More and more amazing experiences!

Tuesday was game day. We now play all our games on turf, which we think, is better than grass. We played against Heights HS in a stadium called Delmar. That is the stadium where all the football games were played too. Our dinner that day was chicken nuggets, chocolate chip cookies and a fruit salad. That sounds all good and stuff, until you need to work-out… My stomach hurt so bad the first 30 minutes in the game, oops... Never doing that again haha. We won the game 4-0 :) Mathilde and I had a random sleep over on that Tuesday. Sometimes we just talk and talk and then fall asleep in the same room.

Wednesday was early dismissal day. It was like saying hi and bye in every class, because the classes were only 30 minutes. We didn’t do anything that day, but that was totally fine with me. Only during 4th period, coach let us run 12 minutes to run as many laps as you can. He forgot that it was a short period so we were still running while the bell already rang… He gave us a pass, so we could still go to our next period without our teacher being mad, that was good :) It was really hot that day and because we got out of school early we (Rachel, Gaia, Austin, Mathilde, Josh and I) went to the park. They brought 3 hammocks and we hang them all above each other. There is a picture on Facebook which makes it clear what I’m talking about haha. We brought lunch with us too, and we played this weird game with a ball and a small trampoline. It was a great afternoon. We have to love Texas, never winter and always summer! Around 6 pm we went to get food at Canes. It is a chicken restaurant and people say it is really good, so the foreigns needed to try that of course. Josh, Rachel and Austin all go to the same church. In that church, they played a documentary about religious stuff of course, in the evening. We all went to watch it just for fun and that was the end of a really good day.

Every morning when I come to school, I put my soccer stuff in my locker so I don’t have to carry it around all day (even though I’m sure people would like the smell of my always nice-smelling cleats…). Sometimes the locker room is closed and then I put it in coach’s office. That Friday, the locker room and the office were closed so I needed a different place. I ended up putting my stuff in Lizzulli’s car. She is in the soccer team too so when we needed our game stuff I could just take the bag out of the car. Apparently, in the middle of the day, her mom decided to take the car home, because she needed it. She didn’t tell Lizzulli that she took the car so she took the car with my stuff in it lol. I’m really lucky, she came to the game that evening so I could get dressed just before the game started haha. (never leaving my stuff in someone’s care anymore ;))
We played against Sam Houston, and this was again a really hot day. For the people who have seen me after I work out, I am as red as a tomato… Now I played a game AND the sun was shining bright, not a good combination… Every time we had a little break, I just put liters sunscreen on my face and it actually helped, I didn’t burn my face :) This game we won 3-0, so that was great!

I had to hurry up and take a quick shower after the game, because Mathilde and I were going away for the weekend. I had already packed my bag so we were ready to go celebrate Mardi Gras in Galveston. It is a little more south so we were really close to the beach. We stayed the weekend in a beach house with 3 families (who also have YFU exchange students), and they were so nice to take care of us too for the weekend :)
Let me just explain Mardi Gras to y’all. Mardi Gras is a big carnival. They have parades, which I think are really special. The special thing is that the people who are on the wagons in the parade, throw hundreds of beads to the people who are watching! The goal is to catch as many beautiful and special beads as you can. Every wagon/group in the parade has a King and Queen, and Ladies and Lords. With YFU, we created our own part in the parade. We also had a King, Queen, Ladies and Lords. And as I told you in a previous blog, I was the Queen! All the names were put in a basket and they chose a random name just so you know it was random haha. Daniel, my Danish friend, was the King and we had so much fun together. There were 5 Ladies and 5 Lords. Each of them wore a different color. There was purple, green, white, black and tri-color and they were dressed in that color.
We all bought beads to throw in the parade too. Soooo, back to Friday night when we arrived at the beach house. Everybody brought a belt to put on all their beads, because it would be really heavy to just carry them all. We spent the night putting everybody’s beads on their belts, but I didn’t do anything with mine. One of the privileges of being the Queen was that I would be sitting in the car while everybody else had to walk, ghehehe ;) I didn’t have to wear a belt for all my beads, I could just put them in the car.

Saturday was the big day of the parade. We had to leave really early, because we would meet up and have breakfast with all the exchange students and staff. There were also a lot of Japanese students who were just here for a couple of weeks. They also had their part in the parade with a King and Queen. It was really funny, because they all wanted to take pictures with Daniel and me as King and Queen. We ate the food everybody brought and just hang of before the parade started. Daniel and I got crones and capes and we actually looked royal haha. The Japanese people made a special dance for the parade and they showed us and it was so cute. When the parade started everybody wore the beads on the belts around their waists and we were all ready and excited. The Japanese King and Queen car drove in front. Behind them, the rest of the Japanese students were walking. Then our (Daniel and me) car came and behind us, alllll our other foreign friends were throwing their beads. It was so much fun and people really wanted beads from Daniel and me, because we were ‘special. Again, the pictures on Facebook show better what it looked like :) we had so many beads and when we came to the end of the parade, we had so many left, we just threw them everywhere hahaha. When the parade was over, we all came together, took off our royal stuff and were normal students again :)
We all just talked about the parade and what everybody did. Around 2 there was a new parade. We were not in this parade, so this time we could just watch and try to catch beads. We also just walked around and there was one podium with a rock n roll artist. We, the crazy exchange students, danced along with the rock music. Apparently that was entertaining, because we got free T-shirts hahaha.
The parade was really cool and all the different wagons were beautiful. It was really nice to be on the other side now, not throwing beads but catching them! Oh, by the way, this day I didn’t put on sunscreen, so guess who was a tomato for the rest of the weekend??? MEEEEE…..
Around 5, we gathered again and went to a restaurant with a lot of other people. If you looked outside the window you could see the sea, it was great. I probably ate the best hamburger I’ve ever eaten.
After dinner, most of the people went back home, because not everybody stayed for the night. Though, Mathilde, Nerija, Andreas, Sif, Stella, Jan, Valentina and I were still there. We walked right next to the beach to the city center again. There now was the evening parade. This parade was much more crowded and special. People were throwing heads with colored lights in it and light balls. Of course they throw beads too! In this parade there were cool wagons. They had pirates, peacocks, mermaids and other wagons. Later this evening we went back to the beach house. Mathilde, Andreas and Jan went back to Houston.

