#67 Home Sweet home or cultural nightmare?!

So guys... I'm back to Germany (duh) and after pushing this away from me for a loong time,.. I finally decided that it's time to finish up here.
On June 18th I had to leave my amazing family and boarded the plane that would bring me back to a life that I didn't call mine anymore. This time I thankfully made the trip without any complications and without missing a flight.
It's kinda a strange and weird feeling, sitting at an airport all alone, sobbing while reading goodbye letters your family gave you.
I mean, how could anyone around you understand what this feels like?
After almost 24 hours, I finally arrived 'home'. Should I even say 'finally'? It's not like I looked forward to leave everything behind again.
But then the moment came and I walked out of the airport, seeing my family waving with a big sign that said: 'Welcome back!'
I'm not gonna lie- it was a bit overwhelming. My friend was also there and after I greeted them and said the first sentences, I noticed that everyone was staring at me. Apparently I had talked in English the whole time. Has that happened to any of you guys? It's the weirdest feeling!
The first time I walked into my house, I stopped for a second and took a breath in to see what it smells like.
That moment was really important to me because you don't know how your house smells like when you live in it, because you get used to it...
The only thing I remember of that moment though is that I indeed smelled something. I already can't remember what though :D
Soo anyways... What should I say? It was really hard for me to get used to my 'old life'.
Because no matter what, I have changed during that year. And even though I some of these changes already fade away a little, I still became a different person and I will never go back to who I was before.
I see everything in a different light now and have a whole different perspective on life.
And even after 3 months of being back, I still miss my American family ever day.
Sorry guys but I can't give you a full report on my emotional feelings... It's too hard to put into words.
This was definetely the hardest goodbye I ever had in my life, and probably will ever have,.
One more thing I want to share with you guys...
I've come to believe that everyone has something that will make them truly happy... And many people will never find that in their life. Let it be a significant other who you love with all your heart or the job that brings you so much joy...
Well, even though I'm only 17, I believe that I have found true happiness.
I've found the place where I could be myself and that made me a better person.
I have found my real smile that even lights up my eyes.
And for that feeling, I would give anything.
So if you ever debate if it's worth it to do an exchange year... Think about that you might be able to find true happiness!

I started school today, it's a new school and a whole new beginning! The exchange year helped me have a look at my future so now I already have a plan,.. I have three more years of school and then want to do an Aupair year in either Australia or New Zealand.. After that I'll probably go back to Germany to study on an University (Maybe becoming a Psychiatrist)....
So yes! This is it. This is the last post on this blog (probably).
I wanna thank all of you guys who kept reading my posts and I hope I helped some of you with sharing my experience....
For all of you guys who will still go abroad... Have fun! And never stop dreaming :)

Ohh cornfields... I'll miss you!

We took this picture at our goodbye party :)

#66 What happened?? Second Suitcase, Finals & Michigan

Soo... Somebody tell me where did the time go? Like seriously, there has to be somebody who stole it from me because I honestly can't believe that I officially have less than a month left. LESS than a month. Wow. Let's not try to put my feelings into words cause I would fail anyways. Only exchange students know what I'm going through.
The worst part about only having a month left is that you try to do as much as you can in that short time period. That means you ALWAYS have something going on and you are completely booked out until the day you leave. And everybody knows, the busier you are, the faster time flies by.
Also, it sucks to have so much going on because all the graduation parties are going on and some of them fall on the same day and you have to choose.
So, I also have one happy thing to tell you about before I return to my sadness.
Last weekend we planned on going camping but the weather was miserable so I canceled and said we would go on a day trip to Michigan on Sunday instead. Well, I went to a graduation party on saturday and I was the only one from my family who went early to help set up and when they finally showed up too, they told me that we will leave that day!! So we had to go home, hurry up and leave.
YAY! I got to go o Michigan!! And the first thing my sister told me when we passed the state line: Look, trees!! :D haha. To clarify, there are not many trees in Indiana, just cornfields.
So we spent the night and the day with family and friends in Michigan until we returned home on Sunday. It was a good weekend and I had a good time!
Since I bought tons of stuff here in America, there was no way I would get away without buying a second suitcase. I'm happy I did that already because now I only have to stress out about how to fit all my things into two suitcases.
Since its the last week of school, we have finals. Wuhoo! But there is this really cool, new policy that lets you exempt finals in classes where you have an A or a B and perfect attendance. This only counts for classes that aren't math or english but since I have so many "fun" classes, I was able to exempt three! So I don't have to take finals in Business Law, Sociology or American Studies (In that class I was only able to exempt the history part, not the english part).
That also means that I only have three finals and today I had none so I'm in school doing nothing ^^.
Well, I watched a movie in the lecture room and then went to hang out with Cherry in VS :)
I lost my thought.. LESS THAN A MONTH GUY!

