The Daily Inter Lake

A group of students from Braunschweig, Germany, began their trip home Saturday after launching the 25th year of an exchange between their city and the Flathead Valley.

Next fall, a group from Kalispell will complete the cycle with a visit to their German friends.

Twenty-two teens and three teachers from a pair of schools in the Northern German city of 200,000 headed to Seattle, then San Francisco on their way home.

Their stay here was part of the German American Partnership Program.

It takes students far beyond classroom walls.

For Dennis Hybsz, a 17-year-old senior from Braunschweig, his group's tour through Montana satisfied his love of the landscape.

After kayaking and mountain biking in the Flathead with his host mom, Sally Stueben, he had a chance get his boots on mountains like he never sees in the flatlands of his Northern Germany home.

"In Glacier National Park or Yellowstone," Hybsz said, recalling the group's travels to the two national parks, "you see how important [landscape] is. You see you are just a small part of it, you are not the kings of the world."

Marie Kriegeskorte, a 15-year-old sophomore, was treated to a little work that never would happen at her home when she helped John Gregg and the rest of her host family put up Christmas lights on the roof.

"We do things much later," she said of the Gregg family's October decorating, "and there are no lights on our houses."

Candles in windows light up the Christmas season for most Germans, she said.

The University of Montana homecoming parade was an eye-opener for Kerstin Hering, a 16-year-old junior.

"Life here is much closer to the school, there is solidarity with the school," she said. Even in Kalispell, population 20,000, she noticed bigger celebrations of otherwise commonplace events.

"Since Kalispell is such a small town, things get so much bigger," Hering said.

The group arrived in Kalispell on Sept. 30, toured the city and took in activities with host families. They headed out for Great Falls, Helena, Butte, Bozeman, Deer Lodge, Virginia City, Nevada City, Missoula and St. Ignatius. This past week, they spoke to local classes on German issues in politics, history, what teens do with their spare time - or whatever sparked their interests.

Claus and Marianne Zimmerman and their fellow teacher Lisa Wachter led the group from Braunschweig.

Through eight visits to the Flathead and dozens of new friendships, Marianne Zimmerman said she has learned patience by contrasting the more-relaxed American West with her homeland's hurried pace. She has come to appreciate Americans' generosity with time and friendliness.

And she has come to trust what her young charges learned over the past 2 1/2 weeks - people essentially are the same, despite the cultural distance between Germany and the United States.

The efforts of Kalispell resident and now-retired Flathead High School teacher Bob Lopp got the local exchange started in 1982.

Lopp had drawn a blank after searching several years for a school in Southern Germany interested in an exchange. Finally a Braunschweig teacher was offered the chance to come here, and brought back the seed of a new exchange.

The following year the Zimmermans hosted Lopp in their home. Their friendship and mutual hosting have continued every year since.

After Lopp finished coordinating Flathead's end of the program, German teacher Stephanie Christensen assumed leadership. In Columbia Falls, teacher Dan Yuhas coordinated that school's participation in the exchange until his retirement a few years ago.

This year, Flathead's second-year German teacher Andrew Costigan took over the reins and plans to lead next year's delegation to Braunschweig.

Reporter Nancy Kimball may be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at nkimball@dailyinterlake.com