It's been over a month since I've last written, so I'm gonna try to summarize everything up. ^these pics are from the beginning of September when the other rotary students and I walked through the Wairapa.

8 September I had dinner at parliament with 2 mps, Chris and Trevor something. I went with Peter and Phil (rotarians) and Kendyl and Pia, 2 other exchange students. We got a tour around the "bee hive" and then just had dinner there.

Wednesday 9 September was the last day of school till mock exams, which we got a week off for. I took english, spanish, and maths. The grading system really makes no sense. The grades are "not achieved", "achieved", "achieved with merit", and "achieved with excellence". (NA, A, M, E) And there are specific points that you must include in an answer in order to get a certain grade.

Monday was my birthday and Danielle and Anna came over with a cake. Anne made me go to rotary (because apparently it's absolutely necessary that I attend every week), but afterwards I went to Danielle's house where she threw me a surprise party.

On Friday, I was put on a bus and sent to Paraparam to stay with my couselour for the night and then go with her the next day to Tatum Park for the Rotary orientation weekend. There are 10 inbounds and 6 outbound students and we all just listened to lectures and speeches and did some team building activites all weekend. Saturday night, we were supposed to have dinner and speeches by the students, but the All Blacks were playing the Wallabies so the speeches were postponed (we won 26-6). When we actually did them, I talked about how NZ is unique and I think it went well. Kendyl (the other American) spoke about what NZ can learn from America. She talked about how NZ has no national pride and it should be more like America. Most people in the world don't like America because of its national pride and because we like to flaunt that we're the best. So you can imagine how her speech went over. I could hear the rotarians in the audience grunting and I was sitting there watching her make us look bad, just waiting for it to end.

Anyways, Monday I went back to school for one week because we have 2 weeks of holidays now (like spring break). It was kind of a pointless week really, we just got our mock exams back and talked about them. I brought a bunch of candy and things that mom sent me for my birthday and people really liked them. Especially shockers, I don't know why, and reese's and everyone thought twinkies were a really big deal, but most people could only eat a few bites of it.

Over the holidays I've been going to the beach, mall, laser strike, movies, hanging out at friends houses..nothing real special.

These are all from Belmont regional park, which is right behind Anne's house.

And this one is for dad cause he always makes me put people in my pictures...

So last week 2 girls in my school got back from America. They did some kind of exchange program that lasted 5 weeks. They are both in a few of my classes. It's really funny because I hear them talking to other kids about what America is like. Most of the things they say, I just think, hmm I didn't know that was special. Like dollar stores and drive throughs at starbucks. Other things I laugh at and think, yep that's America for ya. Like our super ginormous serving sizes. And a few things I wish I could argue about.
I also brought my yearbook from last year to school and gave it to my kiwi friend. She kept it for a few days. During the week, people came up to me and said they saw my yearbook and asked me about it. Everybody expected the cheerleading team to be like the movies, but it's quite the opposite. They went crazy about our football field saying it's a giant stadium and they were very amused at the fact that people dress up and actually go to all the football games. Overall, everybody was way impressed and thought my school looks way cooler than Hutt High. Which is true. There's no school spirit here, competition between schools is not as epic as it is back home. Students don't attend any sporting events and no one really cares how the school teams are doing. I saw the Hutt High yearbook from last year also. It was very boring. It was black and white except for a few really random colored pages and there were'nt any individual pictures. It was everybody in their form classes. And of course I couldn't even make out who was who because the pictures were so small and blurry. Even though Hutt High is probably one of the best schools in the Wellington area, it feels like they have nothing compared to my school back home. They use chalkboards here and overhead projectors are thier "modern" technology. Very few classes have them. Also, we have to pay for all our school books and uniform and everything is ridiculously expensive.
Every couple weeks or so we have assemblies. Our year goes into the assembly hall and we all sit with our form class. Then the deans walk in and we all stand silently. If you talk, you get a detention. Then when all the deans are on the stage, we sit and they just stand there and stare at us, straight-faced. It's a very formal process, I see why there is no school spirit. Then they introduce the principal and we stand again and clap. The principal goes up on stage and starts lecturing us from a written speech. It's never very motivating. One time, it was a cold, rainy day and I was wearing a black zip-up (same color as the school one) and the dean took it from me. I went to get it after school and she said next time she'll keep it the whole term.
But anyways, school is alright. Math is hard now. We're doing calculus and of course, I've never done anything like it but my classmates have for a few years now. I also wrote a big history internal last week. Which went well I think, even though the teacher even said it doesn't matter for us international students.
Today I stayed home from school, sick. It was a very productive day. I watched the Little Mermaid I and II (although I would not recommend the 2nd one, it was quite a disappointment), did some laundry, and attempted my math homework. I think I'm going to go back tomorrow, even though I can barely talk.

These pics are from last saturday (Aug 15) when Ann took me around the bays.

