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Dienstag, 30. Oktober 2012

Davison Orchard

Okay, here are the pictures I promised you!
Davison Orchard is near Vernon, and, although it was wet and muddy and rainy, very beautiful. Especially the view...

We were supposed to get a trip around the apple orchards, but unfortunately, the roads were too wet, so that fell short.
We did get a pumpkin, though. The variety was huge!














My pumpkin before the painting!

My pumpkin after the painting!

Like a Sir!

Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge! And yes, there is still more than half left! :)

Today there was a rather uneventful day - the calm before the storm that Hallowe'en will be. I am one of the few (apparently) who won't be dressed up for school tomorrow, most of my classes were abuzz with "What will you be?" and similar questions.
I have my mobile phone as a camera with me, and I will take loads and loads of pictures!
I promise!
And I doubt that there will be so much real lesson tomorrow, but I have pumpkin carving anyway!
And I will write my English test on Thursday and not on Friday like the rest, because I won't be there on Friday! Rossland, we're coming!
One thing left here:
Today was lockdown drill!
So in case of an Amok run, the PA (Lautsprecheranlage) will announce "Lockdown, This whole building is now in lockdown!" And then everybody has to go in the corner farthest away from doors and windows and has to crouch down, in the best case under a table (so I was sitting squished under one for ten minutes, but at least I knew it was only a drill!) and be really, really quiet, and the teacher locks the door and switches off the lights so that any guy going nuts will think the classroom is deserted.

A few years back they had a lockdown in one of the primary schools because some guy was running around naked in front of the school...

And I have barely twenty pages left in my book - exactly twenty two!
Well, I will fill it until Monday I think, which means I finally should get to finishing my other book! (I am colouring and decorating it).

I also cooked for the second time - stir fry! It was really yummy!

So, that was it from me, there are a few more pictures after the cut!

Montag, 29. Oktober 2012

Bored

Wow. It's one o'clock in the morning and I just had a slice of toast with Peanutbutter.
And I'm browsing tumblr and my two contentions still aren't written.

I slept too long today - I woke up at ten o'clock; Doro had been over for a sleepover, and we went to bed at one o'clock. So I'm still like super hyped and can't go to sleep.

Tomorrow is the Pumpkinpatch, and I hope I can take a few pictures there...

I should get back to my writing, though.
Take care,

Julia

Freitag, 26. Oktober 2012

A short Biological Update

So, what happened? I have no idea... Currently I'm sitting in Biology and actually I should be working on finding out axioms and determine whether they're actually true, but since I have no idea what I should look up and I've been anyway playing around with Blogger (we have a Biology 12 blog now! And our teacher wants us to play around with it a bit!), so I thought I'd give you a small update!

Basically Spencer is pretty surprised as to how many exclamation marks we use, so I guess Mr Manderioli was right after all - I'm still writing too German.

Doro and I are gonna meet in the mall tomorrow, and we'll do a bit of Biology, because I anyway have to a bit and I guess Doro had a question, and I'll buy a new Journal (I've got like, 30 pages left?) and I'm gonna get winter shoes, because it's getting pretty cold outside and my Geox can't deal with the snow.
SO, the lesson is almost over, so I'll first run my Contentions by my debate teacher and then my necxt article by my Journalism teacher.

By the way, our first newspaper has been published!

Look at it here!

Have a nice day and a nice weekend!

Bye,
Julia

Sonntag, 21. Oktober 2012

I must be so mad

... because I have decided to take part in this years NaNoWriMo - which is short for National Novel Writing Months and means I try to write 50k words in one month. I mean, it's not as though I have school and stuff like that...
Well, but I managed just fine last year (up until the release of Eragon), so I'm sure I'll be able to do so this year. And I only have to write 1,300 words a day - especially on schooldays that should be no problem, because it's rather hard to meet up with friends when you have school until a quarter past three and are home by four o'clock...

