Eurotour is Coming!

Well I have less than 3 months left here in my wonderful Switzerland. Time is going to go by so fast, I can’t even comprehend it. I am now living with my third host family, and they are wonderful! My house has an amazing view of the hills surrounding Bern, and I can’t wait to see the sunsets from my backyard. I’m currently on Spring Break right now, and I start my Eurotour in 5 days! We’re going to have really nice weather in Paris (70 F!!!) and hopefully everywhere else! We’re going to do so many cool things, such as visiting the Louvre, visiting Anne Frank’s house, going up the Eiffel Tower, seeing the Berlin Wall, going to a thermal bath house in Budapest, visiting castles in Prague, gondola rides in Venice, seeing the caves in Postojna, visiting the Coloseum and Vatican in Rome, and so much more! I'm so excited to be able to go on this trip, since this is the first year in a long time that Swiss Rotary has allowed us to do the Eurotour. I'll be taking lots of pictures and also some videos that I will post on youtube after I get back! 

7 Month Update

Well it's official: I have been in Switzerland for more than 7 months. I have 3 and a half months left. It's so crazy how fast time flies. It feels like just yesterday when I was leaving San Francisco, ready to start this being adventure. I've experienced so many things people only dream of experiencing, and I still have many more amazing memories to make. I will be changing host families in a couple of weeks, and it's an understatement to say I will miss my second host family. They have been so amazing to me, making me feel like their actual daughter/granddaughter/sister. When my old counselor from back in California told me that I was going to bond a lot with my host grandmother(s) I didn't know what to expect really. I now know what she meant. My Oma is one of the most amazing people I've ever met and I've grown so close to her over the time that I've been here. Another person I have grown really close to this year is my host sister Joelle. Luckily, she'll be coming to Northern California for her exchange year, more specifically, district 5130 which is my sponsoring district! Hopefully she'll be living in a town close to me, if she's not in Windsor. The Eurotour is in less than a month and I couldn't be more excited!!!! 11 countries, 13 cities, 21 days. It's most definitely a dream come true.  I just hope we have nice weather! Last Saturday I took my B1 German proficiency test, and I'm pretty confident that I passed! It's weird to think that just a few months ago I only spoke half of what I can speak now. In just 7 months I speak German at the level of a German 4 class back in the Sates. Fasnacht season has come and gone, and I can say it was so amazing to experience. I only went to Bern Fasnacht but I still had an amazing time with my friends and soaking up swiss culture. Since Fasnacht is like Mardi Gras times Halloween, everyone gets dressed up, so naturally I put on my In 'N Out t-shirt, painted football stripes on my face and went as an American. A couple weeks ago I was also able to meet up with one of my mom's oldest friends and spend the day with her! Since I hadn't really seen much of Zürich yet (and that's where she lives), we spent the day touring around Zürich and I got to see lots of cool things, such as a building made of storage containers stacked on top of each other, the Viadukts shopping strip, and lots of more really cool things! I also got to go see Milky Chance play live in Zürich with a couple of my friends. He was so amazing, and I'm so glad I was able to go see one of my favorite artists live. The opening band Kafka Tamura were really good also, and are paling again in Zürich so maybe I'll get to go see them again. My newbies have been here for almost two months now, but it feels like longer. Soon, I'll be the oldie that's leaving and they'll be the newbies who are saying goodbye, but let's not think about that right now. I still have 3 and a half months left and I plan on making the most of them!

 Bern Fasnacht!

 Milky Chance!!!

 With Kafka Tamura 

 Viadukts - Zürich

 Shipping Container Building

 View from Cloud in Zürich

B1 Test Bound (7:00 am!!!)

Blockwoche in Emmental

This past week my school had the second Blockwoche (a project week) of the year, and I was able to explore more Swiss culture. We studies the Emmental region of Bern, which is close to the Bern Oberland. It consists of lots of farmland, with lots of cows and pastures. The towns are pretty small, but very beautiful, as is the scenery. Throughout the week I was able to experience lots of typical swiss things. On Monday we went to a family owned bakery and made chocolate bunnies and got a tour around the factory. One thing I was absolutely amazed by was how big their mixers were! They were so huge, that I could probably fit in one of the bowls if I sat down. On Tuesday we visited the Flyer bike company's factory and got a tour around that as well. Flyer bikes are special because they have a motor in them that helps you bike up large hills, such as the Swiss Alps. They can go up to 30 Kilometers per hour (I think). After that we had a typical swiss lunch, soup, salad and either Rösti or Swiss Macaroni. We then went and learned how to do Schwingen, which is Swiss-style sawdust wrestling. It was really fun! I even won a couple of times! On Wednesday we got to try a bunch of different homemade cheeses. We even got to make our own cheese, which we will get in a couple of months! We also saw typical swiss dancers dancing in the old swiss dresses. On Thursday we learned how to yodel and then we went to a gold/silversmith's workshop and saw how they make typical swiss jewelry. On Friday we had Rösti for breakfast in the school cafeteria (which is so much better than american cafeterias) and then we were done! The whole week was super fun and I learned a lot more about Swiss culture. I'm so happy I had this opportunity, because if it weren't for this week I would have not experienced a lot of these things! Another exciting thing that happened during this week is that I have begun to understand Swiss Bern German when it's spoken! I have been able to read and understand it for a while now, but being able to understand when it's spoken is the icing on the proverbial cake!

