July and the first bit of August passed by very quickly and I was busy too. At the end of July, I finished the first semester of school, and my class, along with all of the other classes, did our presentations for the CETEC Festival. Each class had to put together a play from scratch and I helped with building sets. The theme this year was Italian immigration, and after many hours of painting and gluing, we got the sets done. When it was our night to present, I helped with changing scenes. It was a long night but a lot of fun.
After the CETEC Festival, I had some time off from school, and I went to the gym, continued to play volleyball, and even went on a little trip to Gramado. Gramado is a city about 2 ½ hours away, and unfortunately, because of the non-existent roads due to the floods and the wrong GPS directions, it took 4 ½ hours. I went to Gramado with Anna Paula who was an exchange student in Galesburg in 2017-2018. She stayed at my house, and when she found out that I was going to be staying in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, she wanted to meet up and take me on a little trip. It was so lovely to see her again after years and even meet her dad and step-mom. It was also cool to talk to her in Portuguese because the last time I saw her we were speaking in English. I went to a sunset party in Gramado, Mini Mundo (Mini World), Black Lake Park, and even a small amusement park! The sunset party had a guy playing saxophone and the view was beautiful. We were in the mountains and there weren’t too many clouds so you could see the entire sunset. Mini Mundo has replicas of a bunch of places in Brazil and Germany. (There were a lot of places in Germany because Gramado has a lot of German heritage) My favorite part was being with Anna Paula and catching up with her after all those years.
Overall my language has improved drastically over the past few months. I can speak all day without getting tired and I can have conversations about almost anything. I have finally gained some confidence when I speak too. I love to talk and communicate with people in Portuguese. In school, I understand almost everything. Of course, there are still words that I don’t know, but I am still learning, and if I don’t know a word, I am not afraid to ask. Right now my science classes like biology and physics are the hardest because of the language but also because those are the classes I struggle with the most. I think learning the language and the culture of Brazil has been one of the most incredible things about exchange so far. I arrived not knowing much, and now I am thinking, speaking, and occasionally having some dreams in Portuguese, too!
Another exciting thing that happened was my host mom’s birthday. She had some family over and it was a lot of fun. There was lots of delicious food, and my host sister and I actually made the cake! I am not going to lie… it was a little ugly, but it’s the thought that counts, and it tasted great. It was a vanilla layer cake with white Brigadeirao and strawberries between each layer. On top, we decorated with more white Brigadeirao, blueberries, strawberries, and some flowers.
On top of making the cake recently, I have been making some recipes with my host family. My host dad and I have been making oatmeal, apple cakes, and banana bread. They have all tasted delicious so far. I have also made Apple Crisp for my host family and they loved it and had me make it again this past Sunday. The next thing I plan to make for them is Coffee Cake. I wouldn’t even have these recipes if it weren’t for the Culinary class I had at GHS. (Thank you, Mrs. Barrett!)
On Sunday, my volleyball team hosted a traditional dinner to fundraise for my team to play in upcoming tournaments. It was a success, and the food was delicious. There was chicken, chicken sausages, pasta, salad, potato salad, and bread, and then at the end, there were cookies and coffee. We also sold raffle tickets, and 200 different prizes were won. Someone even won a watermelon, hahaha.
One last exciting thing is that new exchange students have arrived in my district. Over the past two weeks, three exchange students arrived. Two are from Germany, and the other is from Canada. There is one more exchange student who will come to my district, and I think he or she is from Mexico. Unfortunately, the Canadian and Mexican students will live farther away from me, so I won’t see them often. The German kids flew into my city, so I was able to meet them at the airport and welcome them with their host families. One of them will be staying about 45 min away from me while the other will be staying in my city with me!
It is crazy to think that all of my previous exchange friends are home now and that new students are arriving. It reminds me that I will go back soon and that is insane because I feel like I haven’t been here that long. I only have about 4 ½ months left until I return to the US. Leaving here will be so hard because of all of the relationships I have made over the past 7 months, but I will be excited to see everyone back home.
My Class and I before we presented our play for the CETEC Festival.
This is "Rua Coberta" in Gramado. It is a street that is covered and there are lots of restaurants and things to do here.
These are more pictures from Gramao. One is in a chocolate shop, Gramado is known for chocolate and has so many shops there! The sunset picture is from the sunset party in the mountains.
This is me and my host sister assembling the cake.
These are my host parents making an apple cake with me and the finished dessert!
These last pictures are from the airport when some exchange students arrived in my city. The picture with everyone in our volleyball uniforms is from the fundraiser on Sunday night. The last two pictures are of my hosts cats, Anakin and Cleo.