Being An Exchange Student

   Now that my exchange is just about done, I've realized how much I don't want to go home! Argentina has really become my home and my life in Newberg will never be the same, it's the price you have to pay for traveling, a little piece of your heart stays behind.

    I can tell you that if anyone had told me a year ago that I would be spending my summer in Argentina I would have told them that they were crazy! My family normally stays in the states when it comes to vacations. If they told me I was going to become an exchange student I'd tell them they were mental.  If someone told me I would be an exchange student to Argentina I would have asked them what drug they were on because that sure wasn't going to happen. But I'm glad it did.

  But being an exchange student hasn't been an easy ride, it is full of bumps and huge mountains and whatnot. You throw yourself into an unknown place, into a new family,  country,  school, language, culture,  and you have nothing. You have to start a new life  for yourself.  You go through things that people,  even your parents haven't been through. But it has been an incredible journey,  one full of crazy events, which I don't regret. Though I wish I tried harder on the language,  I don't regret much. Becoming an exchange student has been the best decision I have ever made in my life and I'm so grateful for the opportunity and happy it came along.

      Though my time in Argentina was short,  I really feel at home and wish to never leave,  I will definitely come back for sure to visit the amazing people I have met here.

   Exchange is no easy thing and it is definitely NO vacation. Vacations, you don't experience what I have experienced and they are definitely shorter. They don't affect you like exchange does. Vacations are trips, exchange is a second life so if anyone I know is reading this,  please don't call it a trip (trust me all exchange students hate that word) as it was much more than that.  Instead ask:
-How was your exchange?
-How was Argentina?
Or anyway that doesn't involve the word trip.

      Exchange also changes people in amazing ways. You basically have to grow up. And let me tell you that I am not the same person who left my country two and a half months ago. I have changed,  I have matured,  I have grown up.
        Upon my return home I will start school and have to go back to my boring old life, which I'm going to change for sure. On the bright side, Flor will be coming in December so that will be great! I hope I can help make her exchange as amazing as mine was. I also have decided that this is what I want to do,  international work, and will be applying for two or three State Department scholarships to go on a year long exchange my senior year to help prepare me for international work.  (I want to go to Russia, Taiwan, Turkey, or Germany I think). On top of that I will have to graduate this year (I only need 1.25 credits to graduate and will be taking 3 BYU online courses). This year will not be easy as I am taking three AP classes, am doubling up on my English classes, want to start two new languages, and to continue to do good at FFA competitions. I will continue to dance but not as much.  It will be hard but hopefully the award at the end will be worth it.

    Overall, being an exchange student has been the greatest decision of my life and if any of you reading this have even the slightest interest in it I strongly encourage you to look into it and go for it! Seriously.  Look into it. You won't regret it. Also if you have any questions or are interested on how, feel free to contact me! (Leave a comment if you don't have my info). It would be my honor  and I would be more than happy to try to help you get into an amazing,  life changing,  program to give you an experience like this.

Las Cataratas Del Iquazú

  My host family took me to Las Cataratas Del Iquazú over the winter holidays! I'm so thankful for that opportunity,  it was truly something.

   We left around 8 am on a Saturday morning and started the 1153.5 mile drive to the falls. (It was a 21 hour drive but we split it half so we only traveled about 9ish hours that day). First stop was Federación,  a nice town off the border of Uruguay.  In Federación we went to the thermas which was a hot springs! It wad super nice and there were a lot of people there. There was like 8+ pools too so not really crowded. After our 2 night stay we traveled to Puerto Iquazú (only your causal 11ish hour drive) and stayed in a house hotel. The next morning we went to see the falls. We spent all afternoon walking on trails and looking at the falls. I took a lot of photos but they are on my camera so I can't really post them on here and due to an accidental dropping of my phone into the toilet, I couldn't took photos of it with my phone.  Also that day we went on a 3 or more kilometer hike to see a little fall then headed back.

   The next day we went to the falls again but this time went on a boat trip. We went through the rapids then got super close to the falls, like we got pounded on by water. It was scarily amazing  and we got soaked! The next day we went to the Brazilian side which was even more amazing!  Argentina has more falls but the view is better in Brazil. After that we went to Paraguay which we only stayed for a hour and that was just sitting in the car. It was a little sketchy and Flor was freaking out most of the time saying that she wanted to go back to Argentina. 

