day 86, 87,88,89, and 90 (predicted)

Day 86, Sunday
I don't even really remember what I did on Sunday. I got home in the morning sometime and then I just relaxed all day :)
I skyped my parents at like 4 or something, and then I skyped Sophie and went to bed! I'm getting really tired again.

On Monday, I had school just like normal and then I went to Rotary. Just an average day, nothing exciting happened. We talked about milk and cows for an hour and a half at rotary. It made me feel sick almost, hahaha.
On Monday night, Mara and Arlene were both claiming that it was snowing but when I walked outside my house there was not snow falling from the sky so I don't really know if it actually was snowing or not.

But when I woke up on Tuesday morning, there was a little bit of snow on the ground :)

On Tuesday I had school again, average day again. Nothing very exciting is happening this week. And then I went home and made dinner with Minna and Outi.

Today is Wednesday and so far today, I have had 2 classes, English and Math. Both were easy, too easy. I don't have any classes this afternoon because our History teacher is on vacation and here they dont really have substitute teachers so all the kids just go to the computers or sometimes they sit in the classroom and so nothing, but yeah. And I don't have a class after this but I have to stay here and wait for my friends because we are going to Finnish course after school.

Tomorrow is going to be interesting because I technically don't have any classes all day.
Normally I would have History, Spare, lunch, English, Spare but tomorrow we don't have history again so I technically don't have to come to school, but then during Spare there is a presentation from Mara about italy because she was sick when the rest of us made our presentations. During lunch, I have to do a presentation in the middle school (I think the last one, maybe). And then after that, at 12, all the exchange students get to go bowling with some teachers and other students. So we are all going to do that. So technically I am not going to any classes tomorrow. But I'll still be at school for most of the day.

So this post kind of explains day 90 too, I will add that to the title and then add more about it tomorrow night :)

also,

it is snowing in every city in finland except mine...




BOO HOO :(

changes

before i came here, i never liked pineapple other than in watergate salad.

NOW I AM FRIGGEN ADDICTED TO IT and i cant stop eating it and i eat like a can a day

day 83, 84, 85

Thursday... What did I do on Thursday.
OH, on Thursday I woke up with a bad headache at 4am and I was awake until 6 tossing and turning. So when my alarm went off at 6:30, I decided to stay home from school and left a note on my door. After that, I  took some tylenol and went back to sleep until 11. When I woke up that time, the headache was gone so I just stayed at home and cleaned my room and watched TV and stuff.
I think it was on Thursday that Outi and I went to Kuopio at night to get all the rest of my Christmas presents (thats a lie I actually have no idea what day it was... maybe it was tuesday?) And I got them all and wrapped them all and they are ready to ship as soon as I get paid by Rotary.

Friday
I had school all day, WOOOT.  and then I had a presentation in the middle school again. This one actually went a bit better. Mara came with me so they were asking her questions about Italy and about her exchange too. And It was basically 2 kids asking questions but that is better than none. I figured out that either one kid lived in the United States or he had visited there for a long amount of time. His english was nearly perfect and he was talking about how he had been to 2 Chicago Blackhawks games. Nobody flies over the ocean to go to a hockey game... that I know of.
After school, I just came home and hung out. Made dinner and then started to watch a  movie. But I got super bored of it so I shut it off and went to sleep.

Today is Saturday
I woke up at like 10 this morning and then we got groceries and everything.
After that, we went up to this lookout point in Siilinjarvi where you can see the whole town and it was pretty. Its been pretty cold lately. It was -7 when I woke up yesterday. :(  and it was today too but the sun is pretty bright and theres not a cloud in the sky now so it is about -3.

I am going to take pictures down by the lake with Mara and then I am sleeping over at her house. So I will talk to you all tomorrow, I promise :)



Okay to finish off Saturday, I stayed over at Mara's house and we took pictures down by the lake and then went to sauna and watched mean girls :) WOOOOOO.

best movie ever

Day 80,81,82

Sorry I haven't really been writing a lot lately. There's not really much to say. Right now things aren't very exciting.
I will probably start writing less frequently unless really exciting things happen.
I wrapped all of my Christmas presents last night and realized its going to cost me a million dollars to send them ahhhhh. And that's pretty much all that has happened in the last few days.
Today Is Wednesday and I have my longest day of the week, 4 classes plus Finnish course so I won't get home until 6 tonight. Wednesdays suck
It's getting a lot colder now, I even wore my warm winter coat on Monday. It snowed in many parts of Savo (my area in Finland) including iisalmi and kuopio, which are north and south of me but no snow here :( it actually rained all day yesterday and its raining today. Monday was like -3 but yesterday and today are like 3 degrees.

