I will probably never have a title like that again in my life no matter how hard I try, so appreciate it now. Appreciate it.
So today is April 25th, ANZAC Day here in kiwi land, and I have been living with a British family for 2 weeks. My god it’s like going to another country all over again, and I thought kiwi’s were hard to understand!
Not only are words more often than sometimes pronounced completely different (I have to think through the syllables to figure out what my host mother is saying to me) but then they slip into cockney, which is just cruel with a Canadian sitting at the table.
Here are just some of the fun phrases I learned last night;
Going up the apples-means going up stairs
Sweeney Todd-means Flying Squad
Dog + Bone-means telephone
and etc.
From what I’ve gathered, Cockney rhyming slang is all about having set words that rhyme with what you’re actually saying. For instance, stairs rhymes with pears, and so in rhyming slang you would say “Apples and pears” instead of “stairs”. However, just to make it more confusing, the “and pears” is dropped, leaving out the rhyme so you already have to know all the cockney slang words to have a conversation you can’t just make it up as you go along.
When I can actually understand conversations at the dinner table with 4 poms, we have interesting topics. Such as phallic slips and roman emperors. I feel as if I need to catch up and read about the complete roman history and learn Latin. Update more later. Thank you for reading.
I lost about 15 followers in 3 days that I was not online. I apologize for the angry post that I made last week. Perhaps it was not in good taste.
I hope you are all well. I would love to hear a bit about your exchanges (for those of you who are also on exchange), and I would love to post about them on my blog as well! If any of you like, send me a note with a bit about your exchange. :) I’ll post it up.
Have a nice day~
Who the hell do you think you are?
Sorry for not uppdating my exchange blog in a while. Things have been busy, with school and people and rotary and things back in Canada. February flew by and I don’t know how I missed it. March started slow and now it’s suddenly the 19th. How did that happen?
But anyway, to my point.
Exchanges are tough. I am not going to sugar-coat that or express how difficult they are for me in particular; no. Exchanges are tough for most students, unless you are one of the few who lucks out with everything and have the best year of your life without a problem and if that is you then good for you. That’s fine. That’s great, but just shut up about it. I have had my good share of problems this year, because of exchange and not because of exchange. Life still happens wherever you go and sometimes people don’t realize that.
This is a reoccurring issue with my exchange, and last night I was threatened by a Rotarian that he is recommending I be sent home because I can’t control my emotions and need to “be an adult and stop worrying about things”. So back to my intro,
Who THE HELL do you think you are?
1) I am not an adult. I am a teenage girl on a youth exchange.
2) He has no idea what I am going through right now. It is not his business.
And 3) How DARE he threaten my exchange because he is an ignorant old man.
Some people.
Hey guys, so, busy weekend for me. Sorry I haven’t updated in a long time, but I haven’t had internet besides facebook and email on my little flip phone for 3 weeks!
Christ it’s hard to do anything with that!
So, Saturday was my 17th birthday and to celebrate a rotarian took me to Hobbiton where I went on a tour by myself. I met a fellow Canadian and we chatted away the tour, talking LOTR/Hobbit movies and favourite scenes. Hobbiton was amazing and I encourage EVERYONE to go!
As well that day a rebound rotary student held a party for me out on her lake house which was wicked fun!
Thank you everyone who was there. :)
I will post photos later!
Weekend
I had a really good weekend! :) The “lowlight” was that we lost our two volleyball games on Friday 1:2 and 1:2. However, it was fun to play and a completely new experience was going to McDonald’s at 10 p.m. after doing sport! Saturday morning I had an appointment at the hair dresser. I am unhappy with my hair cut because the hair dresser (has anybody seen Pitch Perfect? She was like Fat Amy.) stuffed it up and didn’t to the layers properly. They are just EVERYWHERE!!! I made muffins, we had a yummy Lunch (waffles) and my exchange friends Jesper from Sweden and Alice from France came over to help me with the icing for the muffins. Unfortunately we didn’t care about the amount of butter and the icing turned out shitty but oh well the muffins were our birthday present for our other friend Elizabeth from Canada and we knew she wouldn’t care :) My host mum dropped us off at Canada’s place, about a 40 minute drive. We had a great night there were a few Kiwis too who took us biscuiting and kayaking (I fell off… who else?!). It was such a nice spot where we had an awesome view from, right next to Lake Arapuni. Once more we had the pleasure to enjoy the Kiwi hospitality. They don’t care who’s having their food and staying at their place. You’re always welcome! Another thing is that plans just don’t (or hardly ever) exist. E.g. our trip to Canada’s birthday was organised while I was getting a hair cut! Furthermore the teenagers who are our age have SO MUCH freedom! They can do whatever they want, if you don’t live in town you can turn up your music as loud as you want and you can get anywhere you want because it’s most likely to get your licence while you’re at high school. :) One more Kiwi thing is a sausage wrapped in a piece of buttered toast covered with tomato sauce. I really didn’t like it in the beginning but now I really appreciate it, it’s sooo easy and good!
I got back to Cambridge this afternoon and did the groceries for the Yr 13 camp with my host mum. We have to organise our own food and tents but it should be good fun and I’m looking forward to it :)
You’ll hear more in a week: I’ll get back Friday night, play Volleyball on Saturday morning and then be off to Rotorua until Sunday because some nice Rotarians have invited us to a Maori Festival including a Kapa Haka competition! :)
Fun weekend with Laura, Alice and Jesper. :) Thanks for coming out guys! They made me some LOVELY cupcakes. :3
at The Mount for New Years, in Tauranga. Good night! Apparently the crowd was 50,000. Pretty good for a New Zealand party, if you don’t mind me saying, considering the total population here is about 4.1 million.
I hope everyone had a good New Years!
Finally got a package from my parents, that was 2 months late arriving. I am saved by Canadian candy, Tim Burton films, Adele, my Boston Bruins jersey and Halloween decorations that yes I will be putting up in my room.
Thank you so much Mum and Dad! I love you so much!
THIS IS ACTUALLY SO ACCURATE
Except, obviously, for the whole hobbit thing. There are hobbits.
(Source: notyour-sidekick)
First video I’ve posted online during my exchange! Hope you enjoy those grueling 8 minutes and 50 seconds that you will never get back!
I climbed Mount Ngauruhoe yesterday, AKA Mount Doom from Lord of the Rings. Started from the car park at 9am and got back to the car at 4pm. Long day. Definitely worth it, though, for that!
Just two photos from my south island trip. First one from the top of a Bungy/Luge mountain over looking Queenstown, and the second from Puzzling World in Wanaka!
Originally was going out this weekend camping with my host parents, but plans have now changed.
We’re still camping, but now going to hike around 2 different mountains.
That’s just a *bit* better than normal camping.
Have a good weekend everyone!
This is the longest I’ve spent on a single drawing in a very long time. Done for Illustration class.
