EXPERIENCES

 

Hey everyone how are all of you doing. It's been a while since I have kept you updated. First I want to let you all know that everything is perfectly fine, everything is how it's suppose to be going. So what all of you are familiar with is that I am here to keep you and well myself updated with everything I have been experiencing. Two weeks ago I had a sleepover at my friends house. Her name is Minica, a really nice girl. I am so happy to be able to become friends with her. We did a lot of fun things together like singing, painting our nails, making music videos and much more ahahah when I think back at those funny and crazy things we did, I can't hold myself from laughing. Then she came with the idea for remaking the video of Taylor Swift, it was so funny. But what is important is that we had a really great time together. I am doing really great in school, but now that I have been transferred from my math class to a senior math class, I am having a little challenge, which is really beneficial. I am learning a lot in that class everyone is like you are a sophomore what are you doing here ahaha and we all started laughing. I really like my new math class. I am actually studying for the first time. So today I had a little snack party in school for my apisa club, we ate hawaiien style popcorn en fruit mix. I have to tell you that it is really delicious. I couldn't stop eating. I actually gained 12 pounds of weight, ever sinds I got here I have been eating a lot more than what I expected. My host mom told me that when I get home my family won't recognize me anymore because of all the portions of food I have been eating lately hihiih :). Just to share something funny: in my choir class I am a soprano singer, so now we are practising this new song and it is really difficult. I  asked my teacher if I could sing as second soprano and then he replied that I can go. He specifically said that I have a soprano one voice. As I tried to sing as a second soprano I kept singing higher than the second sopranos. My teacher told me directly to be a first soprano again, I started laughing especially because of his facial expressions. My choir teacher told me not to be afraid of letting my voice out. I am really proud of myself, cause I was always afraid of giving it all, now I know that I will give it my all.

BAKING CAKES

 

Before I came to America I didn't know how to cook, neither how to bake a cake. One day my host mom asked me if I wanted to bake a cake, because she found a really good recipe how to make an apple cake. First I was scared but then I just said to myself to at least try it. I followed the recipes and try to do everything perfect and guess what???, It worked my apple cake came out so beautiful. After the apple cake I also made caramel saus :). I did not just bake one cake, ohw no after a few days I bake 4 more cakes, one with my friend Dina and the other three cakes I baked all by myself, those were lemon cakes. Yum they were really delicious, my family really loved the lemon cake I made. I also send one to my host sister who lives in San Francisco, she and the girls like it a lot. I am so proud of myself :D

 

 



SAYING GOODBYE

 

Hi there, I know that I haven't been blogging in a while, I was a little busy with school work. I was busy with my semester exams and I am so glad it went very well. Now I am in a harder math class which is called probability and statistics, finally I am having a little challenge because algebra 2 was too easy for me. Lately I have been busy saying goodbye to my friends who are returning to their home country. Alyssa is one of my friends from Switzerland (see picture above), she is returning to her country it was really nice to be friends with her. Alyssa and I loved shopping together at the mall. Just to share something really funny: one day we went shopping and we entered a shoe store, Alyssa and I went crazy because there were so many cute shoes, and you know how we girls are with shoes. But there was only one problem, I am so short and have really small feet and Alyssa is really tall and her feet are bigger then mine so we asked if they had our sizes, and the didn't. We were so disappointed. Last night on January the 25th my host mom, Lisa(my area rep.), Alyssa and I went to dinner in town square. We talked a lot, laughed a lot and we had a lot of fun it was my last time seeing Alyssa before she goes, I will miss you. On Thursday jan the 24th my friend Natalia(see picture below)  had a farewell party, she is going back to Brazil, she doesn't live far from Suriname, so I hope I can see her real soon. I am going to miss you 2 my Brazilian friend. Sometimes it is hard to say goodbye but the friends we made aren't only for America but for a life time.

 

 



OVER MY WINTERBREAK

 

The last day of school before winter break it was amazing how I could go to my classes on time. Usually it takes me a long time going to class because of how crowded Legacy high school is. Especially bumbing into others, that's what keeps me from getting in class on time. But the last day of school it was an exception, there were over a thousand students absent, can you believe that??, cause I couldn't. It was the first time I experienced so many students absent, but I didn't really care for that because I was so excited. The reason I was excited was because I had to perform at the assembly, me and my apisa dance team had to dance. I was so excited it was my first time performing at assemblies. Assemblies have been one of my favorite activities in school, but dancing in front of so many students made me a little nervous. But then again I overcame my fear :) and I had a really great time I enjoyed every second of my performance. After school me and my host parents drove to Los Angeles and we stayed at a hotel for two days, and right outside our hotel room there was an Indian wedding which was so nice. The one thing I really liked were all those beautiful colors. After staying two days in LA we drove to San Francisco. I stayed at my host sisters house for the holidays, it was really fun I had the best times with her daughters and also with her. During Christmas I had such a great time with my family, I felt their warmth around me and I really felt I was part of the family, everyone was so happy and cheerful, and guess what we had for our Christmas's dinner :). We had rotie for dinner, I made the rotie and my host mom cooked the curry chicken and the beans and we ate it with a little sambel. The next day I showed my sister how to make rotie so now she knows, the whole family loves it, which I am proud of :). I have seen a lot of San Francisco and I went to the academy of science where I went to see really amazing things. I took pictures but yeah I don't even wanna say it, I deleted those pictures by accident but there is nothing I could do so that's why I am sharing it with you so you can have a vision of what I did over winter break. New years eve was really fun, we had game night, so everyone had to come up with a game. It was really nice we all had a splendid time. SO yeah this is kind of what I have been through. I will keep you updated but goodbye for now and be patient for another blog :D

