Ski Ferien!

After my weeks stay in Germany, I came back and had three weeks of school, and then two weeks of holidays for skiing. I spent both weeks in the mountains with my host families skiing. It was really beautiful, and amazing. BUT.... I recently had a memory card failure (and lost about 400 pictures from the past 3 weeks), and may have lost all proof of these trips forever. So What I'm going to do is mail my memory card to my brother back home, and hopefully he can recover the lost photos from it.

I spent the first week of vacation in Arosa with my 2nd and current host family. A ski resort/location in Kanton Graübunden. In south-eastern Switzerland. I traveled there with my host mom with the trains. It was a long ride, but so worth it. We spent the week there. every day, we would get up and eat, then go skiing until 3 or 4. Then come back to the hotel to relax in the welness baths and saunas. Every day after dinner, I would play a couple games of biliards with my host brother, then go sit in the restaurant on the top floor of the hotel with my host family playing games. Like connect 4 and a Swiss game called Jas (pronounced yas). The last day, on the way home, my host mom and I stopped for an hour in Chur. It is a nice Swiss city, and it was a nice day to see it.

For the second week of ski vacation, I was with my first host family in Ovronnaz, a different skiing place in Kanton Wallis. It was a really nice ski place, and a really nice ski house that we lived in for the week. Instead of a hotel, we had a vacation house that was rented out to us for the week. It was nice, and had 5 bedrooms, one of which i got all to myself. :D My "host niece and nephiew were there too. They are the cutest little Swiss kids, and I had a lot of fun playing with them for the week. Ronja, the oldest, shares my birthday, so When I got here back in August, we had a combined birthday party.

Now I have three more weeks of school, and then I get to miss a week of school with Yoda to teach Swiss kids from my Village how to ski at their ski camp. It should be lots of fun! After the ski camp, I have one more week of school, and then it's already time for the Italy trip!

So I love my host families and I couldn't thank them enough for bringing me with on their ski vacations. I had a lot of fun!

Deutschland!

So I've been really bad at blogging all that has been happening to me, So here comes (hopefully) a nice long chain of posts! :D I spent the last week of Christmas vacation, the first week of 2011, in Germany with Raphael. on the 2nd of January, I woke up at 5 a.m. to get to Dortmund, Germany at about 2.30 p.m. It was awesome to see Raphael again, and his family was really amazing throughout the whole trip. We spent the first day and a half in Dortmund doing different things in the city, with his family, and friends. Tuesday morning, we took a train 3 hours to Berlin. Spent 3 days there seeing the city. We saw pretty much the whole city while we were there. The weather was cold but I still had a great time. But there is a lot to tell you, so how about I just show you instead!!

Bowling in Dortmund!

German "capital building"

Berlin Main Train Station

The Berlin Wall

Checkpoint Charlie

At the Jewish Museum in Berlin

Raphael and I

Swiss Embassy

One night in Berlin, Raphael and I got to meet up with A-I! She was also in the States last year doing an exchange, and we were all in a show that Rotary put together.

Thank you Raphael, and your family so much for your kindness and generosity! They made my year here in Europe much more memorable. It was amazing to get to see you again. I know we will meet somewhere in the future too!... say, Zürich maybe? :D

5 Months down, 6 to go.

Exactly 5 months ago today, at 9 in the morning, I arrived in Zürich International airport. The last 5 months have been more adventerous and eventful then any consecutive 5 months of my life.
In the last 5 months, I have been to 3 different countries (4 if you count the US).
I have tried new (and delicious) foods.
5 months ago I rode my first train... since then, I've spent countless hours/days traveling around Switzerland with them.
5 months ago I could say "hi" and "where is the bathroom" in German, now I can hold a steady conversation with anyone. Maybe even throwing in a little Swiss-German too!
I've seen castles, churches and buildings older then the United States, Famous mountains and landmarks.
I've missed my fair share of busses and trains.
I've froze on top of the Little Matterhorn with a train load of other exchange students, and had a great time doing it.
I've been skiing in the Alps.
I've been asked about Obama.... a lot.
I can understand movies in German now... for the most part.
I've bought and eaten an 11 lb Toblerone chocolate bar, with the help of some friends.
I've helped a few American strangers find their way around Zürich.
I've lived with amazing host families, that feel more like real family then just a host family.