On Saturday night, my next host family had a surprise birthday party for the mom. It was fun; there was lots of entertainment. I met the whole family too. There are 2 girls that are like 21 and 24 or something and a son that is 20. The family is really into music too, they all play instruments. Unfortunately, they live out in the middle of nowhere and it's like 45 min from my school. The son Jay's girlfriend is from New Jersey, so I talked to her alot. She has a major Jersey accent even though she moved to New Zealand 7 years ago, its pretty funny.

On Sunday, I slept in till 10, which is the latest since arriving here. Then at 3 pm I took a train with a bunch of friends to Wellington for the Pheonix soccer game. It was ok; soccer isn't as intense as rugby.

Monday night I did my rotary speech. I think it went well, even though it was only like 10 minutes long. People had lots of questions though. I think I kinda scared them when I started talking about winter. Everyone was shocked when I told them how cold it gets.

Tuesday I went to Wellington again. The drama kids in my school made a movie and it was playing in the Paramount Theater, so basically everyone from school went. It was a legit movie too, like 1.5 hours and really good effects.

Wednesday and today I went to the mall after school. Tomorrow is the ball and I'm really excited!

I know its been a while since I've written anything, so I'm just gonna go through my week.

Friday (July 31) I went to the Wellington rugby game versus Otago. I went with 25 other kids, half were kiwi half german. It was really fun:) The first pic is me Danielle and Dezi

On Saturday, Me, Anna, Danielle, and Dezi took a bus into Wellington and went shopping. Sunday Peter and his wife took me and the Brazilian girl Carol out to breakfast then for a cable car ride.

Monday and Tuesday I just went to school and then to the mall afterwards. Wednesday I went smallbore rifle shooting haha. I was really good actually, considering I've never shot a gun before.

Today (thursday), I didn't have my chemistry homework done. Not that it really matters, we don't get graded on it. Anyways, the teacher gave me this paper and it was to replace the homework that I didn't do. It said, "Copy the words on this side of the page onto the other side in neat handwriting." and then there was this big apology to my teacher. As soon as she gave it to me, I started laughing cause I thought it was a joke. Then I got in trouble again.

School is really easy here. Especially since we don't get homework or tests (none that we're graded on at least) until the NCEA exams. School technically ends on November 2, but starting on Nov. 14, there are the exams which go throughout the month and basically you just show up at school whenever you have a scheduled exam.

During history, we usually get one page to read and then we do nothing for the rest of the hour. For spanish, I can probably speak better spanish than my teacher, and he's not even in the classroom for most of the spell. In english we're just reading a Shakespeare play. For math, we're starting calculus. We just took a math "test" a couple days ago, but you only needed to get 2 questions right in order to pass. As for tourism, my teacher actually came up to me and told me I might want to switch out because the class is so easy and slow paced. Chemistry is basically the only class that requires any amount of work from me.

Yesterday, Peter Harvey (he's the rotarian in charge of all the inbounds) took me and Emiline, the French girl, tramping (aka hiking). We started at 9 am and got back at 3 pm. It was a long day. We stopped for 10 minutes for lunch, but other than that we took 2 minute breaks maybe every hour. So basically it was like walking up mountains for 6 hours straight. But it was way worth it; the sights were incredible. These are just a few random pictures from our hike...

School the past couple of days has not been so fun, mostly cause I actually have to start working now. At the end of the year (November) I have to take these NCEA tests, which test you on the whole year. I'm starting mid-year so I have to get the notes from all my teachers on what they learned the first half of the year, and if I don't pass with 80 credits by the end, then I can't move on to year 13...
I've been having fun after school though. Both today and yesterday I walked to the mall after school with like 15 other exchange students, mostly Germans. My closest friends here are probably Christoph and Lucas, both German. I have other friends that I talk to and hang out with...but I don't remember any of thier names! haha there's too many to keep straight. And lots of them I cant even pronounce.

July 21

Today I was at the bus stop and the neighbor girl and her friends were asking me about America, mostly about Twinkies. Apparently they've only seen people eating them in movies and they were realy interested to know what they taste like. And they were also very curious about the cheese that you spray out of a can...it was really funny.
In the school week, everyone has 6 subjects but theres only 5 spells per day, so you have each class 4 times a week...which leaves 1 extra hour on friday, therefore school starts at 9:45 on Fridays. It also starts at 9:45 on Wednesdays because the teachers have meetings in the morning. But school always ends at 3:15, no matter when it starts. We also get half an hour for tea time and an hour for lunch, so the day goes by very fast.
At 7pm, Kendyl and her host parents picked me up and brought me to see My Life in Ruins in the theater. Kendyl is from Buffalo, New York. Her rotary group reserved the whole theater for 105 rotarians and their friends to see this movie. It was alot of fun; Kendyl and I talked the entire time. There wasn't a moment of silence. It's starting to get annoying trying to have conversations with the other exchange students at my school that basically only speak german or french, so this was a very nice change. Her host parents are awesome too, they invited me to go to their farm next time they go and said I could come over whenever I want and they'll get me junk food:) (Ann doesn't have any)

