The New Kid

Yesterday was my first day at school, and boy was it an adventure.

First off, it poured pretty much all day, which made it doubly gloomy. I’m technically not registered at school, so I just went with Ines to her classes. All the students in her class went to every single class together, so you’re with the same 20 or 25 people all day – pretty different from U.S. schools. All the teachers taught in Portuguese (obviously) so all that went pretty much right over my head. There were many times during the day when I wished I could just be home in Webb’s office eating lunch with people who I know and love…it was a very hard day.

There were some good points though! I met Maud from Canada and Julia from the U.S. – the two other AFSers at my school. They were both really nice and gave me their phone numbers (yes I did get a phone! My host mom was so sweet - she bought it for me…). Julia even sent me a few texts after school to check how I was doing, which I really appreciated after not being understood all day. I also met these really nice Portuguese teenagers in Ines’ class – Mariana, Maria Rui, and Joao. Mariana talked to me all throughout Gym and they were just super nice (and were pretty much the first three Portuguese teens I met that don’t smoke).

So here’s my day, in a time line sense:

6:40 (am)- overslept. Rushed to do hair and brush teeth and wash face.

6:50- left the house for the metro station

7:00- train gets to station, get on it, sit near front with Ines and her friend

7:30- gets to Casa de Musica, Ines and her friend and I eat breakfast at a café, I had a croissant with butter and warm milk…yummy!!

7:55- Ines, friend, and I catch the bus to school

8:15- school starts, aula(?) de Geometria (Geometry class), where they’re doing something COMPLETELY different from our Geometry classes, it all went over my head. After the class I got to meet Maud, the Canadian exchange student.

10:00- Filosofia, the teacher was really funny, even though he didn’t speak English. This kid was asking a lot of questions or something, and apparently the teacher said something like “You’re talking a lot today, perhaps you’re trying to impress our new student”.

11:30- Ines, her friend Pipa, and I caught the autocarro (bus) to a café where we met about 4 other students. There was this one kid who was pretty funny and was like “I like Britney. Not Pop Princess, I like fat and bald Britney. I’m from the Bronx. I’m Jennifer Lopez’ cousin”. The café was nice, I had a chicken salad, and finally got to break my 100 Euro note.

2:00- After lunch (yes, there lunch break is 2 hours long…so not fair) I got to meet Julia, the USA AFSer. I’m so glad I’ve met her, maybe I can have someone to talk with about being an exchange student here.) I went to Ines’ Portuguese class. I can tell I’m going to have a lot of difficulties there, it seems REALLY hard, even for the Portuguese students. I ended up writing a letter for the whole class. After this class we went by the principal’s office to check about me being registered, and she said they hadn’t processed my paperwork so I shouldn’t come back until it’s done.

3:30- Ines had history, but her teacher wasn’t thrilled I was there, so I ended up going to the Library, which was actually nice. I read old Time Magazines by a heater…yummy.

5:00- Ines had gym, but I sat with Mariana, a girl Katerina, and a boy Pedro. We talked about Portugal and the U.S., pop culture and politics and stuff. They were so nice to me, which was quite refreshing after being whistled at by a bunch of seniors on the bleachers.

6:30- We left the school and the rain completely CUT LOOSE! We ran to the bus stop, but then the bus didn’t come for about 20 minutes (maybe less, but that’s what it felt like). After the bus, we caught the train home where I played Sudoku on my new phone.

8:30- Sat down to dinner. We had soup, salad, meatballs, and mashed potatoes. They even bought me peanut butter, which is really hard to come by in Europe. After dinner, I gave them some gifts from the U.S. (UVA jackets/sweatshirts, Williamsburg peanuts that they ate in about 5 minutes, and a Christmas ornament of Tim). Then I showed them pictures of my friends and family, the marching band show, some home videos, and a few songs from Once Upon a Mattress.


A very, very, very long day.

Oh- good news everyone (at least for now, when I’m still pretty homesick). I will be coming back to the U.S. about 2 or 3 weeks earlier than I expected.

June 14 is the day (I think) I will either leave my host family, or leave Portugal, I’m not quite sure. They just said June 14.

Tchau!