Made Dinner for my Host Family

Last night I made dinner for my host family, my host brothers girlfriend is a vegetarian and so is my friend, so I made a vegetarian Lasagne and a Pavlova for desert! It turned out okay, but I forgot to put the Spinach in the lasagne, so I put it on top and it kind of burnt... But it was good on the inside! The Pavlova worked out good, but nothing like my Nanna makes it in Australia. This weekend I have got a Rotary Conference in my City with another District in Lille, and then I will go to the beach on Sunday with my Rotary District. Then on Thursday we will go to Parc Asterix (a huge theme park in Paris), it will be really sad because it is the last rotary activity where we will be all together before everyone starts leaving. All of the exchange students from the northern hemisphere leave around June/July, but then there will be new ones here in August!

 

What is exchange?

Exchange is change. 
Rapid, brutal, beautiful, hurtful, colourful, amazing, unexpected, overwhelming and most of all constant change. Change in lifestyle, country, language, friends, parents, houses, school, simply everything. 

Exchange is realizing that everything they told you beforehand is wrong, but also right in a way. 

Exchange is going from thinking you know who you are, to having no idea who you are anymore to being someone new. But not entirely new. You are still the person you were before but you jumped into that ice cold lake. You know how it feels like to be on your own. Away from home, with no one you really know. And you find out that you can actually do it.

Exchange is learning to trust. Trust people, who, at first, are only names on a piece of paper, trust that they want the best for you, that they care. Trust, that you have the strength to endure a year on your own, endure a year of being apart from everything that mattered to you before. Trust that you will have friends. Trust that everything’s going to be alright. And it is seeing this trust being justified. 

Exchange is thinking. All the time. About everything. Thinking about those strange costumes, the strange food, the strange language. About why you’re here and not back home. About how it’s going to be like once you come back home. How that girl is going to react when you see her again. About who’s hanging out where this weekend. At first who’s inviting you at all. And in the end where you’re supposed to go, when you’re invited to ten different things. About how everybody at home is doing. About how stupid this whole time-zone thing is. Not only because of home, but also because the tv ads for shows keep confusing you. 
Thinking about what’s right and what’s wrong. About how stupid or rude you just were to someone without meaning to be. About the point of all this. About the sense of life. About who you want to be, what you want to do. And about when that English essay is due, even though you’re marks don’t count. About whether you should go home after school, or hang out at someone’s place until midnight. Someone you didn’t even know a few months ago. And about what the hell that guy just said.

Exchange is people. Those incredibly strange people, who look at you like you’re an alien. Those people who are too afraid to talk to you. And those people who actually talk to you. Those people who know your name, even though you have never met them. Those people, who tell you who to stay away from. Those people who talk about you behind your back, those people who make fun of your country. All those people, who aren’t worth your giving a damn. Those people you ignore.
And those people who invite you to their homes. Who keep you sane. Who become your friends. 

Exchange is music. New music, weird music, cool music, music you will remember all your life as the soundtrack of your exchange. Music that will make you cry because all those lyrics express exactly how you feel, so far away. Music that will make you feel like you could take on the whole world. And it is music you make. With the most amazing musicians you’ve ever met. And it is site reading a thousand pages just to be part of the school band. 

Exchange is uncomfortable. It’s feeling out of place, like a fifth wheel. It’s talking to people you don’t like. It’s trying to be nice all the time. It’s bugs.. and bears. It’s cold, freezing cold. It’s homesickness, it’s awkward silence and its feeling guilty because you didn’t talk to someone at home. Or feeling guilty because you missed something because you were talking on Skype.

Exchange is great. It’s feeling the connection between you and your host parents grow. It’s hearing your little host brother asking where his big brother is. It’s knowing in which cupboard the peanut butter is. It’s meeting people from all over the world. It’s having a place to stay in almost every country of the world. It’s getting 5 new families. One of them being a huge group of the most awesome teenagers in the world.
It’s cooking food from your home country and not messing up. It’s seeing beautiful landscapes that you never knew existed.

