I've had so many new thoughts and experiences. I am at a complete loss for words, this year is so completely different than what I had imagined. I tried really hard to not form expectations before I got here, because I knew that there was no way that things would happen the way that I thought. I am really glad that I didn't because it hasn't been at all what I had imagined it could be, and I am so glad. I never imagined that I could change this much in such a short amount of time. Even my friends here are noticing differences between who I was in the first month, and who I am now.
The first weekend of November, the Governor of Rotary in Mato Grosso came to Tangara. It was a really big deal, and the three rotary clubs, the interact club, the rotaract club, and the Casa Da Amizade, all worked together for this event. For the first three nights, each rotary club put on a dinner event. I went to the last two. They were very formal. Me and Leah went to my rotary club's together, and we had to wear our blazers. That was really nice because I didn't have the proper clothes, and that way I got to wear pants (: It was worth it to sit through the almost four hour ceremony because the food was AMAZING. It was so good. There was this desert, and I liked it so much that the cook made me my own pan to bring home. She always cooks for our rotary meetings and the food is always really good. The desert is called Pave (number 22 on the list in the next section). The kind that I had was made with cookies, brigadeiro (chocolatey goodness), and strawberries.
This is a list of 24 Traditional Brazilian Foods, and I've eaten almost all of them. The only ones that I haven't had are the seafood ones, mostly because I love smack in the center of south america and there isn't much seafood here. The descriptions of what they taste like aren't always the way that I would describe them, but just by looking at the pictures you can see that it's pretty delicious. So delicious in fact that I've been following the normal exchange student trend of gaining weight. To give you an idea of how much weight I've gained, in the past week I've ripped two pairs of pants down the crotch. Laugh now dad, but you won't be laughing at the price a pair of jeans costs here :) I would normally just patch them, but my host mom said that jeans with patches of colorful fabric aren't really an accepted thing here, so I'll just wait until I get back to the states.
(She laughed really hard at me when she saw what I was doing, and my whole family constantly teases me for my hippy ways, like using a drawstring bag to carry my stuff around it and wearing patched toms).
Anyway, the week that we had the governor here, we also had the Exchange Student Orientation for all of the exchange students in Mato Grosso. It was an absolutely amazing weekend. They all arrived friday afternoon, and that night we all went out to eat at a big pizzeria.
We were really loud because we were so excited to meet each other and all of the rotarians and host parents were laughing. There was a guy singing and so we went and danced and sang along because he was singing music that was really good for dancing, and that is so popular we all know the words. (here are some of the songs,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58qyVjctzIw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M79e5ji-53w
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzS61Jennkw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x87ekx8TnLQ
After pizza we all walked to the hotel where we decided that sleep wasn't a necessity, and we stayed up talking until almost three in the morning. The next morning we went down for breakfast around 7:30, and then headed over for a rotary meeting at 8. At the meeting there were a lot of presentations, and then at the end we took a ton of pictures with everyone.
After the meeting, we all went out to the waterfall, Salto das Nuves, and even though it was actually really cold out, we all sat out in the water in a big circle and sang songs for a really long time. I'd guess about two or three hours of singing. Everyone was laughing at me, and at Gerardo, and exchange student from Mexico, because we were shivering really badly.
After the waterfall, we all went back to the hotel and took showers, and then we drove out to one of those open walled pavilion building, and had a dance party. The exchange students were all dancing around in a big circle, it was really fun because they played a lot of music from the U.S. and we got to dance around like we would normally dance. When the Interact kids got there, they didn't really know what to do because it was our kind of dancing. For once it was us laughing with them and trying to teach them to dance like us. It was a really great night.
After that we went back to the hotel, where we were way too excited and awake to sleep, so we all crowded into one room and just talked and laid around until about 5 or 6 in the morning. That next morning everyone had to leave and go back to their own cities, and so I went home and got some much needed sleep.
