evelinebrunner.intoblog.ch

I met two other exchange students from the Netherlands and Austria on Sunday. We were together in Toronto at the camp and they’re both staying in Kelowna now, but not in my school. We went to the mall and had a lot of fun with shopping and this kind of stuff Afterwards we had dinner at my house and talked a lot.

 Marina & I

Monday morning I had skating on 07.45..it was pretty early! In the cheerleading session we had a basic football introduction (American football is pretty confusing) from our coach with small performance of them. We had a lot of fun and the coach said she did that so that we know for what we are going to cheer on the football field. Since our football team RSS has a match on Friday and we are cheering on the track and therefore we received our uniform.

Cheer uniform

Friday morning we had a city tour for all international students in Kelowna. The organization had ordered a school bus and showed us many places, but most of them Peter and Tina have already shown me. We were about 40 children in the bus; most of them from my school RSS, but there were also few students from another school. On this tour I took about 400 pictures . For lunch the bus drove us to the mall and we could eat at Subway for free. But there were only 30 min left for eating so we were in a hurry and the whole group stood queue at the cash desk. It was very crowded and the employees had a huge stress, but in the end all of us had a large sandwich and a cookie .  All the exchange students were very nice and we had a great time.

 my school

 Marlen, Nele and Sidney

 Kelowna

Friday evening was football time! The host mother of my friend drove us down to the Apple bowl stadium where the football game took place. We were the only cheerleader (our group has 24 members), because the other team didn’t have a cheer group. The coach and the other cheerleaders, who have already cheered for a few years, said we should wear lots of clothes under the uniform, because it could be very cold on the football field at night. We received the cute hair ribbon and the game began. In the beginning our team was very good and we cheered very excited. We did some stunts and screamed very loud for our team. Our fans (all of them had clothes and make up in gold and blue; colours of RSS voodoos) were very nice this game; when we cheered they always yelled back and danced with us. It turned out that this night was very warm and not cold at all. That was very good for us. But in the middle of the game our team became worse and in the end our team lost by 32 to 18. Anyways, we cheered awesome and had a lot of fun on the track, even though our team lost. Unfortunately I can’t do the cheerleading anymore, because in the second semester I won’t have enough time for that. So it was my first and my last time cheering on the track at the same time.

Marlen and Nele, two exchange students from my school, came to our house at Saturday afternoon. We searched a recipe for cupcakes and then we went to Walmart, a huge shopping center for food. On this Saturday the weather was miserable and it rained all the time, so when we came home we were all very wet and first of all we drunk a hot tea. But well, first we went to the Walmart. We spent two hours in the building with looking around and searching products. Finally we paid everything after 20 min standing in the queue. We baked the whole evening (with Energy Zürich radio ), actually because our topping didn’t become very nice. It was very liquid, but it tasted good and afterwards we decorated the cupcakes. Peter made Hamburger for us with tomatoes and lettuce from our garden. These self-made burgers were very good! After a long day and some very funny conversations we prepared the mattresses and we three watched a film on our huge bed until all of us fell as sleep. Next morning we didn’t know what to eat for breakfast so Peter proposed to eat pancakes with pure maple syrup. We enjoyed this brunch a lot and after that Nele and Marlen had to go home.

 our cupcakes

Today afternoon Tina, Christine and I went to look for a wedding dress for Christine’s wedding. She tried it and it fit her perfectely (it was the first dress she’s ever tried) so after 20 we had the dress in our car and drove very happy home.

Wednesday morning we had choir and I had persuaded a girl that she should come to the choir too. In the English lesson we went to the library and we had a one-hour introduction. In our science class we always have a lot of fun! In the afternoon I had my first piano lesson so I went to the cute house of my piano teacher. She’s very kind and she liked all my pieces of music very much. I received a new piece from her and the 45 min passed by very quickly. When I came home Marina gave me some sushi her friend made next day I had it for lunch!

In video production we watched a very sad documentary film about dolphin hunting; that was on Thursday morning. Right after school I went to the ice rink for the first time by bus.

