Rotary Youth Exchange 2013/14: New Family and School Update

I realized that I only wrote three posts in October. It's the 20th of November now and I only wrote one single post for November until now, so even it is after midnight right now and I am really tired, I decided to write a quick update as a lot of things happened since I last wrote a post.

First things first: The guy from the tour answered me. They told me that they still need the signed trip rules sheet and a copy of my insurance card. I did everything and sent it on Monday, so I really hope that everything is ok now and that I get a place. Originally one bus with about 50 seats was planned, but they decided to add another bus, so the chances are bigger now. I keep my fingers crossed.

I totally forgot to tell you that a new Term started, which means that I have new subjects!
Right now I would be in 10th grade back in Austria. When I go back I luckily won't have to repeat the class, I will go straight into 11th grade. I will have to learn everything my classmates learn this year until the end of the first semester. That means summer time = study time!
To keep at least a little bit in my brain, I asked if I can take "Independence study". I just sit in the library and learn by myself. It is a great way to learn and repeat things that they do in Austria. For the last three weeks I repeated Italian what is helpful to communicate with my exchange buddies from Italy. This week I started Latin (what makes me feel depressed, because I don't really like it, but yeah). We will see how that goes.
Then I have Choir, like last term. My second block would have been English Reading, as I had English Writing before. It is required to have both of them, but as I am an exchange student I can take basically every class I want to. I wasn't motivated for English Reading, because people told me that it isn't a lot of fun and that it is kind of boring. So I dropped it, but didn't really know what to take instead. My Counselor at school told me that Kinesiology is still open. I thought that it will definitely be better than Reading, so I agreed and now I am glad I did. Kinesiology is the study of bones and muscles of the human body. We also learn about movement, Physical Activity and much more. Every Wednesday we have a workout. Two weeks ago we did Zumba, last week we had something else going on (I can't really remember), that's why we didn't do a workout and today we did T'ai Chi. It is so much fun! I love this class to death, because it is super interesting, but challenging at the same time!
After that I have PE. We do things like floor hockey, basketball and much more. I haven't heard of some of the games, but it's still fun. I can say nothing against it.
Last I have Drawing & Paint. It is cool and I like it. What I learned so far is looking at the object I want to draw much more precisely. I worked about 6 hours on my final project and I am super happy with it.

I think I have told you that I have always wanted to be a cheerleader, right? I might have also told you that they didn't want to let me try out what made me sad, but I couldn't change it. Well, on Monday two girls came into my class and told me they need to talk to me. I got out of the class and they said that my lovely teacher Miss Riley asked if I want to be a cheerleader for basketball. It made me jump around and of course I said yes. It is actually harder than I thought! There are about 30 different cheers and it's hard to spell things and to move your legs and arms different to each other at the same time. I have two weeks to learn it. I can do it!

So on Tuesday I had a test in Kinesiology and for the first time ever since I am here I studied very hard. I studied for about four hours, because the names of the bones wouldn't go in my head. At the end I got 95% in my test and that's ok.

Some exchange problems: You gain weight. A lot of weight when it comes to me. I have always been skinny and underweight and at the beginning of the summer I had 42 Kilos. Guess what… Now I have 49.4 what is not a lot, but a lot for me. I really need to start eating healthy and to exercise. It's not that I feel really fat (well, some pants are hard to get in. I put all my new Kilos on my hips and thighs), but I feel stuffed all the time and just not healthy at all. That has to be changed! Getting back to my old weight - challenge accepted!

Another event is that I switched families today. Rotary wants us to have at least two different host families, because they want us to experience different lifestyles. My second family consists of Don and Becky, a lovely couple. Their children are already out of the house. I was with them for my first week, so I know how it is to live with them.
I was really sad to leave my first family, especially my host sister Mary Kate. She became my real sister and we told each other everything, shared every secret and helped each other out with advice and clothes. I will miss living with this crazy and wonderful girl…

So now I am laying in my new bedroom and it feels weird, but the new home also has some positive points: I have my own bathroom (instead of sharing with two other teenage girls), it is silent (what is good and bad at the same time), I am the only child and I have a treadmill in the basement where I can exercise. I tried it already and it is so much fun! Losing weight here I come!

Tomorrow is Thursday, game day. I am totally excited for the final game and I still haven't lost the believe that we can win this! I'll keep you updated.