Then next week, I switched host families. I wasn't expecting it to be so hard to switch families. I really miss my first family, but I also absolutely love my new one. They're both so different and yet I feel comfortable in each. My time at my first host family was more relaxed. My host mom was often at work and my host dad was usually out doing rotary things or working at the local Casa Das Criancas, the orphanage in our city. Me and my brother Henrique would get home from school, eat lunch and then after dishes, usually have the afternoon to ourselves. I had rotary on Wednesday nights with my host dad and mom, and then Interact on Fridays. That was basically it. The rest of the time I would go our with friends, walk downtown, go running, work on portuguese, watch TV with Henrique, sleep, cook with my host mom, read, eat, and other wonderful things
At my new house, things are a little more scheduled. We have Cafe da Amanha, (breakfast) every morning at 6:30, Almoso (lunch) at 12:30, and Cafe da Tarde (we don't really have this in the states, but it's basically a snack and coffee) at 3:30. Usually me and my host dad eat leftovers or some sort of quick-cooked meal around 9:30 or 10:00 at night because we get hungry. I don't have much alone time because I have a little brother Joao Pedro who is 12, and a little sister Valentina who is 3. I am with her from about 7:00 in the morning until she goes to school after we eat lunch. We play lots of games together, make forts, she loves to do my hair and makeup, we make cake for Cafe da Tarde, play in her tree house fort, take snuggle naps, and lots of other things. Joao (me and Leah call him Johnny), is at school from 7 in the morning until noon, and then has to go back after eating lunch. We play soccer together a lot and go swimming in the pool in the backyard. On saturdays, my host mom takes the three of us to a street market for lunch, and we all get pasteis and tapioca. (Pasteis is number 7 on the food list up above). Then we walk around and buy different vegetables and fruits. On sunday nights we go to church together. I went to my first service two Sunday night's ago. I am really glad that I am familiar with what to do because of the church services I sang at with the NYC (northfield youth choirs), it made me feel a lot more comfortable. The biggest difference I saw between the church services that I've attended in the states, and now in Brasil, is that the people here are really intense. There is a lot of singing and the people are a lot more involved with the service. They had a lot of movements that went along with the songs, and they had a lot of prayers that everyone said together. My little sister Valentina fell asleep during the service, and because my host mom went up to do communion, I got to hold her for most of the service. I kept getting smiles because of how cute she is with her curly blond hair. She just slept right through the whole thing even though people were yelling and singing and clapping.
I just realize that I've never posted pictures of my first house or of my first family, so I'll post first some from there, and then from my new house and of my new family. I don't have the pictures from my new house yet but when I'm not sick, I'll take some and add them in.
My second host family:
I switched host families one week before school got out for the year. Because I was in the third year, the graduating class, it was a pretty crazy last week. Everyone was both extremely excited to be graduating, and extremely stressed about passing all of the tests and classes. There were tests in every class that week, and so a lot of my time at school was spent working in my Portuguese work books during the tests, and then dancing and messing around with my friends when we had a basically free period. The teacher was still usually in the room, but they usually were messing around with us too. We took a lot of pictures. It was with my camera, so I am not in a lot of them, but I want to post them anyway :)
I've got some bad news too. (Dad feel free to send me an angry email) I broke my tablet. It was in my bag on my desk and all of the kids in my class were dancing around when school was done on the last day, and I accidentally knocked the bag off my table, when my friend went to use it to translate a word for me, he found that the screen had shattered. That wasn't a very great day.
But, anyway, pictures!! :)
(the first one is Henrique my wonderful host brother and best buddy :) he's making a face because he hates pictures)
The night that we graduated we all went over to my friend Isa's house, and we did a kind of secret santa present exchange. The difference was that with this you didn't give your present to the other person, you went and described them until someone guessed the right person. It was really fun and a lot of people cried because of how sweet it was. Then the rest of the night we swam in the pool, ate yummy food, and danced to Brazilian music. Here are some pictures from that night.
It was really lucky that I was able to go to this party, I'm really glad that I was. ODIC, this big camp for all of the Interact kids in Cuiaba, Tangara, and other cities in our state was the same weekend. I was supposed to have left that afternoon, but I figured out that some rotary members of my club were driving out early the next morning. I asked if I could go with them instead, and thankfully it all worked out! I was exhausted when I arrived at ODIC, but soon the excitement of seeing all of the other wonderful exchange students, all of my friends from interact, and meeting a bunch of new people soon woke me up. We did so much those three next days, I could write a whole blog post describing everything, so I'll just write the big stuff. First off, the theme was Harry Potter (Yay!) and we were all separated into the four houses, and then the other wizarding schools. Our different teams competed in different challenges over the three days, which was a lot of fun. Also, every night there was a big party, and each night was themed differently. I missed Las Vegas night, but I was there for the two others, cowboy night, and fantasy (basically Halloween). We also went to a big water park and were there from about 9 in the morning to 4 in the evening. The park didn't have much for shade, and even though I diligently re-applied sunscreen with all the other exchange students not used to the sun, I was bright red by the time we got back on the bus.
