12/12/13- 12/15/13
Christmas time is coming and you can feel the warmth in the air. People are buying gifts, decorations are being hung, and families are spending more time together. This weekend my exchange student family got to spend a little Christmas time together. I took the train to Wroclaw with Lana, Ashley, and Sunny to go meet the other 60 exchange students. We talked about what each of us our buying our host families and what we think they will buy us. It was a fun 8 hour train ride together.
Once we arrived at the train station, there wasn’t a Rotaract there to meet us. Thank goodness we had a teacher from my Paderewski High School because he took us to the hostel. We dragged our bags across the streets through 5-6 blocks. We ended up switching bags with each other because our own bags were too heavy for us. I held Lana’s bag, Ashley held my cake, Lana held Sunny’s suitcase, and Sunny held Ashley’s bag. Good thing we have each other to rely on.
We were the first people to arrive at the hostel and we got to room with each other. Everyone finally came, dragging their bags up the stairs and hugging the rest of us. The weekend wasn’t anything like I expected. The Rotaracts did not have everything figured out so we didn’t really see anything exciting. We went to one museum that was interesting, but the rest of the places were extremely boring.
The best part of the weekend was hanging out with my friends. It felt great to get a hug from Ashley, Sam, and Grace! They are my sisters on exchange. For Christmas, I bought them a coin purse from Turkey, nail polish, German candy, and traditional key chains from Turkey for their blazers. Grace bought us each animal sweaters for Christmas. I received a penguin sweater that is super adorable! I also got penguin slippers that were equally as adorable. I enjoy giving gifts to my friends as much as I enjoy receiving them.
At the Rotary Christmas meeting, we all dressed up very nicely. The girls did their makeup and boys were suites. We walked in the cold to the meeting, which was horrible, but then we all took pictures in the coat room. It was nice finally taking a group picture with all our Rotary Blazers. The best part of the entire weekend was singing with the other exchange students though. It made us a complete group instead of 5 other countries staying in one country. We sang all the typical Christmas carols like “Let It Snow,” “Silent Night,” and “Rudolf the Red Nose Reindeer.” The final song of the night was “We Are the World” which was belted out by all the exchange students. We wrapped our arms around each other’s shoulders and swayed to the rhythm. It was a feeling of unity with the other exchange students.
We sang the song until all the Rotarians left the room. Lastly, we all hugged Caroline as she cried about leaving Poland. It was her last meeting and she leaves for Australia next weekend. It made everyone sad because she is leaving. We had one big group hug while wishing each other merry Christmas and happy new year. It made our group of 60 become finally unified.
Stephanie Raquel
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