Skyzone and Garden Factory

29th of November, Saturday

We were supposed to go to Niagara Falls with an Australian girl and the Gormonts, but the girl didn't come, so the trip was off. Instead, I went to Skyzone, with my volleyball team. Coach P wanted one last event to celebrate the season.
   Skyzone was the first place I was told to go to, when I asked, what I should do in Greece NY. It's an indoor trampoline park. The whole place is covered in trampolines, even the walls. There are different courts, for the first part of our one hour pass, we played dodgeball in our own private court against each other. Although I've never been to anything like Skyzone, we do play a lot of dodgeball in Hungary. Every fun PE class is spent playing different variations of the game.
  The jumping was amazing. We got cute orange socks with sticky squares on them, and took our places on the court. I love trampolines, it was so much fun. I got tired though, quite soon. All that jumping takes a lot of energy.  Before I knew it, 50 minutes have passed, playing dodgeball, and our 1 hour pass was almost up. I explored other parts of the trampoline park too, like Sky Slam, which is trampoline-basketball (I was really bad at it, so I gave that up), and also a place, where you ca jump into a huge pit full of foam cubes. However comfortable it is, to do a flip off the trampoline into a sea of softness, getting out of it was quite difficult. Dube got a blurry picture of me doing a flip. Skyzone is not a safe place though. At least one injury a day happens. So it did, when we were there. A little girl was taken away by the ambulance.
  After the one hour, I left Skyzone exhausted, like a 5 year old after running around the whole day. This place is heaven for kids with ADHD. My feet were so tired, they hurt. I might have sore legs tomorrow. But it was so much fun, I don't care. A good workout and a lot of excitement.
  After grabbing a bite at 3 at home (because I didn't dare eat before going on the trampolines), we went to the Garden Factory with Herb, Anne, Sun and Xynan. It's a big store where you can buy Christmas-y stuff and Christmas trees. Also, there are a lot of attractions for kids, like a petting zoo, slides, games, toy train and a merry-go-round. We got there around 30 minutes before closing time, so we only had time to visit Santa and take a picture with him. We chose a tree and as soon as it was tied to the top of the car, we were off. We also visited this expensive store, where you could buy fancy Christmas ornaments and gifts. Herb wanted me to choose an ornament, to put on the new tree, so me and Sun both got one.

Thanksgiving & Black Friday

27th of November, Thursday
My very first Thanksgiving! This is the most American holiday, not just because of the history (the concurers and the Indians making peace for one feast), but also because it involves a lot of food. We don't celebrate Thanksgiving in Europe (I've been asked this question a lot lately), but I'm glad I can finally experience this too, I've only seen this tradition in movies before.
  Alma left at 10, and Herb and Anne worked in the kitchen since the morning. The guests arrived at 3 pm. Two of Anne's sisters came with their families, Herbie, Carol, Bevin and her sons DJ and Xynan. There were a lot of people in the basement, we barely fit. I just loved the ambiance of the house today. Everyone was happy, there was a lot of chattering, laughing, having fun. And the dinner was absolutely delicious. We had two turkeys, mashed potatoes, gravy, vegetables, everything you need for a traditional Thanksgiving feast.
   And some other exciting news: I bought a laptop. I ordered a refurbished Lenovo u430 online. I'm really happy about it!
  Black Friday shopping is nowadays on Thanksgiving day. All the best deals are available on Thursday. So me, Bevin, DJ, Sun, Erin and Merci (Bevin's best friend and her daughter), we went out shopping. We went to Walmart first. We spent around 30 minutes outside, waiting in line in the freezing cold. When we got in, everything was crazy. Tense employees, trying to fight their way through the crowd, trying to listen to the 5 different customers' questions. I got a 1T external hard drive, earphones, gloves, stockings and a huge 28 piece Sharpie set. It took us hours to get all our stuff and check out.
  Our next stop was the mall. The first store I went to was Charlotte Rousse, where I bought two knit cardigans. I got a lot of clothes at Old Navy, and a ring and necklace at Claire's. We also went to Target, but I didn't buy anything there. Although I've saved a lot of money, I spent a lot too. But I guess that's what Black Friday is all about. I could experience every bit of it. The waiting in line, the pushing, the rush and the getting home at 1 o'clock with so many bags that I could barely fit the door. It was a lot of fun though.
  Thanksgiving is about appreciating the people and things in your life. So today, I thought of everything I;m grateful for. I'm most grateful for having the best parents ever. They're really awesome, I know I wouldn't be who I am today, if it weren't for them. I'm thankful for this year, that I can spend it here in America. Although Rochester is a very cold city, the people in it brighten my days. I'm grateful for my friends at home, who still keep in touch with me, even though we are an ocean away. I'm thankful for my new friends from my new school, and from Rotary. The Rotary club is like a second home to me, thank you, for making my experience so wonderful! I just feel so lucky, to be surrounded by so much love and opportunity.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Decorations