#65 Things I'll miss about America

Since I only have 31 days left, I thought it would be time to do this post.. Wow, I can't believe I already reached this point in my exchange year. There are still no words to describe the feelings going on inside of me right now. I hope you have fun reading these and maybe (if you are an exchange student) you can identify with some of them.

#1 Shopping on Sundays 
I think every exchange student in America knows what I'm talking about!!! Isn't it awesome if most stores are open on sundays? Right now I'm so used to go shopping with friends on a sunday and we all know it's not like this in Germany so I will really miss that option!

#2 Indiana Roads 
Yes, I will miss these endless seeming, straight roads that are bumpy and full of holes. I'll miss seeing cornfields, cornfields and more cornfields when I look out the window. Indiana roads is something only people who have been to Indiana understand. And I love them!

#3 High School 

I only have five days of High School left. And then I'll never return. Ever. Wow. That is what seniors have to deal with but at least they had 4 years of High School and most of them hate it anyways (they don't know how good they have it).. But yeah, even though my school here is, uhm.. let's say unique, I still love it! The friendly relations to the teachers or the easy classes, it's just so different than back in Germany! I will miss going on these (really, REALLY uncomfy) yellow school buses to go on field trips. I'll miss saying the pledge of allegiance before school starts and I'll miss having lunch that doesn't even suck that much. Who would have thought that I would ever say: I'll miss school?!

#4 Country Life 
When your house is in the middle of cornfields (not even kidding, cornfields on every side of your house!) and the next town is a five minute car ride away from you and all it has is a subway and a dollar general (but at least three churches) then you know you live in the country! Well, that probably doesn't count for everybody but that's how it is here. And I'll tell you, country life comes with its own side effects! For example are people showing up at your house randomly all the times. And I don't mean, they ring the bell (cause we don't even have one!) no they just enter because you don't lock your house anyways :D And you have at least one dog or one cat but mostly a bunch of each. Ever heard of 4-H? Of course, your children are part of it! You want milk for your cereal? Goat milk is available at all times... Want to hang out after church on sunday? Let's meet at your house and shoot some guns. That's how life works for most people here. Oh.. and if you ask: where do you go to school? You most likely get the answer: I'm home schooled!
That is how my life is here. That is what I love so much! The moment when all channels you get in the car are either country or christian music. The moment when you don't have to go to school because of fog. The moment you see road kills every two miles (ore more often). It's all part of it. Oh my, how I'll miss this!!

#5 Free Refills/Water 
One thing that I really appreciate about American Restaurants or Fast Food places is that they offer free refills for your pop and you get water for free! In Germany we have to pay for the water, which is really annoying. Here, I always get water with my meal cause its free and I'm not a big fan of pop.
Besides that, pop is so much cheaper here! I don't know if that's a good thing or not, cause people also drink much much more pop here than we do in Germany!

#6 Panda Express, Taco Bell & Co
There are millions of different fast food places here and I'll miss some of them! Like Panda Express, the best fake chinese food I ever had! Or Dairy Queen with the delicious blizzard ice cream, and Taco Bell with, well.. Tacos :D In my ten months here I got to try many of the fast food places and I wished I could take some of them back to Germany!!!

#7 Youth Group 
I definitely had the best friends times in Youth group. That is the church meeting for teens on wednesday. I found so many good friends there and every wednesday we have a blast!! I will miss that hang out time so much when I go back to Germany. Nobody understands how close you can grow to people in that one day a week. Also, the special thing is that everybody accepts you the way you are and you can be yourself!!!

#8 A house full of people
I lived in a house with 11 other people for then months. In 4 weeks I'll go back to living with 2 people and being alone a lot of times. It will be different and it  will be so weird! Giving up all my amazing siblings for being alone again is probably the hardest thing to do. You guys probably think: 11?! That's just crazy!! And yes, it is crazy, but in the best way! You always have something going on, somebody to talk to and people to help you.

That's all for now. I'll update it if something else comes to my mind. Until that, enjoy your time wherever you are!!

