Another late post :\

                                          Yes, I am in love. Before you start getting weird thoughts in your head let me tell you,I am in love with the country of Holland.

                                 Though I haven't seen the WHOLE of Holland, the two cities, Delft and Amsterdam impressed me.Maybe this sounds weird,I prefer Amsterdam to Switzerland.ANYTIME.Maybe because there are more people in Holland? I don't know.Ik weet het niet.

                                 Let me start from the beginning. I had a rotary actitivty the day before,and that evening I got horribly sick. I even considered not going.But then I though" It's Amsterdam you are going to ,baby.Not SCHOOL" So I just took some medicine and kept telling myself that I was alright.

                                   I woke up at 2.45 am in the morning that day.SO EARLY.But I didn't know then that it was totally going to be worth it.Why? Denise,Lily and I got a free train ride,because my host dad works for the Belgian railways.Not just that,it was first class and the coaches were EXACLTY like the ones in Harry potter.OH JOY.

                               We,along with other rotary kids and our team leaders took the bus and headed to HOLLAND.I have never been so excited before. In a few hours,we reached the city of Delft.

                                Delft,derieves its name from the dutch verb"Delfen",which means"to dig" To build a city in holland,you need to keep digging canals.So I am pretty sure I saw around five canals in Delft. I grew tired of seeing them.  

                               But what impressed me is that in Holland,cyclists have priority over the others. The roads are constructed keeping cyclists in mind.NOT CARS. Every Dutch citizen is the proud owner of a cycle.How nice. But for us,tourists,it's a total nightmare.You can't walk in peace.Every two seconds you'll hear the "kling kling" of the cycle and then you give way.I assure you it's tiring. 

                              We spent a couple of hours in Delft and the headed out to our destination- AMSTERDAM. 

                              We reached there in about an hour,and yes all of us were excited. The boys espicially,when our leader told us that we would be doing a tour of the red light district. And why not? After all we have all heard so much about it. And indeed,we had a great time.Thanks to our raging teenage hormones.

                            We spent the next two days in Amsterdam visiting "The Anne Frank House" ,"The Van Gogh Vermeer Museum" and the" Rijks Museum"  My favourite was the Anne Frank house.It was all so real.For a good one hour,I was Anne Frank,I was in hiding,I was captured and I died.And yes,in the end,I was secretely crying.Let's hope such a thing NEVER happens again.

                             Sadly,every trip has to come to an end. But I had a wonderful time in Amsterdam,I won't call it the land of prostitutes and drugs,I would call it"The land of cycles".Like every other city in Holland.

                             And finally,I hate to say it.My lovely year in Europe is coming to an end. I knew it was coming.I just didn't know it would come so fast.I am excited to see my family and my friends again,but at the same time I also want to stay here. Can India and Belgium merge to form one country? So it won't be painful to leave? Maybe I should stop thinking about this because I still have three months left.

                            And one more thing,It's my birthday in ten days and I'm excited.Any clue as to why I am so excited? My host parents are taking me to Paris on my birthday.ON A FIRST CLASS TGV train! YES YES YES.

                            Maybe,I should stop now? Yes,I should. I will try to reduce the gap between two posts.It's a lot.Let's hope laziness doesen't come in the way.

Till then,

A bientot!

                                

                               

So..Here comes my first post,almost FIVE months after creating it.I can't believe I'm so LAZY! Well...I decided,I have to write about my exerperinces,somewhere else other than my diary,it took me FIVE months to push myself to do it.I promise to keep you updated regulary from now on.I am pretty sure I realise the importance of time,now that I'm in Europe and everybody,literally everybody is always on time.


Speaking of being In Europe,I'm an exchange student in Belgium.I'm sixteen,well I'm almost seventeen( A month and couple of days more),and I can guarantee you that this year has been the best one in my sixteen years.Never have I experienced so many emotions flowing out of myself like blood at the same time.

As you know by now,I have spent more than five months in Belgium.It has been a good experience so far.Of course I have had my bad moments,but every experience can't be good,can it? This is what I keep telling myself when I'm sad.

I am extremely happy that I am doing this program. I have learnt so many things in the last five months,things I coudln't learn back home.It's been so overwhelming,this whole program

Speaking about the things I've learnt,here are some examples. When I was still In India,doing my final year of school,I was still dependent.Looking back,I see that Aditi was still a baby.I was never capable of doing things alone.I needed my parents,my Aunt and my Grandma for everything,I needed to be told to study,I lacked concentration,I took a  LOT of things for granted.I hardly did things on my own,most of the times,I would wait for my parents to do it.I would spend hours on the phone with my friends,I never realised the importance of time,though my father kept telling me,I just didn't pay attention.

But now that I am here,in Belgium,Life has taught me many lessons. I now know that if I am not ready on time,nobody is going to wait for me.Friend or no friend,if you are late,you are alone.This is just one of the many things that I have learnt in Belgium.If I write all of them,the list is obviously going to get long,maybe it ill never end and you will be bored to tears reading it.

People in Belgium  are really different. Even after being here for five months,I am still shy iin school,I feel like a baby in front of my classmates.They are also sixteen,just like me,but they are so independent.In short they are eighteen year olds who are actually sixteen.They have already started to make money,they do what they like,when they like(I don't know if that's good or bad) etc etc.The list goes on.I try my best to fit in,and its much better now,but I still have a long way to go.

Another thing different is that shops close by six in the evening.I keep wondering,how do people make money if they shut down so early? I do not remember any shop closing before 9pm back home.It's strange sometimes.

The food....Well it is basically raw.Atleast for me. I come from a country where spices are used in almost every preparation,so the food here was tasteless for the first two months.Dinner time was the only time I got homesick. But now,I have lost all my taste buds.Indian food is spicy to me now.The other day I had Indian food and  after I ate the first bite,my eyes started watering.

My first four months were really difficult for me.Language was definitely a problem,but more than that,adjusting was difficult.I am sure I took more time than the Americans,or the mexicans,where life more or less is the same.

But now,I am doing really fine.Now that I wasn't doing good earlier,but now it is just so much more better.Enjoyable.I won't be happier if it wasn't for the friends,they come from all over the world, (The USA,Mexico,Turkey etc etc) And of course the family I have been staying with.Especially my host parents.They have taught me so much.I owe them.

Also,I have to thank my first friend in school,Esen,who is from turkey.She is there to help me whenever I need her,and my french would'nt be the way it is now if she was not there.

Okay,this post is getting a bit long I think. I hope I didn't bore you.

I forgot to thank one more person,Mikayla.She opened the blog for me.Mikayla,thankyou so much for helping me for those first few weeks in school.If you remember it was you who gave me the courage to go to school.Merci beaucoup :)

A bientot,
Aditi