Surviving eight months and then some.

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Last weekend I went to Helsinki to attend a district conference. While there, I met some kids who have been there for eight months already. All of them Aussies and Kiwis (New Zealanders) of course. All of the Estonians that are living here now attended as well (except for the my Mexican friend Mariandrea), and it was a blast. We had five hours to ourselves in Helsinki... sounds like trouble, I know. The only thing was that it was way too much time. Sure two hours or even three would have been perfect, yet we get five. Alright. What do you do with a time limit of five hours in Helsinki when you don't know the place, don't speak Finnish, don't have that many euros, and it is a pretty freakin cold day. Well... first you get one of the guys in the group to pierce his chest and a girl to pierce her tongue, then you buy four skateboards and have a race with four people to see who can go the longest without falling on their bum, then you buy a boom box and sing songs from Mulan and Hercules, then you take all the cameras and set them on a timer to go off while every one jumps in the water to freeze to death. Now, none of us did any of this because, like I said, we didn't have that much money, and none of us are stupid enough to do any of the above. Still sounded wicked awesome though right?! Had you going there eh? What we actually did was go to the malls (about four or five times each since there were two of them, back and forth), ate McDonald's, and then we ran into some of the oldies. So together there were about thirteen or fifteen of us kids. We hung out together and had a few laughs and then we had to go back to the island that we stayed at. Suomenlina I think is what it was called. It was so pretty there too! Incredible!
When the oldies got to the island to stay with us, they told us about their adventures they already had. It was so weird to hear about what they had already done because in our minds, we are still in awe that we have some things available to us: things like euro trip and Estonia tour and Lapland tour and then St. Petersburg trip. They started telling us some tips of what TO do and what NOT to do. Do not eat the KFC or McDonald's in Russia, barter in France for the best price on things, take loads of pizza and pasta from Italy, and buy all the chocolate you can from Germany. I don't think that I truly grasped the concept of what I was getting myself into until the morning I left and that day when the oldies were telling us that stuff. The morning I left was actually a funny story; I was talking to mum after I pulled an all-nighter packing and finishing everything at home. I asked her just how psychotic this entire idea was: here I am about to get on a plane to a country I don't really know, to live with a family I don't know a thing about, to eat food that I have probably never even heard of, to speak a language that only about one million people know, to be without parental supervision, and I will be there for an ENTIRE year. If that sounds sane, than you are just as twisted in the head as I am. And there I was excited about it! Then again, why not right?! Mum just said 'are you trying to make me cry?'.
So the oldies were pretty amazing just to sum them up. They told us so many stories that were fantastical, they gave us so much advice, they made us laugh until we thought we would pass out, they just did so much for us. I was so proud that weekend to be an exchange student. If I turn out that nice, insightful, comical, truthful, serious (forbid that THAT should happen, just joking), proud, accepting, and just spectacular, that would be a dream come true.
Of course, I already am spectacular already so nothing new there. HA! Just joking. Another delightful entry completed and another entry you have spent time reading! To my dedicated fans, tsau!

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Comments

[Rachel]

I LOVE IT!! :) girly you are definately in this for the right reasons and it seems having a lot of silly fun with it too:) oh and by the way you are pretty much amazing, funny, crazy sarcastic (sometimes), a joy to be around, absolutely great to talk to and definately with out a doubt all around spectacular!! :) oh yeah and I LOVE how you spelled surviving wrong;) My english is getting lost somewhere too I think I left a lot of it in Amsterdam;) xoxo

[Favorite Aunt: cousin!]

XOXO
Okay...I'm confused...where are you??? what happen to Lea? You now have a new family? For like the rest of your trip? This is all very foreign (no pun intended) to some of us! EXPLAIN.. Love and miss you!