   The next day we drove for an even longer time to Rosario,  a very beautiful city where the flag was made, also where Messi lives. We even got to eat in a restaurant he owned.  (It wasn't very good). The next day we went back to Necochea and got home around 8 pm, which was good as we had school the next day.

  I am so grateful for my family for taking me and for this experience overall!

The Food

  Okay, we all knew this post would come soon. I'm in love with most of the food here. For those of you who don't know me, I am a pretty picky eater, not as bad as past years, but still. I don't like certain textures of food, which mostly all fall into the fruit category. I can't stand it and makes me want to throw up (I even get the feeling of throwing up). But while on exchange,  I decided to really try to put that aside and try most things.... I tried fruit. Well I tried apples (which I do sometimes eat at home) a pear and a banana. I have drunken a lot of juice while here and really love it too! Fruit isn't bad tasting to me, it's literally just the texture.   

        
  The way the meat is cooked here is really amazing. There's no spices and if there is, it's salt. My family sometimes cooks our meat in the fireplace too! Just cover burning coals and smoke. Oh so good. Chicken is sometimes cooked like that too.

 

My host mom comes from an Italian heritage,  so all the food she makes is very Italian as well. Argentina itself, or at least the places I've been are very European. (Which makes sense as when everyone was migrating, the US didn't have tue most immigrants,  it was actually Argentina that had the most [thank you AP European History for actually teaching me something]). So anyways, we eat a lot of pasta and Italian food. The bread is also amazing.

 

  Dulce de leche, which is like caramel, is another amazing thing here.  it is used as a spread as well as a filling for most pastries. Alfajores, are a sugary bread thing covered in either chocolate or a white powdery sugar with dulce de leche in the middle. They are my loves. The pastries ate amazing here as well. Did you know that churros actually are from Argentina?  Yup they are my friends. Empanadas are also my life and something I'm really going to miss.

 

   Okay, sorry to say this but Hershey sucks. The chocolate is disgusting and chocolate here is way better. There's kinder (from the makers of  Nutella), Colfer, Milka, all these amazing ones! They are soooo good and I'm determined to find them in the US.

 

   Finally, mate.  Mate is a traditional drink that basically a open tea bag and drunken throw a straw and shared with your "mate" (you're punny Karissa!) It's super good and I'm bringing it back with me!

   Overall the food is amazing and I'm going to miss it sooo much!

The Past Month

*my tablet is working again! So this was one of the post I made but my tablet wouldn't post,  there was another one but it didn't save therefore it's completely gone. I may or may not retype it I think it was on my flight and arrival here but I'm not sure.

 

   Wow, it has been a really long time since I posted last.  So on May 17th I had my final orientation with my district. It wasn't as fun as I thought it would be, we literally just picked up our business cards, polo shirts,  and we had a seminar to go over any questions. It was kind of boring come to think of it. But oh well, at least we got to eat with the long terms.

 

  After that I started the wonderful job of packing.  This took about 20 days.  The first ten I just stared at my suitcase, took suitcase selfies (I'm not kidding literally sat in my suitcase and took selfies) and then made a huge pile of stuff on top of the suitcase. Then after that it just sat there for a few days and then put stuff in my suitcase. After unpacking and repacking like 3 times literally until the night before I left I finally decided that it was good.  I really don't like packing...

 

Anyways, after many months of waiting the time had finally come. I left very early this morning and am now "enjoying" my 6 hour layover at Dallas Fort Worth airport! This morning I had to be at the airport by 4:50 am. I literally got about 1 1/2 hours of sleep last night. Then at 7:30 my first international flight will leave and I will be on my final way to Argentina.

 

   I cant believe how quickly this snuck up on me. Sure I've been waiting and waiting for this but it's all happening very fast! It seems like yesterday I was 50 days from departure and now I am on my way!

 

Well, that's pretty much all that has happened this past month besides finals which all went pretty good, I believe I have kept my 4.0 for another year! Which I am very proud of and am crossings my fingers for one class.  According to our grading website I have all A's but we will see.

I can't wait to finally arrive! Yes I'm very scared but I know all will be alright!

 

P.S. sorry for any spelling errors or crap like that,  I'm typing on my tablet and I can't type on it to save my life! I'll try to fix the errors but it depends on what I catch. Thank you for understanding!

