Sad news.

I hopped over the English Channel on Monday morning at a rather unfortunate hour (something gross like 6 am...), arrived at 7 am local time in Dover, and headed off toward Cambridge and Newmarket. The weather was AMAZING in England. Really. It was warm and SUNNY, and the air smelled like springtime, which was WONDERFUL. It's really a beautiful country, with rolling hills and tiny villages. Driving on the left side of the road is pretty fun too. :)

I know I promised pictures, but here's the thing....

I only got about 20 pictures the entire day, because we were in the car the WHOLE day. I'm not kidding. I got out three times: once to go into each of the John Deere stores we visited, and once to eat lunch and go to the bathroom. Seriously. No exploring, no visiting towns or interesting sights. So, all of my pictures were from inside the car, so they weren't that great.

Here's the other thing:

They all disappeared.

No, I'm not kidding. I uploaded all of my pictures just now, and they're mysteriously... not here. I checked my memory card, and they're not there, either. I must have accidentally deleted them. It's unfortunate, to be sure, but that's the way these things go, I guess. I wish I still had them, but at least I didn't lose a BUNCH of pictures, like the 150+ I took today in Bastogne. Ah well, life goes on. :)

So. I finally got home yesterday at about 5:30 pm. My host dad had a dinner of some sorts to go to, so he left, and my host mom and I had dinner, then I came up to my room and went to sleep. I'm lame, I know. I go to bed at about 8pm every night, but I'm TIRED people. It's exhausting to be an exchange student.

Today, I woke up at 8 am to catch a train at 9:22 so I could be in Liège to meet up with everyone else from Rotary and go to Bastogne, a city in southern Belgium. Christian, my Canadian buddy, and I sat together on the bus, which was quite pleasant. When we got to Bastogne, my favorite New Yorker, the fabulous Emily Snell was waiting for me, so I was STOKED about that. We started off having lunch (it was like 11:30 or something by that time) at some sort of petting zoo/farm thing in Bastogne. It was a pretty cool place: it's a petting zoo/farm as well as a home for people who are mentally handicapped. The residents take care of the animals and help out with general farm work, which I think is really cool. The land was very beautiful. While we were there, we saw goats, rabbits, llamas, chickens and sheep, including a lamb that was born this morning! One of the workers caught a lamb and we could pet and hold it as well, which was so cute!

Christian and a llama.

After that, we piled back in the bus and went to a museum about World War II. The guide is a member of Rotary, and he had Harry Potter glasses. SO awesome. The museum was WONDERFULLY done, and very interactive. There was a lot of information and a lot to see. There were little video screens everywhere, playing videos of people who had lived in the region during the war. They shared their memories, which were heartbreaking, more often than not. One woman told how her father had told them to go on ahead as the family was fleeing from the Germans; he would catch up with them later on his bike. He never came.

A letter written during the war. It was giving information about people selling on the black market, which was a booming business at the time.

After the museum, we went to the Mardasson Memorial, which is in honor of the Americans who fought and died in Belgium during the war. Over 70,000 American soldiers died there. Isn't that number mind-blowing? The monument is in the shape of the star, and it has every state engraved on it. You can climb up a spiral staircase to the top, and look down over the city of Bastogne, which was really cool.

Yours truly in front of the crypt. There's a memorial in there for Catholics, one for Protestants, and one for Jews. They're absolutely BEAUTIFUL mosaics.

Christian and I on top of the Mardasson Memorial.

After that, we climbed back into the bus and drove to a random building (that's not an exaggeration... none of us knew where we were) and where we were served pie, waffles, coffee, and soda by Rotary. They have a thing for giving us pie, seriously. There's almost always pie at Rotary events. I sat with Emily and Kryston (New York and Missouri), Christian (Canada), and Siddhant and Aditi (both from India). We had a very interesting conversation about geography. I learned that India has 28 states and that Canada has 10 provinces and 3 territories. Also, Aditi and Siddhant tried to name all 50 states. They got quite a few of them too, which was very impressive, I think. The first three they named? Washington, New York, and Ohio. Emily and I thought it was hilarious that Ohio was the third, out of all the states they had left to choose from...

