I haven’t had time to write in over a week! It’s been super busy, but also A LOT of fun! All of last week I woke up at 7:30am, had German classes until 2pm, had university programs until 5pm or 6pm, and then went out with all the exchange students on events planned by the buddy system until strange hours of the morning. Every single day I met a ton of new people. Everyone’s really friendly because we’re all here alone, except for a few couples on exchange together. I don’t think I’d like that very much. In a few weeks, the groups will form and then people will become less friendly, I guess.
Anyways, Tuesday was the welcome pub. On Wednesday, we all went bowling. I bowled like crap but I played billiards like a pro and I’d rather have it like that than the other way around. Christiana, Cora’s sister, came to visit from Germany for a few days and we got along really well. She loves to go drum n bass parties back in her hometown, so I’ll think I’ll visit and see how those parties are. Ohhh, I miss jungle parties and dancing to it! Other music always gets boring after a while, but never jungle. Another surprise: I had 2 beers this night. I also figured out why I could drink and actually liked the beer here: it’s not half as carbonated as in Canada. That makes it much smoother for me and has less of a gag effect. Also, I found out that BEER IS CHEAPER THAN POP! Isn’t that ridiculous??? Most of the time, I order house beer, because it’s the cheapest that they’ll have, but it’s also possible to order house beer and get a Heineken! I also tried Schuetzengarten, which is the local beer here, and it was very nice. Cora, Christiana, and I were among the last people to leave the bowling alley. I think I got home at 2am or 3am or so? I can’t remember anymore.
On Thursday, we had a pub crawl. The pub crawl started at 8pm (I haven’t started drinking so early in a long while) and, for me, it finished at 5am. I tried to wear my other pair of cheap shoes that I bought for fun, but these were even more painful than the flat ones because I was bleeding on both ankles before I started bleeding on one ankle in the flat ones. I had to limp into the McD’s to get band aids and then Cora and Christiana walked with me back up the stairs to change shoes. I felt so vain and retarded, but I did get one picture with the shoes and a grumpy face lol. Now I have 3 large blisters on my ankles and I can only wear one pair of shoes and I have to have band aids on them or else it hurts even more. Lesson of that day: Always bring band aids with cheap shoes!
Well, the first place we went to was this Arabic-themed lounge with the gorgeous fountain that I’d been to before with Till. This time, we got a picture of the fountain. Isn’t it loooovely? We went to 2 more bars after that, but the first place was the nicest. Finally, everyone ended up at a club where there’s strippers on the lower floor (although my friend Woeter checked and reported that the strippers weren’t there that night). I was starving for the last 2 or 3 hours that we were there and I made roesti (special potato hash brown) at 5am lol. Really, it’s the perfect after-club food because its quick and greasy. Mmm. I’ve stocked up on them because there was a sale and I know I’ll eat them all hahah.
Back on Monday, I met a guy named Pascal from the Netherlands. On Tuesday, I saw him again and met 4 other people from the Netherlands (Femke, Petra, Susann, & Woeter) and got invited to go skiing/snowboarding with them on Friday. I only knew Pascal when I agreed to go, but it ended up being so much fun. They’re all so nice and fun to chill with! I wasn’t going to go snowboarding again, but Goo convinced me that I had to or else I’d regret it.
So, on Friday, I skipped my morning German class and we went to Flims Laax Falera in the afternoon. In St. Gallen, it was like 15 degrees. In Laax, it was still about 9 degrees at the bottom, but -2 or -3 degrees at the top of the glacier (over 3000 m elevation) smack in the middle of the Alps. It was my first time snowboarding on a glacier! We had perfect weather – it was just bluebird skies for the whole weekend! I think that this weekend, I experienced the most beautiful thing I have EVER seen. At 3000 m elevation, the skies were clear and there were huge mountains ALL around. You could see for sooo far. I took a movie clip with my camera, because it was as close as I could get to preserving the image. Pictures just aren’t the same as being there. Movie clips are closer, but they never give the same feeling either. I used to imagine what it would be like to be there, in the middle of the Alps or the Rocky Mountains, and I can’t believe how lucky I am to have experienced it already. Now, whenever I’m stressed, I’ll just think back on that.
We stayed at a youth hostel, but our room was right above the club, so it was loud. I got woken up several times the first night, but the music was always really good and sometimes I’d stay up to listen to the song heheh. The second night, some of us went to another room but the rest of us stayed up until after the music was done. We would’ve just joined the party, but the none of us really like the music the second night – too much gangsta rap.
What was really nice about snowboarding in Europe was that I didn’t find so many people who have an attitude problem like in Canada. There are very few packs of snowboarders who think that they’re too cool and yell insults at other people. Of all the days that I’ve gone snowboarding, the only unpleasant thing that’s happened to me was falling because someone passed me a little too close for my own comfort. At first, it felt like I was cutoff, but it wasn’t actually that bad. There’s also a good mix between snowboarders and skiers, because some older people snowboard and some younger people ski. I’m also really, really happy with my improvements this year!
I came back on Sunday night with minor whiplash, bruised knee, bruised thigh (from my first few times using a STUPID T-BAR!), a jammed finger (I don’t know how, I haven’t had that since I used to play volleyball), and very sore muscles. I fell off the T-bar twice in the 4 times that I took it. It’s really annoying and uncomfortable on a snowboard. As well, one of my worst fears came true: GOGGLE TAN! Ahhh! My first time with goggle tan lol. I’ve got to spend more time in the sun to even it out hahaha.
I also found myself with a new roommate on Sunday – Christof, from France – but I was too tired to chat with everyone in our house while they were having a late dinner. I just passed out, pretty much. I talked to him in the days after that. He’s nice and charming in that French way hehe.
On Monday, I went along with some other exchange students to an Alumni party because it was graduation day for some people. We went to the AHA Club, which is the equivalent of our Guvernment, in a sense that it’s in the middle of nowhere and it’s the biggest club around. Still, their AHA Club is the size of our normal clubs lol. It was the first time that I tried Red Bull! I had a Red Bull & Vodka and I still felt really awake even at 5am! I also found out that they DO make Malibu Pineapples here, but they’re not as good :(. It was a lot of fun because of the people that were there, but the DJ absolutely sucked. He couldn’t mix at all and he played half house, half salsa, and a little bit of hip hop right before I left. Salsa is good, but only for a short while. Same with house. Well, it was the first time that I went clubbing on a Monday haha! I went to bed at 5am again. My schedule’s getting screwed up!
My languages are also getting screwed up, with all the Dutch and High German and Swiss German and English and Spanish and French flying around. It’s cool, but it’s hard to focus on one.
Well, I’m off to bed because I’m going to wake up early to make breakfast for my flatmates: French toast, maple syrup or icing sugar, and fresh fruit!