The Next Half Of My Year

So I'm in the mood to blog right now, so here's a layout of what the rest of my year is going to look like.
Just a couple of days ago we welcomed out Newbies to Switzerland so this month I'm probably going to be showing my Newbies around Bern and teaching hem how to use the trams and trains.
In February a lot is going on. I have a Blockwoche coming up where I will be traveling to the Emmental Region of Switzi and learning all about Swiss culture for an entire week. After that i have Sportsferien, which I will be spending up in Flims with my first host family. The Berner Fasnacht is near the end of the month and I'm so excited for it! I definitely want to go to more than just one so I'm looking at going to the Basel Fasnacht as well, because it's the most famous one here in Switzi. Also we have another Rotex/Rotary weekend in Engelberg - this will be the first one with the Newbies! I am also going to a Milky Chance concert with a couple of other exchange students and I'm really looking forward to it!
***In March I am hoping to be able to go to Spain to visit Zephyr (my best friend who is also on exchange this year in Spain) for about 5 days.
In April spring vacation starts and I will be spending it in Germany with my first host family at a family reunion! That is for the first week of April and then I come back and go straight to my 3 week Eurotour! This is the first year in quite a while that Swiss Rotary has allowed us to do the Eurotour and all of the exchangers are super excited for it. I will be traveling all around Europe; from Paris --> Amsterdam --> Brussels --> Berlin --> Budapest --> Prague --> Bratislava --> Vienna --> Postojna --> Venice --> Rome --> The Vatican City --> Milan. After I come back from my Eurotour I will be switching host families and going to live in Stettlen.
In May is mainly just school and traveling around some more. Swimming in the Aare and hanging out with friends on the weekend. I will also check out the BEA Horse Exhibition, which is just like a Fair with livestock and an amusement park and little booths to shop at. Basically May is going to be a really relaxed month for me.
June will be my last month here, and it is also the last month of school. I also plan to spend the weekends chilling in Bern or exploring more of Switzerland. I'm planning on getting together a bunch of Swiss friends and exchange students to float down the Aare with me, sort of as a going away thing.
And that's about it for the rest of my exchange! Of course more things will come up and I'll be doing a lot more, but for now that's what's planned!

***This is very tentative and I'm still in the process of getting Rotary approval. Fingers crossed though!

Weihnachten Ferien in Davos/Five Month Update

So over Christmas (Weihnachten) break I spent the whole two weeks up in the village of Davos with my host family. It was so amazing! At first we had barely any snow because it has been a pretty mild winter (for Switzerland at least. I'm freezing!), but on my birthday I woke up to a complete winter wonderland, which was one of the best birthday presents ever. The first couple of days were spent chilling out at the apartment and sitting on the balcony enjoying the beauty of the Swiss Alps and also exploring the town. While we were there, the Spengler Cup Davos was happening, and I was able to go see one of the hockey games with my host dad and brother. We saw the local Davos team play the Croatian team and it was super fun and the perfect atmosphere to see my first live hockey game in. Christmas time was really fun, my host grandparents and my host uncle's family were with us in Davos so we all had a nice Christmas dinner together. My host dad made some beef stroganoff, which was super delicious. We then opened presents (because here in Switzerland they open presents on the night of the 24th). Overall, I had a really nice Christmas and I love my host family. My birthday was a couple days after and for that we went sledding in Bergün! It was so much fun, and I definitely want to go back there sometime! New Year's Eve was spent with my host family eating ice cream and watching fireworks and drinking sparkling apple cider. Very quaint, but it was nice. We left the next day to come back to Bern. I have been here long enough that I consider Bern as much of my home that while in Davos I began to feel a bit host sick (homesick, but for your host city) for Bern. If I got host sick from just being away for two weeks, I don't want to imagine what leaving is going to feel like. Right now, that sense of helplessness to not be able to stop time is creeping up on me, with me being here for five months already. My oldies have left and on Sunday all my newbies arrive. Being an oldie is both a joy and a sadness. It's a joy because you get to meet a whole new set of amazing people and create even more lifelong friendships.You get to be a sort of older sister or brother to these new exchangers. You know what they are going though when they first get here because you were them once, only a short while ago. It's also a sadness, but there is a joy to this sadness. It marks the halfway point of your exchange and you realize just how fast time has flown by, and you just want to make time stop. You want to live in this moment forever and keep on experiencing the many wonders of your fairly-new home. But setting a time limit for your life in a year makes you appreciate it more and take every opportunity to do or learn something new. I am so excited for what these next 6 months are going to bring me. I get to go on a Eurotour with some of my best friends in the entire world (literally) and visit amazing places and LIVE in EUROPE. Few people get to experience what I am experiencing, so I am extremely grateful to everyone who has made this possible for me. Here's to making the best out of everything.

