Zach Starr
Humboldt-Institut in Konstanz, Germany
Major: Public Policy
Pre-Departure
Hi “Guten tag. Wie gehts? Ich heiße Zach und das ist meine blog post. Okay in English now: Hi everybody! My name is Zach Starr and I am one of UMBC’s Study Abroad Ambassadors for the Winter 2025 semester, which means that I will be sharing my study abroad experience in Germany with all of you!
I am currently a graduate student in my final semester of my Masters in Public Policy at UMBC, where I obtained my Bachelors’ in Public Health in 2023. My study abroad program is with the Humboldt-Institut in Konstanz, Germany, where I will be taking an intensive German course for two weeks. Why is a Public Policy student learning German you might ask? Well, I am pursuing a Fulbright Scholarship to study immigration health policy in Germany, and I am learning the German language to prepare me for the project I am proposing. Language skills for the country you are applying for is very helpful for a Fulbright scholarship application, which is why I decided to pursue a German language program this Winter. For my study abroad program, I will be taking a German language course at the Humboldt-Institut in Konstanz, Germany. I’ve been studying German for a semester now, but this course is going to be about 4 hours every day for two weeks, so much more intense than what I did here in the U.S. But before I start my classes, I have something important to take care of…I am seeing my friend Max!
I met Max through an international student exchange between UMBC and Universitat-Kassel and he has been one of my best friends ever since. Max and I became friends in 2019 and I visited him in Germany in 2022. Max has taught me a lot about German culture and he is a big reason why I have decided to pursue my Fulbright Scholarship and German language training. During my trip to Germany in 2022, I went to visit Max and his family in the village of Landwehrhagen, just outside of the city of Kassel. This was my first trip outside of the U.S. and I had a great time on this trip. I had a great time with Max’s family and I am so excited to see them again. I will be spending my New Year with Max and his family and he is going to show me the city of Bohn, which is somewhere I’ve never been before. We plan on going to the “Weinachtsmarkt”, aka a German Christmas Market, the weekend I arrive. I’m bringing gifts for him and his family and I am really looking forward to giving them if I can fit them all in my suitcase! Right now, I have two suitcases that are packed to the brim with stuff, so after I finish writing this I am going to work on “traveling light.” 
As for the journey itself, I am a confident traveler. I love flying and enjoy the peace I get in the air. I actually like airplane food (I know, it’s weird) and I look forward to relaxing in the sky. I have a very short layover in Istanbul before I get to Germany, so hopefully I am able to get to my connection in time. Once I get to Germany, I just need to find the right train platform and then I’m good to go!
Study abroad is not always accessible for graduate students and I am very grateful to have had this opportunity. I would’ve loved to do something like this during undergrad but COVID made that difficult. Now that things have changed, I am just happy to be able to continue my education in another country for the first time! When I come back, I will be quite busy finishing graduate school and finding a full-time job so I am going to enjoy my time abroad by doing some learning, traveling, and resting with good company. I know that I am going to learn a lot over this break and I am super thrilled to share with you the skills I pick up.
I’m honestly really excited to return to Germany. On my first visit, I had some struggles but now that I know some of the language and I’ve been there before, I am confident that this will be a good trip. I haven’t seen Max for two years, so that alone makes the trip worth it, but I am also excited to explore Konstanz and spend my winter break learning a new language. I leave on the 27th and I look forward to sharing more with you soon, but for now, auf wiedersehen!”
In-Country Post #1
Happy New Year everyone! It’s Zach again but this time I am writing to you from across the Atlantic in Germany. I left the U.S. on a beautiful afternoon last week on December 27th on a 10-hour flight to Istanbul, and then a 3-hour flight to Germany. The flight itself was smooth and for once I had no issues. The food was actually great, they had good shows to watch on the plane, and best of all, the flight was quiet!