Well, I neither have time nor plot, so I think it's gonna be great!

I hope you're all fine back home - I must admit, I'm not up-to-date at all, and so I really have no idea...

I have been skypeing for about three hours today - and while it was really great to get rid of all these emotions (thanks again, lywe!), it left me quite drained.
But in order to make my panic attacks stop, I am to skype with my parents frequently - probably to prevent such an emotional chaos from building up again.
It's really not a nice feeling, being trapped in your body like that, and I absolutely abhor it. Well, once Debate is out of the way (hugely stressing for me), I should return to very fine in a matter of days.
Speaking of Debate - I'm almost finished with my two contentions (Behauptungen) and yes, I know, I said I'd have it done by Friday evening (I'm not sure I posted this here or just wrote it in my journal, but here it is: I wanted to have it done by Friday night), but of course I didn't manage to do it until the last second.
From what I've seen in the Facebook group, I'm not the only one, though, and at least I can claim I had the idea already and only had to flash it out.
Luckily, it's only a rough draft for the Rossland debate, so I still have time to dress it up nicely!

My package probably has left Richmond already, but I don't know where it is right now. I'm still hoping for an early delivery!

Have a nice time!

Samstag, 20. Oktober 2012

Sick

Long weekend and what do I do? Get sick, of course.
Probably a viral infection, says Marina, 'cause I'm not running a fever. But I'm feeling nauseous and my throat hurts and I'm tired, so I'm lying in bed, reading, and that's basically all I've been doing today, and now I'm also drinking watered down juice to keep hydrated.
Oh, and I finally answered my mail!

I actually wanted to meet up with Dorothea, but I fear I might be contagious, and I really don't want to get her sick - she's been through this already, I don't have to burden her with this again!

I just hope I'll be fine again by Monday - I'd miss so much, a Spanish quiz, our last Biology lesson before the next quiz, Debate and English, and I really don't want that!

My laptop had problems with the graphic board driver and crashed twice, and firefox also isn't at it's top...
I already run a virus scan, but it came back emptyhanded, so I have no idea...
I'll keep an eye on it, and if it doesn't get better, I'll ask Steven for help.

I have hardly any appetite these days, only to get hunger attacks. Today it came around elven, and it sucks. It really does. But now I'm quite content - I have never realized how often I eat out of boredom!

I have exactly 59 pages of my journal left, and Lara was teasing me with some kind of book during our skyping session - I have NO IDEA what it is!
But I really need to get a new journal! Because I can't not write!
I started out with single entries, but now I'm doing it in the same style as the "Plötzlich Prinzessin" Novels - I'm just writing Date and Time.

When I get home, I'll maybe type everything up - my handwriting is really messy in places, and I am slightly confusing at times, too, but hell, it's helped me so much to simply sit down and write everything down that's bothering me...

So yeah...

I need to go and get Postcards - I actually wanted to do that today, but well, I'm bedridden, so postcards are a bit hard to get!

It's been rather rainy all week, in case anyone is interested, and the sun sets at around half past five (I think. With all these clouds it's rather hard to tell)

The package my parents send me was shipped to the east coast first, which is why I still don't have it - it arrived near Toronto and is now most likely carried by truck.

I'm looking forward to getting it, although it must be quite big, according to my parents.

I have discovered sandwiches! There is nothing better!
Here are my favourites:

1. Tuna
2. Mayonnaise and Black Forest Ham
3. Peanutbutter
4. Chicken
5. Eggsalad

I'm addicted to Peanutbutter Toasts! It's actually all I've eaten today, and while I didn't like it the first time I tried it, it gets better the more often I have it.
It's nice because it's sweet on the one hand side (honey) and salty on the other, with a flavour of nuts, and it's just so. amazing.

We read a short story by Edgar Allan Poe and, hell, he's creepy. And strange. And a bit morbid. And a master of Irony. I mean, his character Fortunato is left to die in a crypt full of dead people, lured there by his love of wine (The Cask of the Amontillado) and ... well.