26th of November, Wednesday

The day before Thanksgiving, first day of Thanksgiving break. NO SCHOOL!
  I had a Rotary meeting, which was really interesting. I invited Alma, so she got to meet the club, and could see a little bit about my weekly routine. She liked it a lot. There weren't many people, because of the holidays. For weeks, I prepared to sing Hungarian folk-songs, and today I did. Because there was no speaker at the meeting today, I took my time, and sung 11 songs I collected. They represented the major themes in Hungarian songs, like love songs, soldier songs or children songs. The Rotarians seemed to like it. Or even if they didn't they acted really grateful and congratulated me. It felt good, I was surrounded by friends, who care about one another.
  On the way home, Kim took me and Alma to AC Moore, then back home. We organized the basement for Thanksgiving. We are expecting 20 something people. Herb and Sun took tables from the church, and we set up the 4 giant tables downstairs, filling the entire room. We hid the storage parts of the basement, and organized everything. Me and Alma, we grabbed some pieces of paper, and markers, and made a bunch of decorations for the empty walls. We drew leaves and eventually, we made turkey themed drawings, cut the birds and plants out, and taped them on the wall. It took us several hours, but we had fun just being artsy. Now the basement has a happy Thanksgiving theme.
  In the evening, Herb took me and Alma for a last minute pre-Thanksgiving shopping to Sam's club, where Alma got crazy. She kept jumping on the shopping kart, she was hilarious, because she looked like a five year old trapped in a grown up body. When we found some awesome giant Grumpy Cat plushes, she calmed down a little bit.
  When we got back, we continued our artwork until midnight. We planned on watching a movie, but we just ended up talking until 1:30.

Broken laptop

24th and 25th of November, Monday - Tuesday

These two days have been the only schooldays this week. Two easy skinny days. But they weren't emotionally easy. My laptop broke, and it didn't work when I restarted it. That means, the situation is bad. Very bad.
  I gave it to Mr. Doty on Monday to take a look at it. He's a computer science teacher at Athena, but he gave it back on Tuesday with some bad news. The problem is probably with the hard drive. Which means, all the pictures, schoolwork, everything is lost.
  On top of my cyber misery, my bus left me behind at the end of the day. Not like that's uncommon, my buslady is a very impatient woman. So Herb picked me up, and he wanted to cheer me up, so we went to McDonald's, for the first time. I've been joking about the fact that I haven't been there yet, because McDonalds seems like a really typical American thing, but now I can cross this off my bucket list.
  I only ordered a cheeseburger, no wonder they gave me a McChicken. First McDonald's experience in the US, and they messed up my order. It's quite funny, luckily, the new sandwich is actually "healthier" and more expensive than we paid, so I didn't complain.
  After lunch, we went to a computer specialist, to ask him about my laptop, but his deal was way too expensive to fix it.
  At 5, Kim picked me up, and took me to their house. I was invited earlier the day for dinner, to say goodbye to Abbey, who's moving to NYC on the weekend. We chatted and had some delicious chicken. I always love going to the Masiello's. They have great food and I always learn something new. 

Mockingjay part 1

23rd of November, Sunday

We saw the Hilton High School's musical yesterday, The Sound of Music. That's the only thing that happened on Saturday.

  Sunday started off sadly. My laptop of 9 years broke, and I think sonething's wrong with the hard drive. It made a funny noise, and it doesn't do anything, it just repeats the same text over and over again. If anybody knows a key combination or something I can use to at least enter the BIOS settings, I'd be very happy. (I have an ancient Lenovo N500, which has grown to be my daily companion).

  After talking to my parents, Herb took me to the mall, where I met Alma. We went shopping for hours. My primary object to hunt was a pair of good winter boots, but I haven't found any. All there was was a few fall boots, that weren't even waterproof.