#64 Washington DC, Prom, Chicago...

Just to let you guys know, this trip was beyond amazing!!! I loved it so much and I'm sad that the time passed so fast.. I won't go too much into detail about what exactly we did but I will show you guys a bunch of pictures!! So if you ever have the chance to go on a senior trip with your High School, DO IT! It's worth the money even if it appears expensive at first. Actually, I don't have many pictures of the trip on my tablet yet so I'll just include some pictures of Prom too... YES! Prom already happened!!!

Prom was awesome! But I do have to say that I have the opinion that people make too big of a deal out if it... Some girls spend $700 on their dresses!!! Not even kidding! They also spend $60 on their nails and an extra $100 on their hair. Not to mention that we still had to pay $30 for a Prom ticket (if you didn't have a date). Ohh.. And don't forget about shoes!!
Thankfully I have awesome sisters who did my hair and nails so I didn't have to pay any for that. I also was lucky enough to find a dress for 60 bucks! :)
Prom itself was fun with all my friends but all it was was basically just dancing in a fancy building. Don't get me wrong, I loved it! I just think its too much of a thing here in America and I wouldn't spent a fortune on it. But now, enjoy some pictures!!

I made my corsage by myself (no date problem) and Cherry did too.
She actually made hers out of paper!

In the end, Cherry was my prom date.. I asked her on the day of Prom :D But that's a
long story.....

The monday after Prom was Senior skip day.. Yap that's actually a thing in the USA and its basically just a day where the seniors skip school. So of course Cherry and I took the chance and didn't go to school.. Better yet, we used the extra time to go on a road trip to CHICAGO! Together with two of our sisters, the boyfriend of one and 3 other exchange students from Italy and China, we left on monday morning in a van. Only that the van broke down in the middle of a highway somewhere in nowhere... So we spent some time with small town people (including 2 cops) in a tow office. It was like in the movies! Small town talk!! We actually made it to Chicago in a 2 hours delay and had an awesome day with speed sightseeing. Ever heard of Garret's Popcorn? If you get the chance to go to Chicago, try it!!!! Pictures will follow later :)) I also had the chance to go to Chipotle for the first time and goodness, its sooo good!!! One advise, if you don't like spicy, don't order the chicken.. Cherry, who hates anything spicy, was disappointed to find her meal that didn't contain any sauces to prevent it from being hot, spicy.. "It's a trap" she said :D

#63 Spring Break

Note: I started writing this post last monday and it's now tuesday, one week after it. So some time has passsed, haha :D

Last monday: Unbelievable... Spring Break is already over and I am sitting in class gain. Yaay!.. Notice the sarcasm. Even though I didn't go to Florida like 90% of every high school student, I still had an awesome week. I hung out with friends and my family, made German pancakes and soup with bread for them and I also went through a 4-day cleansing with one of my older sisters. That means: no food, only water and a special drink made out of lemon, water, pure maple syrup and cayenne pepper. I tell you guys, you'll get sick of that drink faster than you think!

Now (tuesday) Guys I'm sooo excited!!! It's tuesday, the day we are going to leave for the senior trip to Washington DC! I can't believe time passed so fast that it is already that time of the year. The bus will leave at 6pm today and we will drive overnight and will get to Washington DC around 4:30am in the morning. The week will be really exhausting, we will be on our feet all day until sunday.
But I am soo happy! Sadly it also means that we have less than 2 months left until I have to go back to Germany.. That is nothing :( America is really crazy and paranoid. We had to leave our luggage this morning in the school and they will use police dogs to look for drugs and will open every bag to search for weapons.. Isn't that a little too much?! I mean compared to Germany where they don't even check anything.. :D But okay, I don't have anything to hide so I don't really care.
We have so many baby goats at home right now, it's 7 cute little babies and 5 goats are still pregnant.
Cherry and I even got to watch a goat having her baby which was an experience. It's really cute when they try to take their first steps.
We have lots of things planned for the next months and time will run faster and faster. My emotions are all mixed up and I don't want this to end....
Oh well! That's all for now!

#62 You know you're from Indiana, when...

I just saw something like this on another blog and I thought it would be a great idea so I did my research and I found so many things that relate to my life :D It's awesome!!!

Oh yeah.. That's all they talk about. 4-H...

I thought its normal haha

hahaha so true :D

Delicious! Especially at cold football games

had one cancellation and at least 4 delays due to fog.. (last one just yesterday)

yeep. 