I'm taking the bus after Debate now, but thankfully, there is another boy, who also takes it! So I don't have to transfer on my own!

We also had an Earthquake drill - our teacher only read out the rules and guidelines, but we actually should have gotten under our tables to cover ourselves!
Earthquakes aren't that much of a danger here, but as far as I understood it, they're expecting one near Vancouver!

My headphones, which I bought here, don't work anymore. The right one doesn't give any sound. But luckily, I still have my Apple ones, and while they're rather uncomfortable, they're waaaaaaay better than none at all!

So, well that's it from me for now, I'm going back to reading!

Miss you all!

Julia

Sonntag, 14. Oktober 2012

My week in fast forward

So, okay, here the real blog entry.
It seems as though I'm not the only one - Doro suffered the same thing, and so did half the world, it seems. But one of the girls from the forum has had hers restored already!

So, anyway. It's been a long time since I last really posted anything - almost a week!

I was a tiny bit busy, so please forgive me. I have to sit down sometime soon and work through all the photos I've shot so far, because they are getting more and more and are cluttering up my harddrive!

What happened... Let me consult my journal.

Okay, so at the moment it's really strange: When I go to sleep, it's too warm, and when I wake up it's too cold and I'm freezing... Meeh.
But that matter has resolved itself luckily enough!

I got 100% both in Japanese and in Spanish, and my Spanish grade at the moment is 104.5%. I'm not joking, seriously.
I got 193% in oral participation, because I constantly have my hand in the air. Well, I like it, and so I have a very decent chance on 100% in Spanish!

In English I'm gonna hand in my essay rewritten, cause no matter how much better I'll be, my mark will be bumped at least half a point - and I had 4 points, which is a B, and with 4.5 points, I'll have an A. I anyway have an A with 92%, but it's only the second highest grade in the class, so my slightly competitive nature (selectively competitive) has said: No way. I only have to get 2% better, cause the best grade is 93% at the moment. Shouldn't be too hard.

We're gonna write our "Unit Test" soon, though, and it's gonna be about characteristics of Short Stories, the Short stories we've read and generally everything we've done... Well, I better take a look at it soon, cause it's quite a lot!

My lunch has become kind of a mixture of Philosophy and Psychology, which I'm discussing with Lolu and Mr Derksen. Both of them are really fun!

I'm finally finished with my first Journalism article! I had already written 240 words and thought to myself: Come on, a hundred words more you'll manage. And I didn't only manage a hundred words - my essay is more than 500 words long, which I'm really proud of!

And I'm busy combating my fear of surprise situations - those of you who know me might remember my breakdown in sevenths grade in that unexpected Latin test or the breakdown in eighth grade in Bio - well, the only way to get rid of that anxiety is by doing unexpected things and being spontaneous, so I got off the bus three stations too soon on a whim.

No, honestly, I was reading and I thought I'd missed my station, so I just got off, only realizing too late that no, the bus had come from the opposite direction as usual! Well, instead of bursting into tears, I simply followed the bus where it had gone to and actually found my way home all alone from a neighbourhood I didn't recognize! As you can imagine, I was immensely proud of myself!

On Friday, there was Black and Gold day because of a Volleyball Tournament. There were a lot of people in the KSS wear, and I decided when they sell the shirts and sweaters, I'm gonna get some. Because the school wear is just awesome!

There also were free pancakes!

In English we were allowed to go to the Volleyball game, but I asked to use the computer; I checked my mails and then discussed autism and savants with Mr Derksen. Oh, and I read a bit.

In Spanish we finally learned how to conjugate verbs ending with -ar.
Those of you who have Latin: Does it seem familiar?
Example: Cantar - to sing - cantare

Yo canto                  canto
Tú cantas                canta
Él/Elle canta            cantat
Nosotros cantamos  cantamus
Ellos/Ellas cantan     cantant

Yeah, I really have an advantage!