Side note:

Some of you may know that one of my passions is education. I believe that the American education system is broken and needs to be completely reformatted. Schools should be palaces. Teachers should be paid like kings. Kids should wake up every day excited beyond all imagination because they get to go to school. Courses should be challenging. Graduation rates should be 99% across the country. All of these things are POSSIBLE. But as of right now, are any of them true? No, unfortunately. But I digress. The point of this was to explain a few differences between American schools and schools in other nations.

Did you know that in Canada, kids can (and DO) choose to take a 5th year of high school to bring up their grade average and thus give them a better chance to be accepted to college.

Siddhant and Aditi could name about 35 of the 50 American states. I couldn't name 5 cities in India. Nor did I know that India has states. I took World Geography sophomore year. I passed with an A. I took a full year of World History Sophomore year as well (1st semester Pre-AP, second semester regular). I earned an A in both of those.

Siddhant and Aditi are fluent in English, German and Marathi, as well as 2 or 3 other native tongues from India. They are here in Belgium, learning French. They are both 18 years old, and they speak 5 languages each, FLUENTLY.

At the end of this year, Siddhant is returning to India for 2 months, then moving to Germany, where he will study to be an engineer for FIVE years. He won't return home during that time. He will be going to university in GERMAN.

And to think, kids in America whine about having to take 2 credits of foreign language.

Just some food for thought.

Tomorrow, Amandine and I are going to Oostende, so I can touch the ocean. I've never touched an ocean before. Heck, I didn't even SEE the ocean until 2 weeks before my 17th birthday! I'm super excited. After that, we're going to take the train back down to Bruges and spend the day there. I'm excited! :)

Friday night, we're all meeting up in Hannut to celebrate Amandine's 18th birthday (WOO!). Then, Saturday, I'm hoping to go to Maastricht (in the Netherlands) with Christian. I love having a week off of school. :)

Biosus,

Mika

(that's what all my Belgian friends call me. I LOVE it.)

London.

London London London.

That trip was seriously crazy fun. I LOVED it. While in London, I saw King Henry VIII's tomb, the interior of Windsor Castle, Queen Mary's Doll House, Buckingham Palace, countless telephone booths, drank Starbucks, and rode the London Eye.

The London Eye was probably my favorite part. We went up at night, and the entire city was lit up, everything was glowing. There were fireworks going off everywhere as well because of Guy Fawkes' Day, which made it even more magical. I wasn't originally going to ride because it was ridiculously expensive, but Jordan looked at me and said, "Mikayla... When will you have the chance to go again?" He was right. I'm SO glad I went. I have the souvenir picture of the group of us on my dresser, and every time I look at it, I smile.

Here's a recap:

I got to Namur at a disgustingly early hour on Thursday, and we all piled into the bus for the drive to Calais, France. I saw France for the first time on that trip, which was pretty cool. We got to Calais and had to go through customs, which involved filling out a little paper thing with details about how long we'd be staying in the UK and our addresses here in Belgium. It was pretty cool, and I'm happy that my passport has a new stamp. After that, we boarded the ferry for the trip across the English Channel. This was another first for me: I'd never seen the ocean before. Jordan, Emily and I went outside on the deck, and it was FREEZING, but we managed to get some good pictures.

My favorite:





After the boat ride, we drove to Canterbury Cathedral and took a tour, which was actually immensely interesting. I took loads of photos there as well. There's so much history in these places that it's almost hard to comprehend. Just imagining that popes, archbishops, and kings have done important business and altered the course of history on the exact spot you're standing on now is just... mind blowing.

After Canterbury, we drove to Picadilly Circus and were given free rein to run around and explore, as long as we were back on the bus by 10. I took off with Emily, Jordan, Sam and Caitlin, and we had a very interesting experience searching for a bathroom. Apparently the Brits don't have to pee, EVER. There were NO public bathrooms to be found. It was a major crisis, honestly. I don't know where I found the bathroom, but I know I found one eventually. Then, we went to eat at an Indian restaurant we found on a side street. The food was very good, but VERY expensive. The bill total was about 80 pounds, which translates to $130. For 5 people. Crazy, I know.

We went back to the bus after that, and finally went to the hotel. We ended up spending most of the night in Caitlin's room, playing cards and just talking.