The first flight was just under 10 hours and the landing was probably the roughest I’ve ever had on an airplane. After rushing to find the gate for my layover, I found out that my next flight was delayed by an hour and a half. This gave me some time to sit down and check in with my family at home and the friend I was going to visit in Germany. After helping another traveler figure out how to connect to the airport wifi, I got my second breakfast of the day and went to find my flight. By the time I got onto my second flight of the day, it was about the 12th hour of my traveling and I was quite tired. Thankfully, the flight was quite empty and I fell asleep as soon as the plane took off and woke up to a third breakfast, which was the exact same as my first, but still very good! I woke up just in time to see the plane fly over the Alps in the winter, which you can see in the pictures. After that, I tried to get what sleep I could until we landed in Frankfurt.
Late on the morning of the 28th, I landed in Frankfurt which marked my arrival to Germany. The baggage claim was the quickest I’ve ever seen and I was out of the terminal around 45 minutes after we landed. I had some time to kill before my train to Kassel, so I went to get some Thai Food from the airport. I began by successfully ordering in German, but the waitress switched to English, which tells me I still have work to do with these classes. After that, I dragged my luggage onto the train and struggled to lift my suitcase into the storage because I had packed it so full. A nice older gentleman came up to me and asked “Kann ich helfen Sie?” which means “Can I help you?” in German. This time, I was able to understand so I politely thanked him for his help and we lifted my luggage onto the rack. After that, I settled in for my one-and-a-half-hour train ride to Kassel and slept a bit again.
After I arrived in Kassel, my friend Max greeted me with a big hug and we headed to the village of Landwehrhagen to stay with his family, who I had not seen for two years. We had a big breakfast the next morning to celebrate and then we went to the Weinachtsmarkt (Christmas Market) to celebrate. After that, we went home and did what Germans do best, board games. I am not pleased to say that I lost but I have to be honest. 
The next few days were spent resting a bit and then went on a brief walk while I ran in the afternoons. I had a lot of trouble sleeping because my body was stuck on American time, but I think I am over that as of last night. We ordered some good pizza for New Year’s dinner and then, we went to Göttingen for New Year’s and I had a great time welcoming 2025 with a bunch of other international students. I was surprised to find fireworks for sale in the grocery store in Germany, which is something that I can’t find in Maryland. But we had fun and slept in as much as possible the next morning. For the first day of 2025, we went back to Landwehrhagen and had New Year’s lunch with Max’s family.
Overall it’s been a great first week and Kassel is just as fun as I remembered it. I said goodbye to Max’s family today and we headed to his apartment in Bonn for some more exploring before I start my classes on Monday. I hope to be back there soon and when I do, I am going to be able to speak a lot more German with them, which is exciting to me.
In-Country Post #3
Good evening everyone! I’ve had quite a journey since my last blog post so let’s break it down. After we spent some time winding down with Max’s family, we went to Bonn where Max is completing his PhD in physics from the University of Bonn. We spent the first day exploring the city, starting with his lab. Max spent a good half hour introducing me to his colleagues and showing me around his lab. I will not pretend to understand physics, but what I can tell you is that he does something with lasers and it was cool to see how it all worked.
After that, we went to lunch with the other physics students and got hamburgers, which was definitely not a very German meal but it was still good. Then we explored the downtown of the city. Bonn used to be the German capital before unification, so it was nice to see some of the history reflected there. We stopped by the Rathaus (“townhouse” in English) where JFK had once come to visit while he was in the city. I also took us into the bookstore to do a bit of shopping. Unfortunately, books in Germany are quite expensive so I just got a hot chocolate at the cafe. Bonn is also where Beethoven was born, so Max took me to see that as well. All of this took us about 6 hours so it was dinner time once we were finished. Max picked up his friend Fang and we went to a Vietnamese restaurant which was quite good. The last time I had Vietnamese food in Germany, it was way spicier than I was used to in the U.S., so I couldn’t finish it. Luckily that wasn’t a problem this time. It’s also worth mentioning that at this point I had been jet lagged for almost a week and couldn’t sleep well at night. I managed to buy some melatonin from the pharmacy which after a week has finally gotten my sleep back on track. But it was a rough few days before that.
