Closing Time

Hey Y’all,

            So this is it, my final post. I was originally supposed to leave in late June but plans change. Instead I left on April 14th. I chose to end my trip early so I could have time to visit Universities before making my final decision. It was a heartbreaking decision to make but I know it was the right one for me. There’s so much I could write about my time in Brazil that this post has been difficult but I’m going to write about my last few days and how readjusting has been.

            On my last weekend, my amazing family threw me a going away party. It was a fantastic party with all of my good friends and family and then some strangers that were just there to party. It was bittersweet having to say goodbye to everyone.

The next day my sisters and some of our friends went to the Holi One festival. It was a blast! The electronic music and all the colors everywhere were so much fun. We danced all day to the pounding music and were coated in covered in a rainbow by the end of the night.

Leaving was sad but mostly I felt numb. I couldn't believe I wouldn't see so many of these people again. Boarding that plane was tough and arriving back in the USA was even harder.

Saying goodbye

My balloons floated away, of course

Being back is... strange? Hard? Good? Bad? It's all of those things and more. I have the unique situation of having my family move states while I was away. I left home in San Antonio, Texas but arrived home in Seattle, Washington. I cried a lot the first week, two or three times a day. I've had problems fitting back into my family. They've had all this time without me and have established new routines. They tell me I'm so different from when I left but can say exactly how. I've already graduated from high school and yet I won't start school until this fall. I'm in a new city where I know no one. The food here in America is beyond amazing and I can honestly say I am not missing rice and beans twice a day. It's been a really rough adjustment. Some days I'm thrilled to be back and in a beautiful new city and some days I hate the city and even the country and everyone in it. During the first week I kept saying, "that's not how we do it in Brazil." 

Being an exchange student is a heartbreaking experience. You sign up to move to a new country, join a new family. To fall in love with this place and all the people you meet there, only to leave after one year. All good things must come to an end and like all amazing experiences, the end hurts. It was worth it though. It hurt so much because it was  a once in a lifetime experience. I will always treasure my time there and the incredible people I met there will never be far from my thoughts. The people and the experience helped shape me and I will cherish my memories. 

For all future exchange students, learn the language, make the most of every moment, say yes to every invitation, and get to know the people. They're what really make the experience special. Before you know it your year will be over and you'll be back to your regular life. Tchau and boa viagem!

P.S. I made my college decision. Go ducks! 

Let's Get This Party Started

Hey Y'all,
    Sorry for the lack of updates things have been rather exciting here in Brazil. We just recently celebrated Carnival last month. For those of you that aren't aware of what Carnival is here is how Google sums it up,

1. "A week-long party characterizes Brazil's Carnival, the Mardi Gras of the southern hemisphere. Celebrations and parades are held throughout the country, most notably in the city of Rio de Janeiro and the Brazilian states of Bahia and Pernambuco."
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   Looks like a good time, right? I was picturing, well, the pictures above. Not exactly. My family chose to do a much more family oriented weekend at our countryside home. We drove up after school on friday to a beautiful part of the country about 3 hours West of Sao Paulo. Our family home was a beautiful stone house with an attached guest house and a pool and garden. It also came with two friendly and adorable dogs. Our whole extended family came up for carnival and it was a blast to get to spend this time with them.
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4. During the day we spent our time hanging with the family and swimming in the pool. We went out clubbing twice. Both times there were two or three dogs hanging out in the club. They laid down in the middle of the dance floor, sat on the couches, and even climbed up on stage with the band! Even the Brazilians were confused by these lost dogs.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
5. We went to town only a few times.We mostly ventured into town to get ice cream and other goodies but one time we did go in with some of the younger children to go to the children's festival. Young children dressed in halloween costumes threw confetti at each other while adults dressed up in silly costumes danced around and sang. 
   
   
   

   

   I'm pretty sure my face says it all.

   
6.  I was expecting a big Carnival like the type you see in Rio but I enjoyed my experience with this small town Carnival. Though, I definitely plan to go to Rio for the big Carnival experience. I was disappointed that no one I asked could tell me the meaning of Carnival or why they took part in it.Overall, I'd say Carnival was a success and I had a wonderful time celebrating with my family. 

