Hi! Because of yet another snow storm I am now trapped in my house while the wind outside is having fun and we have yet another snow day because of bus cancellation. So I finally got the chance to wake up late at 11:30 and draw and paint. Now I'm just having a ball finishing up a drawing of my favourite actor... if your are new to my blog, you wouldn't know that I love drawing and painting, and that is what I do in my spare time.
Okay, yesterday and thursday the week before we had school concerts as I am thinking I mentioned last week too. We performed for elementary school children who we tried to make interested in music at High School. So Senior Band, Jazz Band, and JazzAttack played. And because I'm in both Senior Band and JazzAttack I got to perform quite a lot. I don't have any pictures unfortunately, since I forgot my camera... again! I think I'll have to take more pictures. This can't go on!
Anyway, we played several songs, here are a few of them: Senior Band: - Gimme some Lovin' - Land of thousand Dreams - A 'The Lion King' medley, that sounded a bit like this. It was fun to play the conga drums to this...!! - Raider's March (from the motion picture INDIANA JONES, this was epic awesomeness)
With JazzAttack we were singing: Satin Doll by Duke Ellington Blue Skies by Irving Berlin And I love her by The Beatles Keep Holding On by Avril Lavigne in that Glee Version which I don't really like... but we had some good soloists...
I liked playing with a lot of my friends, and I also got to know some new, which has been nice of course. This was a small little blog post, and I'm not sure I'm going to post more this month. I have a concert to go to, and other small things that makes the rest of the month a bit hectic. And then I'm thinking I'll change the look of the blog when we approach March, since it hopefully going to look more like spring soon...
Finally I would just like to say: Support the countries in the middle east for their right to a civilized country with freedom and democracy! They are fighting for something we fought for 100-200 years ago, and deserve it just as much as we did. Peace from here; Bella
This is how it STILL looks like here... but a snow-blower is always a good thing
Hello fellow readers and writers! I've decided to let you know how my second semester is going so far. For now it has been a blast. I start out in the morning with music where I'm getting taught to play the clarinet. It is a nice, but big class. Luckily they are all some really nice people. I really enjoy it, and I feel that I just get better understanding music by not only playing the piano and singing. Even though it is still hard for me to reach the high notes on the clarinet. I just managed a B. I can also play the Canadian national anthem 'O Canada' and 'Imagine' by John Lennon.
Second class I have gym with my friend Lindsay, who is awesome, and we're kinda just having fun. Right now we have a basketball unit, but I really do not like basketball... Anyway, I am excited for playing more games, especially Badminton, Volleyball, and Squash!
I've met a couple of new people that I'm hanging out with at lunch, which is nice. I mean of course I like to talk with the same people as before, but new people are always interesting! I am starting to get busier and busier at lunch too, running back and forth to a lot of weird stuff.
English is the hardest course for me; all that grammar and all that writing! But I decided before I got here that I wanted to write more English. I feel like that was a smart decision, because it really challenges me in a way that my first-semester subjects did not. I don't talk with a lot of the people in this class, but it is okay, since I seriously need to focus on the subject.
Okay, the last and the best period of the day is PEOPLES GYM. It is a class where I have gym with people from the special needs - classes (this classes at the school for disabled.) There also co-op classes for this. It is very interesting and reminds me a lot of a summer camp that I used to be at every summer in Denmark. It is just the feeling of doing something good for yourself in a social way that makes this class good. You know you will feel good by having fun yourself and sharing it with these awesome people. And to try to be a role model is a healthy thing too; I am certain I will learn tons of practical skills of this class.
I think it was last Wednesday we had a Reach for the top competition. If you haven't read my blog before; it is a trivia thing where we answer questions. We won 3 out of 4 battles, so I think we did okay. I think we are currently number two in the tournament. I am very happy that I can contribute to answer some questions that my partners can't, so that I also feel as though I'm a bit important. It's mostly geography questions, society questions, art questions, and some others I've been able to answer.
Thursday I went to some concerts with the music department of our school. I was singing with JazzAttack and playing percussion with Senior Band. Unfortunately Senior Band played songs from the Lion King, so they are now stuck in my head. Since I only had about 14 days to remember the lyrics and harmonies of most of JazzAttack's songs, I had trouble remembering bits of the songs. Good thing that miming is one of my specialities.
Oh and did I tell you that I am going on a music trip to New York City in May? If not, well now you know. I am getting very excited! Especially because it is with all my hilarious music friends! I'm indeed very grateful for this opportunity, and I can give all the credit to my wonderful music teachers. They wanted me to go, and they've been very nice to me. Today I was in the U.S.A just crossing the border to get my travel visa, so that the poor music department wont have any problems with me when we are travelling to New York. This also led to a little bit of shopping since everything is so incredibly cheap in the U.S. compared to Canada. It kinda reminds me of crossing the border from Denmark to Germany and get cheap candy.
I've now come to the conclusion that I really don't want to go home. Of course I want to see my friends and family again, but the people at my school and the fact that I can almost just do what ever I want to do makes me want to stay. I don't want to start Danish high school. But I do realize that Denmark is where I belong and it is my homeland. And that is where I'm supposed to get a proper education for the next three years. My Denmark-counter says 133 days till I come back to Denmark. It is too short a time.