The next day we went to the city of Köln nearby to see the Köln Cathedral, which was one of the largest in the world. The building itself was quite impressive, however, we found out the hard way that the building was not heated and it was a cold day. Other than that though it was quite impressive. I love a challenge so we climbed to the top and after around 500 stairs we made it and took a few good pictures while we caught our breath. Only one of the spiral staircases up the tower was open, so people were going up and down on the same thin hallway, which was quite a mess. After that, we walked around the city some more but ended up going home a bit early because we couldn’t find any food that wasn’t super expensive.
Now Sunday had come and it was time for me to leave and go to Konstanz for my course. Bonn is in the middle of Germany and Konstanz is in the very far south, so I had a long distance to cover by train. (Not) Luckily for me, it was snowing all over Bonn that morning which caused many problems with Deutsche Bahn, the German train company. My first train was cancelled so I got on a second with a transfer that was an hour longer. Then, on my second train, I noticed that after one station in a very rural area of the country, the train started going north instead of south. I found out the hard way that while I was on the train, Deutsche Bahn had canceled my train to Konstanz and rerouted it somewhere else. So I would like to take this moment to say, thank you Deutsche Bahn! : )
I called Max and he helped me figure out the next train to get on. After a long and horrible day of traveling, I finally ended up in Konstanz 3 hours later than I was supposed to. After I put my stuff down I took some time to relax and prepare for class the next morning. Classes that morning went well and I met some of the other students. The interesting thing about this school is that both the students and workers come from all different walks of life and age groups, which helps me learn a lot about both Germany and other countries as well. I’ve made friends with people from 5 different countries so far, so it’s been quite an experience. I also got to cross into Switzerland for the first time that day since Konstanz is right on the border. Anyways, I am quite tired from my classes right now, so that’s all I have to say. I look forward to telling you all more about how everything goes!
In-Country Post #4
Guten abend alles! I am writing to you once again from Konstanz Germany after what has been a fantastic and educational week. I’ve gone on quite a few adventures this week and I am really excited to share them all with you.
First, the educational stuff. I spent most of last Thursday and Friday in class refining my German skills in class. At the Humboldt-Institut, we spend about 4-5 hours a day in class, with brief breaks and meal breaks in between our classes. It can be quite intense, so the breaks are very helpful. One of the main difficulties in the German language is that there are three “articles” or “the’s”, “die”, “das”, or “der”, for each word, and there’s not an easy way to figure out which one goes where. In other words, this requires a lot of memorization. That was what we spent the latter half of last week focusing on. It’s not the most exciting or most fun subject, but it is critical to the German language, so I am doing my best to learn it.
Now here comes the fun part, our “Freizeitaktivitaeten” or “free-time activities.” Last Friday we went to a museum about Zeppelins. Now that part was interesting in all, but they had a giant ball pit that was way more fun than the rest of the museum. That was a good way to end the week and rest up before we headed to our activity on Saturday, which was hiking in the Swiss Alps! We packed lunch and left early Saturday morning to get to the Mountain, which was about an hour away. This was my first time deep into Switzerland, so I spent most of the ride looking out of the window at all the pretty houses and trains. They have lots of street-trains in Switzerland, even in the villages. For those of you who live in the Baltimore area, imagine the light-rail but there are a lot more and they run all over Maryland. Once we got closer to the mountain, the view got more and more unbelievable until we arrived at our destination. Unfortunately, we couldn’t hike the original route because of the snow. But that’s okay because we got to go up the Mountain Lift to the top instead and hike around the top of the Mountain. Most of the pictures here are from that journey because it was just that incredible. We made a loop for about an hour and then some of the others were starting to feel tired, but I wanted to keep going so I convinced everyone else to do one more trail. It was quite foggy for a bit, so we weren’t sure if we’d see anything. But then the fog cleared and the views were absolutely unbelievable. We spent another hour hiking, and then we had lunch at the top of the mountain. There are much worse places to eat lunch I must say. Also, I should add one of the pictures features a man parachuting off the mountain. I am sure my mom appreciates that fact that I decided not to do that. After that, we were pretty exhausted, so we headed back to the van. I slept the whole ride home and spent the rest of the night in awe of what I saw there. The next day, I got the chance to be a participant in a research project interview with a student who was doing their Masters’ thesis here in Konstanz on language acquisition. It was an incredible experience and allowed me to really reflect on my language learning journey.
