Sunday, April 24, 2011

Easter away from home

Had a lovely lunch with Glenda's family
Today was Easter day, it was raining most of the time.. not surprised. I had spent my friday making hot cross buns with Glenda and her family, she's from New Zealand. It was so nice to hang out with her for a bit, she totally understands the cultral differences i'm experiencing! I'm by no means much of a baker so i was sure very proud of myslef having made hot cross buns.. obviously with assistance, it was a New Zealand recipe book and we don't use the same measurements as Americans so i was completely confused how to measure any of the ingredients because you have to then go ahead and convert it all! Glenda showed me the link to the New Zealand Anthem sung for the Christchurch earthquake, just thought i'd mention it here.. has to be the best version i've heard of our anthem :) http://www.zmonline.com/listenlive/zmaudioplayer.asp?recnumber=1183

It's nice to know i'm not the only person who can't work out the US coins, pennies, nickles, dimes.. yeah, i find it awfully confusing!! It's taken Glenda a while to work it out

You're never too old to go on Easter egg hunts!!
Went to Church this morning with Sheila and Ron, i've been going to a Protestant Church lately, i'm really not use to this kind of preaching but it's where Sheila's been brought up and i'm happy to go with her. I like the music and the laid back rules. Sheila put on a huge Easter lunch/dinner, ham loaf.. with the hot cross buns i made with Glenda and some other interesting Pennsylvanian dutch food. Sheila organised a easter egg hunt outside.. good fun! Can't believe i had easter in america, i was sad i wasn't with my family doing the whole traditional lunch thing in Waikanae but at least they called me this afternoon, i forget they're a day and a half ahead of america.. Easter has already been and gone long ago for them.

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Spring break

This week is spring break, so no school while we all enjoy a well deserved Easter holiday. The weather is lovely.. rain, wind and more rain. I've missed this over cast foggy weather :)
Spring break is just a week long unlike back home where I'd be having two long weeks away from school. I don't really mind that it's only a one week off school since i'm actually really liking Cardinal high school, i know that there won't really be many people who could agree with me on this.. most people think the school is too "small", "boring", "gay" with "too many unnecessary rules".. actually. the last one i'll agree on because it is fairly true. Why can't we wonder the hallway during lunch break? why can only 2 people at a time leave to use the restroom at lunch (the time when everyone wants to go)? why are their rules on what you can wear if it's mufti clothes every single day? well i guess this one answers itself.. the school doesn't want people looking slutty if they can help it, why can't we pass that big rock outside? (the boundary of how far we can go at lunch) oh and lastly, why do we need a pass to leave the classroom to go anywhere??  i suppose this is how they do things around here..
So back to spring break.. it's Easter on Sunday, looking forward to spending the day with my American family :) I love it how everyone decorates their homes with all this cute Easter stuff, literally see plastic Easter eggs hanging from tree branches and huge Easter bunny toys in everyones front yards, even signs just sitting on peoples main doors, it reminds me of what it was like around valentines, they all just decorate for the "next big thing"! Saw the movie 'prada than nada', cute movie (almost like me and Julia's personalities!)
This guy >>

um.. prom date :P haha noo, just happened to find him when we were going to maccas at 12am, the excuse for getting a photo with him.. "this is amanda, she's from new zealand.. um can we get a photo of her with you? she likes your hair" hahaha!!!! and yeah.. he was actually pretty cool with that :D alright awesome, the new boyfran as they've all been joking.. his name is Fredrick aha! (we've named him)

I never want to change so much that people can't recognize me.

It occurred to me while sending my friend Sian hopefully a cheerful and inspiring email.. just how much i've really changed. I found this quote, by Taylor Swift obviously haha
"I never want to change so much that people can't recognize me"
I know for a fact that i'm not the same person i was when i was living in New Zealand. I actually wake up and get up at 6am when my alarm goes off (it helps that i'm waking up to the sound of a guitar strumming.. rather than the sound of an old telephone, thank goodness for all the different sound affects on those amazing ipod touches!!), doing homework.. haha well most of the time at least :P I'm looking forward to the next few months from now, sounds like there's a couple of pretty exciting plans
<< Thank you skype!! i can still see strange people like this every so often :D

Thursday, April 7, 2011

Eat. Pray. Love.