Yas! I learned it and everybody plays it.

perfect description. We can go from summer to winter in 2 hours.

#61 What it means to be an exchange student

I don't know about you guys but I am thinking about these kind of things all the time right now.
My year is ending soon (who would believe that) so I have a lot on my mind.
Today in my american studies class I wrote a little text about these thoughts. Even though I am still here and didn't go back yet, I thought it would be a good idea to post it.

It is hard to describe this feeling. People who don't know how it is to be an exchange student can't relate and others will know what you mean without any explanation.
But how can you put it in words to let your parents and friends back home know what is going on inside of you? How will they ever understand that you cry about going back to them?
My heart is torn apart an I'm divided by two countries I both call home.
Germany - where I've been born and raised. The place with all my childhood memories and people that mean the world to me.
Indiana - the state I fell in love with in such a short amount of time and the place where I met my second family that fills my heart with joy everyday.
It has become my life, my home, my everything.
How can anybody expect me to o leave that all behind? They say you can always come back but it will never be the same as it was before. You will be a visitor instead of somebody who is living there.
People have moved on, started to forget about the girl with the funny accent or the boy who rocked the soccer team.
And you will notice. And it will hurt.
It already started. The sadness that creeps up inside of you when people are making plans for the times when you are already gone. It's painful, not lying. Of course you will never lose the memories or the feeling of home but it comes with a side-effect - The constant missing of a life you will never get back.
In some ways it's like a breakup. A breakup with the person you've become during the year and who will stay behind in some parts.
You will come back to your own life, but not as a whole.
 I'm afraid that I will never get over it. But just as a real breakup, I know I will.
Only that there will always be that hole inside of you, even if it gets smaller with time, it will never disappear. You won't feel it everyday but from now to then, there will be something that brings back memories - maybe it' the flag of your state that you see in a movie or a song you used to listen to when you were away. And then the hole will start hurting again, and you will be sad. People around you won't understand and all you want to do is going back in time and hug those people that were part of your year.
Most of us don't realize what it really means to be an exchange student before we come here. We see it as a fun adventure, a short period of time compared to the rest of our lives.We all find out that we are wrong. Even if we don't expect it, we find ourselves lost in the new world, seeing it as our lives now. So it's not just an adventure you can come home from, it is a new life that you begin and that life won't just stop. So what people should know is that as exchange students, we give up parts of ourselves. We get all the amazing experiences and memories in exchange but in the end we will never get back what we have give. Change That is what we all do. We become this new person that had left parts of themselves in the new life and when we come back, we are different.
Your friends don't understand why you act so weird and what happened that you are not the same anymore. And you wonder why it feels so different to be home.
In don't know if it's just but it all feels more like a dream to me. Even when I was sitting in the airplane I still couldn't believe this was really gonna happen. And now - 7 months later that feeling hasn't disappeared. Sometimes I find myself thinking that this can't be real - but it is.
The time is running out. 3 months. That's all I have left. I try my best to make the best out of it but in someways it's like facing my death. The death of a life I love so much.
That's what we all have to go through, that's what makes us exchange students.
And it's worth it.

#60 Double Placement & Little states my opinion!

