First Week In Switzerland

It has now been a week since I have arrived in Switzerland. My fist reaction as I saw the country though the window of the airplane was "Wow it's so green". And it is. Everything is green. Green and beautiful and fresh. The expected exhaustion was not as bad as I thought it was going to be, allowing me to go to a swiss music festival my second day here. It was located in Bern, right in the heart of the city. Musicians and performers from all over the world came to be a part of the festival. In typical swiss fashion I have been taking the train and tram everywhere I go; to school, to the city (Bern), to other cities, and it is just amazing. I love how I can just hop on a train and go to Zürich or Interlaken or Geneva (not that I have..... yet haha) My host family is very nice and was very welcoming. I have two host brothers who are 18 and 15. I had a host sister, but she left for New Mexico for her Rotary exchange. I have been at German class (Deutchkurs) for 5 days now as well. I am learning a lot and can communicate with my host family in a combination of english with german words scattered throughout. Each morning I walk about 10 minutes down to the train station to go to my class. The walk is breathtaking, literally. When I come back home I have to walk up about four hills, and this takes 15 minutes. I am so lucky to have this opportunity to live in such a beautiful place. Every day I am in awe of the scenery and the views. The rolling hills and the snow-capped Alps in the background, the flowers lining the windows in every house, the cows with their cute little bells and all the gardens. One thing that surprised me was the abundance and availability of fresh fruit. Each morning consists of granola, yogurt and fruit, which is a breakfast I would expect back in California. The weather is all over the place, with one day being windy and rainy and the next humid and sunny. I absolutely love it. The other day I wandered around Bern with two other girls in my class and we found a sand volleyball tournament happening right in front of the Parliament building!!! Naturally, I had to stay and watch at least 2 matches, and it was a good thing that I did because I was able to see the swiss national men's sand volleyball team play! I had met my "oldie" (an exchange student who has been here since January) there at the game, and after he took me to see the bears and the rose garden. My host sister also showed me around the school I will be going to, Gymnasium Kirchenfeld. The school is beautiful, with 4 levels and an entrance that is a Parthenon-look-alike. I will begin attending school in the beginning of September. I have also found a club to play volleyball at! It is called Volley Muri-Bern and the girls who I am playing with are at the same high level that I am used to. I have since learned how to jump-float serve, and it has gotten very good. Today I went over to another exchange student's house (her name is Amanda and she is from Brasil) and played some fuzball and hung out with a group of other exchange students. The funny thing is that intend of yelling "no" just a couple of times like I would normally do, I yelled "nein!". From the way this week has turned out I am looking forward to the rest of my exchange and everything that will come with it.