  So after windowshopping for 3 hours (which was enough time for Alma to buy 2 sweaters, a ring, a pair of Converses and stockings), we sat in the movie theatre to watch The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1. It's the first half of the book Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins (which I've read), and the third part if the movie sequel The Hunger Games. My parents saw it yesterday in Hungary.

I don't want to spoil anything but it was AWESOME!!! I loved it so much. The beginning was a little slow, but it got faster after the first 30 minutes.

  The only distraction was Alma. She kept commenting on everything and kept asking questions. Who's that? What's he doing? What's in the box? I don't know what's in the box, I haven't seen this movie either! But she shouted anyways. I was surprised we weren't sent out. Italians are loud, especially in the cinema. :D

The picture is of me, skypeing with my dog.

Report card

21st of November, Friday

Another schoolweek has come to an end. Finished with a skinny day, where nothing really happened. Except for Creative Writing, which is always fun. We moved on to 5 word horror stories. Spooky! But the stories weren't necessarily scary, they could be about personal horrors. Here are some of the best from today:

WiFi is slow. No Facebook!

Hiding on tree. Branch snaps.

Went to school without pants.

Drowning in my own blood.

Pushed, not jumped. Survived, silent.

I need a new arm.

and my personal favourite:

Student loans and gas prices.

After school, I took a long nap. Yay! I got woken up by Herb and Sun getting home. We decided to go out to this Greek place 7 minutes away.
  The Greece Family Restaurant. It wasn't very Greek, but they had a Macedonian waitress, who kept hugging and kissing us. She was very sweet. I had a gyros (also known as kebab), which is a Greek-Turkish dish. It's meat with salad and vegetables (often with tzatziki), wrapped in a thicker pastry. Absolutely delicious. Because of the many Turkish immigrants in Hungary, Budapest is full of kebab delis. Gyros is a cheap and quick food a Hungarian can eat when hungry (hehehe, still not funny). So even though it's not Hungarian, our people embraced it in their culture recently.
  I kind of missed it, and this one (though a little bit different than usual), was very yummy! It was a nice experience, and a lovely dinner.
  Another interesting thing that happened, my report card arrived today. It's a document, that tell parents about their kids' first quarter grades. They're sent out in the mail at the end of every quarter year. Turns out, almost everything I told you about my grades is right, except for PE, where my average is 91%. Don't ask me how that happened.
  Altogether, I have a 92% average.

Dinner at Davinci with Judy, Tracy and Larry

20th of November, Thursday

When I stepped outside today, our street was beautiful. Everything was covered in deep, white snow. It was so pretty. And because I was so impressed by the surroundings, I didn't notice the cold. I took out my ski jacket, my warmest coat already, plus I wore the Russian hat my sister gave me, which can protect one from a winter in Moscow. And it's just November. Still, this much snow is nothing compared to what's west of here in Buffalo. It snowed 7 ft in the last few days there, and everything stopped working. Traffic, transportation, work. Everybody's just trying to get rid of all the snow.
  In Creative Writing today, our topic was flash fiction. It's the short version of short stories. They often have a word limit, which in today's example was 6. We had to write a six word story in a few minutes in class, and everyone cam eup with something great. Often sad or funny, but sometimes inspirational or deep.
  Once I started thinking in 6 word stories, I couldn't stop. I kept writing them untill I got home, 3 hours later. These are some of the best ones I came up with today:

Promised he'd love forever. He lied.

Cake gone. Diabetic roommate. Calling police.

There are no unicorns. Feeling depressed.

Santa is actually my parents? What?

Died but her heart lived on.

My mute child says "Hi Mom!"

Left your knife in my back.

Last man alive hears a scream.

One short of Guiness World Record.

No makeup hides the ugly within.

I'm a murderer, not a vegetarian.

Too cool for school. Failed grade.

But I wrote like 50 more. Even at the concert in Select Choir, I couldn't stop. A college orchestra visited us, and they gave us a 1,5 hour long show. The whole music department was there. I listened to their music, and wrote my stories. After the concert, we were free to go home.
  Larry picked me up at 5:30. We went to this Italian place called Davinci. It's a very nice restaurant, real Italian, with no pizza. We had some pasta while we talked. Such a merry company. We joked around the whole time. It's always funny to hang out with them, they have a great sense of humor. It was hard to believe we only spent 2 hours there, time flies fast if you're having fun. Thank you, Judy, Tracy and Larry for the dinner, it was really awesome, I enjoyed it a lot!!! <3
 

Snow falling outside of school, like a fairy tale.

