On Wednesday I left to go to the orientation in New York and said goodbye to my parents and sister. It was weird just leaving them there while I went through security because once I got to my gate, I was all alone and quite frankly, didn't know what to do with myself. I didn't have to wait for long to board the plane, and the flight to New York was only a bit over an hour, so it was all fine and dandy. Upon my arrival in New York, I got my bag from the baggage claim but had to find where the AFS people were waiting for us. After asking a few people and wandering around aimlessly, I found them! We waited for the other AFSers at the airport for about 2 hours or so, and then we took a shuttle to our hotel. Let me tell you, if you ever take a taxi in New York, BE PREPARED. Our driver got lost a few times, and we were all so carsick after spending an hour in the shuttle with his reckless driving (it is New York after all). Anyhow, the orientation was nothing special, although I did get to get a lot of cool people there.
Alas, our flight left on Thursday night, and the people going to Hungary and Belgium were on the same flight. I was really worried because we took Swiss Air, and I had heard that they have really strict baggage allowances, but I got on with my trumpet and my HUGE backpack with no problem. Alas, there was not much legroom and I did not get a wink of sleep on the plane, but that's kinda expected. We then took a short flight from Zurich to Brussels, and waited some more and lugged our luggage around and all that jazz, and then took an hour bus ride to the orientation sight.
The orientation was Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, and we basically just went over a lot of important information and participated in various activities each day. I also met some cool people there, but I will not elaborate any more because this blog post is already very long.
I met my host family (finally!) and we took about a two hour car ride to our home. On Monday my host parents took me to my school, to get my identity card, and a bunch of other places. On Tuesday I went to the Belgian equivalent of a zoo, but my host parents failed to tell me that it is two hours away from our house. Alas, I got car sick on the way there, and didn't feel very good the whole day. Later on, we were waiting to go to this bird exhibit show, and I got all dizzy, and I communicated enough in french for my host parents to understand that I didn't feel well. Basically, I blacked out but was still conscious while my host mom brought me to a bench. Apparently all the Belgians were looking at me like I was completely crazy. YAY AMERICA. Tuesday was not my day.
That little spectacle really made me miss home, especially my parents. When I don't feel well, I like to lay in my bed and be coddled and comfortable and to SPEAK ENGLISH. AFS tells the students that there is usually a "honeymoon phase" at the beginning where you think that everything is awesome, perfect, cool, etc. but to be honest, I haven't experienced this. My host family is very nice, but it is a really big change. At home, I have a sister close to my age (16 years old) and here I have a 3 (almost 4 year old brother). I guess I kinda forget what being a little kid is like...He wakes up around 7 in the morning, in in my house, I can hear everything. It's quite the adjustment, but I'm sure I'll get used to it.
The last few days I've had this AFS thing everyday where we go to museums in the morning, and then after we learn french. I'm in the higher level group, but to be honest, the classes aren't very helpful because I am a bit more advanced than most people in my class. Still, the teacher speaks only in french so it is still helpful in that respect.
I can't really think of a blog title using a song title for this post because it is such a mix of everything that's happened, but I'll post a song from a band I've been listening to a lot since I arrived.
A la prochaine,
Catherine
