Month #9

Hey everyone! Please let me apologize for being SO late with this post. Things have been really hectic here and I’m just finishing it up now. I can’t believe 9 months went by almost a month ago. Ridiculous. I could have had a baby in that time period. I DIDN’T, but I could have. So here’s what’s been going on in the last month for me. Hope you enjoy it.

Week # 35 (April 26-May 3): I found out Sunday that my next house is our Rotary club counselor’s. The day I was to change houses was switched about five times, which was a little annoying. But it also meant I had 4 or 5 different “goodbye nights” at my third house! So that was funny. I spent the first part of the week packing and unpacking all of my stuff. At the Rotary meeting on Monday I found out that one of our members is going to sponsor a concert that my friend and I would like to put on! My friend studies piano at the music academy here in Wroclaw and we plan to perform about 8 songs together when my mom and aunt are visiting. We have to get right to work to prepare.
In the middle of the week, I moved to my fourth (and, hopefully, last) host family. I’m very happy in my house. The family is very kind and helpful. I met my host sister, Ania, and my older host brother Jacek. They’re really keen on teaching me more Polish, and I feel like they really care about me. I mean, they bought me peanut butter on my second day of living with them! And for those of you that know me, that’s the way to my heart! Anyway, later in the week I met my host (who’s about my age), Maciek, returning from a class trip in Ukraine. This week, I also met with an elementary school teacher who contacted me asking if I’d give a 5 minute presentation for her students on “International Day.” She asked me to prepare two songs in English and a little speech about New York.
This weekend was maybe one of the most interesting yet that I’ve had in Poland. In Wrocław this weekend was a “Thanks Jimi“ festival, which was a guitar festival in honor of Jimi Hendrix. I went to Rynek first with Emily and we watched over 6,000 guitars play „Hey Joe“ and „Smoke on the Water“ together. It was really cool because this year Wroclaw beat its „guitar number goal“ by almost 4,000 guitars. (last year Wroclaw was in the Guinness Book of World records for the most number of guitars paying the same song at the same time and there were only 2000!  After the concert in the main square, we took off to the Olimpic Stadium, where the night concert was being held. So my first concert ever ended up being Deep Purple in Poland! It was a really calm concert, not too loud and not too many scary people. I really enjoyed it. After the concert I slept over at Emily’s house. The next day I returned home and planned two pretty important things: The first is the music program that my friend Ania and I will perform for our concert. The second is that I designed the trip my mom, aunt and I will go on! I can’t wait for them to come.

Week #36: On Monday I prepared my presentation for the children’s „International Day“ and on Tuesday I presented to them. I brought stickers from New York and my business cards. I spoke for about 5 minutes about my exchange program and what I’m doing in Poland and then I sang two songs in English. It was pretty short but very important to the woman for whom I did the presentation. And I like making people happy…. So I guess it was worth it. In the evening our new exchange student from Australia, Kaila, came to my house and spent the night. It was nice to hang out with her and share stories. She’s been here a few months but lives in a town outside of Wroclaw. She left the next morning to go on a Euro Tour with exchange students in Austria, since she wasn’t able to come on ours. It’s a similar program, though, so she should have a blast! Tuesday I started gymnastics for the first time since before Euro Tour. Wow, was I sore. But it felt good to be moving again. I also had my first rehearsal with Ania for our upcoming performance. We mostly talked about the program, sang just a little, because she has to look over the notes of course.

On Thursday, my phone blew up. Yeah, I was sending a text message and the screen literally flashed and cracked. Really weird. So Thursday was spent figuring out how to fix it since I already had a ticket to go to Warsaw Friday. So Friday morning, my host mother and I went to a cell phone store and had the screen replaced, a half hour before my train which we ended up running to catch. I arrived in Warsaw in the evening and hung out with a few friends at Carlos‘ house. He’s an exchange student from Brasil. They ended up going to a party but I was tired so I stayed at home and read a book. The next day I met up with some other friends in the center of Warsaw and together we went to Cascia‘s (from Canada) house for an exchange student BBQ. There were a lot of us there, maybe 30 people. Cascia’s host family has a beautiful house with a pond and a dock and tables – the perfect place for the party. We all slept on the floor inside in sleeping bags (or where ever we could find a place). I had a lot of fun… I’m really glad I went. It’s a big difference from the beignning of the year when I would have, undoubtedly, said no to going to a party. I’ve become a lot more social this year and easier going – a really great thing that an exchange year can do to you if you let it.