Saturday:
Emily and I almost missed the bus because we went on a Starbucks run. SO delicious. We drove to Windsor Castle and took a tour, which was extraordinary. Jordan and I were the last ones done because we couldn't stop marveling at everything we were seeing. The views were incredible, as was the art. I've seen this picture a million times in books and online, but to actually see the real piece of art? Incredible.




After our tour, Jordan and I stopped in St. George's Chapel, which houses King Henry VIII's tomb as well as the St. George's Chapel Choir. It was finished during the reign of King Henry VIII, and was one of the most intricate, beautiful buildings I've ever had the privilege to enter. Henry even had a special room built for his first wife, Catharine of Aragon, to watch mass.

Our next stop after a quick lunch of McDonald's, believe it or not, was Madame Tussauds Wax Museum. I met Leonardo DiCaprio, Indiana Jones, John Wayne and DANIEL RADCLIFFE. So many levels of awesome. I also had wax figurines of my hands made. I tried to do that thing where you make a heart with your hands, but it didn't really work... So I have two awkward looking wax hands sitting here in my room... but it was still awesome. Maybe I'll make them into book ends.


After that, we went to the Hard Rock Café for dinner. I had a veggie burger and it was delicious. We also happened to be sitting at a table surrounded by Billy Idol paraphernalia. I LOVE Billy Idol, so I was very excited about that as well.

After dinner, we went to the Phoenix Theater for a performance of the musical "Blood Brothers." I enjoy theater, but this... this was phenomenal. It's about twin brothers, separated at birth (their mother, a poor woman who already has 5 or 6 children, gives one of the boys to the rich woman whose house she cleans). The rich woman, Mrs. Lyons, states that twins separated at birth, can never know of each others' existence, or they will both immediately die. Of course, as the boys get older, they somehow find each other and become friends, much to the dismay (and terror) of their respective mothers. It's a beautiful story with amazing music to go along with it. Definitely one of my favorite experiences in London.

We returned to the hotel when the show was over, and hung out in Caitlin's room again, but that night we had a tea party. It was quite enjoyable. :)

Saturday we woke up, packed, and then commenced a walking tour of London. We saw tons of buildings including:
The Tower of London
Big Ben
London Bridge
Parliament
Buckingham Palace
The Royal Courts
Trafalgar Square
The Prime Minister's Street
St. James' Park

After our tour, we had a mad scramble to find lunch, as we had ended up in an area that contained absolutely NO restaurants whatsoever. Eventually we found a place selling fish and chips, so we munched on that outside in the park. AMAZINGLY delicious. Seriously.

While we were waiting for the rest of the kids to come back, the group I was with decided to get ice cream. We stopped at a little stand on the side of the road (it sounds sketchy, but it wasn't) and were greeted by a lovely man named Simon, who was working there. He had delicious ice cream as well. He was quite the character, and was immensely pleased when he found out we were from Belgium. He said that he only knows one phrase in Dutch: Zal je met me trouwen? which translates to: Will you marry me? Quite humorous, I will tell you.

This is Simon, the Ice Cream Man. He's holding a picture of my best friend, Hannah. I took that photo with me everywhere in London and took pictures of her with all of the landmarks and anything else I thought she'd like.

Once all of Rotary had regrouped, we divided up based on which museum we wanted to go to. Jordan, Caitlin, Sam and I chose to go to the British Museum. It was AMAZING how much history was inside that one building. I could have spent hours and hours, if not days and weeks just wandering the halls. However, we were all antsy to get out and explore the rest of London, as we had until 11 o'clock that night all to ourselves. So, needless to say, we were not in the best mindset for a museum. Some of my favorite parts:
The Rosetta Stone
The Book of the Dead
"Paula Deen. BUTTAH!"
"I really freaking HATE Rachel Ray."
"There should be way more Picasso stuff in here. Isn't this like... false advertising?"
"Dude... all of these people.... speak ENGLISH."
"Okay, so I'm thinking we're not at the maturity level we need to be at to be in here right now..."


