Internet cafe: Godsend

Oi todos!!

Things are continuing to go well, although i am realizing i am forgetting the english i once knew-- grammar and spelling i mean! oh well! Thins in Sao Jose are going well. I am staying busy, spending a lot of this week and the athletic club in our city with friends either playing tennis, futesol or doing aerobic classes. My friend Jenny from Germany and I quickly found we stood out far too much thsu today we hit the stores looking for spandex pants. thats right, in brasil all females wear spandex to work out in. its not a pretty sight. i mean-- they all look fine, and its so normal here, but on me? its not pretty. So today jenny and i found some really cool, (really cheap) spandex so that we stand out less. I think it will work. But they are really tight. they are actually pretty comfortable. My uniform pants also came in, but they arent the ones i thought i would get, most of the girls wear looser warm up pants, but mine are the spandexy ones also. its like living in the 80s but im enjoying it because maybe ill come back to the USA and start a new/old trend! haha. My red soccer shorts are soo masculine at the club! haha. School is still school. A teacher showed me a drawer full of books in english in the library and thus so far i have read 2 babysitter club books. yay. hah they are really entertaining and easy reading.The books i the drawer are so random but there are a few that i will probably read in the next few days. I send some mail home to the states today, so my family should be looking for that in... 3 weeks? i have no idea how long it will take, actually! It was quite the process tho, because apparently no one has envelopes so i had to go to a special shop to get enveloopes then to the post office and had to use glue to close them. quite the ordeal. haha. oh well. its fine. ta bom. The language is okay. its really hard an slightly frustrating. but i take refuge in knowing that ive only been here for barely 2 weeks and that things will get better. I understand a few things and have asked that my friends and host famly only speak in portugues to me from now on. its going okay. im not really a quiet person but the situation here has forced me to become one. when i find someone who speaks english as their first language i have a hay day. there is a boy in sao jose from south africa but i cant hardly understand him between his accent andmumbling and then my german friend is not completely fluent. but its all good. Im goign to sao paulo on saturday with the mesquita host family for a wedding and i am really excited. but before that on friday night im goign to the local discoteca for a smashing time, i hope. i ve never bee to one, anywhere. the closest is a dance at ike. but i dont think that compares. Next week i look forward to seeing my friend Kuba from Poland who lives a town over. He will probably come visit or I will go to see him and then next weekend we have a rotary meeting function for just local exchangers, i think there rae 8 of us in my area. im really excited. Today while i was shopping i also bought a new notebook to match the other kids at school and some pencis and colored pencils, hoorray! yesterday i got some haivaiana flip flops too. the most popular thing in brasil, besides soccer id say. they are pretty cheap for american dollars as well. oen pair is actually a ronaldo pair with his number and brasilian colors. eu gosto! i like! haha. well im in an internet cafe and im down to ust only a few minutes. things here are good... the days are long but im staying busy and am really trying hard with the language so i stop feeling so stupid. haha. hope all is well with everyone else, i miss everyone so much!!!!!!!!!!


by the way, the weather here is quite cold between 8 at night and 11 in the morning. but i survive and look forward to summer, kinda, except the humidity! haha

beijos!
Katie!

Ay caramba

I told everyone I´d blog but now it is taking far too long and i need to get off of the computer i really hope the pictures go through, if they dont i will try again tomorrow!!! im so sorry for the wait!! love you all

Oi americanos!