I think it's time that I talk to you guys about double placements. If you are an exchange student for 2016, you will get your host family soon and some of you guys might end up in a double placement.
I know that for some it doesn't sound very appealing but let me tell you something.
Having another exchange student from a different country in hour family can be a really good thing!
When I met Cherry, my sister from Thailand I was so happy yo have her with me.
Of course I had some doubts at the beginning too, I mean, what if she doesn't like me? Or what if they like her better than me? But mostly I was just excited to meet her.
And now, over half a year later I still have that excitement.
Cherry and I are roommates and I have somebody to talk to about everything. Somebody that is going through the same experiences and that gives me a feeling of safety.
I know that it is not like this in every case but we are getting along very well and I can trust her. I had some stuff going on and I was so glad I could talk to her about it.
I don't know how this year would have turned out if she wasn't there. She is just a part of this just like my other host siblings and I love her to death! And now I have a friend in another country!
So please, keep an open mind and think about it before you may turn down a family just because it would be a double placement. Give it a chance and there is a possibility it will make everything even better. When I told other exchange students that I have a roommate, they looked at me in pity but I love it. Before I came here I was hoping I would get my own room but really that changed.
I don't feel alone at all and when I am sad it is comforting if somebody else is next to you.
See, it is really important to keep your expectations down. Like most of us, I was dreaming of a perfect host family with a big house, my own room (maybe even with my won bathroom), nice siblings, pets that I can play with. Traveling all the time, doing exciting stuff.
I can tell you something. That is not gonna happen. You will not get the perfect host family because it doesn't exist! When you read blogs, you don't read everything about them and even the best looking host families has its issues.
So yes, my host family is not perfect. I have disagreements with my siblings and my parents, I don't like some of the rules, I have chores to do, if I like it or not but that is how it's supposed to be! You want it to be real and that is how a real family situation is like! I mean. think of your family in your home country. I bet it is not perfect and there are things you don't like, right? So try to keep down your expectations and realize that perfect doesn't exist. I love my family here and everything about it.
And I am happy that I have chores, that I have to do dishes and help in the house like everybody else because that means they see me as a part of the family and not just as an exchange student.
I wouldn't trade my host family for anything.
So now to the area. Yes. I would have loved to go to California or even Texas but I ended up in Indiana. I bet it's not high on anyone's favorites list of you guys. That's okay. It wasn't on mine either. Hey, I'm not even living in a city! You want to know how many inhabitants in my town live? Well, I don't even live in a town. I live in the middle of the country. Everything I can see from outside my house is cornfields everywhere and the long Indiana roads.
My school is small. Only 600 students and it is hard to describe it. People always ask me why I would pay so much money to come to a school like Tippy but they don't understand that I love it! Everybody knows everybody and the country life is jut my thing. So even if you don't get placed in a state like California, Arizona, Texas or Florida, your year will be just as amazing!
So yeah this is just my experience and opinion about double placements and little states.

#59 Crazy American Life!!

Hello guys,

sometimes it still amazes me how different and crazy America is. I mean a couple of days ago I saw a woman with a tail at Walmart!! A tail! And then the day before yesterday I walked into one of my classes and there were two monkeys!! Real, living monkeys! I mean, how often does that happen in Germany? It was awesome because the woman that the monkeys belonged to told stories about them and one of the monkeys was so amazed by a teacher that came into the class during break that she didn't want to leave so she just called her class down into my classroom :D Just plain crazy!
It is really true that Americans love guns. In my area at least. One time I heard two people of my family talking about people banning guns and how crazy that would be. They actually believe that guns bring safety to their country and I'm not sure how I think about it. I mean, friends of mine have handguns that they carry around all the tome (Legally!) and they are shooting guns in their free time.
It could be the country life but I learned to have a more open mind towards gun and I kinda share the excitement they have even though I can't shoot them.
In our school we get a free snack and juice at the end of every day now. I don't know what they were thinking but they say it's cause some people may don't get enough food a home. To be honest, more people here are overweight and there are no students that are too skinny because they don't get enough food! But hey, I won't say no to free food :D
Oh how I will miss this life full of surprises. The strange but friendly people you meet everywhere and the endless opportunities you have. Time is still running down and it stresses me out. I still don't want to believe that I have too go way to soon. When I came here over six months ago, I was a stranger. The host family was people I don't know and I didn't belong to them. But now I am a part of them. They feel like home and family to me and I act like I am one of them. I tease with my brothers, have playful fights and arguments. I talk to my parents, tell them what's on my mind, ask for permissions to do something just like their own children do.
Yesterday someone knocked on mine and cherry's door when we were wrapping a gift for one of our sisters so we said: Don't come in? Who's there?" And the response was: Your mom. It felt so good. It felt so good! She doesn't see us as exchange students but more like one of your children.
Of course I still have my real mom in Germany and that doesn't change how much I love her and I'm still so excited to see her again soon.
In school I feel so much more independent. I mean in Germany you have the same class you spend the whole day with and here I walk from class to class alone and it doesn't even bother me. I have people I know in every class and I don't feel insecure anymore.
So now that the time is running I realize that there are millions of things on my plan that I didn't do yet and that I really want to do. The last three months will be so packed and it scares me a little. I'm still freaked out about the whole getting all my stuff home situation.
The Washington DC trip is coming up, spring break (which is only one week) and we are still planning road trips to Chicago, Michigan and other places we wanted to go before Cherry and I have to leave. I am thinking of leaving on June 18 and that means I only have three month and 8 days left. Wow.
But let's go back to happy stuff! Tomorrow we don't have school and my sisters and I are going to visit another sister of us and we will go shopping, to Panera Bread ( a restaurant I always wanted to check out) and just to have a good time. I'm really looking forward to it! I was able to manage to be an A student for the third 9 weeks. Yay!
and guys, I wanted to give you a tip if you are going to be an exchange student soon. I am writing a diary everyday and it really helps me keeping track of what I did and it will help me remember everything when I'm back to Germany. I am writing it in English so it doesn't collide with my english improvement. Also, now I am really sad that I started with it so late (end of November) because I can't remember much of the first week I was here! Everything was so new and it seems like a dream and it never happened. So make sure to write some notes about your first days, especially your feelings and everything!
That was all for now :)