Everybody had a great night of sleep and we did everything slowly Sunday morning. We woke up, ate strawberries and cookies for breakfast, and got ready for the beach. There was no parade on Sunday so that is why we decided to go to the beach. I took a sunscreen bath, to make sure I wouldn’t get more burned…. I wore a hat and sunglasses to make sure my face would absolutely see no sun hahaha. We hang out at the beach, playing volleyball, building sandcastles, walking in the cold seawater. It was great. For lunch, we went to a Mexican restaurant and it was delicious. I’ve decided I loooove quesadillas! After that, they drove me back home. This weekend was so amazing! :)

Now it was a normal school week again. On Tuesday we had a fire drill. They literally announced it 5 minutes before it went off so it was stupid haha…
We had a game against Westbury that day. Dinner was spaghetti with chicken alfredo sauce. I had never eaten that but it was really good. The game was at a stadium further away than normal. The game was supposed to start at 6 pm, but we arrived at 6.30 pm, oops… I think it is karma for them coming late 2.5 hours last time. The first half was normal, 40 minutes, and we scored 5 goals already. The referees decided to do 20 minutes for the second half, because the score would be so high for us otherwise. The other team didn’t want to do 20 minute, they wanted 40 minutes. Don’t ask me why… They lost all their games in the competition so far, they have more than 80 goals against them and scored 0 goals, but still wanted to play a full game…. The referees didn’t let us play 40 minutes so we just played 20 and the final score was 7-0 :) After our game we watched the boys game for a while and the won too, 2-1.

Last Wednesday we started to dissect a mink in my anatomy and physiology class... I’ve done a sheep heart and stuff but a whole animal was a little too much… We had to cut off the fat and stuff and look at the muscles, not a lot of fun. It is going to take us a lot of time to dissect the whole mink, look at all the organs and other things inside too. I don’t really enjoy doing it, but watching it is really interesting ;)
After school, mom and I picked up Stella from her school and we went to Morgan Ranch HS for the track meet. Sif and Valentina go to Taylor HS and Andreas goes to Seven Lakes HS. They had to compete against each other, and also against other schools. It was not like the track meets I had in The Netherlands. Everybody was in the midfield inside the track and it was really crowded. The sunset was amaaaazing. We watched them run and it was a great but cold evening :)

Thursday after school I made homemade tomato soup (met balletjes ;)) It was really good, almost tasted as good as mom makes it back home. That night, Josh picked me up to watch the Westside Boys Lacrosse game. I still don’t really know those rules, but it was a fun game. They lost 8-7 though (in overtime), so that was messed up…
Friday after school there was another athletic game. I didn’t have a soccer game, so I watched Stella’s soccer game with mom in Katy. Daniel was there too and it was fun, but they lost too, 1-0…
Mom dropped me off at the Hills house after the game again, and Gaia, Mathilde, Rachel and Austin were already hanging out around the campfire. We roasted hotdogs and made s’mores. We just talked and had a nice evening :)

The next day, early in the morning, my hair still smelling like campfire, mom, Gaia and I went downtown Houston. The Houston Rodeo is almost here so we went to see the Rodeo Opening Parade. It was so much fun. Before the parade started, there was a 5K and a 10K run, all the way through the downtown. We didn’t run though, we just support the people who did run haha. The people in the parade were mostly sponsors of the rodeo or people who organize the rodeo. It was so Texan, it was great! Everybody was wearing cowboy hats and boots. There were people on horses everywhere and you could hear the lovely Texan accent through the speakers. There was this one man who looks really tall because he is standing on stilts. He entertained everyone and he was really funny. I’ve never seen so many horses in my entire life. There were even dancing horses in the parade! A lot of High Schools were in the parade to show their marching band and cheerleaders, it was really cool. You know horses can be pretty big. Imagine little cowboys of 9 years old on a big horse in the parade, it was so cute! I cannot even tell a dog to sit and these little boys were riding and controlling big horses….
There were also a lot of military wagons and military people on horses. Of course you could see the Texas or American flag with almost every wagon. After every horse part, there were those cleaning wagons to clean up all the poop, it was really funny, everybody enjoined them cleaning up and taking away the smell hahaha.

Later that day I went to the Hills again. Mathilde, Josh, Sarah-Joy and of course Gaia, Rachel and Austin were already there. We ate homemade hamburgers and had a great movie night. During one movie, Gaia put on a facemask. We then decided to give everybody a facemask, including the boys. It was so funny, they looked ridiculous.
This morning the thunder woke me up. I swear, the house was shaking. We went to church and right now we are watching a movie at home. Just a nice and lazy Sunday afternoon. Upcoming week is the last school week and then it’s already spring break YAASS!!

I will tell y’all about spring break and more in my next blog :)