If I had known what to expect, I would never have set foot on that plane.
It had been a dream of mine for a long time to visit the USA, the land of unlimited opportunities. My friend Sarah and I had barely gotten ourselves together when Ms. Bühner told us during the advanced English course that this year's course trip at the end of the eleventh grade would take us to America.
"USA, Marie, we're flying to the USA!" Sarah called out a little too loud, even before Ms. Bühner had finished speaking.
Ms. Bühner looked at her over her glasses, but her stern gaze was spoiled by the laugh lines in the corners of her eyes. The other students laughed, but they were just as excited as Sarah and I.
And now here we were. Not in New York City, or San Francisco, or any of those well-known cities. Not even at the Grand Canyon or Niagara Falls. No — we were at the rather provincial airport of Rapid City, South Dakota.
South Dakota!
"It's somewhere in the middle of nowhere," I murmured to Sarah when Ms. Bühner announced our destination.
"South Dakota," Ms. Bühner said, raising her eyebrows at me, "is in the Midwest. But the area is very popular with tourists. There's Mount Rushmore — the famous mountain on which the presidents' heads are carved — Plus the scenic Badlands. And historically, South Dakota has a lot to offer too. The Gold Rush in the Black Hills, the Indian Wars..."
I exchanged a look with Sarah. Naturally! Ms. Bühner was also our history teacher and we already knew that we could visit some museums and listen to her endless lectures on her favorite subject: American history. But then I shrugged. What the hell. I was coming to the US and I was looking forward to using my English skills in the wild.
I stretched my legs and retrieved my carry-on from the overhead compartment, glad to be able to move again. On the long flight from Düsseldorf, Sarah and I watched one film after the other because I couldn't sleep on the plane. After an endless line at immigration control in Minneapolis and boarding this tiny prop plane, I was pretty exhausted; there was also the time difference.
When we got off, we immediately felt the muggy heat that hit us, which I found very pleasant after the refrigerator-like temperatures on the plane. It was July and the air at the airport seemed still.
"Once we get to the hostel I have to get out of these big jeans," Sarah said, tugging at the fleece jacket she wore on the flight.
I looked around for a sign that we were indeed in the US. "So far it looks like any other airport in any other country," I remarked.
"Why would an airport look any different," Sarah replied distractedly.
Ms. Bühner counted her sixteen students and we followed the rest of the travelers to the entrance of the fairly manageable airport building. Inside, I shivered again immediately and was glad I hadn't taken off my sweater yet. The Americans really did have a thing for air conditioning, it seemed.
While we were waiting for our luggage, I noticeably dismantled. The tiredness after this fourteen-hour journey finally made itself felt and on the bus ride to our hostel I only saw a little of the surroundings.
I had heard that the states in the Midwest were also called 'fly-over states' by the Americans themselves because they said there was nothing worth landing for.
You were right.
The area here looked pretty unspectacular at first glance, a few isolated houses and farms in a flat to slightly hilly grassy landscape that was divided into pastures. Was this supposed to be the once-wild prairie my brother Max used to rave about? At the age of twelve, he had a weakness for Indian stories and dreamed of galloping across the prairie on horseback armed with a bow and arrow. Well, to each his own. Sometimes he would ask me to read to him from his books and I would oblige, but I honestly couldn't understand what he thought about it. I preferred love stories or thick fantasy novels.
"We're here," Sarah said, gently nudging me with her elbow.
I woke with a start to find my head slumped against the dirty bus window.
Half asleep, I followed her and the others to our hostel on the outskirts of town, made my bed, and told Sarah I was going to skip dinner.
As soon as I lay in bed, my eyes closed and I fell asleep. Tomorrow was another day.
I didn't know that it would be my last in this world for the time being.

"Good morning," piped the woman behind the hostel's reception desk as Sarah and I came down the stairs from our room. "How are you today?"
"Uh...we are fine," I said, a bit taken aback. How nice of her to ask!
It took me a while to dig up my English skills again. But that's what we were here for, after all, so I decided to practice right away. "Thank you. Yesterday, after we arrived, I was very tired. But I slept good ... uh ... well."
Sarah nodded and let me do the talking. Although she was good at English, she didn't really dare to show it. That would be fine.
"Wonderful," the lady exclaimed, and I found her enthusiasm a bit over the top. But I thought she was nice nonetheless.
"Uh, where is breakfast?" I asked.
She showed us the way and we sat down at an empty table. From the next table, Hannes and Luka, the only two boys in our English class, nodded to us.
A small buffet had been set up in the room: packaged muffins, cereal and cereal, apples, toast and bagels that could be warmed in a toaster oven, milk, orange juice and coffee.
"Peanut butter," I called, reaching for the small packet of spread. I grinned widely. "Welcome to America!"
Sarah shook her head as I spread peanut butter and grape jelly on my toast. "Where did you get that?"
"Peanut butter and jelly sandwich," I said, mouth full. "It's a staple around here."
Sarah just nodded absently. She had her phone out and was tapping away wildly. “Thank goodness there is wifi here. I really wouldn't get along otherwise."
I rolled my eyes a little but made sure she didn't see it. I knew who she was chatting with. Your dearest friend 'Jo — pronounced like the English 'Joe. His real name was Johannes, but the name was probably too uncool for him. Honestly, I didn't begrudge my girlfriend that she fell in love, but the two of them together were sometimes really unbearable for me. They were always hanging on to each other, holding hands, kisses here, kisses there...
I glanced at her phone and saw her typing the words: _I miss you so_. And half a dozen little hearts behind it.
"You've only been apart for twenty-four hours," I said, shaking my head.
She looked up. "Yes, and already I can't imagine how I'm going to be able to endure a week without my sweetheart." She ran her fingers through her thick, auburn curls.
Sometimes I envied Sarah's hair. Once in a while? OK, actually always! My hair, even on a good day, was difficult to style, to say the least; strawberry blonde and so straight they could only be styled with a ton of hairspray and three dozen bobby pins. So most of the time I had to settle for a ponytail.
"Young love," I said with a funny sigh.
Sarah nudged me in the side. “Just wait, it will happen to you too sometime. The right one will come."
"I don't believe in 'the right guy,' I reminded her. We'd had the conversation a few times, including before Sarah got together with Jo. Now she thought she'd proved me wrong. But I was me sure their relationship wasn't going to be romantic and exuberant forever. It was just the hormones that eventually wore off. And then what was left? You broke up and found a new partner for the next hormone injection. Or you stayed together and became totally unhappy, like my parents, who hardly had anything to say to each other.
“You are so terribly unromantic, Marie. Um, maybe I should call you Mary while we're here."
I smiled. "If you want."
"You're secretly just jealous," Sarah said with a wink.
I knew she was joking, but it still hit me. Before I could say anything in my defence, she turned to the boys at the next table, who were getting up.
"What are we going to do today?" she asked.
Hannes, who always seemed to know everything, answered immediately. “In the morning we look at Mount Rushmore and the Crazy Horse Memorial in the Black Hills. In the afternoon Ms. Bühner wanted to go on some cave tour."
"Sounds okay for our first day," I said, smiling at Hannes, who got red ears as a result.
Sarah and I also got up to go back to our room and pack our backpacks. I reminded myself to smear myself with sunscreen so I didn't look like a boiled lobster at night. With my fair skin, that was always my biggest problem. And even if we were to spend the afternoon in some cave, with the sunny, hot day outside, the morning was enough to burn me properly.
Dressed in shorts and a spaghetti strap top, I got to the hostel door at nine to board the bus with the others that would take us to our first stop: the mountain with the giant presidential heads.
USA, here we come, I thought.