#58 Winter Jam, Snow days & life itself

Heyy guys :) I'm sitting in my american studies class and we have a five minute break so I thought it would be a good time to update my blog. I didn't abandoned it, even though it might look like it. There is just so much going on in my life and I don't really have time to go on here very often.
Lately I have the routine to watch Netflix in my study hall if I don't have any open assignments or tests to learn for and I read a book in VS. No boredom anymore :D But now back to the topic. A lot happened since last time I updated. First of all: Winter Jam! You guys probably don't know what it is.. Winter Jam is ten famous christian bands that go on tour in winter. It is soo huge and you should hear the music! You might not believe it is good, cause it's christian but let me tell you there are rappers and rock music as well. It was my first concert ever and I loved it so much. When we got there, the line of people waiting was almost a mile long, I'm not even kidding. Thousands of people.
I really had a great time. The only down-side - we came home around 1 am and I had school the next day... Yesterday and the day before yesterday Cherry and I didn't have to go to school because of snow that made the country roads dangerous to drive on. Yay! We took the opportunity to play in the snow and we went sledding with Cherry. It was a first time for her cause it never snows in Thailand.
We also had a goodbye party for a former worker and friend of my host dad at our house and we were 46 people. Many of them were in my age and I hang out with some of my friends. But not only that, this whole party atmosphere was perfect! I felt like I really was a part of it and like I belonged to them. I can't describe that feeling but I just felt so good and had so much fun. There was also the baby of a friend and I got to hold her and play with her. In Germany I don't get the opportunity to see little kids very often. Soo cute! *-* I could start crying right now because I have to go back so soon. I'll miss the feeling of being a part of a group so much and all these nice people that just accept you for who you are and who don't judge you by your looks or something. We were hoping we would have a cancellation again today but then we only got a 2 hours delay. Close enough I guess. But hey, it's friday!! I really try to focus on my american school right now to stay an A-student. It is hard for me to keep my American Studies grade up though and it goes back and forth between A and B.
I can't believe that February is almost over already! Why is time flying by so fast?

This, That & Everything

4 months. That's all I have left. And to be honest, I seriously can't believe it. The time ran by so fast and it get's faster and faster every second. I try to get the most out if it but it feels like it's just rushing by. I am in the constant fear of missing out on something and that makes me nervous. I mean even though it's still hard for me to realize but this is the year of my life. And it's the only ONE year of my life. Everything that I take for granted right now will be gone soon forever. There is no going back to this life that I am living right now. I will go back to what I left behind like this never happened.

And it's not like only my american life feels like a dream, the one that I will go back to feels as unreal as this one. I don't remember how I felt before I came here. I don't remember the Leah I left behind because I created a new version of myself here and this Leah only knows this life. Everything changed, the way I look at things, the way I act around people... The culture here is so different and I learned to live with it, even better, I learned to love it. I love that you can be yourself and nobody judges you - and even if somebody judges you, you won't care because there is always somebody on your side. I don't care about other peoples opinions anymore. Playing games like Yugioh is lame, right? Guess what, here in America a lot of people play it and nobody says anything. 

