I'm staying in an apartment in the south of the city, with my host parents, two host brothers (18 and 20), one host sister (22), and host grandma. Every Sunday we go to the dad's relatives' house for family time and twice I've brought another exchange student, my friend Kornelia from Slovakia, which is very nice because we can look bewildered at each other when everyone is talking really fast. My Spanish has improved impressively since I've gotten here, it's still hard to participate in a conversation when everyone is chattering away, but if people are talking to me I'm usually fine. I took Spanish up until AP before I came, which is more than the majority of the other exchange students, but it has still been difficult adjusting from classroom gringo-spanish to native spanish. I don't know how the others are doing it, some came with almost no Spanish at all.
With my host brother (middle, black shirt) and friends
We played a lot of poker, I won
September 9th and 10th all the exchange students in district 4280 (Cali, Medellin, Pasto, Ipiales, and Pereira) met in Pasto for inbound orientation. It was a really fun weekend, it was great to finally meet everyone after having been talking to them for so long (we have a group on facebook.) There are 24 of us in all, from all over the world. There is one other girl from the US, a Morgan from California who's also living in Cali. We stayed with families for two nights, one or two per family. I was placed in a family with a boy from Germany, and we had a great time with our host sister in the limited amount of time we got to spend together. All of us can't wait to get back together, which probably won't be until November when we have a trip to the Amazon with the other districts. There are seven of us in Cali, and we've gotten together a few times since the orientation, and we have plans for everyone to get together at Morgan's house for a camp out next weekend.
Denmark, US, and Brasil
At Laguna de la Cocha in Pasto
Unfortunately we don't all live close enough to be able to see each other regularly
RYE D4280 2011-2012
On a boat ride on the laguna
Team USA
At the airport flying home from Ipiales
School is going really well, I'm in 11th grade (the oldest, there are only 11) at Colegio Berchmans, and I have a uniform. It's not too bad considering, but having never had a uniform before it's still a pain, especially the shoes (penny loafers.) I started a week after I arrived, and it was nice to have a week to adjust and spend with my brother and his friends before having to get up at 5 every day and get home at 4, I'm usually really tired and don't do much week days. All my classmates are really friendly and patient and helpful, which is good because I hardly understand anything the teachers say in my classes, let alone understand the material they're trying to teach. I usually end up falling asleep at some point during the day, which seems to be really common among exchange students. There are two other exchange students at my school, a boy from Mexico that's in my grade and also through Rotary, and a girl from France in 10th grade. Both of them already spoke Spanish fluently before coming, which I view as completely cheating on the exchange part.
The school owns a farm and last Wednesday my class went for a kind of team-building/self-reflection day
There are about 30 kids in my class and 120 in my grade
These girls took me in from the start, I'm so grateful to be surrounded by such kind people
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I'm not entirely sure how this blog thing works but if anyone has any questions post or comment them or if that doesn't exist e-mail me at gracehpetrie@gmail.com
Grace, this is really awesome that you started this!! I look forward to more updates, stories and pictures. Glad you are having a great time!! Love, Amy, Bill, Benjamin and Tyler
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