The computer in my house is very slow but i feel blessed to be able to use it! I tried to post a blog last night and it was too slow to finish and today I am in a hurry because i am going to a friends house in about 50 minutes and believe you me it will take that entire hour to publish this blog. Brazil is everything and nothing of what i expected. Portuguese is so difficult. some words are very close to spanish, and the otehrs are no where near. It sounds very much like french, very italian, a little spanish and kind of chinese? haha its crazy. I have been learning quite a bit as how could i not? many people know english which is helpful but also makes it hard not to just speak english but i have been doing well to say `que falo?´ to ask how to say words. Okay after i arrived in sao paulo with gabriel my cute brother, i was joined by a cute cousin joaquim and a cute cousin helena haha and then we drove together through sao paulo to Tubaca, a beautiful farm outside of my city Sao Jose do Rio Pardo. It is a small city of about 60000 people and it is very very hilly with a small replica of Cristo Redemptor on the hillside above the city. I dont understand my whereabouts yet but am beginning to understand slowly. Okay, so Tubaca is the farm of the Mesquita~s grandparents who are very very wealthy-- one of th emost wealthy in the town. They have a huge huge huge hundreds of acres of coffee (cafe) and cattle. It is gorgeous as it is on a hill overlooking hte city. It is a huge mansion with many maids all in a row and just a wonderful place. I met some 30 family members all who are soo kind and so brazilian and so welcoming and many of the cousins have been on exchange to america, canada and many to germany andmany know english which is so helpful. This family reminds me of ours how kind and how well i felt i fit in? Maybe i dont but i like to think i do. haha. So we all sat around and ate great food, much meat, rice and beans and fruit and had coke and guaranlos or something, the famous brazilian soda that is much like mountain dew and i do not prefer it. i think it tastes kind of like strait alcohol? haha i dont know. So we sang and talked and watched telenovia. afterwards we had cake for teh grandfathers 67 birthday and then i joined the cousins going to Mococoa-- a city nearby about 10 miles from Tubaca and the next city from Sao Jose. We went to a party for a cousin moving to Canada. The party was great-- much music, (country music-- brazilian country music, they love it hear) and they had drinks and food. It was very fun and i met so many people--- so many people who have been on exchange it was great. One german called America Shitland because he thought iw as german too. and then i beat him up ahhhh WW3. very much joking of couse.. he felt really bad when he realized i was american as i responded in pure english WHAT DO YOU MEAN?: haha no it was all in good fun and i assume he was a few sheets to the wind or so they say. The next day, sunday, i spent with the family and then met my new host family. They are Luciena and her son Kevin and daughter Sevena. They are 15 and 12 respectively. We have spent much time together and i love them all very much- so weet. The kids know very little enlgihs so it is great to learn with them, Luciena (Lou) speaks fluent english as she lived in boston in the 1980s. we went to a friend of hers home and i liked them too and then we camehbome and slpet. (this keyboard is hard to type on... and i am in a hurry --- so descupa{sorry} for the errors) . On monday i stayed home from school and awoke when my family came home for lunch -- the big meal of the day. I then played volleyball (volley) with kevin and his friend marcello and then Lous family came over for dinner. We had pizza that was great, and coke, claro! Her family is a mother (her father died) and a brother and her brothers wife and 3 kids. Her brother lived in Portland and knows great english and her mother knows gerat enligsh too. i really really enjoyed her brotehr as he was especially helpful in teaching portuguese-- as they all are.. Sometime i learn too many words in a row and forget them all! But my vocabulary is expanding and i feel as if there is hope for me yet. :) The family lloved the aplets and cotlets i think, but i dont really like them! haha. They also really enjoyhed the book on washington and lous Brotehr read it aloud and translated as he went--- very impressive. I will do those things from portuguese to english for you when i am home. they also loved the pictures of our family.. so when i figuer out my address, anyone can send me pictures of the family-- i forgot im blogging not emailing, nevermind.
Today was my first day of school and it started at 7 where i joined 2nd years (outta 3) in their classes at the same school as my siblings and my other host mother is the director of this school. I liked it a lot--- so many nice people and everyone so excited to meet me. I am one of 2 excahnge students in the whole school-- as it is a small school and my class is only 35 in the entire grade. they are 16 or 17 and are very impressed that i can drive in america and are really excited to take me to teh discoteca. the other exchange student is from Germany on ASI. She is very cute adn very fun. So today in a little bit ia m going to a friend from schools house to hang out. I am excited. haha. The schooling was very hard- obviously as i understood nothing. They had math class-- some kind of algebra i probably wouldnt understand in english followed by physics, then a break --- then we had writing class--- and then we had math and physics again. i mostly looked at pictures of a brazilian magazine and am constantly amazed at how much it seems american culture affects adn has influence on brazilian culture. but i liked to look at the soccer pictures. My entire class had a good laugh at my portuguese in 10 minutes a day book, so i porbably will be leaving that at home from now on. School began at 7 and ended at 1230 where i came home and had lunch with LOu and the kids and lous mother. All so so kind. Which brings me to now.

