District Conference

So this was the post I was talking about in my last one. I wanted to write about the District Conference that took place at the beginning of the month.

The District Conference of Rotary District 6000 took place on May 2nd and 3rd for us exchange students. Other Rotary members had to be there a few days earlier, because they had other kinds of meetings to attend. Anyways, I already came one day early on May 1st and got out of school early (woopwoop) to leave for Ames. In the hotel I met up with Franzi, because she came early as well. Then we waited for Kate, the outbound going to Austria this summer, because we were staying at her dad's house for the night.
After she picked us up we drove to her hometown Boone, which is about 15 to 20 minutes away from Ames. Then we met up with some of her friends and they all showed us around Boone. It was really fun and after we said goodbye to her friends we drove to her dad's house where we started to watch a movie. Kate and I still had to finish the info board about Austria that we needed for the District Conference the next day. Right when we started we realized that we didn't have enough craft stuff to finish the whole thing properly, so we had to drive to Walmart at like one in the morning. We finally got it done late at night and Franzi was already dozing off.
The next morning we had to get up really early to get ready, because we're girls and girls tend to take a long time to get ready. Shower, outfit choice, make up, hair, ... We left the house later than we planned, but still came to the hotel in time. At the hotel we met all the inbounds and outbounds and after warm welcome-hugs Chris, our inbound coordinator, helped us to practice our march. Which march? Well, our first point of the day was the ceremony where they presented this year's inbounds and next year's outbounds. We had to walk in with the flag of the country we were coming from/going to. The inbound had to carry the flag (if there were several, the one that was first in the alphabet had to carry it) and the outbound(s) walked after him/her. Sometimes it happened that there was no inbound. In that case the outbound had to carry the flag (same thing with the alphabetical order). The order in which the countries were marching in was also in alphabetical order. And what country starts with A? Austria, right. And who is the inbound? Me, right. So who had to march in as the very first? Oh yeah, that would have been me, right. I was double nervous to mess up, but luckily everything went well :)
I really try to remember what happened after, but I can't really remember... I think that after we walked out again, we had to put up our boards in the break room, so that Rotarians could see it and ask us questions during the break. Pretty sure that was it... Anyways, after that we were assigned to our rooms and then we changed and went to the hotel's sauna and pool. We had tons of fun and it was really great! Oh, oh, oh! Cy the Cardinal, the mascot of Iowa State University came to see us! Let me tell you something about Iowa: Almost everybody I know is Iowa fan, but I am Iowa State fan. Ames is the college town of Iowa State University. I was there almost 8 months ago to see the game Iowa State vs. Iowa and that's what I wrote about in my 1 MONTH post (*big sigh* such a long time ago *big sigh*). So yeah, as a Cyclone fan, that was like meeting a celebrity for me!
On the last day of our meeting we had to listen to a bunch of speakers and do smalltalk with Rotarians and then we had dinner and listened to another speaker. We got to leave at about 1:30. After we left the dining hall, we all said goodbye and took pictures, because it was the last time that we saw some of the people, which was really heartbreaking :'(

So that's it for today guys! Sorry that it was so long, but I had a lot to tell you! See you next time!

This was in Kate's car and we couldn't fit the board in the trunk so I had to sit in the backseat with it and could barely see anything. Thanks to you guys

Our Austria board! You can't see it very well, but I drew Austria on there with all its states and the states' capitals and then Kate and I also put pictures and a little information on there, including a sticker that says "No kangaroos in Austria" that's right there over the state Vorarlberg!

The squat :-*

Mexicans be like...

I really like this picture and I don't know why...

Ignore my ugly smile, but I was just happy that I met my own personal celebrity *-*

Cy the Cardinal with a bunch of foreigners!

Little flashback to the Iowa State vs. Iowa game in September :)

The Italian in bowtie :)

Marta is going home in like two weeks and I can't believe it, because it feels like we just met yesterday. I try to remember that it's just a "see you later" and not a "goodbye". I already put "Visit Marta in Italy" on my bucket list.

District 6000 <3