Routine.... again

Hey guys. Another post! This past month and a half or whatever it has been since I last updated has been one of those wake up, go to school, come home kind of months. Routine, routine routine. It is all soooooo..... Normal. I know that every second of the exchange can’t be completely full of excitement and new adventures, but I am starting to get bored. I think that is a sign that I am a naturalized Romanian of sorts. I am no longer finding as many new things, and it is my normal life. It is just as though I was doing my senior year back home, only without the work. I am so glad that I don’t have to do much work for school though. Trust me. This year is mine, and it makes me so glad that I can focus on the country and not on trying to remember a math problem or something like that. I think in all honesty I have benefited from this year off, so to speak. It has given me the opportunity to discover myself, a new land, a new language and a new culture in relative peace and quiet (Alexia often has the Disney channel on full volume). Oh! Speaking of that, I am changing families again this Sunday. It seems like only a few weeks ago I came to live here at the Stancius but here I am again, switching families. This time I will be going to the Badita family, who has a son in Colorado at the moment. Their other son, Andrei, will be my host brother. My first experience with having a brother in my life. We will see how it goes. This is one of the major things I do not like about the program. Having to switch to three different families in such a small space. We have about three months with each family, and it seems as though I establish myself in their family just in time to move again. It is not pleasant to have to recreate all of the relationships that I just spent so much time creating. But I guess I have done it once, so I will have to do it again. It was really cute/sad. About a week ago, at dinner, when we discussed my departure, alexia started crying. As much as she can bug me, I mean, she talks ALOT, I am going to be sad to leave. I will be glad to get my own room, but in a way I will miss the sounds of the Jonas brothers or Hannah Montana in the background as I shout to Skype with people. I am leaving behind yet another family as I move on. I will get used to it, I will adapt to my new family just as I have adapted to just about everything here over the past 6 months.

Prom is coming up on Friday! It is different than the prom in America in many ways, but it is all basically the same thing. The seniors get together to dance, show their stuff, and have fun. One of the major differences (the other being it is in March) is the fact that the prom king and queen is chosen based on a performance they must give. For example, my friend Valy is nominated to be prom king. He must participate in the group dance that my class is putting on and he must have a partner dance or skit. I believe he is doing a tango for that. I got sucked into this whole thing. I am partners with Cosmina, a prom queen candidate, and I must also participate in all this stuff. UGH! I cannot dance! We are having rehearsals with a professional dance teacher a couple times a week, practicing the dance to a song by a Romanian singer who does a special and famous Christmas program every year live on TV. It is an interesting dance, kind of like a fifties rock and roll song with the same idea in the dance moves, with heel clicking, dips, air guitaring and the like. I am doing ok, but you all know me. I am on of the least graceful people ever to be born, so I have to work at it quite a bit sadly. Then I have to work with Cosmina on a partner presentation. We decided not to dance, but instead do a pantomime set to a selection of music that tells a story. I spent a while yesterday creating this montage of movie quotes and music and all that remains is for me and Cosmina to come up with what we are doing. I had been worrying about this, about getting everything perfect, then Cosmina reminded me, we are just there to have fun. If we are having fun, the judges and audience will as well. I have to keep this in mind. I always worry unnecessarily, just ask anyone who knows me. Especially two weeks ago, when we had a rotary district conference in Bucuresti, and all of the students were required to give a presentation on their home country/district/town. There were about seventy Romanians in the room, and then there was me and my presentation on the wall, and I had to get my spiel out in Romanian. It is safe to say my nerves were shot. I got through it, and the presentation I had to a week later here in Slatina, though luckily to a much smaller crowd. So figure, why the heck worry about something as trivial as this. It really doesn’t matter a heck of a lot.
The eurotrip is coming up and I can hardly wait! I depart with the others on April 8th and we begin our travels across the great continent of Europa. The tour will include Slovenia-Veneţia-Munich-Strasbourg-Paris-Amsterdam-Berlin-Prague-Vien. Quite the itinerary no? :D :D I really cannot wait. I won’t keep rubbing in how awesome it is.

Ok, I again do not know when my next post will be. But I will write on my Facebook Page when I do post. As always, goals are to keep progressing and completing my integration into Romanian society. Wish me luck in my new family.