I found out yesterday that I have a possible 2nd host family and that I could be going to live there in the next few weeks. They live on a farm and I am actually excited for the change in lifestyle because then I won't be bored and everything will be busier, keeping the homesickness away. I've discovered that I really need to keep myself busy to prevent myself from being homesick. Talking to my family Doesnt really make me homesick but when I skyped Shelly, Abby, Megan, Erin and Sarah on Sunday, Megan looked right in the camera an said 'come back home'. My heart broke into a thousand pieces and it made me really homesick.

I also found out that I have another possible host family but I can't go there until after Christmas because their house flooded or something and is being redone. I understand this completely. I've been there and it's not fun. At least we didn't have to move out of our house when ours flooded. I'm glad that things are starting to fall into place. I was worried for a bit.

This morning I found out that my friend Jon from school got accepted for rotary exchange :) I'm so happy for him and it keeps bringing back the moment I found out. Can't believe it was a year ago! But yes I am very happy for him and he's so excited too :)
I'm glad I convinced him to apply because he's so excited now!


:)



Wednesday continued,
I decided to drop my Finnish Creative Writing course. although I like the idea of the class, the people in the class were very NOT helpful to me. I didn't understand what was going on most of the time. All of the class was anonymous writing but when your writing is in a different language than everyone else's, its not exactly anonymous. Also, I couldn't even read what everyone was writing and no one was willing to translate for me. The teacher asked the class to translate for me because she had to go get something. Nobody said one word to me so I ended up translating the whole thing on my ipod by myself. WOOOT> So anyways, I dropped that class and I will make up the extra hours next period..

And then I had finnish course, where my teacher pretty much just talked to us about our countires and her trip to Spain for an hour and 15 minutes. We didn't do a whole lot. hahaha

day 77,78 and 79.

Well I'm sorry that I haven't written in the last few days. I spent the whole weekend at Roosa's house. We ate a lot of food, didn't sleep much, and laughed a lot. :) It was a good weekend.

The only bad t hing about this weekend is that I have had like extreme hiccups for like 3 days. THEY ARE SO BAD. Roosa was laughing at me last night so hard because my hiccups were making the weirdest noises. I can't help it!!!!

Nothing much else happened other than that, we made Mokkapala (chocolate cake) and pizzas and ate our favourite ice cream and yeah :)

day 75 and 76

I know I've been sucking at writing lately but theres not really anything to write about.

Yesterday was Wednesday, I went shopping in Kuopio and bought Sarah and Mom Christmas presents. Still don't know what to get Dad and Josh. We had fun, trying to find Roosa a dress for a wedding. I think we went in every store in the downtown and we still didn't find a dress. Finally, after about 2 hours of looking I said 'WE ARE GOING TO FIND A DRESS IN THIS STORE'. Roosa is probably the pickiest shopper I have ever met. Everything I said would look good on her she was like 'no, i hate that' no i hate that' 'no thats ugly' but FINALLY, we found one. I suggested it and she was like 'well its a dress soo...' and then she liked it and i was like I TOLD YOU SO!!!!!!!!!!!!


That's basically all and then we went to see a movieeeeeeee and then came home. Our bus was like 28 minutes late and I managed to get off the bus at my house IN THE DARK all by myself. The bus comes from the opposite direction than I usually come so I was kind of lost but I just guessed and figured it out!


Today was Thursday and I pretty much did nothing all day. Literally. I watched tv and drank iced tea and layed in my bed. It was an amazing day.


