Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Annecy and Easter Vacation!

So, it's that time again when I feel guilty about neglecting this blog and force myself to write something. Enjoy.

It has officailly been eight months and one days since I've arrived in France! Wohoo! The end is coming soon which makes me nervous and anxious but I'll talk about that in another blogpost. School is starting to come to a close and students are starting to get nervous as the French bac is just around the corner. I restarted school this week after a two week Easter vacation. A week before the beginning of my Easter vacations started Rotary held a huge and incredible meeting with all the exchange students in France in the wonderful town of Annecy! Over 450 teenagers, blazers, pins, pure craziness! I missed a day of school on Friday where I met up with my districts bus outside of Montpellier and headed with the twenty or so students in my Rotary district onward to Annecy. I have to say that the people in district 1700 are some of the coolest human beings I've had the pleasure of meeting! They amaze me every time. On the bus strip we discussed regular exchange student stuff (host families, school, etc.) and then were told to work on a presentation for a talent show the next day. I had spent some time working with Julia, a Brazilian exchange student, on this and we had come up with a parody to a french song yet we needed another stanza. No one had any ideas for this. More on this talent show craziness later. We arrived at the hotel type place near a lake in early afternoon and as we unloaded people who knew each other were running like crazy and hugging, insanity. As I commented about how crazy do that is I saw a girl that had been on the same plane ride over to France, I dropped my stuff and ran for a hug. Irony. Rooms were found, roomates chosen, people hugged. Then we were driven off to another hotel/village type thing where we were to meet the other two hundred or so students! Chaos ensued. I had been talking to people with my district as we walked to where the other students were and yelling was done as we discovered bus trip people and BEFs (before exchange friends)! FOOOOTBALLL! We had dinner and there was a dance floor! One of my favorite parts of the night were just hanging out outside of the dance floor talking and meeting new people. It's hard to really describe how good it was to be with this type of people, people who understand. You don't really know what it is they understand but it's something. The next day started with a conference about how the Olympics brings people together, like Rotary. Pins were traded, lunch was had, and off we went on a boat ride. The beauty of Annecy, the lake, and the surrounding mountains was stunning. There was not a cloud in the sky... All the students were herded to a park where they took pictures of 450 foreigners being crazy, waving flags, and yelling in all different languages. People sang their national anthems, yelled about their football teams and were just themselves. For some reason, being surrounded by all of this humanity was calming. Even though we were in a different country in the middle of people from every corner of this earth it felt like we were home. When the Americans (there were so many!) started singing the anthem I joined in the back of the group and a guy actually told me to leave, that I wasn't american! I gladly informed him that I came from the state of Missouri, thank you very much. I then ran and joined the latinos to scream and throw people in the air. I then joined the finnish girls in waving their flags and yelling for their country (seriously, I had no voice left at the end of this weekend, I could barely speak...). We got back into town and headed to a dinner where the talent show was too occur. This is where we had to come up with something quickly. Everyone learned a quick dance and instead of writing another stanza I took out my harmonica and played with the music. When we presented this it went pretty well but the best part was after we finnished this song. A few other people from the district had written a rap about being exchange students! Man, one of the best rap performances I have ever seen up close (and the only). We had a dj and danced after the talent show. The rest of the night was spent going from room to room in the hotel village, visiting people. It was that night I got a haircut by a few girls I had met a few hours earlier. I've got to say it was one of the best haircuts I've ever had! I didn't go to sleep that night, I went to my room in the early morning, cleaned up and fell asleep waiting to for breakfast. I slept through breakfast, was awoken by Rotarians who came to get us and got on the bus. We met once more with the rest of the students and said our goodbyes. It's incredible how much you can miss people you've only met once or twice. It's those type of people that amaze me the most. After that weekend I had a week of exams, not very interesting. Then came vacations! I went off for ten days to visit my family in Mallorca, I hadn't been there since I was 8. They took me to see a little bit of everything which I loved! Mallorca is a beautiful place with it's own language and culture but I find it has way too many tourists (even though I was one). After that I went to Toulouse to spend a few days with a few Rotary friends, we met up and I got back last Saturday. That's it for now, I hope I can write something in a week or so.

Sebastian

having the time of my life!