School Differences

School here is quite different from school in the United States. First off, a lot of the kids go a private school, there is public school but the private schools are better. I go to ISADAM which is Instituto Secundario Argentino Danes 'Alta Mira'. It is one of the best schools in Necochea. Like almost all the schools in Argentina there is a school uniform. When you think of school uniforms you normally think of a skirt with stockings with a sweater or khaki pants. You know what we normally see on tv or as I have seen other exchange students wear. Oh no, not here. My school uniform consists of navy blue sweatpants and a navy blue hoodie with a white shirt underneath. The other kids have a sweatshirt thing with school name on it, I've just been using my district 5100 hoodie because my family told me to use it. The dress code isn't too strict I guess as the kids bring other jackets and wear other shirts besides white ones underneath. You can take of the sweatshirt too if it gets too hot which is really nice as the classroom does get quite warm.

   The classes consist of geography, English, politics, history, literature, chemistry, math, and a few communication based classes. (My classmates are studying communication, there is another class studying science as well). The teachers come to you, so you never leave the classroom and school ends at different times each now as you have different classes each day. Each class is one hour long and you have a 10 minute break in between each class session. Sometimes you'll have two sessions of a class but you still get that break which is super nice.
 

   The breaks are crazy, the kids can literally do whatever they want. They throw desks, play fútbol, and socialize. You can go get a snack and walk around the school. When you bell rings, it's more like a heads up that the break is over and you don't have to be in the classroom at all. The teachers sometimes don't even come until 10 minutes after the bell rings anyways so yeah. Homework does exist but they don't get as much as I do at my school.
 

  The grading system is all numbers and range from 1-10 with 1 being really bad and 10 being excellent. 7+ is passing. They do trimester and your score needs to be over 21 points in order to pass that class and not have to take summer school or whatnot.
 

  School does matter here but not as much. You don't have to have decent grades to go to university, in fact you can fail a lot of classes and still go! The universities just want your money basically so they don't care about much stuff.
 

  The teachers sometimes decide to not go to school and teach the class so it's normal to have random days off of school. If a teacher doesn't come to teach then you go home, there is no such thing as subs here.
 

   I really don't know which school I like better both are really different but I like them both. Argentine school is really nice as it is super different from our and I love the change, but the United States I can chose all my classes and whatnot. Both have there pros and cons but doesn't everything? 

Buenos Aires trip

   First off, I just want to brag that I have survived my first month here! But it also makes me sad because that means my exchange is almost halfway over... But I got to make it count!

  Back to what I was actually going to talk about, about two weeks ago I went back to Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina with my class. The bus left at midnight on a Wednesday and was a little longer than 7 hours. They wanted or the idea was for us to sleep on the ride there so we could have the full day to do stuff. I thought that was pretty smart, except the fact that nobody really wanted to sleep until like 2-3 am! I got to sit by one of Flor's good friends and have the window seat which was very nice. Everyone wanted to ask me questions so I was literally forced to talk to everyone. A few guys decided that they wanted to take selfies and then they wanted to take selfies with me. Which was okay but that meant like half the people on the bus ended up surrounding me which was a little uncomfortable but I went with it. Being uncomfortable is normal for an exchange student and you learn to deal with it and some even end up feeling more comfortable when they are uncomfortable (if that makes any sense). My friend got up and a guy sat next me, which was okay I thought, they were still taking selfies and I was talking with two girls in the sit in front of me. Well it ends up when a guy sits next to you like that it means they want something and the guy tries to kiss me, twice. I stopped him both times and ended up leaving and my friend sat next to me again feeling really bad. (Ends up some of the guys payed him to do that, thanks guys.) Then after teaching me some spanish, a song that they sing randomly all the time, and asking me to say their names, they finally decided to leave me and try to catch some z's. I didn't really sleep because I just don't. When I travel it's impossible for me to fully fall asleep. I like half sleep where my eyes are shut but I don't fully loss consinousiness and can still hear everything (I know this because I listen to music when I travel and can still fully hear the songs). 
 