THE BUFFET

 

 

Well to tell all of you the truth before I came to America I have never been to a buffet before. My first time going almost made me crazy, really I am telling the truth. My host parents, Miles and Nikki and I met each other at the Bilagio. The buffet was held over there, we had to stand in a really long line. There were all kinds of people there, there were Chinese people, Mexicans and a lot more. Everyone was standing in line ready to eat. When we finally got in I saw a lot of people, but mostly a lot of FOOD, you could eat as much as you want, how many times you want. Everything was really delicious. My host brother Miles told me to taste a little bit of everything. I have to say I ate a lot that day I was so stuffed. And yes I had a good night sleep after that :)

 





MY FIRST CHOIR PERFORMANCE

 

 

The one thing I really like about Legacy high school is that besides all those math, chemistry and all the other hard classes you can also join a class of your choice. Whether it is a dancing class or a guitar class or even a singing class. So the class of my choice is Glee class. Glee class is all about singing, it is a choir class. In glee class I feel really comfortable and myself, there are only girls in my glee class, because it is girls choir. Everyone treat each other like sisters which is a really nice thing. After practicing Christmas songs for the past six months we finally had a concert. The concert was on December 17th. It was such a wonderful evening, everyone dressed up in their dresses, ready to go on stage, even I was pretty excited. I was really nervous at first, but when we started singing is wouldn't stop I wanted to continue singing, it was my first time on stage and now I get why people say that going on stage to perform is a great thing, now I am looking forward to be going on stage often. Hopefully we will have a another concert really soon. THE GIRLS CHOIR ROCK :D

 

 





MEETING THE MAYOR OF LAS VEGAS

 

 

Sometimes when you look at your life and when you ask yourself what your thankful for, you don't even know. But why look so far when the answer is right in front of you, be thankful for everything you have now. I am really thankful for everything I have, for all the people in my life, who are there for me, all the people you meet and everything and everyone you will meet in the future. Who knew I would ever meet the President of America and who knew I would meet the Mayor of Las Vegas, who knew that I would ever be in the United States. I am thankful for everything in my life and all the people in it. I would like to thank Valerie who made it possible for me and Youseff to meet the Mayor. On Monday the 10th of December, Youseff and I had the chance to meet the Mayor, Mrs Carolyn Goodman. We went to her office, Lora who works there showed us around and it was beautiful op there, especially her office. The Mayor wasn't there, because she had to be downtown to light up the Christmas tree. But instead she gave Youseff and I a certificate, which was really nice of her. After seeing her office we also went downtown to see her lighting the Christmas tree, but yes finally Youseff and I took a picture with her. It was an amazing day, I had a lot of fun, but what wasn't fun was that I couldn't sleep that night. I was too excited to fall asleep :D

 





SANTA AT SPRING PRESERVE

 

 

On Sunday December 9th, 2012 my family went out for brunch with my brother Miles and Nikki. We went to this amazing Chinese restaurant called: Ping Pang Pong, if I am not mistaken I already told you about Ping Pang Pong. But just in case, it is the best Chinese restaurant in Las Vegas. We all enjoyed the food, especially the coconut bread, that was really delicious. It was my first time trying it and it was really delicious. After brunch we went home to rest for a while and then we went to the movies. We went to see Lincoln, which was a really interesting movie, it was about president Lincoln who didn't like slavery and wanted to give African American equal rights. It was really interesting and I learned a lot from it. At about 7 o'clock the movie ended and we went to Spring Preserve. The had all these nice Christmas activities for children and even I met Santa :). I went to take a picture with Santa and he asked me what I wished for, I told him that I wanted this year to be really fun, special and exciting, because I am a foreign exchange student. Then he asked me where I was from, so I tried to explain it to him which was funny because most people didn't know where Suriname is. And so I tried to explain it to him, then he said Ow I know where that is, it's in South America. I told him yes, how did you know,  and he said that he used to own a business so he had to travel through South America. Most people don't know where my country is located at, but what is really fun is that there are people out there who actually knows. It gives me a good feeling and it also makes me proud. :D