On Sunday I woke up late and had breakfast at Cascia’s with everyone else. I hung out with people until it was time to leave and then took a train home to Wroclaw. Breanna (from Minnesota) came with me and will stay for a few days here.

Week #37: Monday was really rainy so there wasn’t much to do outside in Wroclaw. I had a 7am rehearsal with Ania and, then, Breanna and I (we were still tired from the lack of sleep) came home and watched „Walk the Line.“ I’d never seen it and it really inspired me to work harder on my singing. Then we went to the Rotary Meeting, during which the place of my concert was discussed. We don’t have a set room yet and I’m really touched because the members of my club are putting a lot of thought into this concert for me. Tuesday Breanna and I walked around the city center before returning home and learning to make pierogi. It’s about time, since I’ve been here for 9 months! They’re really simple though, and tasted really good. I had piano lessons, too. It was weird playing though since I don’t have a piano in this house… I’m so out of practice. Wednesday we went to the Japanese Gardens. It’s my second time going there, but we went at the very peak of the spring time flowers, it was beautiful! Then we did a little shopping because I’m performing in a Rotary concert this weekend and I needed some stuff for that. We went to my old host sister’s bar and had tea with friends, too.

Thursday Breanna went home and I had rehearsal with the band I’m singing with Friday for Rotary. It’s the same one I had sung with in February, and is directed by the same man who is supporting Ania and my concert. Before rehearsal we had a jam session and I got my saxophone out for the third time this year! Note to self: yeah, that was a stupid waste of poundage. My host family has this „tradition“ of Thursday night TV together. They watch two episodes of House MD every Thursday night. Even my older host brother and his girlfriend come over and watch. It’s hard enough to understand in English, so in Polish is was freakishly difficult. Sometimes I couldn’t tell if the words were medical terms or just weird Polish words. Also, everything House says is a joke, which is hard to understand when the person doing to dubbing has a monotone voice. But it was good family bonding time. On friday I had rehearsal with Ania again. It was a bit rough at the beginning, but it’s getting so much better. We’re learning to really communicate and cooperate and play together. It’s so exciting! After the rehearsal I spent time with Daniel and Tamara in a new mall that opened recently in the city. Then we went to a café and had coffee and checked our emails. We met up with a few more friends, one of which stayed with me for the night. Our good friend Doug from Ohio is actually an exchange student in Ukraine but he’s been in Poland moving around and visitng all of us. He’s in Wroclaw for the week so my host parents agreed to host him for a few days.

Saturday was the opening ceremonies of the Rotary District Conference. We participated in a flag ceremony and then I sang my country song with the band. I got to sing in a very famous hall in the Wroclaw University. It was a pretty cool room, full of decorations of Baroque style. After I sang I went to a party with Daniel and Doug and then we all went home. On Sunday, Doug and I went on a picnic to a nearby river and to lie in the sun, which, recently, has chosen to come out quite often! So a busy but well spent week.

Week #38: Tuesday was another rehearsal with Ania, and it went very well. After rehearsal I got some photos printed for my scrapbook I’m working on and did some shopping with Daniel. We ended up hanging out all afternoon at a café in the center. After that I had piano lessons, which went well, but still I haven’t practiced so it’s a bit weird. I had gymnastics Wednesday, but I couldn’t do anything because of my leg. I injured it a couple months ago and it’s never really healed, so we’ve been taking it easy as not to injure it further. After gymnastics I met with Daniel and Kaitlyn in my host sister’s bar and we had dinner. Thursday I had rehearsal with Ania again. I hung out with Isaac, Tamara and Daniel until I was too tired to move. 7am rehearsals really take the wind out of you.