When we were done touring the museum, we all headed across the street to Starbucks, of course, and then stopped to get "hot dogs" at the stand across the street. Why the quotation marks? Well, they tasted like funky sausage, and the box they came out of said "50% meat." I really don't want to know what the other 50% was. It was already dark outside, and the whole street was beautiful. Spending that time with my friends was definitely another one of my favorite moments on the trip. It wasn't necessarily anything extraordinary (okay... we were in London...), but a feeling of contentment just kind of washed over me during that walk. It was an indescribable experience.

We hopped on the metro after that. Next stop: King's Cross Station. Why? Platform 9 3/4. Yes, I'm serious! I had to explain my obsession to Jordan, who, as it turns out, has never read Harry Potter. >:( <---- That's my unhappy face. I do think his interest was piqued though, so hopefully he'll read them SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOON. Life is not complete without Harry Potter. 'Nuff said.


We left King's Cross and hopped back on the metro to go to the London Eye, which Jordan really really wanted to ride. I ended up going as well, and it's probably number one on my Favorite Things About London list.



After the London Eye, we headed back to Picadilly Circus, and met a lovely drunk man wearing a mohawk wig on the metro. After arriving, we did a little bit of souvenir shopping, then split up for the remaining hour and a half or so. I went to a pub and hung out with Jordan and Elliot, and then we began a fruitless hunt for fish and chips. We ended up eating at a seedy little sandwich/donut shop, and watching a TV special about Susan Boyle. Actually, we almost missed the bus because we were watching the thing about her... But we made it, ça va alors. Most of the bus ride was spent sleeping, as well as the ferry. We actually missed the ferry we were supposed to take, so we parked the bus in a parking lot and just sat there for about an hour. And sleeping on the ferry was COLD. But oh well.

We made it back to Namur at about.... 8 am the next morning, and I took the train to Huy and Etienne picked me up. I slept most of the rest of the day, which was nice.



And voilà. That's the story of my trip to London. It was amazing, and it's definitely something I'll never forget. :)

I start school tomorrow.

Yay.

Actually, I'm usually excited for the first day of school. Summer loses it's oomph after a while, and I like the order and discipline that comes with the school year. I like getting up at the same time every day, having a set schedule, and being able to plan out homework and whatnot. I'm a nerd, holy cow.

But anyway, I start school tomorrow, and I'm a little nervous, I think. Nothing major (I'm not going to cry or anything like that...), just a few little butterflies. My new school is huge, and I don't have ANY classes with the other exchange students aside from our one French class first thing in the morning. I know that that will be good for me, that I'll be able to grow as a person, and that I'll learn quicker if I'm not tempted to speak English with the other exchangers. But still. It's a little intimidating, jumping into the deep end like this.

My classes (that I can remember):

French ---> first thing in the morning, taught by an 83 year old priest.

Religion

Math

Phys Ed.

Social Science

Geography

and other things I just can't remember. I think there's a science class thrown in there somewhere...

I went to a Rotary meeting last night and gave a small speech about me and where I come from.

It went something like this:

"Bonsoir messieurs et monsieur le président:

Je m'appelle Mikayla et j'ai seize ans. Je suis americaine. Je viens de Loveland, au Colorado. J'habite avec ma mère, deux chats, deux chiens, et six poissons. Les chevaux sont ma vraie passion. Je monte à cheval tous les jours avec mes amis.

J'étudie le français depuis trois ans. Après mon séjour en Belgique, j'irai à lúniversité pour étudier le français et science politique.

J'ai choisi de venir en Belgique parce que j'adore la pluie. Le Colorado est un dèsert, et il n'y a jamais de pluie.

J'aime lire, parler, et sourire.

Merci."

Let me know if you want a translated version. :P

All four of the inbounds to our club had to give their speeches last night, and we all did smashingly well. We gave the president our flags as well, and of course took a bunch of pictures.

Earlier yesterday, I rode Eros again. Sophie wasn't there this time, so I took Eros into the small arena near his stall and lunged him for a while, which seemed to work out some of his kinks. He still wouldn't behave on the trail though.

This past weekend was the Inbound Orientation for all of us YEPs (as we're affectionately known) in District 1630. It started with a lot of standing around and waiting in line on Saturday morning. We had to show the district people our passports (I forgot mine...) and received our insurance cards and gave the Chairman, M. Binamé, a pin.