Concert in the Athena Performing Arts Center (aka APAC)

On the way home from school in my Russian hat

Most of the snow melted by the afternoon on our street

Channel 8 tour

19th of November, Wednesday

I woke up at 10 am today, and I had a hunch, that I might have been late for school. This might be one of the worst cases of oversleeping. Roger Boily picked me up for the Rotary meeting. I brought the pastry I baked the day before. 

  This Rotary meeting was extra special. We inducted four new members in the club, which is a lot! We learned some things about the new members, and they were given the Rotary pin. The people were a little hype, and the whole room was filled with an elevated feeling. 

  I would like to thank the Rotarians for their generous donations. All this goes to my "Discover America Bus Trip" jar. Thank You!! 

 Today, I had a chance to visit the Channel 8 news studio. I organized it with the help of Rita with Wendy Halik, who is an executive news producer. Anne took me there, and she came with me on the tour. 

  Wendy greeted us in the lobby at 3:30, and our Wednesday afternoon adventure began. She took us in the producers' room first, where they prepare the news. Everyone was very busy, getting ready for the 4 o'clock news. She took us to the studio next. The image you see on TV is just a tiny part of the room, in which the recording happens. It's a huge place with different stations, a lot of monitors, wires, and huge cameras, and it also has a small auditorium. I had a chance to talk to Kevin Doran (he's the managing editor and a news anchor) and Scott Hitsko (who's the chief meteorologist), who were recording. 

  We also went to the control room, where I met the director and the producer of the news too. They were very busy, what they did seemed extremely complicated. They were calling on things, talking really fast, and pushing a lot of buttons while looking at several screens at once. I was glad I could watch them in action. 

  Then we went back, and me and Anne, we sat down at the auditorium, and watched the 4 o'clock news, LIVE! There was little red light, that lit up when the camera was rolling. Rachel Barnhart was the anchor and Scott did the weather too. Other than them, there were only 2 cameramen in the studio. The funny thing that we picked up, is that the two anchors were having a conversation, and (because the recording stopped and started again occasionally) when they had to say something to the camera, they did, and the moment it was off, they carried on their conversation, like they didn't even pause. 

  Honestly, I felt overwhelmed. I felt really lucky, that I could see such a big machine work, and I wanted to take it all in. I loved the athmosphere of the studio. And on top of all the experience, I felt confused a bit too, because everything was so complicated. It seemed so difficult to learn all these stuff, and here they were, professionals in their field. I admire all the energy they put in this. 

  On the way home, we talked about the stuff we saw in the Channel 8 studio, and this was her first time in a TV studio, and she like it too. I have a feeling, that I could work in a place like this. Not as an operator or an editor, but like a reporter or an anchor. It must be fun, every day is different, yet, it's somewhat the same. 

  It was very kind and awesome of Wendy to have given us the tour. I liked the place and the people a lot! 

Americans don't want European blood

18th of November

I was so excited to finally give blood! In Hungary, Red Cross doesn't come to the school, I'm not even sure if one can donate blood under 18. So I signed up, and I was sitting in the APAC in second block, I drank a bottle of water I was given, a nurse did all these tests, which proved that I'm healthy,  but at the end of the survey about past illnesses (no, I neve r had malaria, nor AIDS, I didn't take drugs. etc), BUT, I lived more than 5 years in Europe. This doesn't make me eligable to give blood in the US. If I was from India for example, I could, but from Europe, nope. Well, there was nothing I could do. I got a free, cool T-shirt though. 

  In PE, we started kickboxing. I was so happy! I miss my team and our workouts from home, even if most of the time I was the one getting beaten up. My joy lasted so far, when I realized that we were hoing to do cardio kickbox, which is the girly useless version of kickbox. Also, I soon found out I can hit harder than the student teacher. 

  After school, Anne and me, we went to Aldi. I love that place, we go to Aldi all the time in Hungary with my Mom, of course, the stuff are different in this store. 

  Late afternoon, I organized the kitchen cupboards, now it looks really neat. In the evening, I baked a Hungarian speciality for tomorrow's Rotary meeting. It was so difficult, it lasted till almost 2 with the cleanup.