   Around 8 am we arrived at our hotel in Buenos Aires and dropped our stuff. Then we got back onto the bus and went to a museum. After they we went to a science museum then to a mall to have some lunch. I accidentally grabbed a water with gas instead of one without and was kinda shaking it as I waited for my food. In the end it exploded all over me when I went to open it with my food. That wasn't fun. After that we went to a cementery and then to the hotel. 
 

   The hotel room was like a dorm room with bunk beds and cubbies for us to put our stuff in. It ended up some random person also had a key to our room and had been living in there for a couple days. Oh and there was one bathroom for 6-7 girls. (One of the friends wasn't placed in our room but she stayed there anyways). After that we just chilled and hang out. Then we went to the bar/stand up comedy for dinner. Which was where I ended running into the pole in front of a lot of the guys. After that we went back to the hotel. On the bus the guys kept inviting me to go to a party in their room but I was too tired and really wanted to go bed so I didn't go. Flor, Sofi, and another girl ended up going. I ended up not going to bed until like 2:30am and we had to get up "early" again in the morning. Flor ended up coming back to grab something and the guys followed her in turning on the lights and waking us all up. Then some tried to hide in our cubbies but Flor caught them and they left us in peace. 
 

  The next day we went to a channel studio and then to a radio station later. Both were amazing and were really great to see. The class is studying communication so that was part of the point of the trip. (I think we did something else but I really don't remember). The school even gave us a second breakfast which consisted of an alfajores and soda. My school in the USA would NEVER give us this like at all. Crazy stuff happened, we we're split in half because the radio station couldn't take all 60 of us and I went in the first group. The guys were trying to kick a soda into a garbage can that was right next to me. One of them even got out an aerosol can and a lighter... You can imagine what happened next.

 After this they took us to another mall to do some shopping and eat something before we got back on the bus and headed back home to Necochea. The bus ride home was very uneventful, I got to sit by myself in the very back of the bus so I could lay down and not worry about kitting someone. It was long but I once again half-slept the whole time. We arrived back in Necochea at 6 am and all went home. I'm pretty sure we all went start to bed.
 

   I didn't know a lot of people when the trip happened as it was only my second week being here and going to school. But it was totally worth it. For a while before, I didn't really like the people. Not like as a person but in general I didn't want to be around them. Flor would have friends over and all I'd want them to do was leave. At the end if the trip I realized that I didn't want it to end and I really wanted to be around my classmates! Most of all I wanted to try to make friends with more people and try to understand more. I wanted people to come over, I wanted to go meet people in the park, I wanted to ride bikes or roller blade or even just walk with people. Thank goodness for this as without this I would be very miserable no matter how much I try not to be.
 

   Being an exchange student is WAY harder than what people think but in the end, the struggles will be totally worth it. 

Random/Embarrassing Stories (part 1)

  So much has happened since I have been here and there's stuff that I really don't want to ever forget. No matter how horrible the moment was I still want to look back on it and laugh. Also since a lot of them are pretty darn funny, I'm going to share some of them with you.

   Just so you know, I am one of the clumsiest people in the world and all of the embarrassing ones literally happened! I'm not making them up. Oh and this may be a multiple parts throughout my exchange. 

The Pole Story: So my school went on a trip to Buenos Aires for a few days and we had just gotten out of a bar where we had eaten dinner (empanadas or pizza with water and Pepsi, I call it a bar because that's what they told me!) and were waiting for our bus. We had been waiting a VERY long time and all of us were very tired! (Including me) We decided to walk to find the bus or something I don't know, I just followed the people but then we turned around to go back? I was confused but that was normal so I just followed my friend. A group of guys were walking behind us and then one decided to try to ask me a question. I turned around and walked backwards so I could look at them but then decided to turn around as I was scared that I would run into something. The second I turned around I ran into a pole. A pole! In front of like half the guys... I laughed and thought it was funny, I'm pretty sure they were worried about my mental health as no one laughed...

The Bicycle Accident Story: Flor, a friend and I were going to meet some friends and ride our bikes around town. Well the night before it was super stormy and the roads are made of dirt so it was super muddle and had TONS of puddles. We came to a huge one and decide to go on the hilly grassy area. Well my bike was doing something weird and I stepped into the puddle. Then I went to continue and my bike pedal got stuck on a pole and I lost my balance and completely fell into the puddle. I ended up getting all wet and went home instead of hanging out with my friends. 