Friday I left for Mielno, a city up north in Poland, for the LAST Rotary meeting. Saddest thing ever ☹. Ah I also found out that when you switch the language of your mobile phone from English to Polish (which I did a couple weeks ago… I know, a bit late), the „snooze“ disappears and there’s only a „stop.“ So I got a late start to the morning but I made my train in plenty of time. I met the exchangers from Wroclaw (plus a few extras) at the station and we rode directly north for about 7 hours, picking up people from other cities along the way. Rotary people met us when we got to Mielno and together we went to our hotel. The first night was fun, mostly we just hung out and caught up with each other. There was a brief Rotary meeting and then a soccer game called „Brasil vs. the rest of the world.“ Brasil won, even though they were severely lacking in players. I was really annoyed because I couldn’t play – it still hurts to walk on my leg, unfortunately. We got to bed about 2am and had to wake up bright and early the next morning, a Saturday (and my mom’s birthday!).

There was a bowling tournament today – another thing I couldn’t do! So annoying! Although I rarely have „bad arms days“ anymore, some things (such as bowling) still send me into a lot of pain, so I try to avoid those things. I got to talk to people, though, and hang out with my friends. After we got back from the tournament, I did the craziest thing ever. We got back and put our swimsuits on, and went to the beach! It was about 50 degrees outside and the water was the same temperature. It was the coldest water I’ve ever swam in my whole life. After 5 or 10 minutes of swimming we’d run along the beach and then do it all over again. My leg and arm were too numb to hurt. After we couldn’t take the cold anymore, we went back and dried off. I used a hair dryer haha. Then we had a cookout and our talent show. It was a good show, we turned it into a few hours of „guess who.“ We’d pretend to be one of the exchange students and you had to guess who, etc. It was really funny and I don’t think any feelings were hurt. Then my dad (from the US) called my mobile so I could wish my Mom a Happy Birthday! That was nice. I spent the rest of the night again talking and hanging out with people. The thought that the end is so near haunted us all, and we were all trying so hard to get as much out of each other as possible.

Sunday was spent on the „moving sand dunes“ on the Baltic Coast. We rode about 2 hours on a bus and took a hike through somes woods until we got to the dunes. They were beautiful and I even found a piece of amber in the sand. It was really hard to climb the dunes though, it was quite a workout. We got back late in the afternoon and had dinner. Then a few hours were spent signing each other’s memory books, shirts, flags, pants, what have you. It was tough because there are so many of us and you don’t want to write the same thing for everyone. Plus, I was trying the whole time to hold myself together and not think about „The End.“ It was a good night, though… I spent time with people who are important to me, and hung out with my friends again. I went to bed at 5:30am and had to wake up at 6 to say goodbye to people.

Monday, my 9th month anniversary in Poland, was a tiring day. At 6am I said goodbye to all of the exchange students who were leaving Mielno before me. It was hard to tell who I’d see again and who I wouldn’t (before leaving Poland) so I said goodbye to everyone just in case. Some people were crying. When I get sad, for some reason it’s hard for me to act that way, so oddly enough I just get hyper. Which doesn’t show a whole lot of respect to others… so I was dealing with that. It physically hurt though, the goodbyes. I could feel it inside hurting. It was odd. I never knew sadness could ACTUALLY hurt. And it did, it hurt a lot. After people left the Wroclaw group went back to sleep until it was time to catch our train home. We slept the whole train ride and as soon as I got home I went to sleep too. Happy 9 months!

So I can’t believe it’s been 9 whole months! That’s just crazy to me. Though the Mielno meeting was a bundle of fun, it was also painful to attend. I’m glad I’m not leaving right after the meeting though. In the next week I have rehearsal everyday with Ania because our concert is the 31st of May, 2 days after my mom and aunt come! I have our whole schedule planned out, so I’m psyched for that. Things should be picking up speed and I’m sure it’ll be June, and then July, before I know it. Until month 10!