FUN EXPERIENCES AT LEGACY

 

Sorry, I don't have a picture for this post, I promise I will upload a few next time. I just want to share my great times in school with you. Being an exchange student makes live even more interesting and adventurous. Sometimes it seems so impossible, but nothing is impossible you can be whatever you want to be, you can go where ever you want to go. You just need to work hard for it, and believe in making it reality. I enjoy school a lot, school is really easy and sometimes it feels like I am not in school, it feels like I am on vacation. Most of my global diplomacy friends say that to. They said that they will enjoy their time being here before they go home because everything will go back to normal and with that they meant school. Every A day in school I sit in the cafeteria with my friends talking about my country, they still aren't done asking questions, sometimes they keep asking the same questions all over again :) because they have a hard time memorising the words and names. On B day I sit with my other friends well we sit on the ground which is different, but fun. I have to split my time with friends, because we all have different lunches. Every Wednesday I stay after school for Apisa, Apisa is a club where we learn about Tunisian dances, food and much more. And we have been practising every Wednesday. One time my body felt soar for 4 days straight, because of the dance practices. The assembly is in 1 week and the coming Wednesday I have to audition, so I have to practise really hard to get accepted. I am also in Glee club, it is a choir. The seventeenth of December my choir group has to give a performance, I already ordered my dress. I am really excited to see it, but I am even more excited for the performance. I can't wait to perform it's gonna be my first time performing in front of an audience, and everything will work out fine. :D

 

 

 



MY VOLUNTEER WORK

 

After looking for months for a volunteer work I finally found one. I got a volunteer opportunity at the Animal Foundation. Nikki also volunteered there so I asked her if I may join the Animal Foundation. First I had to attend one of their orientations, which was held in a library. After that I had to follow a training. So I have to tell how my training went. I went to my training and asked where I had to be to follow it. Then they send me to one of the rooms in the building, but there we 2 trainings that day, there was one for beginners, where I had to be and one for the staff members. I went into the wrong room, and I didn't know. After thirty minutes I realised that something was wrong, because they weren't doing anything I was suppose to do. I asked one of the trainer and he said that I was in the wrong room OMG.... After that he send me to the right one hihih so silly of me. So I was a little late, but my trainer went through all the stuff again so I could keep up :).

 



MY FIRST SURINAMESE DISH IN AMERICA

 

Hi there I am back :), so yes I told how Thanksgiving was right???:). Well now I want to share with you how my first experience was with making Roti. Roti is an Surinamese dish. I never made roti before, but on the Independence day of Suriname my host family and I also wanted to celebrate the Independence day. So we decided we would try to make roti together. While my host mom was cooking the curry chicken and the kouseband :) which are beans  :)  Miles and I were busy making the Roti. When we first were finish we waited for a while to bake them, but then.......... uhm well they stick together, we couldn't separate them :) hihih it was so funny. So we had to do it all over again. After we were done, we baked them and it turned out to be a really delicious meal. We all enjoyed it, it was fun making Roti.



FIRST THANKSGIVING IN USA

 

It has been a while that I haven't been blogging, I am so sorry. I have been really busy with school, my clubs and my volunteer work but I will tell you more about that later. Now I want to tell you about Thanksgiving,.................. well my experience about Thanksgiving. From what I have learned Thanksgiving is one of America's most favorite Holiday. I was in my US history class and all the students were excited about Thanksgiving, they said that it is a day where you can eat a lot and be thankful for it. It was my first time having thanksgiving in America, I was all excited especially about all the delicious food there were going to be. My host mom cooked all these good food, she made crabs, stuffing's, bread pudding, mac and cheese and much more. OMG there was a lot of food. Before we ate we all stood around the table and said what we were thankful for, and I am thankful for this great opportunity as a exchange student, I am thankful for my friends and American family, I am also thankful for my friends, family back home who made me who I am today.

 

 



                                             

PRESENTATION ABOUT SURINAME

 

 I had to give a presentation about my country: Suriname. I choose to give this presentation in my global diplomacy class because there are students from America in that class but also a lot of foreign exchange students from around the word. The day before I had to give my presentation I was really nervous, but when I got home I prepared myself and I knew that I could do it. When I got to school I got the last 20 minutes of my global diplomacy class to present my country, I wasn't nervous at all. The students really liked it, the were so excited to learn about my country, and they asked a lot of questions. I happily answered them. It was a great day I was so happy that everything worked out well.