I am still trying to figure out what I want to do with my life. like university wise. So many ideas floating around in my head, so if you're reading this, please comment below and tell me what you think I should do!! Seriously any suggestions can help right now.  Now that alll my friends are applying for University, my brain can't decide what I want to do.

ahhhh.

day 72, 73, 74

Okay so on Sunday, I went to visit Lucie in Leppavirta, which is about an hour away! First, I went to Kuopio to Katharina's (from Germany). Her parents drove us to Leppavirta. We got there at like 5pm and met with Amelie (from Quebec) who had stayed over the night before at Lucies. We all hung out for a bit and then we had to drive Amelie to the nearest train station (45 minutes away). After Lucie, Katharina and I got back to Lucie's house, we had dinner and ate cake, cookies, and cupcakes that we had all made. I made the cookies. We hung out until like 3 am and had a great time. It is great to be with rotary exchange students because idk we just understand eachother so well. We made promises that we would get together soon again :)

On Monday, we left Lucie's at 2 to take the bus back to Kuopio. I stayed in Kuopio with Katharina until 7 and we went shopping and sat in a coffee shop! It was fun too and I got 3 new shirts and a scarf for under 50 euros :D awesome deals everywhere. :)  After that I took the train home and fell asleep. I was so tired by the time I got home.
While walking home from the train station though, I walked past the beach. Although it was only 7:30 at night, it was pitch black and the beach looked so beautiful. I tried to post pictures but its impossible to capture the same things in a picture that you see with your eyes. It was so pretty because the lights of the town and buildings surrounding the lake were shining off the water and it was still and calm and quiet. It was so peaceful. I stopped for like 10 minutes even though I was freezing.


It is getting colder here, it is supposed to snow this week apparently. I hope not.

I am off school this week so basically all day today I layed in my bed and watched movies and tv shows on my laptop. After dinner, Minna went back to Henriikka's (where she had been all day) and Outi and I went and rented Bad Teacher which we then watched and ate popcorn and now I am here.

X factor is next and then BEDTIMEEEEE. :)

Day 71 :)

Yesterday, woke up at about 10, and then I just watched tv and hung around the house for a few hours. At like 1, I went with Roosa to the horse stable. I offered to go help her because I figured it was bettter than sitting and doing nothing all day :p
But I realized that I have really no crappy clothes that are warm. And I didn't want to get horse pop on my sweatpants because they are my favourite.
So we went and cleaned out the stable and then groomed Leevi, Rossa's favourite horse and then she rode for an hour while I froze my butt off
After I got home I was frozen. It was so cold yesterday so I had a hot shower and tried to warm up and then we had dinner
After dinner outi's fried came over with her little girl and we had coffee and tea and cookies (Finnish evening snack)
Pretty much after that I just went to bed because I was tired :p

day 69 and 70

Thursday was just a normal day. I didn't really do anything exciting. I had school and then after dinner, we took Minna to Henriikka's and Outi and I were on a mission to find myself a winter coat. We went to Citymarket, which is basically the Walmart of Finland. It is awesome. :P and I got one. It's really nice and I think it was worth the money because I will have it for probably 5 years. I haven't bought snowpants yet but I don't need them until Lapland which is at the end of November.
My boots arrived so now my feet will be nice and warm walking to and from school :D I think I will probably buy a pair of other boots (fancier and not so warm) because although I brought 3 pairs with me, 1 pair doesnt fit me, the other has holes all in it and the 3rd pair is completely destroyed already. :P
So I am zero on boots right now pretty much so I think I will just buy a cheap pair of boots when I find one. Not really super necessary because I can live on these boots for now.
Oh also on Thursday, I had another presentation in the middle school and this time the class asked even less questions. At least in the 1st one, there was one kid who kept asking questions and making comments. Not here. Whatever, it still went okay.

On Friday, I would normally have school but it was the day that we got back our exams so I didn't start school until 8:35, and I was done at 10:40. Each class was only 25 minutes long, long enough to get your projects and exams back and see your final grade. Since I am an exchange student and the language barrier is so different, they can't give us grades technically because we can't compare with the other students. A few of my teachers gave me a grade as to what I would have gotten in the course but overall I just got an S, which means I completed the course.
In English 7, I got a 10 (PERFECT!). In English 4, she didn't give me a mark. In French I got an 8 I think (can't remember now). In geography I didn't get a mark and in health I got a 7 (I don't see why because I put a lot of effort into my project but the teacher didn't really  have anything to mark for us so I think he just picked numbers out of a hat).
After that, Roosa Mara Tiia and I went for fries at the Old Fox. (tradition) and then we started walking home. When we got half way home, we decided that we should have gotten snacks because we were going to Henri's last night. We didn't want to walk all the way back uphill to the grocery store so we walked to ABC instead. Both equal distance, but ABC was not uphill. (We aren't lazy at all.... but seriously its a big hill.........)
And then last night we went to Henri's and it was a lot of fun. We just listened to music and hung out and ate hamburgers and played NHL 13. I freaked out because Tim Hortons was on the ice on the video game. it was funny.
Also, we watched Henri and Anssi do tricks on the trampoline. They both do circus, which is actually a kind of big thing in Europe. Well bigger than in Canada. Its awesome they do all these cool tricks.