It's raining, at the moment. Or rather, it had been raining all day yesterday. Today was half-half.
The weather really reflects my mood, I'm totally melancholic, and slightly down now that I don't have a Debate partner anymore. I hope I can get that sorted out tomorrow.

I'm planning to send something for Christmas home, but I can guarantee you that it won't arrive, as I won't be able to send it till mid November, maybe even beginning of December. And I would have had to send it now already to have it arrive on time!
But I can't do that, as I do not yet have everything I want to send along.
I think though that the wait will well be worth the result!

I'm really tired, but I can't sleep... So I'll write one or two mails, there are a few people whom I owe replies.

Oh, and my blogger stats are reappearing, seemingly randomly. The only thing that worries me slightly is this:

 a) I have 40 Pageviews over all. Look at the picture below. If you add all those clicks up, do you get 40? I don't.
b) Why are most of my viewers from the UK and Canada? The latter I can understand, the former I can't.



ETA 10:13 PM:
My Stats are back! I'm so happy right now! :D /ETA End

And I realized once again: British English is the best English in the world.
The guy behind the till at the Paintball field was from Cambridge, and he spoke just like Doctor Who! He even looked a bit like David Tennant!
The tenth Doctor. David Tennant from Doctor Who


Have a nice week!

I love and miss you all,
Julia

Shock

MY COMPLETE STATISTICS HAVE BEEN WIPED!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Omg, shock. My whole statistic has been wiped clean. There are no records of clicks before yesterday. Every single post has zero clicks.

And I was so close to 5k klicks :(
I don't know what happened, I have honestly no. Freezing. Idea.

Anyway, we've been paintballing today, the other exchangers here in Kelowna and me.
We've been 14 people, and let's just say it was a hell lot of awesome fun.
I'm really tired now, though.

I've probably lost my partner for the Rossland debate, because he missed the deadline for the admission slip, and now I have no idea where to get a partner from. Because I'm pretty sure that almost everybody already has a partner. -.-

I finally finished the rough draft for my first article; I'm still waiting for data to complete the second one, though.

Biology is really interesting and .... I don't know what else to tell you.
Let me digest my shock, first of all. :)

Love you all,

Julia

Montag, 8. Oktober 2012

Things

Okay, first of all I want to thank everybody who is following this blog, and especially all of you who comment. I really appreciate it, and even if I do not answer, I'm immensely happy. Answering just gets swallowed up by real life here ;)

Okay, so homesickness definitely is here since I skyped with my parents.
I'm a bit peculiar in that regard. I was perfectly fine - on a constant endorphin-high, as I called it, and of course there was a crash. My crash was 'manufactured' not only by my parents, but also by my biology test, for which I maybe could have done more. I'm a bit apprehensive of my grade now, even though I know that it won't dent my grade that much. But well, knowing and actually understanding are two pair of shoes...

At least my homesickness is not crippling in its intensity. It makes me feel a bit sad, especially when I listen to songs I associate something with.
Or I get tears in my eyes when I see a brand I know from Germany. There are quite a lot, and to get to more happy things, I will list them here (I might already have mentioned some of them in earlier posts; I am actually not quite sure...):

  1. Kikkoman Soy Sauce. Not German, but we have the exact same thing in Germany.
  2. Knorr.
  3. Lindt. It's not even that much more expensive than in Germany, but then again, it's actually Swiss.
  4. Milka
  5. Rittersport
  6. Kinder. Bueno is called Bueno, but the Kinder Ueberraschungsei is called Kinder Surprise.
  7. Gerolsteiner. Don't even ask. It's even (well, of course it is, it's called because of that well) filled in Germany! Gerolsteiner GmbH!
  8. Fleischmann's. I don't even know what it is, but it sounds definitely German.
  9. Kraft with Philadelphia. Yeah, that cream cheese. (der Frischkaese)
  10. A lot of Volkswagen. And you should hear them pronounce it! In the commercials they say "Volkswagen. Das    Auto", just like in Germany. 
  11. Nivea
Well, I have seen veeeeery few BMW's here, but a lot of Kia's, Hyundai's and so on...