In English we did some funny name games and all of us were running through the classroom. It turned out that the youngest student (he’s 14) is the tallest of us and I noticed that the students here are much younger than in Switzerland so here I belong to the older half of the class! At home Tina and Peter were preparing the meal for a BBQ party they were going to this evening. I helped Tina cutting the vegetables. Marina wasn’t at home for supper so I was alone at home for two hours. When she came home from her shopping tour we watched a movie together; Letters for Juliet. But we couldn’t connect the DVD player to the TV so we just watched it on the computer. While we were eating ice cream and popcorn Christine and her fiancé Tyler came home. They brought along a huge stuffy dog, which Tyler had won from a shooting game at a funfair. It was approximately half as tall as Christine and about twice as wide as she. They helped us as well so we were able to watch the movie on the TV.

 stuffy dog

On Saturday I had a seminar from the figure skating club. It lasted 5 hours and I met lots of skaters from Kelowna. We had two on ice sessions in groups and there were three coaches on the ice. (We normally don’t have group lessons here; every session we have a private lesson for 15 min) We made some steps and skills and in the second session five professional judges came to the rink and each of us showed them a jump and a spin. They valued the features and gave us some tips. I liked the off ice and the dance and in the changing room we always had a lot of fun.

On Tuesday I had choreo on the ice with a nice coach. I will have choreo at least every Tuesday for 20 minutes from now on.

I had my first choir lesson on Wednesday morning (7.30 :/) with Peter as director. I am in the really large choir, where all the students, who want to try singing, can go. So we were about 70 students in one room sitting. We haven’t sung yet, because Peter had to do the introduction. Tomorrow I will have my first real choir session. And I had my last math lesson on wednesday, because I will be able to drop the D block. Instead of math I can go on the ice

Thursday was School Photo day!  Every student had to make a picture and there were five professional photographers shooting the photos. Today our afternoon lesson (English) last just one and a half hour, because our American Football team had a game and the whole school went to our football field for watching the game. Everyone was dressed in the colors of our school (RSS), blue and yellow. The school master handed out some free ice . Just after the game I had cheerleading. They put me into the larger group and there were a lot of students, who have already done cheerleading for a few years. They told me that I was a flyer so there were about five people (guys and girls) below me. Holding and pushing me up into the air. It was pretty hard, because I had to tense and control my whole body. And I was the only flyer, who was doing that for the first time :/, but fortunately I didn’t fall or hurt myself.

My math teacher gave me the math book for grade 11 so I worked for myself during the class, but I think I am not going to math anymore.. Today’s Film class was very cool. I met some really friendly Canadians. But we’re already going to write a test in Film making on wednesday. Just after school some german girls, a mexican girl and I went to the Cheerleading try outs. It was a lot of fun and the teacher was very impressed of my jumps Tomorrow morning there will be the list of names from the cheerleading groups hang up. I will see in which group they put me . In the evening I had another ice session.

There were a lot of students in the school area, when I arrived at school this morning. All of them were talking about the holidays. At 9 o’clock all students form 10^th grade (about 600 pupils) rushed into the gym (a big sport hall) and the school principal welcomed us to our new school. Afterwards we had to go to our home teacher. I went to Mrs. Ginnell, who is a very kind ESL (English as a Second Language). She is the home teacher of all exchange students and she guided us to our home room. There were a lot of German students and we went through our whole timetable, so I had to change class room four times and each time there was another class. Actually I’m just going to have two classes (each 2 ½ hours) a day, but today it was an introduction day. I’ll have to change some of my classes and that takes a while..

After my first school day, where I have already met some people, I heard that I will have an orientation camp in Kelowna this afternoon for all exchange students. When I arrived there, I immediately recognized some of the students, who were in Toronto in the camp with me. That was very cool! We had lunch there and then the leaders told us some things about our coming year. (We are going to do something special with the exchange students every month! ) After that we had a ‘test’ (writing, reading, oral), where they wanted to find out how good our English was. That lasted two hours..

Just after supper I am was going to be on the ice for the first time. The ice rink is nice and there were quite a lot of other skaters in my age (ALL of them wearing lululemon!) I got to know them a little bit; they are very friendly. And I met Karen, the wife of Jason Mongrain (my teacher in Kelowna). She is very kind and she showed me the schedule. Now I can choose my lessons on the ice. Peter was very excited about the figure skating