The day I turned eighteen

The fiftieth of September two thousand and eleven, the day of my eighteenth birthday…


I woke up at 5:30 in the morning, not because I was excited for my birthday, but because I had to get up for school. As I dragged my body out of bed a smile crept onto my face as I realised that it was my birthday :) after showering and brushing my teeth it was time to open my cards from England. They had arrived two days before but because I knew they were for my birthday I decided to wait to open them.  I had recognised one of cards had my mum’s handwriting on, I opened it first. Out fell a pink card with the words “with love for you daughter, on your eighteenth birthday”. Inside was a poem wishing me love and happiness on my birthday. As I read the card a few tears fell from my eyes, not because I was sad but because I was grateful to have a little piece of my family with my on my big day, I know I know I’m a biiiiig baby >.<



the cards from england



nothing else special happened until I got to school. I sat down in class in my usual space without saying a word; I didn’t expect anything because I didn’t tell any of them that it was my birthday. the fist class started so I begun to read my book, the class finished and I continued to read my book, only half listening to what was going on around me. all of a sudden a girl in my class stated clapping while singing *parabeins para voce* the Brazilian version of happy birthday while I just sat there with my mouth open, how did they know it was my birthday? I think facebook told them ^.^ anyway the whole class sang happy birthday while singing and clapping pretty loudly and it made me smile because they bothered to make the effort to wish me a happy birthday. The day continued without any mention of my birthday until I got to gymnastics where my teacher promptly shouted as I walked in, its Alison’s birthday, in Portuguese of course. The whole gym club stated a chorus of parabeins para voce while taking pictures and clapping.

my cake with 18 candles :)

My next surprise was when I got home after gymnastics. My host mother had asked her mother to bake me cake for my birthday, so I thought it would be like one of those little cakes that you get in mars and spensors, but no, this cake was maaaaaaaaaaaaassie. It was chocolate and tasted amazing. I got presents from my host parents and brother, which I really wasn’t expecting and made that day extra special. Presents included jewellery, money, clothes and shower set. All in all I have to say it was a petty good day.

my brazilian family <3

The day i bonded with my host family

I didnt think it was going to be anything other than a normal weekend in my timetable, but it turned out to be a fun filled day bonding with my new host mother :)

The day began with my host mother and i playing in an orchestra in a near by city. Three hours later we were getting ready to leave the weirdest thing happened...when  i am in public, i usually stick b my host mothers side because i can speak fluent portuguese yet and i tend to panic if someone i dont know talks to me ^.^ however my host mother needed the bathroom so i was left to fend for myself. Now i dont know if it cause i look interesting to talk to or if the woman thought she knew me but for some reason or another a lady in a green dress started to walk towards me and i knew she was going to start talking to me. I had two options, to either run into the bathroom after my mother or to stand there and attempt to communicate with this woman in portuguese...i picked the first one. >.< so i turned around to pick up my clarinet and run away but before i could take one step she was standing in front of me, looks like i would be having a conversation in portuguese then >.< i heard her say " oi, tudo bom?" which i knew meant, "hi everything well?" so mabye this conversation wont be that hard i thought to myself. i replied "tudo, e voce?" meaning " everything, and you?" but the next thing i knew the lady was talking at top speed as if her life depeneded on it, occassionally pausing to look at me. at the end of her little speech she looked at me as said "sabe ne?" meaning "you know right?" i had no idea what she was talking about but me not wanting her to repeat what she said just said "eu sei" ( i know) and wished that she didnt want a longer answer. but she seemed happy with that response, she smiled at me, said "tchau" and walked off while i was thinking how ould she not noitce that i wasnt brazilian?! which means that either my portuguese is amazing or she just wasnt listening... i like to think that it is the first one >.< after leaving the orchestra i mentioned to my host mother that i needed to buy a new school bag, biiiiiiiiig mistake because my host mother is a shop-a-holic! we started shopping round about 4 in the afternoon and we didnt get home until quarter to 11! we started shopping in the outside markets, then moved onto to wal-mart and finally ended in the massive shopping centre. everywhere we went, people asked my host mother " ela nao brasileira?" meaning " she is not brazilian?" and when my host mother replied that i was from london they would always say, "ohhhh muito chique!" i guess brazilians think people from london are amazing :) one of my favourite stores that we went into was Wal-mart, as soon as you enter there are loads of little stalls waiting for you to buy their goods, obviously i went to the food stall first and bought a massive looking doughnut for 1 real - which is about 40 pence. i also drank coconut water out of a real coconut for the first time and the women laughed at my facial expression when she hadned me the coconut, i really thought she was going to pour the water into a glass for me! after about three hours of shopping we finally ended up in a bag store. there was the cutest "hello kitty" bag and i decided that was the bag i wanted, so my host mother bought it for me for my 18th birthday :) when we finally returned home i showed my host brother my bag with pride, only to have him ridicule me for having such a childish bag but i think he was screctly jealous because his school bag wasnt as cool as minee xD to whoever reading this it might seem like a boring day with the parents but to me it was special because it made me feel alot less homesick and more part of their family. eu amo minha família brasileira! ( i love my brazilian family!)



my new amazing bag <3



The day I met other exchange students from around the world

From the 2^nd to the 4^th of September I got the amazing opportunity to meet and greet other exchange students from around the world living in my state as me. I knew I would get along with them, I just didn’t realise how much…

After running around the house and trying to pack and leave on time, my host mother, my host father and I finally left for Aticibia. Two house late we arrived and the hotel that I would be spending the weekend with the other exchange students. Upon arriving I found all the other exchanges talking in the lobby. I checked in, put my bags in my room and went and joined them. There were students from all over the world, from Canada to Japan and all the counties in between. I introduced myself and naturally I expected myself to have a British accent. What I didn’t expect was a crowd of people to suddenly crowd around me and ask me to repeat the words “harry potter” and “bloody hell” over and over again. But something that did make me laugh was, when I said that I am from London, one of the students asked me if it was in France or America! After a couple house of socialising we had a meeting with the international contacts from out host counties. We also met Rotex; a group of students had already been on exchanges and returned to Brazil. We played a few games to get to now each other better and after a very intense game of musical chairs with all 34 students participating we finally went to our room. I shared a room with two other students from the United States and Taiwan. We spent ages talking about each other cultures and finally got to sleep at lie one in the morning, which wasn’t the best idea seeing as we had to be up at 6 the next day :/ 

The second day included more talks and meetings with various different people who explained the dos and the donts of being an exchange student. They shared their personal experiences and we gave some of ours. By time everything was finished it was about 10 in the evening. The Rotex group put on some music for us to listen to but it turned into a nightclub type disco with lots of singing, dancing and picture taking. Unfortunately it was cut short at 1 in the morning because the head of all inbound exchange students told us that we had to go to bed.

Sunday came and we had one final talk in the morning and then we had free time for about five hours. We used this time to check out the hotel swimming pool. Before we knew it, it was two o’clock and time to check out. After a final round of badge swapping, picture taking and “oh Alison, say hay potter again!” (You would have thought they would have gotten bored of it but no, they were still mesmerised as ever >.<) I was ready to leave. I was sad to say goodbye to people who could speak fluent English but it was great to know that people were feeling exactly the same as me, it mean I was a normal exchange student!