Halfway Up the Stairs

Hey Y'all,
     Happy Halfway Day! I've officially been here 160 days today and I have 160 more to go until I return home. In honor of Halfway Day I'm posting about my recent vacation and then I'm sharing some exciting news that I hinted at in my Christmas post. So here we go....

My family and I spent six days at a family apartment near the beach. The beach was beautiful. We drove there, unpacked, and immediately headed to the beach. We were joined by our family friends who have kids my sisters ages; a 16 year old son and an 11 year old daughter. All ten of us were staying in a three bedroom apartment about five blocks from the beach. On the second day we went to the beach around ten am and stayed until about two. The brazilians preferred to stay on the beach and chill but Germany and I took off into the water. Germany decided to take over mom duty and remind me to apply sunblock every hour and when I rolled my eyes at her, like I do my regular mom, she took to spraying me with it when I was distracted. Despite the sneaky German's tactics I got horribly sunburned. I was bright red! I was sunburned everywhere; my back and shoulders, my legs and hips, and my face. It's by far the worst sun burn I've ever had in my life. It started with two days of mind numbing pain where it hurt to move. Then it bubbled. Horrible bubbles all over my front and back. Giant shudder inducing bubbles. Then came peeling. So the third and fourth day of vacation were spent with me hiding out in the apartment, avoiding all sunlight, and trying to remain as still as possible. Did I mention we had no wifi? I'm pretty sure I've now seen the Veronica Mars movie a hundred times. No joke. The fifth day i ventured to the beach again, this was after pain but before bubbles. I thought I was home free. Ha! I spent my time at the beach playing in the waves, drinking coconuts, and I bought knock off Ray Ban Aviators. It was a great day. The next day I bubbled. I bubbled hard. We went to the aquarium in the morning. It was sad to see how tiny the animal's cages are. Then we went back to the beach to ride a banana boat and a spinny boat. Germany literally shoved a t-shirt over my head and told me to deal with it and that I would NOT be making my sunburn worse. The banana boat was a fun if mellow ride but the spinny boat... well let's just say Mama, Auntie, and my youngest sister jumped off early. I was tempted to but was too stubborn to give in. The ride goes like this, this large disk like float is placed at an angle so we're all falling and gripping onto the handrails. The boats pulls us which causes all the passengers to flop around and fall all over each other and just generally get sick. Three people were tossed off of the one that went before us. I was determined to hold on despite the fact that I had a giant headache and being thrown around was definitely not helping. But I'm American and I had to represent. So we all spun around and cursed like sailors before being tossed into the ocean. We went back to the apartment and I took a nap to clear my headache while Saint Germany packed our bag, bless her. Finally, it was time to go.

The horrid spinny boat. If only we knew
what we were getting into.

Germany and me. I am not amused.