I really want to go watch it someday :)

english= gone

yesterday, my teacher asked me to write 5 words in english starting with 'a'. the 5 words were supposed to be things that we wanted to have in life.. the only word i could think of was 'akkoset' in finnish (meaning alphabet). i still can't think of any good words starting with a that fit this criteria....





also, about 2 minutes ago, it took me about 30 seconds to find the ? key on my laptop. i am getting too used to using the finnish keyboards at school. 

day 67 and 68

Yesterday was tuesday. It was pretty much just a normal school day. During lunch I had to make a presentation about Canada to one of the Grade 9 classes because they learn about Canada in English Class.
It went pretty well except they didn't ask me any questions so it was awkward. And a couple of the boys were extremely rude and I almost wanted to ask them if I was interrupting their conversation (still don't have patience for rudeness....) Other then that the day was pretty good.


Today was normal school and then we went for pizza. We had no Finnish Course because our teacher is gone to Spain to build a sauna for her friend. She is driving there. (INSANE..., well I guess I will pretty much do that on eurotour.......anyways, still crazy) So yeah that was my day. And then Finja, Mara and I went for an adventure on the way home. We just go down streets or paths that we don't know where they lead and find out and then go back the way towards home. That's what our adventures consist of.

On Wednesdays, we eat pizza and go on adventures. :)

day 64, 65, 66

Sorry I have been too lazy to write lately. :)


Saturday I woke up at like 11. And then just hung out around the house with Minna and Henriikka for a little bit during the day and then Roosa and Veera came over and we watched Paranormal Activity 3. We had to help Veera get through her first scary movie. (She's terrified) and then we sat and watched funny youtube videos for like 2 hours. At around 7, Roosa and Veera left and I started to watch New Girl online. It is really funny and I watched it for most of the day on Sunday too.

Sunday, I woke up at about 10, and then we went for groceries at 12. We had dinner at about 3 and then I started  baking apple crisp. :) It turned out pretty good! Almost as good as at home, but the brown sugar was a little different so idk. I felt pretty bad because the apples leaked all in the oven and made a stinky, black, sticky mess! But it was really good. I skyped my family because it was Thanksgiving in Canada, it made me kind of homesick, but not that bad. I just slept it off and I was fine.


Today is Monday and I had school. 6:30 always comes so early on Mondays. I had Math, History and English today. I was done school at 1 and came home and had a nap. I am so tired today. I am going to rotary now and I will write about how that goes when I come home :)


Okay so rotary was actually really good.
They asked me to introduce myself again and I opened my mouth and ........................














FINNISH CAME OUT.




it was amazing.

day 63

Great day. 

First, i had math and i ACTUALLY UNDERSTOOD WHAT WAS GOING ON. even though the teacher didn't speak one word of english the whole class. it is amazing to actually know whats going on!!!! I was so proud of myself 

I don't even remember what other classes I had today :D

After school, it was pouring rain. Roosa, Petra and I went to my house to get peanut butter cookies and then we went to the grocery store to get some stuff for mokkapalat, which is basically one big brownie. It was really good. We had a lot of problems. We started to make the topping and ran out of icing sugar so we just tried to make it work, poured it on the brownie and it wasnt thick enough and looked stupid so we poured it off and started again. We had to run to the neighbours to get more icing sugar first though :D 

We then went to Perjantai Kahvilla and ran around the hall and found all these secret doors and stuff .It was fun. Everyone started singing church songs so Roosa and I got bored and went home to watch X Factor and eat ice cream (lactose free of course!!). 

It was a good day although it's been raining non-stop since probably 1 o clock. WOOOOO. rain. :(

day 62- 2 months!!