The Clock/Futbol Incident at School: So at my school, which I'll probably make a separate post on about all the differences, you can do whatever you want on breaks. Like, I'm not kidding. The guys like to play futbol in the classroom so on like the my third day of school they were playing and ended up accidentally hitting me in the head and then later in the arm. Which was okay but it made me laugh that out of all the people it could have hit, it hit me! Also they throw desks around the classroom too (no I have not been hit by one, yet.)

   Also a few days ago they were playing during lunch and had moved all the desks to the sides of the classroom and then decided to just kick it at the wall. Well it hit the clock which fell and then shattered everywhere! They reacted by hiding the evidence that there was even a clock by hiding it on this lower part of the ceiling. I thought this was crazy but apparently earlier that year they had broken a window! 

Well that's all my stories for now. Hope your days got better by reading my funny troubles/stories of embarrassing myself as well as the other random ones.

World Cup

  Being in Argentina during the 2014 FIFA World Cup has been an amazing experience I am so happy to have experienced. The passion of this country is truly something. Every time Argentina won a game there would parties. Parties everywhere. Cars would line up on the streets and honk, people would sing and everything was crazy! But it was so nice to experience something that could bring literally all kinds of people together. The USA we literally have NO passion. We could care less about the World Cup as a whole and that goes for just about everything. We have the Fourth of July and all our holidays but nothing truly compares to the passion here.

Still got that Argentina pride! This was after the final match. When we well lost...

   Though Argentina didn't win, I was so happy to experience this wonderful opportunity and had a great time watching all the games. But hey! We still did better than Brazil! (No hate to Brazil [sorry Kari!] but it's a joke with my classmates and basically all of Argentjna, it has to do with a song that we sing that basically asks Brazil how does it feel to have us in the house of their fathers [not direct translation! I'm sorry!] so that's why it makes me laugh.
 

     Overall, it has been a great experience and I truly do love it here. I can't imagine my life at home and I already don't want to go home. I am still struggling a lot with the language, I understand about half if what people are saying but I still can't speak confidently with people. Which this may be explained in another post. Well that's all for now!

Update

Just wanted to give you guys a little update on what is going on and why I have not been posting. The plan was to have me make posts from my tablet but it won't connect to the internet so I can't post anything from there even though I have two posts ready to go. Since it won't connect to the internet those posts have NOT been saved to my account so I can't post them from my phone. Sorry about that, I have been trying to figure it out but it's not working out I may just have to post from my phone. Thank you for understanding and I'm sorry about the issues.

The First Orientation

   Finding out your country is one of the most wonderful, brutal, and time consuming process ever. First off, remember that each district is different so if you are a STEP student and are not in district 5100 this may be different for you.

     After being accepted in November and filling out the huge final application,  you have to wait until January before you even get to chose a country! This personally left me extremely confused on where I wanted to go and doing a lot of research and losing a lot of sleep. Like seriously, it would take me forever 2-3 hours to fall asleep! I thought I wanted to go to Europe for sure but I wanted a slightly longer exchange... basically I was really confused. Then January came and it was time for orientation.  I went in to orientation without any clue of where I really wanted to go.
      
   My exchange officer drove the five of us to the 4h camp in Salem, where we were then split up into our cabins, everyone from my club had one of each other in their cabin except for me. I thought this was a good thing because it would force me to socialize with other people outside of my club and help me practice for future situations which I will need to do this. (Like on exchange or running for different offices in FFA or other clubs). We then all headed back to the gym where we got our binders, name tags, sized for the blazers (well long term did, short term gets white polo shirts) and our pictures taken for our business cards. After that we headed to dinner where we ate. After dinner we went back to the gym and were split off into groups then given five minutes to figure out a plan to build the tallest tower out of marshmallows and dry spaghetti noodles. I had a girl in my group who went to an engineering thing over the summer so we believed we were going to win. Then they announced that we weren't allowed to talk. We did pretty good but didn't win. After this we went back for a snack and to take a test. Then we headed back to the gym to talk to the district exchange officers about the countries we were interested in. After that we were sent to bed for a early morning the next morning. 

