On Tuesday, April 21, the College experienced "Eine Phenomenal Prunkvolle Präsentation," or, for you non-German speakers, "A Phenomenously Pompous Presentation" of German Studies. The performance, entitled "Kabarett Maulesel"--or Cabaret Mule--incorporated the teachers and students from German classes 126, 128, and 300 into one cabaret.

The cabaret began with the College's own German professors, Arne Koch and Cyrus Shahan, performing "Die Moritat von Mackie Messer," a 1928 piece by Bertolt Brecht and Kur Weill. This perf - ormance was closely followed by students in German 126 and 128. The students performed a mix of poetry recitals, play reenactments and even a few songs.

To highlight a few of the performances, German 128 students Erik Baish '12 and Ramsey Meigs '11 combined their musical talents for two songs, "Rosenrot" by Rammstein, and " D e r Tantenmörder," an 1897 poem by Frank Wedekind. Fellow German 128 students Megan Conroy '10 and Autumn Smith '12 performed a short skit entitled "Koslowskis Kinder,'' which mocked a man's inability to tell the difference between similarly sounding words, causing a humorous c o n f u s i o n .

German 126 student Rob Woodhouse '12 turned a poem "Menschen" by Ernst Toller into his own original musical piece. Following the performances of the German 126 and 128 students, the German 330 class performed an original play. Written by the German 330 students with help from Ranja Radwan, this year's German teaching assistant, the unnamed play incorporated all of the students from the class and featured another set of witty playon- words. As a man and a woman attempt to meet somewhere in Germany, the man misunderstands the name of the station that the woman is at. The misunderstanding between the pair alternates between the man and the woman, creating confusion and keeping the two from reaching each other. Eventually, however, they both end up at the same destination.

The students had worked on perfecting and memorizing their pieces for several weeks. While some class time was spent on the cabaret, it also required students to invest much of their personal time outside of the classroom to prepare for the show. The cabaret reflects one of several larger projects the German students are expected to fulfill throughout the semester, and students did an impressive job of memorizing their pieces while still being able to act them out flawlessly.