The next 6 months are going to go by faster then the first 5!

December and the Holidays

Lugano, Switzerland
(in the Italian part, about 15 minutes from Italy)

December went by faster then I would have liked, but it was a good month. I've been skiing a few times in the Alps here, and it was absolutely amazing. I went once with friends, and a couple other times with my host families.

Skiing

Picasso exhibition in Zürich

Castle in Baden.

A traditional Swiss Christmas festival.
Küssnacht am Rigi

My Christmas Tree!
Not as big as back home, but I liked it.

A lot of Swiss families burn real candles on their Christmas Trees.

My Christmas this year was very Swedish. My host mom was born and raised in Sweden, but my host dad is Swiss. They can all speak Swedish fluently, as well as German. My host mom can also speak a few other languages. My host aunt and her son were visiting from Italy(she is also Swedish), and My host mothers cousin from Germany was here too. So in my house there was Italian, Swedish, German, Swiss German, and English being spoken. English because my host cousin only speaks Italian, and Swedish, but a little English. Conversations were always being translated between German, and Swedish, and Italian.
Traditions were a little different here. We opened presents on Christmas Eve, and not Christmas Morning. We had a big dinner on Christmas Eve instead of the usual Christmas morning breakfast of strawberry pancakes with eggs, bacon, and whipped cream, :D That might be the thing that I missed the most throughout all the holidays.

Christmas Eve Dinner.

Christmas morning breakfast. I made pancakes!

A day out with my host family. The day after Christmas.

On the way up to the top of Uetliberg.

Uetliberg is also known as Zürich's mountain.
You can see the whole city from the top.

After coming out from a break in the cafe, it was dark so we got to see the city lights.

The Matterhorn!

Last weekend, the 27th and 28th, was the Rotary Matterhorn trip. It was an awesome weekend with over 100 exchange students! I started out on Saturday morning riding from my house to Zürich HB (Zürich's main train station), there I met up with probably 9 or 10 other exchange students. We took a train to Bern, and met with about 20 more. From Bern we rode to Visp. Waited there for about 20 minutes when the rest of us came. Rotary reserved a train car from Visp to Zermatt. Zermatt is the home of the Matterhorn.

The train ride from Visp to Zermatt was crazy! there weren't enough seats for all of us, even with the reserved car. So we were all over the place sitting on the ground, in the door way, on the bag racks, people standing in between all the seats. At one point, Yoda and I played Hide and seek.


The gang from Bern to Visp.







We get to Zermatt, and walk about 15 minutes to the hostel where we stayed the night... We got a lot of looks as there were 100+ people walking down the street, none of them speaking German. Cause we're exchange students... we don't speak German when we are all together.



We get to the Hostel, and are split up into countries... here are a few of the Americans... But if we say we are from America, the Latinos will get mad... so here is a group of the USA students!




After we all got our rooms, we all met in the middle of the village, and split into groups of 5 or 6, and had a scavenger hunt. It was lots of fun, and the things we had to do were a little weird. We had 5 tasks.
1. Take a picture of the Mattehorn with a Swiss flag in front of it.
2. Take a picture of a wedding couple, or a picture of a picture. Also find a fried egg.... For free, "FREE"... doesn't exist in Switzerland... ever.
3. Find the price and place of the most expencive hotel room, and the cheapest hotel room, Price of ski rentals for a day, and price for an area pass for a day. The most expencive hotel was at a 5 star hotel, and it was 3,030 Franks for one night.... that's just about the same in USD.

For this next one, you have to know a little bit about Swiss German. It's not like Swiss German is universal for the whole country, You travel an hour away, and they use different words, and speak differently as well. So here's what we had to do.

4. Find 10 phrases in Swiss German that are unique to the Zermatt region.
5. Trade a cookie cutter (heart shaped) for something cooler or of greater value. (also not easy to get swiss people to give you something for free when they don't get money in return.) We ended up getting a magnet of the canton Valais flag.

That night, we had Fondue for dinner. It wasn't the best... but that's alright.

Sunday morning we went to the top of the Little Matterhorn, a neighboring mountain top of the Mtterhorn. It was snowing and REALLY COLD! So we couldn't see anything from up there really at all. But here is the group of most of us.

What can I say... Looked just like a GIANT Toblerone.
















The Family!... well some of them.













