Heya,
Today I won’t spend too much time on writing a fancy introduction and tell you straightforward about my last weeks in England instead.
Around the end of October, my host family decided that their house is big enough for another exchange student, so Marina, a 17-year-old girl from Croatia, moved in about one month ago. During the first days after her arrival, she was shy and seemed to feel quite lost sometimes, but I assume that every exchange student has to go through this phase at the beginning of their stay. I hope that she feels more comfortable by now.
Marina attends Year 12 at a school in Canterbury where she takes English, Maths, Computer Science, IT and Economics. In addition, she loves football and healthy food (when she prepares her meals, I often find myself thinking things like “Wow, this looks really delicious ... Maybe I should ask her to cook something for me as well”).
When I thought about the events that I want to write about in this entry, I realized that I went for quite a lot of walks/hikes this month. In addition, I started to go for a run every now and then and although I take no P.E. at school, it feels as if I got a little tiny bit fitter compared to last school year. Hopefully, I won’t stop being active during winter when it is cold outside.
A few weeks ago, our host father Peter went to Hythe for some shopping and dropped Marina and me off near the coast. The sun was shining and we spent some time walking along the beach. For some reason, this entire situation seemed so typical British to me ... Do you know this feeling? This certain kind of atmosphere that makes you thinking “this is what (South England/France/any other country)” feels like? I do not exactly know what the trigger was ... maybe the parents playing with their children in the sand, maybe the design of the houses along the pedestrian precinct, the smell of the ocean in the air or simply the English language coming out of the mouths of the people surrounding us. Whatever it was, for a minute I felt as if I have just experienced a very authentic part of the lifestyle in South England.
Last Saturday, my host mother Laura, her friend and I went for a walk with the dogs. Okay, actually it was more a hike than an easy walk, but I really enjoyed it anyway, especially because of all the animals that we saw: Antelopes, giraffes, desert dogs, …
“Wait, what?”, you might be thinking now. “Giraffes and other exotic animals in the environment of England???” Well, the hiking route that we took led through a part of the Port Lympne Wild Animal Reserve which accommodates monkeys, giraffes, zebras, rhinos and gorillas to name a few. As Port Lympne is rather a wildlife park than a zoo, the areas where the animals live are kind of integrated into the environment, so you could easily forget that you were actually walking through a man-made institution.
By the way: Laura’s friend is originally from Switzerland. She told me that she first came to England as an exchange student at the age of 16 and two years later, she moved here. I was impressed by this because she must have been very brave to leave her native country just at the age of 18.
Today, Laura, Lucy, Rosie, Marina, the dogs and I went for another walk at the coast in the town where Laura is from. It was very beautiful there because the sea was so rough from all the wind and it felt great to be a part of this turbulence. In addition, it was fun to see the dogs playing in the water. Laura even put some very long seaweed on her head to wear it like hair, which made everyone laugh.
Besides, I did something very silly and stupid: When we walked back to Laura’s car to drive home, I spotted a gigantic puddle and suddenly I felt the incredible urge to run through it. I can remember the day when I was about 8 years old and a friend from school and I went outside to jump into the puddles that formed after a heavy rain. For some reason, I felt like this 8-year-old girl again and without even thinking about it, I sprinted through this monster of a puddle. Yes, although it just lasted for a few seconds, the water splashing around me felt great ... But the result of my childish escapade was that my entire trousers and the inside of my wellies got wet. No, not just wet, but completely soaked. And then I remembered that my camera was in the back of my rucksack and if I would have tripped over something, it could have become wet ... Well, in the end it was only me being soaked, which was not very helpful with regard to the temperature being around 2 degree due to the strong wind. However, it was kind of fun to do something awkward like this.
What else is there to tell you? Let me think, school is currently not too bad, I am reading the book “Wonder” by R. J. Palacio at the moment and recently, I often found some time after my last period to play the piano in the music department of my school. Besides, I got to know some very lovely British students and I enjoy spending my time with them. So all in all, I am having a good time at the moment.
I hope you are doing fine too.
Have a lovely week and see you soon,
Sandra
PS: Here is a picture for everyone who would like to see what a relaxed dog looks like. ;)