 



MY FIRST FOOTBALL GAME

 

 

Yesterday was my first day volunteering at the Apisa carnival booth for the homecoming  football game at Legacy high school. Me and the other students had to cook food for the carnival. We made spam musubi, a Hawaiian dish and we made lemonade. At 4.30 we sold it at the carnival where everyone bought it and tried it, they said it was very delicious. At 7 o'clock I met my friends to go to my first football game at legacy. It was really cold that my dad had to bring my jacket for me, it was crowded, cheerleaders were cheering, people were screaming. Even I did make a lot of noise: GO LONGHORNS. My friends were really excited to have a foreigner as their friend and they were really glad that we went to the game together. It was really fun and just in cause you were wondering who fun the game, well the legacy longhorns won with 41 to nothing. :D GO LEGACY LONGHORNS

 

 

A WEEKEND IN SAN FRANCISCO

Last weekend I went to San Francisco with my host family, we went by car. It was a nine hour drive, it was really fun. I had to stay with my host mom's daughter Lisa and her four granddaughters. They were all so nice and I had a really great time being with them. On Friday I went with Sela to her dance classes, she had ballet and African dance, I also met all of her friends who were really nice to me. The weather in San Francisco is really different than the weather in Las Vegas. When I first got to San Francisco I was really freezing it was really different. On Saturday I did a little of sightseeing with the girls and my host parents which was really fun. After that we went to a festival where Selah had to perform. There were a lot of people and different kind of dances. On Sunday I had to go back to Las Vegas, cause Monday I had school. On Wednesday I began with my apisa club, I learned how to do the Hawaiian dance, which was a little difficult but it was really fun, I met new people, and they were excited when I told them that I was a foreign exchange. When I got home that day my hips were hurting, I think I need to do a lot more of practicing with the dance. This past week was really fun and I got to experience new things.

 

 



Girls day out

 

After one week of school it was finally Saturday, my friends and I were going to meet up at the fashion show mall. My friend Kayla, who lives across my house went with me to the mall, it was time to look for Millicent. Millicent is also an exchange student, she's from Ghana. But the big problem was: how are we going to find Millicent in one HUGE mall. And finally after one hour of searching for Millicent we finally found her. And then it was time for us to shop :D we visited a lot of stores, bought a lot of clothes and had a lot of fun. We walked through the strip, took a lot of pictures. We shoped for six hours, and shopping for six hours is really exhausting, but it was a lot of fun. At six o'clock it was time to say goodbye.

 





YFU ORIENTATION

 

 

 

I woke up at nine yesterday morning because I had to go to an orientation with my host parents. After driving for several minutes we arrived, the orientation was held at Alissa's host family's house. Alissa is also an exchange student from Switzerland, after we introduced ourselves we went upstairs and chatted with each other about our experience these past three weeks. At 11.30 the other exchange students arrived, and we started talking to each other. At the orientation we talked about the different cultures, how to be a lovely exchange student and much more. What I really liked was that we talked about our difficulties as exchange student and we all came with solutions to help each other. My host mom Cisca volunteers at YFU and she also gave us good advise. I will never forget this day, It was nice meeting different people.

 

 

 



Meeting President Obama in real life

What a beautiful new day, time goes by so fast. School is really fun, I always try my best to do well in class. When I came home from school my mom called me and said that my father got VIP ticket to see president Obama. I was so happy I can't explain how happy I was. My father volunteers at the Obama campaign and rewarded with two VIP tickets. Me and my father went to see President Obama, there were so many people standing in line. We didn't stay in line that long 'cause we had VIP tickets. After waiting for several hours it was time for President Obama to give his speech, everyone clapped for him, they want him for four more years. When he was done with his speech he give all the people who were in front a hand, even me. That will be something I will never forget, me seeing President Obama in person and even shook his hand.

 

 

 

A GREAT SUNDAY

 

So today is September 9th, my mother's birthday Happy birthday mom, I'm in Las Vegas but I hope you have a great birthday. Okay now today has been very awesome, I went to a Chinese restaurant with my host mom, Nikki, Dina and her little brother. The food was so delicious, the ping pang pong restaurant serves really good food, everybody had fun. After eating, talking and laughing we went to the Alliante park, wow what a beautiful park, all the children were having so much fun, even I did. I played a lot with water because it was so hot. I was all wet but after a few minutes I was dry again because of the heat. I had a great time today thanks to Dina, Nikki, and my host mom Cisca :D.

 



AN OBAMA WATCHING PARTY

 

Wake up, take a bath, and of to school, everyday is an exciting day for me. So much to learn and so many new people to meet, nothing is better than friendship. I made a lot of new friends in these past two weeks and I have been to so many amazing places. Yesterday I went to an Obama watching party with my host parents, so another chance for me to meet new people. And indeed I met a few people there and they were all so nice to me and a chinese woman thought that I was a chinese girl, cause my name is chinese :D I must say they were very nice people and the food was also delecious :p. I had a great time at the watching party and I really enjoyed the democratic national convention.