One thing: You all probably know the song YMCA, don't you?
Here there actually is a Y(oung )M(en's )C(hristian )A(ssociation). And of course one for women, too, called YWCA...

Today is Thanksgiving, but like most families, we already celebrated yesterday. There probably will be Turkey for the next week! (Just joking!)

We had Turkey and Cranberry Jelly, and Potatoes, Yams, red Beet, Melon, Carrots, Onions and Turnips, and stuffing and two kinds of dressings. The former is bread croutons with something, and the latter are not the stuff you pour over your salad, but a sidedish.
In Marina's case a Turnip mash, I think, and in Steven's case mashed potatoes with thyme. Which led me to remark that the smell reminds me of being sick, because when I was coughing, my mom would heat water and put salt, thyme and some other herbs into it. Marina thought it was really funny...

Well, I actually wanted to go to the gym today, but well... I forgot to take a look at the holiday schedules of the bus. Because of Thanksgiving, as I mentioned.
So I went to the busstation, texted with Doro and read a book, and went back home, because the bus didn't come. Well. Shit Happens.

But I need to go to the mall tomorrow, so I'll go to the gym afterwards. I need money for my debate trip.
We're having a debate in Rossland, but well... I don't have a debate partner yet, and since I barely know anyone from the group, I need to see to how I'm gonna get one. But I'm sure I'll find one.
Okay, the matter is resolved. I just got one: A boy with special needs, and he is really good at debate.  He's kind of cool, although it takes a bit to understand him - he has problems with articulation and well, I'm an exchanger, so it's hard for me to understand some stuff anyways. But honestly? I'd rather have him on my side than on my opponents!

Our topic is just really strange. It is: Be it resolved that economical bailouts are detrimental to society. Wow. An economical bailout is the government giving money to bankrupt institutions, like our government to ... Opel? Or what Schlecker would have needed.

(Meh, I just got a pimple on my elbow, probably from putting it on the table whilst typing... and did you know that whilst is rather formal and you wouldn't use it for example in a newspaper article?)

I still owe Dorothea money... Oh, and by the way, if you want to read something really good, check out her blog. It's in German:
Mein Semester in Kelowna

So, if you've read that far, congratulations. I have one more topic:

Vancouver!


It really is amazing and absolutely stunning. I already posted a pic on facebook, but I still have to resize and stuff like that for the others, so I don't know yet when I'll be able to post them.
I might just do so on flickr... Well, I don't know, but I'll let you know as soon as I do!

What else is new?
Oh yeah, I finally switched my keyboard to English, which is why I don't have any Umlaute anymore. But Firefox kept bugging me with a French keyboard, so i uninstalled the Canadian pack of keyboard layouts and used the US English, and what did Firefox do? Use the German keyboard. But luckily, I was able to resolve that with help from Steven.

Tomorrow there is a test in Japanese and one in Spanish, and I guess we'll start with our next Bio topic... I don't know yet what it will be, but I swear I'll learn more. I'm constantly feeling sick, and well, I dislike that.

But Lara sent me the first page of the stuff my class back home has been doing, and make an educated guess about their Biology topic!
It's .... Biomolecules (tadadadaaaaa!) But so far only Starch, Cellulose and Glycogen, and I may say that we've done all that far more in depths - I mean I wrote 13 pages on Biomolecules and Digestion! Just in notes!

I still need to write an article for Journalism; I actually wanted to do that today, but somehow I forgot. Well, for my other article I'm still waiting for a response, but I hope I'll be finished by the end of this week!