After that, we had lunch, which was typical cafeteria food. I don't even remember what it was. I sat with Jordan again as well as some other exchange students, and it was nice to sit and talk some more. When we were finished with lunch, we saw about 584 slideshows about Rotary and the rules and what we are and are not allowed to do. Once all of that business was finished, we took a walking tour of Huy, the city we were staying in. The architecture was phenomenal. We toured an old cathedral and a monastery that was connected to a museum. It was all very interesting, and I wish my camera hadn't died halfway through. :( Dinner was uneventful (I don't remember what it was then, either), but afterward, Rotary had a dance party thing for us. There was a DJ and music and flashing lights. We also got 2 beer tokens each. With one token, we were able to get one glass of beer.

***No, we were NOT breaking any of the Rotary rules. The rules about drinking in Belgium are different, because of the culture. We, as Rotary Youth Exchange students are allowed to drink if we maintain proper behavior and do not go over the legal limit for alcohol consumption.***

I spent most of the night with Emily and Lily, from New York and Florida, respectively. We stayed at the dance for about an hour, then went up to Emily's room and just sat around and talked. The dance ended at midnight, and we all went to bed then, which was good because I was exhausted.

The next morning, we listened to more slideshows and presentations, then had breakfast. Our host families came to the breakfast as well, though we didn't eat with them, which was weird. The students ate first, then the parents (again, weird), so while the parents were eating, most people hung around talking or playing cards. I played cards with Jordan, Emily, Aditi, Christian, Lily, and a few other people as well, I believe. We played Egyptian Rat Race and B.S., and had a lot of fun.

After the parents finished eating, we all piled into our cars to go to another meeting thingy, at a nearby school. We listened to two or three speeches, took a huge group photo (I think I'm looking away... I wasn't sure what was going on) and then went home.

All in all, it was a pleasant weekend. :)

Today, I went riding with Marion, the daughter of Etienne's brother, who lives across the street. She has a pony, Fleche, who came home today. I had a chance to ride Fleche at the stable before we brought her back. She's a cute little pony. And I did NOT get bucked off. :)

The other day (maybe it was Monday?), I went to Namur with Etienne. He teaches at a cooking school there, and showed me around. He also drove up a large hill and we drove around the castle there. It's absolutely stunning, and the views are incredible. As we were driving through Namur on the way to the cooking school, I saw a CHINESE RESTAURANT! I don't know if words can express my excitement upon seeing that building. I told Etienne how much I love Chinese food, and he brought some home today. It was delicious. I think I'm going to have what's left of it for dinner.

There's a little problem though. My craving for Chinese food has been satisfied, but now I've moved on to cheesecake. Oh my gosh, I WANT CHEESECAKE. Oh well, I guess I'll survive.

I'm also out of chocolate, so I'll have to go buy some soon. Belgian chocolate is SOOOO good.

The other day, Anne-Michèle loaned me Season 1 of The West Wing in French. She has all 6 seasons and she knows how much I like politics, so she figured I'd want to watch it. She was right. I watched three episodes yesterday alone! It's definitely really hard to understand, but I like it nonetheless. I've tried watching it in French with English subtitles, just in French, and French with French subtitles. I think the French with French subtitles is my favorite. The English subtitles distract me from the French speaking, and the plain French is too complicated for me. My only complaint is that the French subtitles don't match the speaking, so that kind of sucks. But hey, it's better than nothing.

The chipmunk is still here, and it's still making tons of noise. I think it waits until I'm relaxed and about ready to sleep before attacking. And yes, it plans these things ahead of time. There's also a bird outside my window that caws every morning to wake me up. I love nature, but that bird is evil. Maybe it's friends with the chipmunk.

Tonight at dinner, I found out that Adrien can understand basically everything I say when I speak English. He just refuses to speak English back. I think it's a good and bad thing. It's good because I'm forced to speak French, but bad because he needs to practice speaking English. I did make him speak English to me today at lunch. I had understood what he said in French, but I wanted to see if he would say it in English. It came out as: "My father was to cherche my brother." That right there is an excellent example of Franglais. In case you're interested, he mean to say that his father had gone to pick up his brother (Amaury).

They're very into fountain pens here.

