I have a new address! Take a note of it...I posted it on the right side! >>>

I start school next week, Monday, on the 25th. I will have all new classmates and I'm a little nervous.

My host family right now is okay. I have a total of 4 brothers and sisters, plus an annoying little nephew who is always here. The grandpa always sleeps here as well. Plus my parents. The house is always full to say the least. My host sister, Betina, is 14 years old...and she likes to go on the internet a lot and watch a lot of tv. My host brother, Felipe, is 19 and he likes to watch a lot of tv too. My older host sister, Roberta, is in her 20s and she likes to get out of the house and travels a lot. My other host sister, Deise, is in her 20s also and she is married and had a son...who happens to be the annoying nephew. But it's neat, her house has a pool and I take advantage of it. =D People call the nephew "Guga" but his full name is Gustavo. He likes to run around the house either yelling or crying.

Here's an interesting fact: I gained 4 more kilos during my January trip and afterward. This is equal to about 8 pounds. I am really sorta sad about this. =/

I have a exchange student friend from Germany now! I met her on the trip and she lives in a city about a few hours away. She visited me last week for 3 days and 2 nights. This made me sooo happy! =) We have a lot of good memories from last week. Ice cream, pool time, walking, going out for pizza, driving around at night, screaming at people outside....hehehe! =D I am planning on visiting her in her city, Santa Rosa.

My camera broke and my mom is sending me a new one soon. When I get it, I will take pictures of my new house and room...etc. =)

And after 1 month of traveling...

Wow...I just spent 1 month traveling all of Brasil with some of the best people I could have traveled with. I can't even explain! I left my hometown here in Rio Grande do Sul on the 3rd of January with a group of about 80 Rotary exchange students with a company called "Terra Brasil Turismo". I wanted to be able to see ALL of Brasil because I knew that the south of Brasil was way different than the north. And it sure was wayyyy different. First we went to Brasília, the capital of Brasil. It was a very pretty city. Before it was constructed, everything way planned out. From an airplane, the city is shaped like an airplane or bird. I saw the president's house there! After, we took a flight to Fortaleza...a gorgeous city! The temperature was SUPER hot (about 100 some degrees F) and it was perfect for the beach! It is one of the best cities in all of Brasil to buy things for cheap...so I definitely took the opportunity! =D After, we went to various cities including: Natal, Recife, Canoa Quebrada (broken canoe in english), Salvador, Rio de Janeiro, Porto Seguro, Lençoís, Parati. I saw my first SCORPION in Lençoís!! I went to take a shower and there was a little baby one in the corner...everyone was screaming! One of the roomates was brave enough to get a magazine and sweep it outside. In Fortaleza I went to one of the biggest water parks in all of Brasil: Beach Park. I went on the biggest water slide in the world! It's called the "Insano" and reaches as high as a 14 floor building, where you go from zero to 101 kilometres/hour (around 63 miles/hour) in just four seconds! I was the third person to go on it! The walk up the stairs was very tiring and very scary!!!! In Fortaleza we also went on dune buggies, where I burned my leg on the exhaust pipe of the buggy. I now have a huge scar on my lower leg!! (a natural tattoo...=P) My favorite cities where Canoa Quebrada, Salvador, and Riod de Janeiro. Canoe Quebrada is a verrrrry small hippie village. The little roads are all tiny and the roads are very bumpy. Ou bus couldn't even fit through the roads so we had to walk! The little shops there were so original and neat. There were sooo many hippies walking around and everyone seemed so happy to live there. The symbol of the city is a half moon with a star. Salvador was very beautiful. It is the BEST place for Carnaval in the entire world. It is very historical and is also a very huge party city. The beaches were gorgeous there. Rio de Janeiro was unexplainable. I was just so sad because the only 2 days that we were there, it was raining and cloudy. The mountains surrounding the city were so beautiful though. I saw the "favelas" or shacks where the poor people live. I recommend that you should watch the movie "Cidade de Deus" (City of God). It is in português but they have subtitles in English. It's a great movie about the poor people and favelas in Rio de Janeiro. (not a documentary) Our hotel in Rio was right in front of the famous beach "Copacabana"! (barry manilow!) In reality, this beach is pretty dirty and very very dangerous. I couln't take my camera out to take a picture because I was afraid someone would steal it!

I made so many friends on this trip from all over the world. I plan on visting them sometime on my exchange here! So many good memories and such a great time! I can't even sum up everything, really...

I arrived in the São Paulo bus station to take a bus back to my home town and waited about 7 hours there for my bus. So I took this bus about 14 hours to Cascavel, a boarding city. Then I waited there in the bus station (alone...with no one to talk to) for 10 hours. I couldn't walk around though, because I had about 3 huge bags of stuff to lug around. Then finally I got on my bus to my city...which ended up being late. That took another 14 hours until I finally got to Panambi, my city. =/ Oh my gosh...it was tiring. But I did manage to get my nails painted at the bus station. =)

As soon as I got to my first home, I went to sleep. When I woke up, I was alone and there was a note saying that I had to switch to my 2nd family now because the whole fam went to visit my host mom's mom because she's sick. So that was sorta emotional because i hadn't seen my 1st family in a month and i had to just switch families all of a sudden. So I'm now here at my 2nd family. And I don't know why, but my feet are swollen. And we went to this "Grape Party" or something and I fell and now have a scrape on my leg too. The grapes here in Brasil are gross. They all have pits inside. And the Brasilians eat them without chewing. (weird, right?) They just swallow the thing whole.

I think I will go to sleep now. I updated all of my pictures on my photobucket site!! LOOK!! and make sure to comment this blog if you read it! (please!)

Video of the "Insano": http://video.aol.com/video-detail/beach-park-insano-brazil/105490752
(it really is a lot more scary in-person)