School starts at 8 a.m., but not all the students always have first period classes every day. They go home at different times depending on their class schedule for the day. The latest they finish is 2 p.m.
“I always have gone to school by myself except for when I was in Kindergarten.” This is not unusual in Germany. Since there are public buses and streetcars that stop near the school, many kids are responsible for getting themselves to school in the morning.
German kids eat lunch at home after school. They do not have school until midafternoon, so they wait until after the school day is done to have lunch. Some parents prepare lunch for their children and take their lunch-break from work so that they can prepare and eat with their kids. Other kids have to make or buy their lunch and wait for their parents to return home. The kids I talked to love to buy sandwiches at the bakery.
Unless the students are in a foreign language class, they speak German. There are many ways to say hello in German: hallo (literally hello), moia (g’morning in the local dialect) and guten Tag (good day) are three of the most common ways to greet people.