Amaury and I went for ice cream after dinner today. I had strawberry this time, and it was delicious. I have a feeling I'm going to be going to the ice cream place a lot. :)

One thing I've noticed since I've been here: my dreams are very strange. They're not bad, exactly, just strange. For example: Last night, I dreamed that I skipped school and took a train to Australia and spent the day there without telling my host mom. I missed the train back or something, and got in huge trouble.

Why is this strange? Well, number one, you can't take a train from Belgium to Australia.

Number two, I've ditched a grand total of 2 days of school my entire high school career; I don't think I'm going to start now. Other exchange students have been having strange dreams as well. I suppose it's part of our brains and bodies adjusting to a new lifestyle.

I'm craving American news. My friend Corbett just told me that Obama has officially ended the war in Iraq and that there's a hostage situation at the Discovery Channel building. I had no idea either of these things were happening. I'll have to start going to cnn.com or something so I can stay updated.

I'm doing laundry again. I don't know if I've said it already, but the first time I did my laundry, I used fabric softener instead of detergent. Go me, right? Well, I've got the buttons on this machine down-pat so I'm not worried about it never stopping. I'm just waiting for it to finish the eternal spin cycle so I can grab my laundry and go to sleep. I'm exhausted, and I think I'm getting sick (why does this always happen to me the first week of school?). My host brothers are passing some sort of cough/runny nose business back and forth, and I will be thoroughly displeased if it hits me next.

Well, that laundry is almost done, so I have to run. Have a smashing rest of the week everyone. :)

Mikayla

Rotary trip to Bruxelles

Yesterday I went to Bruxelles with all of the other exchange students in all of Belgium. I had a lot of fun and made some new friends. First, a big group of us took a double-decker bus from Liège to Bruxelles. Jordan, Jaclyn and I sat in the very front on the top level, so we got to see EVERYTHING through the windshield. There were even windshield wipers for us so we could see better! On the bus, everyone exchanged pins and cards and got to know one another a little better. The girls from 1630 were given navy blue scarves and the boys dark blue ties so we could identify each other as members of specific districts. I looked like a flight attendant with my scarf, and Jordan was having some difficulties accepting his tie. It was too short (he's 6'5", so he wears extra long ties) and didn't match his pants, as he put it.

You know what's amazing? The number of boys who don't know how to tie a tie. I had to tie Jordan's and Aaron's, and other guys were complaining that they couldn't make it work either. If I ever have sons (shudder), they are going to know how to tie a tie. Period, end of story.

Once we got to Bruxelles, we all sort of milled around in a park until everyone else arrived. Camille, my third host sister, was there, so I had a chance to talk with her for a while, which was great. Anyway, once we got moving, we toured the Royal Palace (the flag was flying, so the king was in residence! How cool is that?!), which was BEAUTIFUL, if a little extravagant for my taste. :P There was also a section with taxidermies -- a polar bear and a boar. I didn't like that part as much...

There was a room in the palace that was decorated with 1.4 million beetle wings. They were the most beautiful things I've ever seen. Honestly, the room looks like it's part of the Emerald City from the Wizard of Oz. The entire room sparkled and was a dark, iridescent green. Words can't really describe it.

Most of the exchange students were hungry at this point, and I think I would have liked the palace more had I not been starving. Next we went to the city hall in Bruxelles and had the flag ceremony. Basically, kids from each country gave their Sponsor Rotary District's flag to the Chairman of their Host District. The U.S. was by far the largest group there. That ceremony took quite a while, but afterward, we went to lunch, which was at a beautiful restaurant looking down on the Grand Place, a beautiful square in Bruxelles. The architecture was phenomenal. Anyway, we had a meal of meatballs and frites. It was yummy, but I really wanted chocolate afterward. :)

After lunch, we had a tour of the House of Parliament, which was extraordinary. We had a chance to sit in the meeting rooms of the Senate and various reading rooms and places for the press. The tour guide explained (in English, which was nice) the portraits and the marble busts that were all over the place. Most of the artwork was of long-dead politicians, but there were photos of the current king and queen, which I enjoyed.