I enjoy brazil so much but am missing home a little bit. Sao Jose is full of slugbugs--- the cheapest car--- and very rocky cobblestone roads. Thank you for reading. Please keep emailing even when i dont have a ton of time to email you back!! Oi Beijos! i love you all....

Katie (Kayche) is what they call me here

Going well..

... here in brazil. i do not have a long time to blog, as my family has a rather slow computer and my brother and his friend just asked me to play uno. if nothing else i am learning the numbers well and the kids in my family are great for learning the language as they dont know too much english. which is good. my mother is pretty much fluent in english as are most of the adults i havemet so far. marolinha and marcos family-- the family i was orginally going to live with here, their whole family knows english but were so so so so kind when i was with them on saturday and sunday at their ranch- called Tubaca. soo beautiful. i ate great food with them and enjoyed my first day in brazil with so many great great cousins and siblings and i was overwelmed but in the best way. now i am here with lucieno and her family and i love them as well. i need to shower pretty soon, i stayed home from school today to sleep and i have been playing volleyball and had a snack with my brother and his friend. it is goingto be hard to blog here as the simplest task onthe computer is slow because of the internet connection. tomorrow i get to paly tennis at the club in town-- a country club of sorts and i am looking forward to that. i am all moved in as well. my town is gorgeous, with its own smaller replica of cristo redemptor- the christ statue in rio de janeiro. sao jose is very hilly, rocky roads and many trees and what not. it is gorgeous and very warm, and not as humid here as it is in sao paulo. tomorrow i start school and am anxious to meet some friends who live in sao jose. i must be playing uno now.
all my love, beijos (kisses)
Katie (they call me kay chay.. my name in portuguese... or one german called me kathy. haha my family in yak knows kathy is no bam. not okay.) <3

I´m here!

Oi everyone! I made it to brazil in one piece and am happily in my host brother´s apartment fresh off my flights. Yesterday was probably the longest day inthe history of my life and saying goodbye was the hardest thing i´ve ever done but now that i am here i see that everything will be okay. My brother gabriel is extremely nice and cute and was very helpful picking meup from the airport. he is fluent in english and apparently lived in canada a few years ago. so thats been great because its helpful to be able to speak to someone rather than not at all. or something. either way im in his potery-barn-esq apartment in sao paulo---- a crazily huge large city that is colorful and tropical with many birds chirping. seems like it has not yet set in that here i am in brazil for a year. Besides LAX airport being a huge mess and too large with no clocks, my trip was fine. I was confused because we stopped in Lima, Peru to pick up more passengers before heading to Sao Paulo so i asked many people and was finally convinced when, .. we boarded the plane? haha. Everyone was pretty helpful and pretty friendly considering how long i was traveling. I met another Rotary girl from Cali who is headed north of sao paulo to a place i dont know the name of. she was really nice, her name was caitlin and she doesnt know portuguese either--- so i felt good about that. haha. i was so happy to see her in LA that i talked her ear off. haha. It is a wondeful feeling finally being here, altho i have yet to meet my whole family. and apparently they won~t be my family? í´ll be staying with a different family but i dont know who they are? should be good. haha . im not worried tho. This weekend i am with the Mesquita´s and we will be going to ¨The Ranch¨ for the grandpa´s bday. I smell bad thanks to the Peruvian security who felt like being tough and taking my deodorant. and my luggage is in Gabriels car so oh well! i think we leave today, this afternoon, for The Ranch. I´m excited to learn the language!! But now i must go and detach myself from the computer. I might watch wedding crashers in portuguese because gabriel rented it. or the OC because they have that too -- or Friends. Things here are kind of like america its slightly odd. I will blog again another time.
Until then, beijos--- tchau!

Fly Away

Hello! I am so extremely stoked: my date is almost here!!!!!!! I'm supposed to leave this coming week, Tuesday - Saturday.

I am scared, excited, anxious, thrilled, terrified, sad and happy all at the same time!
Tune in soon for a fabulous post haha :)
love you all who read this. haha