Exchange is exchange students. The most amazing people in the whole wide world. Those people from everywhere who know exactly how you feel and those people who become your absolute best friends even though you only see most of them 3 or 4 times during your year. The people, who take almost an hour to say their final goodbyes to each other. Those people with the jackets full of pins. All over the world.

Exchange is falling in love. With this amazing, wild, beautiful country. And with your home country. 

Exchange is frustrating. Things you can’t do, things you don’t understand. Things you say, that mean the exact opposite of what you meant to say. Or even worse…

Exchange is understanding. 

Exchange is unbelievable. 

Exchange is not a year in your life. It’s a life in one year.

Exchange is nothing like you expected it to be, and everything you wanted it to be. 

Exchange is the best year of your life so far. Without a doubt. And it’s also the worst. Without a doubt. 

Exchange is something you will never forget, something that will always be a part of you. It is something no one back at home will ever truly understand.

Exchange is growing up, realizing that everybody is the same, no matter where they’re from. That there is great people and douche bags everywhere. And that it only depends on you how good or bad your day is going to be. Or the whole year.
And it is realizing that you can be on your own, that you are an independent person. Finally. And it’s trying to explain that to your parents.

Exchange is dancing in the rain for no reason, crying without a reason, laughing at the same time. It’s a turmoil of every emotion possible.

Exchange is everything. And exchange is something you can’t understand unless you’ve been through it.

Summer is here

I haven't been doing much lately, just going to school and enjoying the awesome weather! Today it is 27 degrees, and all this week it has been over 20. Everything is so much better with the sun! Everyone is so happy and everyone is out on the streets. I have recently changed classes at school, I changed from the Science classes to the Literature classes. I now have a lot more French, which is great! In about 2 and a half weeks it will be summer holidays, because I don't have to do the BAC (French Exams) I start summer holidays earlier. The first week of summer I will be going to Paris to go to Parc Asterix with my Rotary district, it will be the last time that all the exchange students are together. After that all the oldies (from all the countries that start school in September) will return back to their hometowns! It is going to be so sad saying goodbye to everyone! But at the same time it will be good to spend time with my French friends and then meet the new exchange students who will arrive in September. I have been doing a lot of exercise now that the weather is better, I try to do something each day (either run or swim). Yesterday I went bike riding with my next door neighbours, who have a son the same age as me! It was fun, then we went and played soccer against some of his friends in a park. I have been living in parks lately, just going to a park with friends after school and relaxing... It is the best feeling. I have had my first taste of French summer this week and I love it. It doesn't get dark until about 10 30 at night which is so awesome! Last night there was a free concert on in the city, so me and my friends went to it, it was hard to believe it was so late but still light. Time is France is going way too fast! It's been over 4 months now, my parents will be arriving in September, so soon! I have a lot to look forward to in the summer, including going to Italy with my host family for 2 weeks! I really love my host family, I feel so welcome here and everything is going really well!

London/Ireland

Sorry I haven't blogged in a while, I have been away for 10 days and was very busy! First I took the underground train system from Lille to London, it took about one hour and twenty minutes, it was really fast actually. I then met up with my old host family from Canada (previous 3 months exchange I did), it was so good to see them! I missed them so much. In London we did all the touristy things, which was really good because it was my first time in London. The weather was okay, one day it was over 20 but i rained a lot one of the days too. On the second night we went to Phantom of the Opera on broadway, which was so awesome. We visited heaps of castles and went to a lot of old buildings. After 5 days in London we continued on with our travels, we took the plane from Heathrow Airport to Dublin! Dublin was so cool, it was a lot more relaxed then London, I really liked London but it was always really busy, and the people were so nice in Dublin. We took two day trips around Ireland, one went to North Ireland (Belfast) and the other went to the West of Ireland (Galway). The Galway bus trip was my favourite, we got to stop at the Cliffs of Moher which was probably the most amazing natural thing I have ever seen. They are huge cliffs looking over the Atlantic Ocean. In Belfast I got to go to the place where Titanic was made and first hit the sea, it was really cool. It was then time for home! It went so fast, but the last day of travelling was going to be a long one... We took the bus from our Hotel to the airport (40 minutes), then we took a plane from Dublin to London (1 hour 10), then we took a train from Heathrow airport to central London (one hour), then we took the train from London to Lille! And finally my host mum was there to pick me and Shalen (Canadian host sister) up, the rest of the family flew back to Canada, but Shalen came back to Lille for 3 days to see another friend who lived here and so I could show her a bit around Lille. Now to holidays are over and it's back to school until the summer break. 