I also reread my Farewell book, and I carried it with me to school to fight my panic attack, so I'd like to say thank you to everybody for all those nice words!

Well, that's it from me for now, I hope you're all having a nice day!

Regards from Canada,

Julia

Dienstag, 2. Oktober 2012

Jammerpost

Heute mal ein Jammerpost auf Deutsch von mir.

Ich hab Panikattacken, aber ich weiss nicht, wovor.
Im Moment wird mir allein beim Gedanken, morgen zur Schule zu gehen, schlecht.

Ich weiss aber nicht warum.
Heute morgen war noch alles in Ordnung, ich hab mein Japanisch Oral exam mit 100% bestanden und Spanisch war auch toll und dann auf einmal gegen Ende vom Lunch fang ich an zu zittern und mir wird schlecht und die Welt wird ganz blass (meine Art von "Schwindel". Mir wird nicht direkt schwindelig, oder die Welt dreht sich, sondern alles wird ganz blass) und mein Englischlehrer (den ich in der naechsten Stunde gehabt haette) fragt mich ganz besorgt: "Julia, geht es dir gut?" Ich, wahrheitsgemaess: "Nein"

Ich hab versucht, mich in den Unterricht zu setzen, hab aber ganz schwitzige Haende gekriegt. (Als ich das hier schreibe, zitter ich auch schon wieder, aber es ist nicht so schlimm)
Ich bin dann schlussendlich zum Office gegangen und hab mich von meinem Hostdad abholen lassen, bin dann mit unserem Hund an die frische Luft und hab ne Stunde geschlafen, und jetzt konnte ich zumindest was essen...
Aber ich will morgen wieder zur Schule gehen, wir haben einen Bio test und ich mag die Schule doch so gerne!
Ich mein, ich LIEBE die Schule in Kanada, die Lehrer sind so nett und alles, und ich will die Schule nicht verpassen!

Es gibt zwei Moeglichkeiten, die mir spontan einfallen, was das sein koennte:
1. Ich hab den Kulturschock. Aber den hab ich mir immer anders vorgestellt, also mit Depressionen und so...
2. Ich hab Heimweh in der komischsten Form (also echte Homesickness)

Keines von beiden ist recht toll... Oder ich hab einfach nur Angst vor Bio und Spanish morgen (Spanisch "Popquiz", also ne Ex, aber die Lehrerin hat das so gut wie angesagt mit einem energischen "hint, hint")
Naja, aber immerhin gehts mir jetzt, da ichs aufgeschrieben hab, schon mal besser.

So, back to business.

I have a few more ideas what this could be, so here a short list (I need to get that out of my system)

  1. Homesickness
  2. Culture Shock
  3. Illness (might have caught a cold)
  4. panic in the face of tests
But this stuff aside, this day was great!
I got two parcels, one from my parents with a lot of stuff like cartridges (Tintenpatronen), Post-its and some clothes, and one from Yuumei. I finally have my 1000 Words comic, and it's even signed (The first 500 orders were signed, and I didn't know whether mine was so soon!)

I did all my biology stuff and tomorrow we have a quiz, and I missed the last reviewing session because I didn't feel well, but I think I have most of that stuff down. I'll take another look at it tomorrow during lunch...

I had a nice chat with Vroni and I managed to sneak an hour of sleep into my afternoon...
What am I complaining about?
Let's see whether method no. 1 works: Forget about it.
If not then no. 2: Rationalize it down should do the trick ;)

Oh my god, I totally not up-to-date!
I didn't even know that Dirk Bach had died... It was a shock to learn of that; I found it over the fanfiktion.de forum, where a few people had written:
"Die Sache mit Dirk Bach schockt mich grade. Ich fand ihn immer so lustig!"
And I: Oh my god, what the heck are they talking about?!

But it is a shock; I'd never expected such a thing!
It shows me in the worst way possible how fast a live can end. Especially with popular persons or persons I respect my mind attaches an 'immortal' tag...