Louis and I on the way to school one day... I'd say I'm startin to look pretty Swiss.

What is Switzerland?

Switzerland is the experience of a lifetime.
Switzerland is expencive.
Switzerland is a completely new life.
Switzerland is full of adventures waiting to happen.
Switzerland is more then just good chocolate.
Switzerland is beautiful.
Switzerland is a new school with new friends.
Switzerland is not being able to understand people.
Switzerland is a new culture.
Switzerland is not REAL German.
Switzerland is getting better and better with every day.
Switzerland is smaller then Lake Superior.
Switzerland is a public transportation wonder.
Switzerland is not in the European Union.
Switzerland is not as easy as I sometimes make is seem.
Switzerland is the country with the tallest mountain in Europe.
Switzerland is cold right now.
Switzerland is in need of snow so Benjamin can go skiing.
Switzerland is full of awesome Rotarians.
Switzerland is 4310 miles (6936 Kilometers) from home.
Switzerland is in need of a rotary district as awesome as district 6220.
Switzerland is more then trains.... they have boats too.
Switzerland is full of mountains that I will miss next year.
Switzerland is in need of a Chem teacher as amazing as Mrs. Mazzon.
Switzerland is run by a council (instead of a president). That council has more women then men.
Switzerland is housing the 2010-2011 exchange student ski team!
Switzerland is a lot more... but i can't think of anything else right now.

On top of the World!

We had fall break for school the first two weeks in October. The first week, I traveled a lot around Switzerland with the other exchange students, and friends from school. The Second week, my host parents brought be and my host sister to Mallorca, Spain. Mallorca is an island a little south of Spain. It was really beautiful, and I swam in the Ocean for the first time, went hiking with my host parents, went snorkeling with the fish, and ate a LOT of doughnuts at the buffet every morning.

So when I first got to Switzerland, I discovered Mango fanta... which was exciting. Then I went to Spain, and discovered Lemon Fanta... which wasn't as exciting as Mango, but it ws still awesome. Then about a week ago I learned that there are actually over 90 different mango flavors worldwide. now that is exciting.



Two weeks ago, a few friends and I went to Schloss Chillon. A castle in a little bit to the south east of Lausanne, and on Lake Geneva. It was HUGE, and really cool. I went with Yoda, Jenna, and Wes. Took us a while to find it, but once we got there, we made some really good pictures. Even figured out how to do something cool with my camera! Long exposure pictures are a lot of fun sometimes.

Yoda, Wes, me and Jenna!

Schloss Chillion

Here is a picture from last month. I went to the Stanzerhorn, a mountain that you get to with a pin wheel train, and a cable car. It was really beautiful.

Last Sunday, there was a country fair for Rotary, for you who don't know what that is. We (the inbounds from other countries) make booths with information, pictures, maps etc. of our countries. Then all the outbounds (Swiss students going abroad next year) come and go to all the booths to get a better idea of where they actually want to go. There were about 90 outbounds there, and out of them, 59 put on their application that they wanted to go to the USA for exchange! 59... there is only 30 spots for it, so a few of them are going to be dissapointed. Here's the good part though, after it was just over, a student and his parrents came to talk about the USA, so I talked to them about the school system, sports, trips that Rotary does.... for a good half hour... ALL in German! I was
pretty proud of myself

We had a surprise birthday party for Shannon, an exchanges student from Florida.

Hiking with my host family in southern Bern.

My host sisters God daughter. She's wearing the Twins shirt
that I gave her for her birthday... Which happens to be the same as mine.

Skating in Luzern with a bunch of exchange students one afternoon.


Another of the Schloss Chillion.

A really cool tree we found on the way to the castle. In Lausanne.

A day trip to Geneva! (Genf auf Deutsch)

The crew at the United Nations. We couldn't go inside cause it closed 30 minutes before we got there, but it's still cool to say we were there!

This is the famous fountain in Geneva Jet d`Eau. Yeah... that's French. While we were in the French speaking part, we let the Canadian, who knew French, do the talking. Except for once when I was ordering a kebab. Using all the German skills i could find at the time.... in return I recieve a blank stare, and fast French sentences. We switched to English...

Earlier that same day... we bought the biggest chocolate bar I've ever seen!

Nick and I are doing the honor of opening it.


Trips can sometimes end up like this.