So, the actual schoolday- it was OK. The headteacher incident probably spoiled it, but apart from that it was a pretty good day. Massive generalisations follow: German schools seem to be slightly less strict and more flexible, but the pupils themselves are perhaps more polite. They will lend me their textbooks to look at and give me a chair if I'm standing, without even being asked, which I don't think would have happened at my old school. And although they can be a bit disruptive, they are rarely directly rude to the teacher (or, thankfully, the teaching assistant). I think problems do arise in the Hauptschule especially with learning English, and especially with older pupils, because by this time they have realised that they probably won't need English that much in their future jobs, and they just don't have any motivation. And I think they might have issues just by being in the Hauptschule. One of the teachers today said that a Hauptschule class were setting a bad example for the school in front of the new guest ('twas I), and someone answered words to the effect of 'Yeah, but it's only the Hauptschule though'. They weren't a bad class in the sense of being mean, but they were very disruptive and I think that if you were in that class and you wanted to learn, you just couldn't. But then again, the British system doesn't differ that much. In theory dividing people into sets based on ability is more flexible, because you can still change, but in practise, people still get shunted to lower sets and basically forgotten about.
While we're making huge generalisations (I say we, I mean me), I think that Germans are more friendly than Brits. Well, OK, I think everyone's more friendly that Brits*, but with some notable exceptions *cough* schulleiter *cough* everyone I've met has been nice. A cleaner took pity on me today when she saw me standing for hours outside the staffroom and offered to bring me a chair. I said she didn't need to, but she said 'mache ich trotzdem' and brought me one. This is something I also think would not happen in GB. We have a tendancy to ignore people in any kind of difficulty, because of course, to have problems is to be WEAK. But I do feel quite at home here, language difficulties aside, and it's the small things which have really helped.
And tomorrow I don't have to wake at 5.30am!!!!!!! I can sleep for as long as I like!!!!! HOERA!
*I'm sort-of joking. I'm not a self-hating Brit, I promise. And I like many of my fellow countrymen on an individual basis.