Another really funny thing that happened at the water-park was that I ended up dancing a song in front of almost a hundred people. They were having a sexy dancing contest where girls would come up and in front of everyone and dance this really popular dance (I'll post the link below, but be careful who you open it in front of, it's a little..well Brazilian). The announcer found out that there were exchange students in the park and so he stated yelling for us. Someone pointed out Fernanda, an exchange student from Mexico, and the guy convinced her to come up with him and the other Brazilian girls. Then she said, "but there are other exchange students here". The guy asked her where from, and she said the U.S.. Then he asked what my name was, and everyone started yelling OLIVIA as a chant. The other interact kids pushed me out of the crowd and then he walked over and grabbed my arm and lead me over. Then they got Julia, from Germany to come too. There were the three of us and about 10 Brazilian girls. It was absolutely ridiculous, the song started and we were laughing so hard because we don't know the dance, and trying to follow along with the other girls. Everyone thought it was hilarious :) Then when they voted who got to stay, it was the three of us and three Brazilian girls. We had to dance again in front of everyone, and when they voted again, it was just the three of us and one Brazilian girl. Everyone was laughing and cheering and afterwards we got a t-shirt to remember the experience from. (I do like free t-shirts)
The first is the official video, but you can't really see the dancing, so the second is the actual dance. (and the girls dancing with us were pretty close to that good, I looked like an idiot) You can imagine how funny it was much easier once you watch the video, especially if you've ever seen me try to dance like a Brazilian. It was one of the most embarrassing, but hilarious experiences I've had.
I got back really late Sunday night, and spent Monday and Tuesday having much needed rest time with my family. On Wednesday, I went over to my first house because Henrique had a lot of our friends form school there. We made lunch, it's called strogonoff , but it is very different than the strogonoff that I've had before, it was really good. You eat it with rice (of course) and then put these, kinda like potato chips, but they're really tiny little strips.
Thursday night I got to see my friends again because the teachers from our school took all of our graduating class out to eat at the fancy hamburger restaurant. It was a ton of fun, and we took a bunch of pictures. I thought it was kinda funny because it was a really expensive restaurant, but the hamburgers weren't much better than just a normal street diner, but because I haven't had one in so long, it was probably the best hamburger I've ever had. They all laughed at how excited I was, and then they laughed because I asked for mustard and ketchup and pickles. Unfortunately they didn't have any pickles. When we were done eating, we decided that we weren't done being together, and so we walked downtown for Ice-cream. My teacher, who is one of my best friend's dad said that he could drive me home afterward, and when he came to pick us up, we had to fit six of us in the backseat, and two others (besides him) up front. Thankfully we all lived really close by, and since it was night, we were the only car on the road. This is really normal in Brasil, and you will often see trucks go by with a bunch of people in the back. (Don't worry mom, I'm way to scared to do that, and none of my friends do it either). The last picture is my personal favorite :)
On Saturday we had our Formatura, it was the graduation ceremony. Every girl was dressed up in a really fancy dress, and almost everyone had theirs made specifically for them. I did too, thankfully because it was a lot cheaper. My dress was a deep wine color, and was really simple with an open back. It was very different from our graduation ceremonies (at least from ARTech's and I would imagine the High school's as well) We all had to wait backstage, and then the announcer would call someone's name and you had to walk across this stage, and down the stairs, and then walk up this really long aisle with your parents. My parents couldn't come, so Leah and my little brother Joao walked me :) Everyone thought that was really adorable, because he was in a little suit, Then we sat onstage and a bunch of people gave speeches. Afterwards everyone danced and it was really fun! I don't have many pictures because they were taken by professional photographers. I'm not sure if, or when I'll get those, but if I do, I'll add them in.
Last Friday, my host mom's sister from another city, her son, my two cousins who live in Tangara, and my host mom's mother were at our house for lunch.
My cousins are:
Marcus, 18
Ryan, 6 (pronounced He-on, we became best buddies)
Vitor 13 I think.
This is Marcus, Joao, and Vitor.
We had churrasco, both beef and a special fish from the river here, farofa (number 4 I think from that list, it's one of my favorites) rice, beans, and fruit. Afterwards, me and Marcus took little Ryan, Vitor and Joao swimming, it was a ton of fun. We were all so hot that we just jumped right in the pool in our clothes. We played a bunch of wrestling games, and then jumped off the deck into the water. After swimming awhile, we played football. Eventually it turned into wrestling again, and we jumped back into the pool. That night was Valentina's ballet performance. We all went, and it was absolutely adorable. Because she is only three, her group did a little piece where they were flowers. It was so cute, the little girls kept getting distracted or confused, and everyone was smiling and laughing.
Afterwards I went to another formatura, it was for Ideal, another school in Tangara. This formatura was really fun because there were a lot more kids there for the party afterwards. Me and my friends had a lot of fun dancing and singing along to the music. The next morning, I went to the open market with my host mom, aunt, and cousins. We ate pasteis and tapioca and bought more fruits and vegetables for later. Afterwards we went back to the house and went swimming again.
Wow, this has turned into a huge post! I've had a wonderful month, I will try to keep the next post smaller :) and I will add the rest of those pictures in when I get them, I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving, and that the Paulsen family has a good cookie day!
Beijos,
Olivia
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