And now for some pictures!

This was taken at the Zürich Airport when I said goodbye to my Oldie

Updates On Life: 4 months

So this post is just going to be about stuff that I've been doing lately.

I've been playing volleyball since I got here and I've also been playing in games with my team. We're pretty good and my team are all super nice. I'm really happy to be playing because I can keep up my skills while I'm here. School is also going really good, I'm able to understand a lot of what's going on in my classes and talk to my classmates a lot more in German. I've also started a new german course and it is also going really well, as I'm learning a lot and my german is definitely improving. Life in general is amazing. The weather has turned more into winter, and we had the first snowfall in Bern a day ago! It was amazing, I was walking up to the tram stop to go to school and I felt stuff falling on my face, but it wasn't exactly rain, and as soon as I realized it was snow I basically started dancing in pure joy. It was so amazing, even if it only snowed for a couple of hours. I also switched host families about 2 weeks ago. I really love my new host family. They are so amazing and I've been so fortunate to have such wonderful host families so far. Winter vacation is in one week as well and I will be spending Christmas in Davos with my host fam! We'll go sledding and my host mom is going to take me cross country skiing and we're going to go ice skating and I'm so excited! Since it is nearing the holidays I have been a little homesick, but other than that I'm am doing wonderfully. As you know, I went up to Zermatt about 3 weeks ago for a Rotex weekend and it was absolutely amazing. it's crazy how fast this year is gong by and I really don't want it to end. I've fallen completely and undeniably in love with Switzerland. I'll be updating this some more about what I'm doing and stuff like that. And after I get back from Davos pics will go up!

MATTERHORN WEEKEND (aka the best weekend of my life)

So about 2 weeks ago (I know, this is really late) we had our Rotex Matterhorn weekend! It was so amazing and super pretty. Rotary had reserved a whole train car for us so we could all sit together. We took a train from Bern to Visp and then from Visp to Zermatt. The train rides were so much fun because exchange students are awesome, and just generally make everything fun. The day was a perfect day to travel as well, with the sun shining and not a cloud in the sky. When we got to Zermatt, I couldn't believe how beautiful it was. Pictures just don't do it justice. After we got there, we walked for about 15-20 minutes up to the youth hostel where we stayed. We got all settled into our rooms and then we went back into town to go to a museum and have dinner. The museum was really cool, it was all about Zermatt's history and how skiing has evolved over the years. We then went to a little Swiss restaurant where we had fondue for dinner (YUMMMMM). Since there was snow everywhere, we had a huge snowball fight after dinner. Then we went to club that Rotary had rented out for us to have a dance at. We danced for about 2-3 hours and then we made our way back to the restaurant for dessert and to present a song from our home country. Naturally, us Americans did a mash up of Queen's We Will Rock You and Miley Cyrus's Party in the U.S.A. It was a lot of fun. We then headed back to the youth hostel and all stayed up till around 2 am talking and swapping pins and signing flags. We then got up around 7:00 am the next morning and left to go up the Klein Matterhorn at 10:00 am. The gondola ride up there was roughly about 30-45 minutes long but took all of us an hour to get up there. The view was absolutely stunning and it was freezing cold. You couldn't even tell where the mountain ended and where the sky began because everything was so blindingly white. Sadly, after we came down from the Klein Matterhorn, we all grabbed our stuff and headed off to the train station. We all took a train together back to Bern, but from there we all split up. It was honestly one of the best weekends of my life, if not the best and I'm so excited to have a couple more with my fellow newbies, but also so sad at the same time because that was the last time I would see some of the oldies. Overall, everyone had an A-MA-ZING time and it's something I'm sure none of us will ever forget.

I just want to take the time to thank all the oldies. Thank you for being so wonderful. You have taught all of us newbies how to live in the moment and not take anything fro granted this year. You've taught us that if we want to do something, do it. We are family and that will never change no matter how far apart we are. You will be terribly missed. Hoping with all my heart for wonderful things to happen to all of you.