Sarah's Report - January

 

When I got back from the Christmas break not many people were talking to me, so I talked to my Rotary club about changing schools or classes. Changing schools wasn’t possible but if I talked to my main teacher and the counsellors at school I could change classes. I planned to go into the European section because it’s a section that learns English and what I was thinking is that maybe they would be more interested in talking to me. It wasn’t to be speaking English or anything like that. I talked to the main teacher and the counsellors and they said it wasn’t possible for me to go into the European section because it already has 38 students and is to full. Apparently my min teacher had tried to put me in it at the beginning of the year and it was to full then as well. But I continued to talk to the counsellor about the difficulties I’ve been having at making friends and that I’m always eating alone. She knows one of the girls in my class very well so she said she would discreetly bring me up with her and get her to ask me to lunch with her and her friends. She did talk to her and that Friday I ate with her and her friends. It was really good and I think now they really realize that I’m always alone because before I had said it but I guess it never registered. It’s difficult for me to eat with them unfortunately because there are different groups within the class and I’m in group 1 and they are all in group 2 and they take Russian and I take Spanish so we start lunch at different times. Also people have been starting to talk to me again and I’m really hoping I get to do things soon on the weekend with them. When I was also talking with the counsellor she told me there's 4 other students who moved to France who can’t speak French so she arranged a class for me and them to be in. I think school will be getting a lot better soon, at least I hope so.

 

 

I went to one Rotary meeting this month. I had just talked about Christmas and how the change in families went. Other than that there was a Rotaract meet up at a city that’s close to me. Unfortunately the Rotary district wouldn’t let the exchange students stay the night with the people in Rotaract so only me and 2 other exchange students went for one day. It was nice and they said that since I live in the same city I can start doing things with them so I’m going to be asking about that.

 

 

Because I haven’t been able to make friends I’m looking at  starting to play badminton but I still need to find a club. So i changed families and I really like my host sister and my host dad but my host mom does annoy me at times. She stops me every 3 words to try and correct my French which then turns out to be a mistake and she didn’t need to fix it but she thought I was trying to say something else. I can’t say I’m tired or something else like that without getting a lecture and it does get frustrating. I’m trying to learn French how everyone else is speaking it but she thinks I don’t and I tell her that I do and show her but she's always saying I can’t and even once I do a French exercise perfectly she just continues saying I don’t know how to. I did have the other Canadian in my district stay the weekend and she did say my host mom was sort of weird. First day she said I wasn’t locking the door properly but I don’t leave or have the key for the door she was talking about. My host sister could have 3 people plus herself stay in the same room but I can only have 1 person. I understand that it is her house and she gets to decide who can and can’t. I am getting settled in her though and it's a lot different than the Murador’s and it was a bit more relaxed in the Murador’s where here I do feel a little stressed about saying anything. My host mom has complimented me and said I am the most practical exchange students they’ve had because I do ask questions about themselves and are curious to know them where the others weren’t. 

 

 

I’ve been talking about 200 euros that our district wants us to pay for the mandatory events and some people have paid that and the district talked to my YEO here about my payment I think but they haven’t brought it up to me yet so I have no idea what's going on.

 

By Sarah Ash

 

If you would like to send Sarah an email, her address is: sarahash00@shaw.ca.