I don't really have much else to say today other than it is my 2 month anniversary with Finland. Ahhhhhh, I love this country to death. Seriously, I can not imagine myself getting sent to any other place in the world. It's like i have some secret connection with Finland. Maybe Josh and Sarah were right, I was adopted and both my birth parents are Finnish. KIDDING. :)

I have not really experienced homesickness at all. One of the biggest things I miss is school sports. There are no sports in schools here and I really miss the bomber spirit and watching football and getting all dressed up in school colours. Although I love the school system here, if they added sports it would just make it even more amazing.



That's all I am going to write for right now because I am going to go sit on the dock and write there.
be back soon with more information.




So today marks 2 months in this absolutely amazing and beautiful country. I honestly can not imagine myself in any other country but here.
September 30th marked exactly 1 year since I found i was accepted for exchange. i remember at the time feeling kind of numb. i was excited for the future but also unsure of what exactly what infornt of me. for the first little while, i was unsure of what i was getting myself into. i was going to miss my senior year, my prom and graduating with all my friends. when i met all the other outbounds in january, everything kind of changed. i realized that i was not the only one who would be going through those things and that we all would deal together.
In February, when Announcement Day was in the air, I got nervous. Well I guess not really nervous but more anxious. At the beginning of the process, my  heart was leaning towards Europe. I had been there before, and loved it. Asia and South America were unfamiliar to me and that kind of scared me. .When my rotary club told me they thought i would be going to SA, my thoughts kind of changed. Although Europe wasn't unappealing to me, SA was a new kind of exciting. At that point, I realized I didn't really care where I ended up.
When Announcement Day finally arrived, after a week postpone (like we hadn't waited long enough....)I was a disaster. I remember having to get up fairly early because we were always so far away. When we arrived in Mississauga, I was even more of a disaster. We drove past the hall where it would be held and I got even worse. Of course, we were like an hour early so we went and got some lunch. The only place we could find was subway. After a short stop there, we headed back to the hall. We were still the first ones there (like usual...) so we just waited in the truck until more cars arrived. When the rotarians finally arrived, I felt sick. I wasn't sure whether it was the nerves or the subway I'd eaten. Im thinking nerves. The rest of announcement day is pretty much just a blur. I remember my name being called. Don't remember reading the letter, don't remember sitting down, don't really remember what came after that. All I remember is hugging Katri, and I think I only remember that because there is a picture of it. I don't even really remember leaving the hall. It was all pretty much a blur. It wasn't that I was disappointed for Finland, I just really had no idea anything about it. Yes I had done my minor research on all the countries but not to any extent because I didn't want to get home. Its fair to say that that night I went home and Google'd for about 29420348 hours. After that, it felt like a huge weight was lifted off my shoulders but yet another one was put back on. I had to wait another 3 or so months until my guarantee forms arrived.
I found out on May 21st that I would be living in Siilinjarvi and again, it was numbness and GOOGLE.
Then came the busy time, guuarantee forms, training weekends, residence permits, insurance, flights. There was a lot to do in a short amount of time. Luckily I got everything I needed in time and then I just had to wait. I wasn't really nervous to leave at all or excited. But the closer the day got, the more excited I got. I wasn't nervous until I got on the plane and it started moving.

In the last 2 months of this crazy adventure, I have learned SO much about myself. I can't even say what right now but so much about myself. I have more patience, I care less what others think and I am a hell of a lot more confident in myself.
I'm sorry to my family. I don't really miss you that much. Well of course I miss you but it doens't hurt to miss you, it just feels ..... normal? I don't know how to explain it. I am not homesick barely at all. The only things I am homesick for are food and school sports...
So that is pretty much all I have to say for now.


The last 2 months have been amazing, I love everything here. I could not imagine rotary putting me in any better of a place <3




If you are future exchange student and you happen to be reading this, don't be unsure about rotary's decision on where to send you. THEY KNOW WHAT THEY'RE DOING!!!!

day 61

Today was the beginning of period 2! I was kind of nervous because I didn't really know anyone in any of my classes except the 1st one.  Turns out I have at least 1 friend in every class. So far, I like all my teachers and it was a really good day :D. I actually like my classes. my history teacher is hillarious and speaks english to us because there are 9 people in the class and 4 of them are exchange students..... Also, we can kind of learn what ever we want in the class so he was kind of open to speaking english and we just talked about our different cultures. :D

I had english 1 and creative writing and math also. Not as fun, but still good. Teachers are good so far.


