This past week I went on challenge week which was organized by my school. I went to Niagra Falls to go to the Strewn Cooking school. This school was also a winery so we got learn how to cook, make wine and much more. While we were there we stayed in the Niagra College residences. This was my first time sleeping in a university dorm and my first opinion of them is that they are extremely gross and small.

When we got to the dorms the first day we assumed that we would settle down in out rooms, go to the cooking school and dinner would be all ready for us to eat. This was not what it was it was like at all. We went to the cooking school, ready to eat, and immediately we were handed aprons and recipes. This was a not so pleasant surprise for all of us.

It turned out that cooking was much more fun that we expected it to be. We also noticed that all food tastes much better when you slave over cooking it yourself.

We spent the rest of the trip cooking all day, eating what we cooked, and then by the time we got back to the dorms we were all ready to go to sleep. I turned out this trip was an amazing experience and we learned a lot about food preparation and where it comes from.

When I got home, for mothers day, I decided that I would cook brunch for my mom and my family. I made my favourite dishes which were mushroom filled beggars purses, salmon in a dill cream sauce and chocolate orange soufflé. All of the dishes were big hits in my family, and they can’t wait for me to cook more for them.

It seems like just yesterday when I got on the plane, travelled just over 30 hours and finally got to South Africa. I was finally on excahnge. All I knew was that I was going to live in someone else’s home, in their country, and go to their school. I knew my exchange’s name was Alex, but that was about it. When I finally arrived in South Africa I met the family I was going to be staying with and they took me back to their house. This is when I experienced the first diference. They drive on the left side of the road. Originally I got very nervous anytime I went into a car but then I got used to it.

The next day I went to school. The name of the school is Bridge House College. My first day was a little bit scary, but very exciting at the same time. I met so many new people who were so different from me. On my second day of school I went to my first Afrikaans class. Afrikaans is the second most common language in South Africa, after English. When I was in this class I did not understand anything they were saying. Everyone in the class would start laughing and I would sit there looking confused. School went on and I made tons of new friends.

The place in South Africa that I was staying in is called Franschoeuk. It is around 40 minutes from the Cape Town, which is one of the main City’s in South Africa. After the first couple of days I have realized that South Africa is nothing like I expected.

I assume it would be dangerous, and I would be scared to walk around by myself. This is totally the opposite. Everyone here is so friendly and warm.

That is all for now!

Since school started in September, I was ready for this winter break. Every year my family usually spends the whole break in Collingwood at our chalet. This year we decided that since all of our friends were going away, we would take a trip to Florida. Just the thought of going somewhere warm got me extremely excited. Then my brother and dad decided that they didn’t want to go to Florida and would stay in Collingwood. This then turned into a girls trip. Then when starting to think about what we were going to do in Florida, the first thing I thought about was my friend from camp, Marcelle. Marcelle lives in Florida, which means during the year, I barely get to see her. She was one of my best friends this summer so I knew I had to spend at least 2 days. I then talked to all of the other kids from my camp who were also going to Florida and we decided that we would all go to her house on the same day.

The next thing we decided we needed to do was shop. Anytime that we go on a girls trip we spend a lot of time in the mall. This is usually because in the states they have different (in my opinion better) stores than we do in Canada. The final thing that we decided we were going to do was sit on the beach and tan! To me and my sister, this will be the most important part of our trip.

I am really looking foroward to this trip and hopefully it will turn out as well as I am expecting!

*** just found a draft!