July 20

Today was my first day of school. It was really fun actually, I met lots of other kids and they were all really happy to help me get around. Also, didnt have to go to the bus stop until 8:00. The bus costs 80 cents per trip I think. When I got to school I went into the library with about 30 other international student, about 28 Germans and 2 French. They were nice though..when they actually spoke English. My timetable wasn't set up right away so I had to shadow a year 13 girl (im year 12) into her calculus class then everybody had 30 min for morning tea. I went into D1, the international students room and ate there. Finally my timetable was ready and I went to chemistry. We were doing a lab in class and I was with 2 other German students so we had no idea what to do. Fortunately, the kids really all friendly and they helped us alot. Then I went to history with Svenja, the 1 German girl. This was 4th spell, so after that I went back to D1 for lunch. Some girls invited me and Lucas, another German boy, to have lunch with them upstairs with all their kiwi friends. They were all nice and it was alot of fun. Pretty sure I'm the only American in the building, some kids said they never get Americans here. Finally it was 4th spell, the last hour of the day, and I went to maths. The math curriculum is different here; in one year they cover a little bit of geometry, algebra, functions and trig, and either calculus or statistics.

July 15

I woke up today and made everyone pancakes again. Then Ann, Alex(3), Max(6), and I took a bus and went to this little kid magic show. After that, I took a bus by myself to Queensgate, the mall. No big deal. The exchange rate is about us$.63 to nz$1, so everything looked so much more expensive than it really was. Every girl here (and I mean like every girl from age 5 to 35) wears skinny jeans and boots and really cute tops with belts and hats, and all the outfits look like they were professionally put together. I feel like a sloppy American. Now I'm thankful for the school uniform. The boys also wear skinny jeans and some of them are really well dressed also. They all have their hair spiked up, not straight up, like spiked all over the place.

Anyways, later on that night the boys' parents came over for dinner. For dessert, they brought 2 different kinds of ice cream. One was Gummy gummy gum drops and it was lime ice cream with lollies in it (lollies are chewy candy) and Hokey Pokey. Apparently New Zealand is known for hokey pokey ice cream. It was vanilla but it had caramel and something crunchy in it, it was soooo good though.

After the family left, Ann and I went over to the next door neighbors house so I could meet the 5 daughters. The 13 year old and her friend were so amazed that I was from the US. They couldn't believe that I live on a lake and that it freezes and we can drive on it! They also asked if I've met any celebrities. I've been asked that question alot just because I live in America. We sat there for over an hour talking. They wanted to know if my school looked like the one in High School Musical, with long corridors and lockers on either side, and if I've been to times square. I ended up going to bed at 9:30, which is the latest since I've arrived.

these are pictures of ann's house.

this right picture is my bedroom. it is very small...but i have my own bathroom:)

July 13

Today was a pretty busy day for me. When I woke up I made my self toast and sprinkled cinamon sugar on it. Ann had no idea what on earth I was making. Then she asked me what kind of food she should buy from the grocery store. I started listing off some things and after peanut butter I asked if she had jelly. She asked me what in god's name that was. I said it was like jam and she goes, "Oh thats right, you Americans actually like that rubbish, peanut butter and jam."
Then Ann and I went off into town to set up my bank account. The girl that helped us happened to be an exchange student in Duluth a few years ago, so she was fun to talk to. I also got a cell phone. I tried to find the cheapest one, but it was still nz$130.
At about 2, I went to the airport with the man that's in charge of one of my rotary clubs to meet 2 more exchange students. The first girl that arrived was from France and she could barely speak english, so I didn't really get to talk to her. The next girl was from Buffalo, New York. She was so sweet and nice! Our host parents gave each other thier phone numbers so me and Kendyl can hang out some time.
Later that night, I went with Ann to the Rotary meeting. Everyone knew who I was and greeted me. I had to introduce myself but my real speech will be August 17.

arriving in new zealand

That 27 hour period was probably the lonliest I've ever been! It was exciting when I got a chance to talk to someone next to me. At 10 am I arrived at the Wellington airport and was met by like 6 rotarians including Ann. They were all excited to meet me and helped me get my bags. Then Ann drove me to her house. All around Wellington are mountians with houses that look like they were just dropped on top.

I took these pictures out of the windows in ann's house and ill put more of her house on later.

Ann's driving was insane. She sped as fast as possible around the narrow, winding roads up the mountain. The whole time I was thinking how angry dad would be if I ever drove like that.

Later on that night, Ann's whole family came over. They were all friendly and nice but I was so tired I went to bed at 7:30.