If you read my Christmas & New Years post you probably noticed that Germany spent both holidays with us and now went on vacation with us. Have you guessed the good news? The family has expanded to include one insane German who dances and sings Glee too much! The week before Christmas she came over for a normal sleepover when her host mother suggested she spend the weekend. This seemed a bit suspect to all of us but I shrugged it off until my host mother pulled me aside to ask how I would feel about her being my roommate for a month with us until she found a new family. I told her that of course that was fine with me. Germany's host parents were having issues and thought it would be best if she was moved to a new family while they try and work it out. She was quickly packed up and moved into our home. I'll admit that I was unsure at first how this would go. I'd only been with this family less than two weeks. I still wasn't completely sure of my place in our home. Would they like her more? Would I be slowly pushed to the side? Was it possible that she'd stay and I'd be shuffled off to a new family? Would she use all my mascara? The answer to one of these is yes but my mom sent me more mascara for Christmas so it's ok. We slowly but surely found our footing as a family with four daughters. My parents are saints for taking both of us in and immediately making us feel part of the family. Even our Aunts & Uncles, cousins, and grandparents instantly welcomed us to the family with Christmas presents and concern about our eating or lack of (is this a brazilian habit or just a grandma habit?) Around week three they announced that they were thinking of keeping her by buying a new car big enough to hold all of us. Then this week Germany's counselor called to tell our parents that they'd found a family that wanted to meet her. Our mother responded by saying, "She's my daughter now. She will be staying with us. We bought a car big enough for us all." And that was that. We're keeping the German. Have there been road bumps? Of course! We're currently sharing a full size bed until our two twins get here and I can tell you that she kicks and rolls over on me. (When I get married I'm definitely getting two twin beds.) Our poor father has four daughters and I'm quite certain the estrogen is just too much sometimes. Nobody in the family can tell us apart. We're both tall and blonde which apparently makes us twins, we've both learned to respond to each others names. We're thinking of getting name tags. When AFS asked me if there was anything I wanted in a family I told them I needed a sister. I now have three. Three sisters to share clothes and makeup with. Three sisters to jump on me. Three sisters to gossip with and who go through my stuff and harass me about boys. I'm never ever alone. There's always a sister somewhere. I went from the youngest with one older brother to the oldest with three younger sisters. The differences are astronomical. For example, I can't remember the last time Dave borrowed my clothes or asked me if his butt looked good in those jeans or came into my room at four am (when I was sleeping!) to talk about the latest text from the boy he liked. But at the same time I couldn't borrow his clothes, okay just his sweatshirts, and he refused to tell me whether my butt looked good in my jeans, and if I woke him up at four to talk about a boy he'd kill me. I'm excited to see my only brother in 160 days but it breaks my heart to think of leaving my three beautiful, wonderful, deranged sisters. If I could just get Germany to stop singing Glee it would all be perfect. Welcome to the family Germany! 

A Merry Christmas and A Happy New Years

I hope y'all had an amazing New Years! It's hard to believe it's already 2015. The year I turn 18. The year I go to college. 2014 was an amazing year and I know 2015 will only be better! For Christmas, my family had a huge party! Brazilians celebrate Christmas on Christmas eve so we had the whole family over and Santa even came over.

The whole family.

Germany and me.

The entire extended family.

We ate dinner around ten and opened presents at midnight. It was a wonderful night and I got many awesome presents from my generous family.

Next was New Years eve! It's tradition to wear white for a new start (I think...) and what color your underwear is is what you're wishing for in the New Year. We drank champagne and watched fireworks.

Family!

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and New Years! Tchau! 

Her name is Rio and she dances on the sand

Hey Y'all,
So for those of you who haven't hear I've moved families. I lived with an amazing family and they were wonderful to me and I have a great deal of love for them. My new family is wonderful! I have two sisters that attend my school. One is 15 and the other is 11. We also have two wonderful parents, a pool, and two labrador retrievers. They're a fantastic family!
                                                                                                                                                              

How do I describe Rio? Hmmmm.... Amazing? Beautiful? A better version of California? It's pretty much all of those things. I LOVED it. If there's any city I could see myself living in,here in Brazil, it's Rio. It's very chill and relaxed, very clean, and just absolutely gorgeous. I visited Rio with Germany, Italy 1 & Italy 2, Hungary, Yoda, and a German boy from German 1's city joined us. We only spent three days there unfortunately, but we did get a lot done.

We started by visiting Sugarloaf Mountain. The whole mountain was clearly a giant tourist trap and was covered in stores but that didn't detract from the breathtaking views.

Ah-Mazing! To keep to our tourist agenda, can you guess what we saw next? Christ the Redeemer! We took a little train like thing up there and the views were awe inspiring. I was sitting behind German boy and across from Germany. We were all holding a conversation but since they both spoke German the conversation kept getting switched to German, leaving me sitting there nodding and looking confused. The man sitting next to me nudged me and said, "Why are they talking in German but you're talking in English?" I looked a lot like the Germans. Once up there we proceeded on to take a million goofy pictures and of course the required Christ photo.

We also had the opportunity to attend a fuetbol game. Brazilian fans are crazy! They were waving their flags, jumping on their streets, and screaming at everything. 

These are some of the highlights of Rio. I had an amazing time and I'm hoping to go back in the Spring to make even more wonderful memories. Tchau!