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Hello, my name is Helen.I am 11 years old.I live in Rantum on Sylt.

TRANSLATION:

And down thereis where I live.Sylt is the biggest GermanNorth Sea island, with an areaof 99 square kilometres.There are 11 villages on Syltand one town called Westerland.Rantum, where I live, is oneof the narrowest parts of the island.

My pets are chickens.My guitar teacher is called Oliverand he also teaches my brother piano.I started when I was six years old.I couldn't even write then and nowI have been playing for four years.

I was born here on Syltand I have lived here my whole life.I live here with my brotherand my parents.Sylt has a population of 21,500.It is just 38.5 kilometreslong from north to south.And east to west, it isbetween 350 and 12,600 metres wide.A third of the islandis covered with dunes.The rest is covered with heathlandand marsh.

In Sylt,the wind blows mainly from the West.There are lots of thatchedhouses on Sylt.In the past, reeds grown on theisland were used to make their roofs.

In winter,far fewer people live on Sylt.Lots of people only comein the summerto spend time in their summer houses.Over 800,000 people a yearcome here on holiday.

Since the 1st June 1927,Sylt has been connected to the Germanmainland via the Hindenburg dam.To stop Sylt shrinking, sometimesa ship anchors off the coast,sucks up the sand from the sea bedand squirts it back onto the beach.The Wadden Sea is a nature reserveon the more protectedeast coast of Sylt.I am here with my friendsbecause we are reallyinterested in the Wadden Seaand we are young Wadden Sea guides.Kirsten says you can only protectand conserve what you know about,which means, that if we reallyget to know the Wadden Sea,then we'll know how bestto take care of it.

This is sponge. Like Spongebob.It is a nativesponge of the North Sea.And when the mussel boats dredgethe mussels from the sea,they destroy the spongesand everything else on the seabed.

Kirsten has shown usall the different plantsand animals on the Wadden Sea.Up to two million tiny plantsand organisms can live in one squaremetre of the Wadden seabed.

Svea, Samira and Ihave learnt a lot about the ebband flow of the tides.We know that the tide goesin and out, or ebbs and flows,because the earth is spinning.And when you spin around,you are forced away from each other.The same thing happens to the wateron the earth when the earth spins.There are two high tidesand two low tides every 24 hours.

Because of the wind,the weather changes very quicklyand it often doesn't staybad for long.Sylt is an extreme place to live inand we love it!