Hanging out with Joycelyn

17th of November, Monday

After a weekend of staying at home, I started my week with an early morning start of school. Like that's unusual! The only interesting thing that happened in school was that I signed up for tomorrow's blood drive. Red Cross is going to come to our school, and a lot of people are going to donate blood, hopefully I'll be one of them.
  After school, at 3 o'clock, Joycelyn (Nathan's mom, Sun's brother's hostmom) picked me up. She called me on Sunday, and she told me how much she thinks about me, and how we should hang out. It totally made my day. So today, she took me to Applebee's, and we had late lunch-early dinner. We talked non-stop. It's interesting, how you meet a person, who's so interesting, and has so much to say, and you two can't stop talking. So while we ate our food (I had some sweet potato with dip, which was super delicious), we discussed all sorts of things. I think she's amazing, she has such a great love towards humanity.
  After Applebee's we went to Starbucks, which I haven't yet done since I arrived to America, but we didn't actually drink coffee, we just looked at the amazing selection of artsy gift cards, and I got some too. We got home at around 6. I had a lot of fun.

End of the first quarter

14th of November, Friday

Today was the end of the first quarter at school. That means, we completed quarter of our year, and our grades for this time period have been closed. For me, that means 99-100% from Creative Writing, 96% US History, 93% French, 91% AP Psych, 90% Select Choir, 86% AP English, 78% PE. I guess that's pretty good, I don't really study here.
  We also had to give in our senior quotes today. I spent all my free time emailing my parents, asking classmates, what I should do. I had like 10 quotes, each awesome. It was 1:47, when I finally completed the form, and handed it in. I went with "Adventure is out there!" from UP. I know, the villain of the movie says this, but it's true. And it applies to my exchange student year too. I'm having an adventure.
  Of course, sometimes that adventure can be very cold. Today, it snowed a lot. And it was veryvery cold. Good thing I stayed inside most of the time. I think that all people in Rochester should develop hibernation skills for the winter, I'd definitely join this revolution.
  So a quarter of my year is already up. It's hard to believe. So many things happened, and so many more are to come. I'm satisfied with most things here. School's easy, but at least I get good grades, people are nice, weather is miserable (this is the winter weather in Hungary, but it's just the middle of November!), homesickness is even worse. But those are the things I have to live with. I've learnt many thing about myself, I'm figuring myself and my future out.
  I think the happiest part of my day was, when I skyped my parents. I sent a package home with the professor I met a week ago, and they got it today. They were so excited, they couldn't wait to open it. It was just a bunch of letters and pictures, but I wanted to send them something, that reminds them how much I love them. We ended up skyping an hour. It was nice to see them, as it always is.

Joseph musical from Broadway

11th of November, Tuesday

Today was veterans day. On this day, the Americans honor their veterans and they thank them for thei services. The schoolkids celebrate this day by not going to school. So I took advantage of this situation, and slept till 11.
  My day actually started, when Abbey picked me up at 2. We went over to their house, talked and watched Criminal Minds until Kim got home from work. Abbey is really in the middle of apartment hunting in NYC, which I find exciting. I mean, it's the dream, to live in NYC, and one of my friends is actually going to live it!
  Kim, Abbey and me, we went on a walk. We walked about 3 miles around their neighborhood (which is a really nice neighborhood). The weather was wonderful. This was probably the last nice day of 2014 here. Our walk wasn't just a casual walk, I almost had to jog, to keep up with Kim and Abbey. After we've got back, we made dinner, which was a delicious salad with an amazing corn chowder.
  After dinner, we went to the theatre! My birthday present from Rotary (other than the flowers, the cake, the wonderful surprise singing and the card, like I'm not spoiled already :D), was a ticket to a Broadway show, which came to Rochester: Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. The theatre was huge! We sat on the balcony with Abbey, Kim and Mike were on the ground floor.
  The show was amazing! The actors were singing and dancing nonstop, every situation was sung, and there were barely any dialogues. So it was really like a spectacle. The costumes were great, the whole sight gave a modernized feeling to the show. They certainly used a lot of effects like lights and projectors. The director rethought a lot of scenes and characters in a modern way (like the Pharaoh was an Elvis imitator), which I liked. Funny thing, the narrator girl and Joseph are in real life married, and they were both on American Idol, but they didn't meet there.
  I had a really fun time, I love the theatre, and watching a Broadway musical had always been on my bucket list.
  I got home at 10, and untill 12:30, I was shopping on a site my Mom sent me, that had a 50% clearence. I bought so many things, it's ridiculous!