ANZAC Day

 So yesterday was ANZAC day in France, I celebrated by going to a memorial in Belgium. I stayed at a friends house the night before and then we got picked up by a Rotarian at 4 am. It was my first time going to Belgium, so it was pretty cool. We were in the Dutch region of Belgium, but pretty much everyone there spoke English because most of them were Australians. The first dawn service started at 5:30 and went for about an hour. It was really good, there were heaps of people gathered at one of the cemeteries where many unnamed Australians and New Zealanders were buried. It was so so so cold, but I managed. After the first dawn service we took a bus back to get breakfast with the whole group (people from all over Australia and New Zealand). We met Brendan Nelson, who is now the Australian ambassador for Belgium, he was really nice. After breakfast we had another dawn service at Flanders Fields, which was also really good, but also really cold. We then headed back for France and had lunch along the way. When we got home I had a few friends over and one of my friends bought Anzac biscuits with them and they were amazing!

La langue française

I thought I would do a blog about how my French is coming a long.. 
I made a lot of progress in my French after the winter holidays (about my sixth week in France), I came back from holidays and everyone at school was telling me my French had improved a lot. Since then it has gotten better too, I can now hold a normal conversation with people and understand pretty much everything. I can now watch television in French and understand what they are saying too, which is really cool and makes everything a lot easier. I still have a lot to learn, especially with my pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary in general. Some days I wake up with great French, and others it is terrible, it is really weird. Sometimes I feel like my French is good then other times I feel like I have gotten no where. French can be really hard and confusing, and sometimes it feels like I will never completely understand everything but it is getting a lot easier now. Here is an example of how the French language is different to English.
 A little French lesson for you...
"S'il vous plaît" means "Please"

(Like we do in English Do + not= Don't)
Si + il  = S'il 
Si: if
il: he, it (in this case "it", normally used as he)

"Vous plaît":
In french Direct object and Verb are the inverse to english.
Ex:  
English: I love you  
French : Je t'aime (I you love) (see how it's switched?) 
** if french was the same way as english it would be: Je Aime te or J'aime toi

SO!
Vous=Formal way of saying you for an adult or plural for a group of people. (tu = you, for friends and family)
Plait= From the verb phrase "Faire Plaisir": to please, conjugated for "il"

Vous plaît: Pleases you 

S'il Vous Plaît: If it pleases you. = Please

Haircut gone wrong

Today I didn't have school because my class had exams which I don't have to do, so I thought I would finally go get my first haircut in France (I had been holding it off for so long because I was scared). When I got there I explained to the lady what I wanted, short on the sides, but still a little long on top and fringe (but I wanted it to blend in, not so you could see the different lengths, but I didn't know how to say blend in French). So I showed her a photo of how I wanted it, which was how I had it in Australia. It started off fine, and looked okay from the front. Then she started to style it, and blow dried it all my hair pushed back and then gelled it. When I got out of the hair dressers, some French guy yelled out "cool hair cut man!" (in French). I took a photo of the back of my hair and noticed that it was like a bowl had been stuck on my head and she had cut around it. It looks so bad, it is actually really funny, it looks horrible but I can't help but laugh. Also, because my hair hasn't seen sun in a long time, it looks really red.