    The second day we had to be at breakfast by 7, one of the exchange officers made that very clear the night before. After that we split into groups for classes. We had like 6 or 8 classes with breaks in between, it was long and brutal but filled with a lot of information.  After the last class we had dinner and headed back up to the gym for the country fair. A lot of us exchange students believed that the country fair would help us decide exactly where we wanted to go. Reality it really just confused us on where we wanted to go. I was considering countries I didn't even think I would even consider.  After the country fair, we listened to past exchange students answering a series of questions of their experience.  After that we were sent to bed,  but just before my district short term country officer informed us that we needed a decision in the morning. I had some clue of where I wanted to go, it was between Finland,  which was where I wanted to go all along and Argentina as my first choices as well as three more options.

      The next morning,  we had breakfast and then it was time to decide. Sitting there trying to decide was really hard, my brain was going crazy! Should I go with Finland, the country that had been on my list since the time I applied or Argentina? In the end I put down Argentina as my first choice followed by Finland, Brazil, New Zealand, and India. I knew where ever I ended up would be perfect,  exchange is how you make it. If you want it to suck, it will suck, but if you make the best out of it everything will be just fine and wonderful. I kept this in mind as I waited and waited forever for a placement.

Finding Out My Country

As I said in a earlier post, you wait a really long time for your country placement. We made our choices and then were informed  that we will find out when the other countries contact our exchange officer, meaning that we could be informed as soon as the end of the month to April or May! This really tests your patience,  trust me. It drove me crazy not knowing where I would be living during the summer let alone even my exchange student's name! Finally it came.

      I received an email on March 2nd, late at night, right after I got home from a long weekend at a cavy show. It said a possible match to Argentina! My first choice!  I freaked out and pretty much informed my whole family (which kind of freaked out my mom as I ran extremely quickly down the stairs and slightly made it sound like something was wrong). Her name was Florencia and she was only a few months older than me, I quickly read over her application and realized how awesome she was and how we were practically perfect exchange matches! The next morning she contacted me and we have been talking ever since.  I'm so excited to go and for her to come!

   I will be living in Necochea in the Buenos Aires province of Argentina,  which is about 6 hours from the capital! Another girl from my club is also going to Argentina and in the same district so I will also most likely be able to see her as well as a past exchange student who came to our club last winter!

      I will be leaving on June 18th and have over 7000 miles to travel! So yes, a 3ish hour flight to Texas,  a 5 hour layover,  then about a 12 hour flight to Buenos Aires! I think the flying is the number one thing that making nervous because I have never traveled alone or even out of the country! But I'm sure all will be fine and it will be amazing because exchange is how you make it and I plan to make it more than amazing! But for now, I will have to worry about packing,  finishing my sophomore year, FFA elections, packing,  auction and banquet, my last dance competition, packing, national application for my agriscience experiment,  and did I mention packing? The count has started and each day that passes by brings a wave of excitement and anxiety but it's all good! Only 40 more days until departure!

Overview of Exchange

I've decided to have a blog over the course of my exchange. The point of it is so that my family and friends can stay updated about my adventures and hopefully help future exchange students!

    First a few things about me. My name is Karissa and I'm from Oregon and will be going on exchange with rotary youth exchange to Argentina! I'm a part of the STEP program so I will only be in Argentina for a few months but I am still very excited. I'm also making this blog for future STEP kids as there isn't that much information on the STEP process for the curious minded so here you go! Unlike long term, who normally have to pick from a list of countries, short term can go anywhere with a certified Rotary district. It is a direct family to family exchange so I will spend 4-10 weeks with my family then my host sister will come and spend 4-10 weeks with me. Short term is pretty much a "make your own exchange" as you chose the dates and everything; it can be for as long as you want or as short as you want (ideal for protective parents who are nervous about sending you to another country). If you go to the northern hemisphere your exchange will be completely in the summer so you'll be there for July and they'll be here for August; with the Southern Hemisphere the exchange is normally longer as it'll be their winter, so you'd go all summer and then they will come during their summer or your winter! (That's what I am doing) It can get crazy confusing other countries such as India also does staggered exchanges, and I've heard that Taiwan and Japan do that too but I'm not quite sure.
 
     I'll be living in Necochea Argentina which is about 6 hours away from Buenos Aires,  the Capitol of Argentina. It is on the coast and is a port city, one the most important because it connects trade to the south. I will be there for about 2.5 months from June 18th to August 30th. I'm so excited and can't wait to share my story with the world!