Zoo and pizza parties

9th of November, Sunday

I started my day with Skypeing my parents quickly, before Herb drove me to the zoo.
  I was invited by Alma, to come with her and her fellow AFS exchange students to the zoo, so I could meet them. So I went there at noon today. The exchange students were really nice (of course, we are all nice). There were about 10-15 kids there today, but there are almost 30 in the area with AFS. There are a lot of kids from Italy and Germany here, but I've met one or two from Switzerland, Thailand, Ukraine, Tunesia, even New Zealand. No one from Hungary.
  So we spent a lovely (and cold) time at the zoo. The most interesting animals were the orangutans (because there was a tiny baby), the polar bear, who had a wild night of partying before, and the elephants. This zoo was smaller than the Toronto zoo. We spent two hours there.
  Most of the group went to Devan's house afterwards. We had pizza and a good time. At 3:45, Herb, Anne and Sun came for me, and we went to Brad and Sandy Shea's house for yet another pizza party, to meet my next host family, the Greenauers. Other than us four, Brad, Sandy, Kim and Syd, Kim Masiello, Mike, Abbey and Larry came too. I had a wonderful time talking to all of them, and getting to know more about the people I'm going to live with from January.

High Falls & Public Market

8th of November, Saturday

I got home at 10 am, Devan and Alma dropped me off. I had a lot of fun with them yesterday, and we made more plans for Sunday too.
  At noon, Herb, Sun and me, we went to the Public Market. On the way there, we stopped at High Falls, which is a waterfall in the heart of Rochester. The river there was used to produce flour, more than 50 years ago. There is a museum we quickly visited, about Rochester and High Falls. The weather was really cold today.
  The Public Market is this awesome place, where you can buy home grown fruits and vegetables for quarter of the price Wegman's wants. We had some lunch at a Spanish fast food place, and we were done with the shopping in 15 minutes. Everything was efficient, and we didn't even have to try to bargain, the sellers wanted to sell everything before closing, so we got the best deals.
  But after we've finished, shopping wasn't over for me. We went to Wegman's with Anne. I did my own shopping this time. I promised I'd make something for tomorrow, so I got the ingredients. It took a long tme till we found everything we needed.
  Herb, Anne and Sun went to a basketball game, so I had the whole house for myself. I made a delicious dessert, that I thought was Hungarian, but after googleing, it turned out to be Swedish. Oh well, it still turned out pretty well. 

Big Hero 6

7th of November, Friday

This morning, I literally got up at 6:23. And by some miracle, I caught the bus at 6:28. Don't ask, I still don't know how I did it. But I didn't have breakfast or lunch, so the first thing I ate today were homemade tacos when I got back at 2:30 (they were awesome, tacos are the best).

  We made plans with Alma, that we were going to see a movie at the mall and after a small misunderstanding with Anne ( totally my fault), Herb took me there at 5. Apparently, kids under 19 can't be in the mall after 4 pm without supervision, but the security guards didn't even look at us. Funny thing, we met Bevin, Dj and Xynan at the mall. 

   The movie started at 7, Big Hero 6. It's a Marvel comic book made into animation by Disney. The movie theatre was almost full, mostly with children. The story is about a boy, who builds robots in a San Feansisco-Tokyo  mashup city (San Fransokyo), and fights evil with his genious nerd friends. And it was awesome!!! It was the perfect combination of emotions. Afterwards, me and Alma, we just satt there, and couldn't get over how cool this movie was. Disney, you proved yourself once again. I don't have any problems with Frozen, but Big Hero 6 is a 1000 times better! So the first movie theatre experience here was really positive. 

  Devan, Alma's host mom picked us up, and we asked Herb for me to stay over. We watched the Breakfast Club together, but I fell asleep on the couch, and so did alma. It was 2:30 when we woke up and went upstairs to bed.

