dinsdag 13 september 2016

Encarnacion & Education from AFS

Hi everyone,

So I decided to change my blog to English cause this way it's available to my international friends as well (2/3 people but still:)) and because I hardly speak Dutch anymore so it's easier to write this way as well. So here we go:) Also my life here isn't all that facinating anymore so I'm probably gonna write like once maybe twice a month.

As I said life her isn't as new and 'special' as it was before but I'm still loving it and my Spanish is actually improving!

About 10 days ago I had a class trip to Encarnacion, this is the city where the beach is at. We left Pilar at 01.00 AM cause it was a 5 hour drive to the city and we stopped a few times so we arrived at our first activity at about 7.30. We visited a factory first this was really cool cause it was really big and the surrounding was actually really nice however I didn't understand much of the tour. After the factory we went to see ruins of the tripple aliance war Paraguay was in with Uruguay, Brasil and Argentina. This was really cool to see and was pretty impressive. When the official parts of the trip were done we had some free time in the city I walked around with some of my classmates and after this we visited the beach it was super that day so we weren't able to enjoy the beach as much as I would have liked to. We arrived in Pilar at about 10.30 pm after a really fun (and loud) bustrip with my classmates.
Because I was exhausted after the trip I slept in on saturday and didn't do much this weekend. Also because the exams were coming up and everyone had to study. Monday was a regular school day and because I  decided to go in the afternoon as well I am at school from 07.00 till 11.30 and in the afternoon from 01.00 till 05.20 pm. On the days I take have class in the afternoon I also play basketball at 08.00 pm so when I get home I usually chill for a bit, eat something and I have to leave right after that so not a lot of time for fun.
Tuesday I had a party from Vittorio (Italian AFS'er in my city) this was fun but considering it was a school night my mom wanted me to be home on time so I wasn't able to enjoy the party for that long. Wednesday was school all day and after that preparing for the AFS camp I was heading to the next day. So Thurday we left at 08.00 am on our way to Asuncion. The camp actually started on Friday but because we were 6 hours away and our AFS director didn't want us traveling overnight we arrived one day early because we arrived a day before the camp all the volunteers were a bit stressed out and we had to wait at a mall for a volunteer to take us to our sleeping places for about 5 hours which was exhausting. We finally arrived at a volunteers house at about 08.00 PM. Where we hung out for a bit then watched a movie and wen't to bed.
The next day we had to be at the AFS office at 07.30am so naturally we left the house at 07.30 and arrived at about 08.00. This entire day was spent waiting because most of the people from my city missed a document so we were not able to arrange our visa. We arrived at our hotel at about 06.30 pm. We had to listen to a presentation about the rules which was all pretty straight forward. After this we had dinner and we had free time. I hung out with my roommates and we just wen't to sleep after.
We had to wake up at 08.00 and the sessions started at 09.00. We started with a pretty basic session about not exactly knowing your place yet and figuring out the language. After this we had a session about the differences in school. Which in my casa were a lot of differences. All good things though:). We had lunch at about 12.30 and the new session called 'good behavior in Paraguay' started at 02.00 pm. This session was about our expectations before coming to Paraguay and how we have experienced it so far. The next session was about our families and the differences between our families in Paraguay. It was cool to hear all these different experiences. And nothing but love for my family of course. I feel so lucky to get along with them the way I do. Then our last session was at 07.00 pm and we saw a presentation about the history of Paraguay and beautiful places in Paraguay we should visit. We had dinner at about 08.30 and after this there was a poolparty but it wasn't all that fun so my roommates and I just hung out in our room again which was fun too.
The next day my bus was supposed to leave at 12.00 however this was not the case because AFS bought the wrong tickets so in stead we left at 02.00. After 6 long nauseating hours we finally arrived in Pilar. My family had ordered pizza so I couldn't be happier to be home. It was so amazing to arrive in my house and it actually feeling like I was home again. The morning after I didn't feel as great as I did the evening before. I missed the people from the camp and because I didn't go to school that day I was bored and I spoke a lot with the people in Holland which didn't really make me feel better. After I wen't for a walk I felt better though and I had basketball practice in the evening to take my mind off of it.
Today I'm feeling so much better and so far I've had a good day.
This was all for now. Pictures of the camp and my trip to Encarnacion are down below.

Love,
me