My family here doesn't have Wifi, in Germany I would not have survived that but with 9 siblings and a whole new life I got to get used to not having internet. We play card games and watch movies together instead. I have so many more people I talk to here. Socializing has become way more easy for me. But I think I lost my point.. Anyways, I love it here. I made so many new experiences and I got a new home that really feels like a home. The rules I have to obey, the love my siblings give to me.  I am just really happy here and it will be so sad when I have  to  go home. I mean how are you supposed to leave a life behind when you know you will never have it back? I don't know why it was so much easier for me to leave my old life behind, probably because I knew I would come back and that it would be a great opportunity. It is a great opportunity indeed but it messes up everything.
I know that I will have to leave my friends and new  family behind and I will go back to Germany, to my old life with all these memories, inside jokes  and experiences and I will have no one who can relate to me. "Do u remember when we tried to hide from the principle- Oh wait no, I forgot you weren't there". And I have to give up this language again and everybody will talk German around me, how weird is that? High School became my school and I love it. I love how it works, even though I doubt it  gives the student the right kind of education but it feels so much better! The teacher are so nice, you can talk to them like friends and the classes are way more fun (I mean, cooking... How cool is that?) But yeah, I think about that a lot recently and it upsets me. In the moment I'm just living my everyday life. I just recovered from having a cold again and today I was SUCCESSFUL! I managed to change my third period class into creative writing even though we are already four weeks into the semester. I'm kinda proud of myself because I didn't give up. When I first talked to my guidance counselor, she said that there wasn't much she could do because you are not supposed to change classes anymore after the first week of school. But then I talked to my friend from creative writing about it and she said she would talk to her teacher. The teacher told me it was fine for her and that she would talk to my counselor. And guess what, I GOT IN! I am so happy about that. The only thing that is sad about it is that I kinda liked the teacher. He was one of the nice ones and he was always a bit funny. I wished time would start to run a little bit less fast.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

#54 Christmas vacation & more

Heyy guys! You didn’t hear from me in quite a long time and I’m sorry for that but over the holidays it was almost impossible for me to update this blog because we were busy the whole time! As I told you before, my family and I went on Christmas vacation and it was awesome!!! But first let me tell you more about my Christmas. Since I live in a big family with lots of relatives, we had three full days of Christmas. It started on Christmas Eve where we had our treasure hunt which revealed what our first destination for our trip was: The caves! In the evening we went to the grandparents where we had a big Christmas buffet and gift exchange with the big family. I got a stocking with all my favorite stuff like Reeses, peanut butter and more. I didn’t expect to get anything so I was really surprised. On Christmas day I could experience the typical American Christmas because it is tradition here to open presents in the morning which we did. Everybody was happy and it was a good time. After that we went to another gift exchange and buffet and when we drove back, I rode in the trunk of a van *-*.
On the last day of Christmas (which is only a Christmas day in Germany and not in America) we went to another side of the family.   We went bowling and had a white elephant gift exchange with Bingo, which was hilarious. This side of the family is known to be a little crazy, so I fit right in :D

One of our two christmas trees, this one is a plastic one. Many Americans don't use real ones

57 Santas are on that tree! Creppy much. It's from our grandparents

The next day we wanted to leave for our trip but I woke up in the middle of the night because I had to throw up and I found out that three of my siblings had the same thing. We still decided to leave in the morning because everybody except me was feeling good again (I also caught a cold or something). So all my siblings rode the van while I went in the car with two of my older sisters and a German exchange student from last year who came to visit. I felt horrible the whole car ride. I won’t go into too much detail about vacation now but I’ll tell you the most important things (to me anyways haha). As you could already figure out, it was a road trip and we didn’t even have certain plans only that we wanted to go down to Alabama but in the end we actually ended up in FLORIDA! I went through 5 new states this vacation (Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Florida, and Mississippi) and we stayed in 7 different hotels. It was so much fun! I’ve never been on a real road trip so I enjoyed it very much. The caving was one of my highlights because it wasn’t just a tour but an exploration trip where we had to crawl through the cave. It was so narrow that we had to press our tummy to the ground and try to push ourselves forward. I almost got stuck so it’s really not that easy! We also watched the new Star Wars and went to the Creation Museum. All in one I had an unforgettable Christmas.  Now I’m in school again and it is really boring in my study hall cause the Internet is down or only open for education sites. My schedule is a little different from last year; I have business law in sixth now and foods in seventh. Even though I thought business law would be the definition of boredom, it’s actually really fun and I like the teacher.
So stay tuned, I probably will upload some pictures soon. Oh, I totally forgot to mention that it was my birthday on Saturday. My family made my favorite meal for supper which is eggroles and cream cheese thingies. On Sunday we played card games for seven hours straight! You guys should check out the game Euchre which is common in the Midwest of the USA. 

Kentucky *-*

Mississippi (We walked over that 2 miles bridge)

same bridge

Such a beautiful picture (my host sister took it)

This is the cave we went through, you can see how narrow it gets and that is not even the worst part. I found the picture on the internet *click*