A package in Pittsford

6th of November, Thursday

I got a 94% on my US History Unit Exam. That was the big event in the school. After school though, that was a mini-adventure.
  My parents told me on my birthday, that a friend of theirs, who is a professor at Nazareth College is going to travel there from Hungary, and they're sending a package for me through him. So I talked to him, and we set the meeting date for today. Herb drove us out, it's a 30-45 minute ride. I've never been to Pittsford, or Nazareth College. Thankfully, we found each other, and I got the package. It was a small envelope, a little heavier than I thought. Me and Herb, we were both curious, what was in it, but I wanted to open it with my parents.
  While we were in Pittsford, we went shopping to Trader Joe's, which is a really healthy and organic supermarket. Everything looks and smells amazing, but of course, edible health comes with a price. We bought some stuff for one of Herb's employees' birthday, and some organic nacho chips. We opened the bag right away (yes, without dipping), and it was really delicious. After Trader Joe's, we went to Wegman's, which we have here in Greece too, but not nearly as fancy as there. It had a huge foodcourt, and lots of fun decorations. We just got some almondmilk for me (that stuff is delicious).
  By the time we picked up Sun, it was already 5 o'clock, and I was afraid I'd miss skyping my parents, because they'd be sleeping by the time we got home. So I talked to my Mom (who was still awake) from the car, from Herb's phone. We opened the package, and it was full of collectible magnets, something really European (I'm guessing because Herb was like "Whaaaaaat?").
  It was so nice to see my Mom. She was so happy today, and to finally see her this joyful, really made me glad. She has such a great sense of humor, these magnets are inside jokes too, kind of. We didn't talk for a long time, but it really made my day, seeing her. I hope my Dad won't be mad that I opened the package without him, but I would like to thank both my parents! I love the belated birthday present! And thanks to the professor too! 

Banquet

5th of November, Wednesday

I told you guys, if nothing happens, I won't write about it. Monday and Tuesday (3rd and 4th) I stayed at home, catching up on schoolwork. But on Wednesday, I had to go to school.
  Everything went normal, until the Rotary Club meeting. My routine presentation went a little off course, when the projector decided to take a break, but I managed to hold my stuff together somehow. I cover my embarassment with humor.
  In the afternoon, I got ready for the banquet. It's our final official volleyball event. It was a dinner at the Brook House. I prepared, I was told to be pretty, with a dress and everything. So I did.
  Kim and Larry came with me, everyone's parents and siblings came, so thankfully I wasn't alone. We rented a big room to ourselves, there were decorations on the wall, pictures and posters. Everyone was gorgeous, we took a lot of pictures with each other. We had dinner, which was jello (I tried it, didn't like it), fruits, cooked veggies, fried chicken and olives for me.
  After everyone was done, Coach P made speeches. He and Marchaesi gave out the certificates, one for each player, with a small personal comment about them (I was outgoing apparently). Seniors got blankets too, with our names and the Athena Volleyball logo on them. Then both coaches thanked everyone for helping out this season, they reviewed what happened, what we accomplished.
  The coaches made a really embarassing, and hilarious video of us, doing silly stuff. Me and Dube, we sang "Circle of life" from the Lion King, it was a cathastrophe, but it was funny. Everything was edited to look like it was in a reality TV show, like the Voice, Britain's Got Talent, and Ellen. That video certainly lightened up the mood. Then we watched a video that Brooke's mom put together, the best pictures that were made this season. We also got them printed out and on a CD. We got a framed picture too, so many gifts.
  After those videos, the banquet was over. Every player got another blanket too, I got a blue one, name and logo on this one too. I needed Kim and Larry's help to get all the presents carried out.
  It was sad. We knew we would see each other in the hallways in school, but it wasn't the same. Volleyball season was over, and we wished it wouldn't have ended. I came here, and everything was new. Now things start to end already.

Homesickness

2nd of November, Sunday

I didn't go to church today, instead, I skyped my parents. Homesickness is inevitable for every exchange student. We are taken from our natural sorroundings, and put into a completely different one. Different language, people, food, smells, air. And the only contact we have with home is our clothes and an hour a week through the monitor of a laptop. And it hurts, that I can't see them, hug them. My dad sent me a video of my cat and dog wrestling, they're adorable. But I'm missing the real thing. I'm really homesick, and I'm sure all exchange students are feeling the same as I do.

  So why do teenagers embark on a journey thousands of kilometers away from their home for a year? My personal reason is finding myself. I'm figuring out who I am, and what I want to be. It's a painful process, it envolves lots of emotions, but it's necessary and very useful. I'm learning English too, and culture, yes, but being an exchange student is so much more than learning about others. It's also about learning how I react to different situations.  

  And also, it's a really good chance to see college, and what the future could be like, if I decided to come to America for further education. So I'm loosing a lot, by not being with my family, even when they would need me the most, but I gain a lot of experience and knowledge I wouldn't otherwise, and my family is extremely awesome and selfless, for letting me do that. I could never thank them enough for what they do for me.