I watched the 'Eat Pray Love' movie. I guess it was alright haha
Maybe it was because i could somehow relate to it that i was able to call it more than an 'okay' movie

"In the end, I've come to believe in something I call 'The Physics of the Quest'. A force in nature governed by laws as real as the laws of gravity. The rule of Quest Physics goes something like this :  If you're brave enough to leave behind everything familiar and comforting, which can be anything from your house to bitter, old resentments, and set out on a truth-seeking journey, either externally or internally, and if you are truly willing to regard everything that happens to you on that journey as a clue and if you accept everyone you meet along the way as a teacher and if you are prepared, most of all, to face and forgive some very difficult realities about yourself, then the truth will not be withheld from you."

Ohh i don't even know. I just liked that part of the movie the most. THE ENDING quote xD

This weekend I went into Warren (where my host Mom's boyfriend lives) Saw 'Battle of Los Angeles' at the movie theater. Um woahhh.. their theaters are so different from the ones i've gone to in NZ. I remember watching an episode on 'friends' (heck, like ages and ages ago!!) but they were all at the movies, sitting down in a really small-ish room (well smaller than the ones in NZ i suppose) with their popcorn and drinks.. it was JUST LIKE THAT!!

Prom is May 7th - exactly a week before my birthday!! I'm 'possibly' going to it, will just have to wait and see how things work out i guess. Had a very very detailed conversation with my mum back home over the phone. I guess some really important questions came out of it that i really wasn't sure how to answer. Do i still want to stay here for a year? am i getting the most out of this experience? is it worth being away from home for so long.. and blah blah blah. I guess i never imagined having the opportunity to just leave if i didn't feel it was working out. But to be completely honest. I just don't think i could leave America just less than half way through it all. I have already told my friends, family and even myself that i would come to America, complete the year, then come back home. But then you have to decide what's more important for yourself. I know for me, most important things are family and friends. It was never money or a nice house or any of that type of thing. But i really feel that i'm still in that process of making close friendships with everybody here. My host family are pretty much just family, the people i'm meeting at school i'm definitely considering them as my friends.
When things get tough you can't just run away from it all, you've got to motivate yourself to keep on keeping on and so that's what i'll do.. finish what i started!

I feel so 'out of shape' right now, i mean i know i'm not fat but it's just that i'm not used to not having any kind of daily exercise. I don't walk places anymore.. we drive!

"Eat. Pray. Love"
I think that's a good way to be :)

Friday, April 1, 2011

Oh my gosh, it's april already!!

I have no idea if i should be feeling happy or depressed that it's april already. i guess i'm just really surprised how quick the months are going.. i've met such lovely lifelong friends!! i hate the thought of one day leaving them to possibly never returning or seeing them again. The reality of how long a year in another country really is has definitely hit me. The end of this trip feels like such a long way away when i think of all the plans i've got sorted for this year while i'm here. I honestly don't think i'm missing out on too much back home, just maybe the school stuff they've got going on is the only major part missing. I think knowing that i could have easily been doing those 2011 year 13 leadership school things is probably the hardest, saddest bit to it all but i know that i'm learning way more educational stuff by not doing my NZ senior year, instead doing it very backwards in America!!. The homesickness is not what i expected, it's probably easier to deal with than what i had originally assumed. i mean, it is really hard being so far away from those 'special people' in New Zealand but i have accepted the distance we have. I've realised that in actual fact.. my life didn't suck all that much back home.. i was always well off.

I've learnt so much in my American studies class, very proud of how well i'm doing just considering how little i knew about the WW1 &WW2 stuff. I almost regret not having taken any history at my old school, because i know that i would have had a much better understanding coming into this if i had. i wrote an english paper on the negatives and positives of student exchange programs. i felt so informed already about it so that it became an easy paper to write!! 150 note cards later.. and i was done. I love my art class, even made a mixed media collage that my teacher ended up entering in the Middlefield, Ohio art show this weekend, i was surprised that the teacher had thought it was just that great to put it in with all the other awesome art work!

It's officially spring.. or so they say -_-
it's actually just snowed again, no surprise really.. it's on and off all the time (i like it <3) haha