At the end of that, André Flahaut, the President of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives gave a speech, and then two exchange students from each country went forward and gave him all of the flags from their country. After a speech by M. Binamé, the District 1630 Chairman and a speech in French, Spanish, and English by 2 exchange students, each country got to take a picture with M. Flahaut. I thought that that was pretty awesome. :) I'll try to get a copy of it.

Our time in Bruxelles had finally come to an end, so we all piled back onto the bus and headed home. I sat with Jordan again, and we chatted and played 20 questions with some other exchange students. The bus ride back went pretty quickly, and I was happy to get home, eat dinner, and go to bed.

Today, I woke up and went riding at a GORGEOUS stable 5 minutes' walk from my house. The horses there are all eventers and jumpers, which was a little weird for me, coming from a western barn. I had fun though, once I figured out the saddle and bridle and what not. I'm riding a horse named Eros, he's 17 years old and huuuuuuge, at least in comparison with the horses at home. He's stable mates with another horse, and they didn't seem to content on parting with each other. A woman who works there, Sophie, came and helped me get Eros to pay attention, which was nice. FYI, horses in Belgium like to buck. She rode with me and we chatted and I hope we get to hang out some more. I liked her a lot.

I also got my first package from home today! It was so nice to have a little box of America.

Hmmm... well, I'm feeling hungry, so I'm gonna go eat.

Toodles,

Mikayla

Holy Cannoli!

So a bunch of new exciting things have been happening in the past few weeks!

• I got Skype! I've been video chatting with Jaclyn (another inbound, from Missouri) and my Hannah (who's back in Wisconsin) so I've pretty much figured out how Skype works. If you're interested in Skyping, add me!
  
• My visa arrived yesterday! It's so pretty, sitting there in my passport. I panicked for a second today, because it says that it's only valid until October 15th, but then I remembered that it's supposed to be valid for that long. :) I have to go to the town hall in my city within 8 days of my arrival in Belgium to verify my visa and get it extended for the rest of the year.
• My laptop arrived today! I think he's going to be named Voldemort. I'm actually posting this from him. He's taking some getting used to, but overall I like him a lot.
• I discovered that the host counselor I was given on my Rotary paperwork is, in fact, not my host counselor. The man who is actually my host counselor is named Philippe, and he and I have corresponded a little. He will be there with my first host family to welcome me at the airport.
• I received my itinerary for my flights! I fly out of DIA on Friday, August 13th (just 15 days from now!) and arrive at Washington Dulles that afternoon. After a three hour layover, I board a flight for Bruxelles, Belgique! I arrive early in the morning (Belgian time) on August 14th. I can't believe it's so soon!
• I met a gentleman named Raphael, who exchanged to my hometown about two years ago. As it turns out, he knows my host families! In a country of 10 million people, who would've thought that it's such a small world?

Au revoir,

Mikayla

Less than 3 months!

I can't believe that in fewer than 90 days I'll be jumping on a plane headed halfway around the world. I'm excited, but apprehensive at the same time. I know I come off as shy, so I need to work on opening up to people. Hopefully this exchange can help me do that. Here's a list of what has transpired lately:

• I got my passport! Yahoo!
• We had the Outbound Orientation in Douglas, Wyoming. A long, long weekend full of powerpoints, speeches, and hotel beds.
• I got my blazer!
• I have to start filling out my Bokoff Kaplan plane ticket and visa information. And get all of it notarized. Yay.

It doesn't seem like much, but it really is. OH! I also have to start getting my pins put together. Can't wait for that. I already have 3 -- one from Esteban (he gave it to me before he went back to Argentina, while we were at the District Interviews), one that came with my Rotary blazer (100% polyester, made in Costa Rica), and one from Emily's mom. My blazer looks a little naked right now, but I'm sure it'll fill up fast!

I've started talking to two of my host families, too. I emailed all three, but I'm still waiting to hear back from one of them. My first family, the Cartuyvels' have chickens and a fish, and 4 kids! The third family, the Golard's, have 4 kids as well (if I remember correctly) and a Brittany spaniel. Both families are already so gracious and welcoming. I can feel that I'll be at home in Belgium, and I'm not even there yet!

One of the things I'm most excited for is meeting all of the other kids going on exchange to my district. I've already talked to a few, and I can tell that we're going to be close friends.

À bientôt!

Mikayla