The rest of the week since then has gone on pretty normally. I go to class in the morning, do some activities in the evening, and then catch up on some work from home at night. Tonight was a bit different though. I went out of the school for dinner into the Altstadt (“Old Town” in English). I had a great time, but I took the wrong bus back and ended up having to walk about 1.5 miles to get back. The last photo 
shows my reaction to that.
This is my last full week in Konstanz, so from there it’s on to Zurich for two days and then back home. I’m excited to go home of course, but I will miss this place. It has been quite a good experience for me. Anyways, I’ll tell you my overall thoughts about it when I return to the U.S. next week. Until then, auf wiedersehn!
Return Post
Guten nacht alles! Huete bin ich in Amerika! For those of you who don’t speak German, I am saying I’m back home now. Actually, I’ve been home for about two days now. My body is still on European time and I am quite exhausted, but I am happy to be home. My last week in Germany went by pretty normally. I had my classes in the morning and in the evening I spent time hanging out with my friends at the school. My remaining mornings were spent mastering the different articles “die”, “das”, and “der”, in front of each word and trying to memorize hundreds of new phrases. My classmate, Cecelia, and I spent a lot of time practicing with each other. Her and I were at the same level of German, while some of my other classmates didn’t have quite as much German skill as we did. So working together really helped improve our learning experience. Working with Cecelia helped me realize that language learning is much more fun with a partner you enjoy learning with. For those of you trying to learn a new language, I highly recommend you find someone else who is trying to learn as well and practice with them. It makes the experience so much more fun.
After my class on Wednesday, I went out to dinner with a grad student from France doing research on language learning at Humboldt in Konstanz Old Town. We got Greek food and spent hours exchanging stories about our backgrounds, interests, and answering each-others questions about our home countries. After about 3 hours, the restaurant politely asked us to leave at the end of the night because we were talking the whole time and they wanted to close. We honored their request and then she took me to see the waterfront while we waited for the bus to go back. And I ended up getting on the wrong bus and walking an hour back to the school. It was a beautiful night and the city was extremely safe. I had never really spoken with anyone from France before, so I took my opportunity to learn as much as I could about the culture in a short period of time. For me, this was the best part of my study abroad experience, being able to learn about other cultures and countries from people who I just would not run into in America.
On Thursday, I spent most of the day in class preparing for my placement test and packing up for my return journey. The friends I made and I were quite sad to leave each other so we played one last card game to celebrate our time together that evening. I am super excited to let you all know that I made my UMBC community proud and won that game! After that, we went to bed and I finished packing and got ready for my test in the morning.
The final exam came and went and I ended up getting a good grade, which means I advanced to the next level of German, meaning my time here was quite productive. After that, I had to rush through my lunch to make sure I made my bus to Zurich on time. I thanked all of my friends there for such a wonderful two weeks, gave them hugs, and then headed to the bus. 2 hours later I was in Zurich and I have to say that FlixBus was so much better than DeutscheBahn for anyone traveling to Germany or Switzerland anytime soon. Max, my friend who inspired me to learn German in the first place, met me in Zurich to say goodbye and we spent 2 days exploring the city. It was quite expensive, as most of Switzerland is notorious for, and also quite nice. After 2 days, Max and I parted ways and I said goodbye untilhe comes to the U.S. in May. My flight home was about 20 hours with the layover so I had an extremely long travel day. Overall, I consider this a winter break that was extraordinarily well spent. I learned a lot of German, made many new friends, and had such an enjoyable experience. I hope to return to Germany for my Fulbright project in the near future, but for now, I am grateful for the time I got to spend studying there thanks to the help I got from UMBC. That’s all from me. Thank you for letting me share my study abroad experience with you all. I seriously encourage everyone to consider studying outside of the U.S., even if it’s just for a few weeks. It was a truly transformative experience for me and it will be for you too!