After school, Roosa, Arlene, Finja, Mara, Marie, Rebekka, Henri, Anssi and I went for pizza. Henri (on his bike) and I (walking) were wayyyy ahead of everyone else because they walk SO FRIGGEN SLOW. So we just waited at the pizza place for them. We all had lots of laughs (and Mean Girls quotes) and talked about our accents and laughed some more.
After pizza, the exchange students went to finnish course, (woooo) and everyone else went home. Mara and I walked home from finnish together and took some pictures at the beach.

All the fall colours are beautiful right now. Its amazing and today was so sunny!

ITS A GIRLLL :D

So i got the message at 12:24 am last night that Shelly and Howie's baby was a baby girllll and then I got another message at 2:30 am saying that her name was Erin Elizabeth Howe. annd today, mom sent me a picture of her. BOY IS SHE ADORABLE.


i almost burst into tears. she's so friggen cute. :D

day 60

Today I had my last exam. We went to the exam at 9 because our teacher told us we would get bored if we came any earlier. But when we went at 9, all the desks in our class were taken so we had to go to  a different classroom and it was weird but whatever. The exam was really easy and I finished quickly and then the teacher let me leave.
After that, I talked to Rauha about my books and host families and everything. As of right now, i still do not have any for sure host families but we have a back up if necessary. As for my books, she told me just to ask her about books before I buy them because she will make sure the school doesnt have any extra copies, and then after I pay them to give the reciept to the club and they will put the money in my bank account. I feel a lot better about it now.

I went out for lunch to Old Fox with Roosa :D and then we watched a movie at home and she tried ketchup chips (not sure if she liked them or not.....). Then we just hung out for a little bit.

Also today I bought yarn and I am starting to make bracelets again. So far today I made 5. I have 3 and Roosa has 2.

Since Roosa left, I have pretty much just been watching tv and making bracelets. And eating. Dinner is good too.

now it is 10 o clock and I am trying to keep myself as awake as possible. Shelly just went into surgery and BABY HOWE #3 should be here in just a few hours. ASK ME IF IM EXCITED!!!!!!!!!!!!



I am going to be up all night waiting for the message. !!!

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

day 58 and 59

I just realized that I forgot to write about Sunday, ooooops :D

I woke up, did some homework. I have been working on this project for school all weekend and I finally finished it today (Monday) I will link it at the end of the blog. I am pretty proud of myself...

So yesterdya, I skyped Mom and Dad and Sarah and Aunt Linda and Uncle John and Remi. It was great to see them all :D kind of sad that I'm not gunna be there for thanksgiving (Aunt Linda and Uncle John will you mail me some cabbage rolls..........?) Even if I tried to do Thanksgiving here, it'd be impossible. They don't have turkey here. (Well I haven't seen it yet). We don't have the special machine to make coleslaw. I can't make Watergate because I relaly doubt they have the pudding here! It's hard to do it in another country! So that leaves potatoes and buns. And that's a typical Finnish meal.

I don't know what else I did yesterday..



Today, I had an exam at 8:10 and it was an English exam. I was done my exam at like 9:15. I had to wait in the room until 11. It sucked. I was so bored. After that, I went to the computer room with Finja, Mara, Lookmou and Arlene to work on our projects for Nina. We had to do a project on the town where we are living in Finland (For most of us it is Siilijarvi but for Lookmou it is Maaninka) That is the project I am going to link at the end of this post.
After that, Mara and I walked home. She thought it was cold apparently... 

After I got home, I worked on my project for like another 4 hours and then I went to rotary.
Rotary was SUPER boring. They were just reviewing their accomplishments and how much money they spent last year. But it was all in Finnish so I didn't understand anything other than nuorisovaihto which means youth exchange. Thats all. :P

Then I walked home, and now I am going to eat cake. :D




Today, I discovered that I am finally caught up on my sleeep. When I was in Canada, I would always wake up around 3-4 every morning and drink a glass of water. Since I've been here I hadn't done it once until this weekend. And I've done it every night since Friday now. I guess that means I'm finally back to normal :D


http://prezi.com/nqwct8v3cjwc/siilinjarvi/ Here is my project