Sewing ; Forever Plaid

1st of November, Saturday

I stayed up until 3 am, so waking up wasn't as easy as it should have been. Alma went home at about 8, I managed to sit up and say goodbye, but I slept till 11. A Rotary event Kim organized started at 9, so I was slightly late, when I arrived at 12:30. It was a sewing event, about 40 ladies were sewing blankets for the veterans. I helped out as I could, I ironed for a little while, swept the floor, but mostly, I entertained. I talked to everybody about how my exchange year is going, and how awesome  Rotary is. We stayed untill 4, then Kim and I went back to Kim's.
  I had an awesome time at her house again. We cooked tenderloin in mustard-apple sauce, and watched How to get away with Murder while it was in the oven. It turned out delicious. After dinner, Kim, Mike, and I went to Athena, to watch Forever Plaid.
  This was a smaller musical put together by Ms. Dyer. It's a story about 4 guys, who died in a car accident on their way to their first big gig as a music group. Now they come back to life for one final performance. Mark, Ethan, Kyle and Ben did some amazing acting tonight, and their singing was phenomenal. They were funny and entertaining. I really enjoyed myself. I'm glad I got to see this show, untill 2 months ago, I've never even heard about it, but "Catch a falling star" is from this musical too. The whole audience clapped standing at the end. Afterwards, Kim and Mike took me home. November started well. 

Halloween

31st of October, Friday

My first Halloween! We don't celebrate this holiday in Hungary, and I always wanted to dress up and experience it. And now I could!
  School was spent in the Halloween spirit. Everyone was discussing what they're gonna dress up as, and what the're going to do. And there I was, completely clueless as to what I was gonna be. I had the dress and the makeup. I asked advice from everybody, but nothing brought me closer to a solution. I missed the bus, which left early to home. I was lucky, that a nice bus driver took me right to our porch.
  For the rest of the afternoon, I researched tutorials and pictures, ideas to what to be. And I got to business at 5:15. I put on my dress and collected the makeup. I made a white base to seem pale, then I added red makeup around my eyes. I painted an inner circle black, and drew vains. I did the lips too, and I spudged my dress with the fake blood. It took me more than 1,5 hours to complete, but I was satisfied with the result. I was dressed as Bloody Mary, the urban legend, who carves people's eyes out.
  I was 40 minutes late to Julia's party, but just in time for the fun to start. There were a lot of people there (10 altogether), including Dube and Alma (the Italian exchange student at Athena). Everyone was dressed up differently: Julia was a Japanese something, Dube was a gladiator / female Thor, Alma was Wednesday Adams from the Adams family, and we had a Mario with a Luigi, a racoon, a Bonnie from Bonnie and Clyde, a headless horseman, and a Vanellope from Wreck-it-Ralph. My costume was the scariest, especially for Alma. It's spooky, that we two were the most creepiest from the group, the two exchange students.
  At 7, we went trick-or-treating! It's the event I always saw in movies, but could never do. It was very much like I've seen. We went from house to house with a pillowcase to collect the candy in, said "Trick-or-treat", and free candy would fall from everywhere. We saw little kids doing the same thing, although not as many as you see in films. We talked, laughed and had fun. When we were too cold, too tired, and had enough candy, we went back to Julia's house. We spent 2 hours, walking outside. Inside, we traded the different kinds of chocholate we got with each other. It was so much fun, I couldn't even imagine anything more fun: dressing up and getting free candy from strangers sounds like the most amazing idea.
  We arranged that Alma could sleep over. I think Herb was happy he could talk to an exchange student, other than me or Sun (who was at a party at Brockport). Washing off the paint wasn't easy, it took me like 20 minutes, and I can still see traces of it. I counted how much candy I had, and the number was clearly too much. If I would eat that, I would die. So I decided to store it for worse days. Because it was our first Halloween with Alma, we decided to celebrate it with a horror movie. We watched World War Z untill 2 in the morning. I originally wanted to see the parts, which were filmed in Budapest (but as it turns out, they were cut out), but watching Brad Pitt fight off zombies got us hooked. It was a scary movie. We talked untill 3, and went to bed. Alma is sleeping on a matress in my room.
  This was an amazing Halloween. Everything I've always dreamed of! These moments are especially the ones, that make me think, that being an exchange student is exceptionally awesome.