This is a beautiful song we are singing in JazzAttack. It has grown to become one of my favourites. I thought you should take a listen.
Hello guys. So a new blog post it is! Last week has been very busy, and everything started out Tuesday where Nina, a German exchange student, the two Aussies Madeleine and Amy, my Canadian friend Lindsay and I drove up to Monkton, Ontario to drive with a bus far up North in Ontario with a whole bunch of exchange students from all over the world: Norway, Germany, Austria, Holland, France, Belgium, Ecuador, Australia, Japan, Brasil, Finland, and of course Denmark which I represent. It was quite interesting to listen to so many accents. It was a long ride and we finally ended up on a hotel where we stayed for two days to have a mid year orientation and an extra dog sledding orientation where we learned how to harness a dog, pack the sled, etc. Here are some pics from the hotel where we just had fun, and we enjoyed the seldom happening of more people from countries all over the world gathering: A moment of epic awesomeness.
All the exchangees in one crowded hotel room
A stop to Mac'cies is good for a long ride to Algonquin
Thursday morning we went to the dog kennel with oh so many dogs. We got split in to two permanent teams that wouldn't see each other for the three days we were gone. My team got two guides called Adam and Adam who were really awesome and very enthusiastic. They instructed us in more dog sledding things, and then Lindsay and I got our sled which we packed easily. Then we got our dogs, and since I am not used to dogs I definitely extended my limits. And now there is no problems with me and dogs anymore. Our dogs were called Bean, Kanook, Jinny, Merv, Austin, and Suzuki. And then we went off. It was a wonderful feeling, and it wasn't as difficult as you might think. The only important words were: "Gi (Right,) Ha (Left,) Easy, Ready? Let's go, Wow (stop.) Our lead dog were Bean and Kanook, they were small but incredibly fast.
When we finally arrived at the camp we had to cut a lot of lumber and other chores. It was quite funny to cut whole trees and actually use it directly in the stove. When it got dark we had to make a camp fire, and this is where my skills as a scout comes in. First try and a huge fire was already burning without any use of paper :-) We slept 15 people in one tent; it was a big tent but it was still crowded. This lead to a warm night not worrying about freezing, but it was also very uncomfortable so I did not sleep very well.
Lindsay with our small lead dogs Bean and Kanook
Adam our guide cutting down wood
Nina (Germany) breaking through the ice so we could get water from the lake
Pierre (France) pulling the sled like a dog, Reynaldo (Brazil) enjoying
My awesome scouting skills... or not
I do realize this isn't the best picture of me, but at least you can see how crowded everything is in the tent
Next day we got up and got awesome breakfast. Well, at least a lot better than expected with pancakes and sausages and of course maple syrup. Yummy. We then started getting the dogs ready to Day two. It was a hard day for the dogs, but the land scape was amazing and I got to take some good pictures. Here are a few examples.
Here is Reynaldo eating lunch on a frozen lake
It is very nice with a few creeks that are actually not frozen.
Some of the small trails. This is taken as you would see things from the sled.
Anyway, we got bak to the camp and I made dinner with a girl from Norway and Lindsay. After dinner we played a game the guides calles 'Man Hunt.' I really do not have the time to explain the rules, but it was funny and I made our team win the last round. It was a bit cold though, to crawl around in the snow at 10 pm. We got quite late in bed because we talked so much in the tent. When we finally decided to sleep, it did not take a long time to fall asleep. I slept much better than the night before.
The last day was almost as good as the others, the only thing annoying was the thought of getting home. We were sledding all the way back to the dog kennel, said goodbye to the dogs, and drove with the bus to the Guide's offices. We got nice chili con Carne and changed into regular clothes. It was nice and we got the chance to say 'thank you' to Adam and Adam. We also took some group pictures with them.
This is most of the students just after the last sledding
This is my seperate group with Adam and Adam. You can see now that we are not afraid of wearing t-shirts in the cold.
The trip on the bus back to Monkton went quickly, but because of snow storm (of course, we are in Canada) my host family, Nina, Yuki (Japan), Madeleine (Australia), and I had to stay in a Bed and Breakfast which was actually really cool. It turned out that it was a PERFECT B&B. It was covered with flowers, dolls, pink curtains, dresses, books, statues, etc. I can't really describe it, but it was like going in to a combination of a museum and a girl's dream. The next day (Sunday) we finally got home to Oil Springs.
And yesterday I started my new semester. My new schedule looks like this:
- Period 1: Instrumental Music. I play clarinet. - Period 2: Grade 12 Gym mix (Girls and boys together) Lunch - Period 3: English grade 11 (This is the subject I fear) - Period 4: People's Gym. (Gym with the special needs classes)
I finally joined JazzAttack, a singing group at the school, and it seems like we have a lot of concerts to perform. So I am going to be quite busy catching up with the others. Oh and all the pictures above are taken from other exchange students, since I only brought a disposable camera for the trip.
Oh, I get by with a little help from my friends,
Mmm, gonna try with a little help from my friends
Ooh, I get high with a little help from my friends
Yes I get by with a little help from my friends,
with a little help from my friends
I have found the most awesome people in Canada. Thank you guys! And cheers for now.
