First Day- My Host Family

Celia (Host Grandmother), Luiza (Host Sister), ME, Cris (Host mom), Kevin (Host Cousin)














Kevin (Host Cousin), Luiza (Host Sister), Me, Angelica (2nd Host Sister)

First Conference

Last weekend was the first Inbound Conference. It took about six hours to get there. On Friday we went to Volta Redonda, RJ, which is one hour away, where Luiza, Cris and I had lunch and got a few things for Luiza's exchange then we went to the Chairman, Renato's house. Where we met the van that took us to Jambeiro, SP. In Volta Redonda we picked up two other exchange students and one rotarian. There was a girl names Mara (Romania) and another girl named Constanzze (Germany). The conference was at a camp that was owned by GM (General Motors) which is where Alcione, the inbound coordinator, worked. We stayed in small cabins that basically had a double bed in the upstairs loft thing and then small chairs that pulled out into beds. It was only us and another exchange student Rennée (USA) as well as Alcione who stayed the night on Friday, the rest came Saturday morning because they were all coming from São Paulo. At the camp it was so cold! It didn't help that the cabins had no heat and no hot water!

The morning basically started out with orientation presentations about the rules and everything. Then in the afternoon the District Governor was there and we all introduced ourselves in Portuguese. We also had a Portuguese lesson. Then later that night we had a Traditional Brasilian Party called Festa Junina. Everyone dressed up in these traditional dresses and had to dance a whole bunch of traditional dances.

There were four of us in our cabin, there was Alexandra (Germany), Joelle (USA), Mara (Romania) and me. The rest of the cabins, except for the boys, had five. I stay "instead of the boys" because out of the 20 inbounds at the conference (3 hadn't arrived in Brasil yet) there were 3 boys, two from Mexico and one more from Thailand. Out of the three that weren't in Brasil yet there was another boy coming from Mexico and thats it. There is also another girl coming from India, making her the only one, and another girl from Germany, making 6 German girls in our district.

Then on Sunday was when we gave our Self presentations in Portuguese. We also had a guy from Belo Tours come and talk to us about the tours we can take while in Brasil.

From the weekend they told us that at the end of the weekend whoever had the cleanest cabin would win a prize and our cabin won, it was only GM stuff but still.

Today (August 25) I went to the Federal Police, and registered and all that. Everything went well, and I didn't have to go to school!

I will write again if anything else interesting happens.

Tchau!
Sarah

First Two Weeks in Brasil

It's hard to believe that I have been here two week. It feels like so much longer. My family is very nice and I am slowly, and I mean slowly, starting to understand what they say. When I arrived i was greeted by my host mom (Cristina), dad (Marcus), sister (Luiza) and second host sister (Angelica). It was about an hour and a half drive back where we stopped in at my counselors house so that I could meet him. Then when I got home my host grandmother (Celia) and cousin (Kevin) were waiting for me. While we were having lunch our neighbors (Gustavo and Scarlett) came over. After that I went to a Rotary party where I presented the president with my club banner and was wonderfully greeted. I have finish my two weeks of school; it is going very well, the people are very nice. It's the first time in a while I have looked forward to going to school, haha. My favourite class was definitly English but I could also understand Math quite well. Every day I have to get up at 5:15am to get to the van in Mendes by 6am and get to Barra do Pirai by 7am. For the first week Luiza had exams in the morning so I had been going to Angelica's, who lives right down the road, to sleep more. Angelica has the cutest sister Pollyana. No one in Angelica's family speaks English, which means that I have to learn portuguese in four months, but Angelica does her best to translate. During the week my host father works 5 hours away so it was just Kevin, Luiza, Cristina and I. Both my host parents are police officers and Cristina works in Mendes. I have tried many foods and they are all very good and very different. As well Kevin, Luiza and Gustavo tried Peanut Butter on Toast and didn't like it. Last Sunday Kevin went home, he had to go back to school on Monday; they had just finished their Winter Holidays. Some schools had to postpone school due to H1N1 risks. However it is not as big of a problem in my area but they are still taking procaution. My school was supposed to start on the 3rd of August but was postponed to the 10th.
School starts at 7:30 and goes to 12:40 except on Monday where I have a break until 2:30 and then from 2:30 til 5:30 I have more classes. I have 6 classes a day (Monday- 8) but most days I only have 3 teachers. Because each class has 2 parts so there is for example Biology I and II, and the teacher can choose which one they want to teach. To better explain here is my schedule:

Monday morning
Chemistry
Chemistry
Biology
--20 minute Break--
Biology
Physics
Physics
------
Monday Afternoon
Biology
Biology
Physics
Physics

Tuesday
English
English
Geography
-----
Geography
Redação (kind of like writers craft)
Portuguese

Wednesday
Portuguese
Portuguese
Literature
-----
Literature
Math
Math

Thursday
Geography
Math
Chemistry
----
Chemistry
History
History

Friday
History
History
Math----
Math
Sociology

I don't know if you understand it or not, I don't really understand either. Each class is 50 minutes long.
On Mondays there is Basketball and I was supposed to play last Monday but it was starting late and my host mom and dad were already there to pick me up, so I didn't get a chance to play, that doesn't really bother me because I am terrible at basketball anyways. But Luiza had a dentist appointment right after school so I went out to dinner with some of my class mates before Basketball was supposed to start. There is also an indoor soccer (futebol) team on Fridays that I can join.
On Sunday I attended my first Interact meeting. I didn't really understand much but it was interesting anyway. As well as Last night I attended a Rotary club meeting in Barra do Pírai where I met the district Governor and he gave Luiza and I both District pins. Luiza leaves in the beginning of September to go to Germany for her Rotary exchange. I have only known her for two weeks but it feels like I have known her forever. We get along really well and I am really going to miss her when she leaves.
We didn't get home from the meeting until about 11:30pm so Cristina said we didn't have to go to school since it meant getting up at 5am. So Luiza stayed home and I decided to go to school anyways making it the first time I went to school alone. I am proud to say that nothing went wrong!
However tomorrow I am not going to school because I am going to my first conference in Jambeiro, SP. So I at least get to sleep in a little!
I will let you know when I return how it went.

Tchau,
Sarah

ps. since I just started this blog I just combined and changed the emails that I had already sent so if there are mistakes than sorry.