I have noticed my pronunciations aren’t always on point, especially ö and ü but now I know where I need practice.

On top of all that I’m really happy with the friends I made over here. They were honestly so helpful and whenever I needed help they were there for me. Also, I could joke around with them which eased the nerves a lot.

I really enjoyed my month here and would like to thank everybody who helped me throughout the month.

-Harr