School

So, i hate being cold. I love snow and blah,blah,blah but, i hate being cold. When we go out on the weekends here we are out until like 2,3,4,idk what time in the morning so it gets cold. Last night was especially cold so i had my swearshirt on at like 11 and felipé told me that i was obviously a true brazilian. I think he is right.
Rachel had some people over for her birthday last night to eat pizza and when she told me i was expecting like ten kids and some delivery pizza. boy was i wrong...
people were arriving at 8 and at like 6 this van pulls up and these two people get out and start unloading stuff. These people end up being the pizza guys. They set up some stuff in the backyard and started making pizza. Then rachels dad comes home with some folding tables from the bar and basically turned our backyard into the bar. I was impressed. I'm looking forward to my birthday now. =)
In a couple of weeks I am going to throw an "american" party at the request of my brazilian friends. I'm looking forward to it. I'm sure the guys will be dissapointed that i didn't import any blonde cheerleaders though.
Its weird how everyone here wants to be blonde with blue eyes like what they think americans look like. In the u.s. everyone wants to be dark and foreign like they think brazilians look. In all honesty though, i look more like what i pictured brazilians looking like. I am the 6th darkest person in a class of thirty people. i don't mind though, after the beach, i have the tan of a lifetime...and it's not even summer here. =DD

So.....
I attend a affluent private school in Brazil...which translates to I attend a school where children study more than any human being should have to. It is an Anglo school and they are like a well known chain of schools here in Brazil. I don't know if this is true of the entire chain but, my school is exceptionally boring(barring my literature class, which i dont understand a word of but, the teacher is so crazy i cant help but stand back in awe). Even the classes i understand are boring. Their math classes in the second year of high school are harder than any math i took in high school. I'm glad i'm not getting graded on my performance here.
I'm always suprised at how much i understand in school. Like last week they were learning about Neo-Nazi's and the KKK and stuff and i understood everything. It was cool. I still don't speak alot but, at least i understand.

Now it is time for me to go do my Português homework =(
Tchau

My trip to Rio

Hello out there!!!
I know I don't update very often but, trust me, that is a good sign!
I'm having an absolutely amazing time!!!
We had last week off from school and I went with my family to Rio de Janeiro. The beaches really are as beautiful as they look in pictures. The city itself was pretty amazing. The one thing that gets me about Brazil is how one second you are driving past thousands of favellas and the next you are driving past five star tourist motels. There is basically nothing that separates one part of town from the other.
I put all of the pictures I took on my photobucket so, check them out.
Now for the best part: my old woman story
so here I am on the beach in Rio. I'm laying down reading Deception Point by Dan Brown (good book) and i happen to look up and see this old lady dancing around....in a purple...thong bikini...i was like whoaaaaaa. She had to have been at least seventy or eighty years old and she was dancing around like she was fifteen. I loved it.
I must, however, cut this update short because the woman who comes every week to do our nails is here and she is yelling for me.
Tchau

I will update soon, i promise!!!

I have been slacking on my updates, i know. It is hard to make time for it though. I have a million things to do when i get online. The most important of which is an essay for my Berea application. They have changed the process over the summer so instead of updating my application, i have to fill out a new one. This happens to be difficult from here becasue their online application is not currently working.
In Brazilian news however, i start portugues classes friday. Saturday I will go to a friend's house to play ps2. Im excited. Of course, the most exciting thing is that next week i will go to Rio de Janeiro... =)
The second most exciting thing is that my b. dad is back from the United States. He has been studying at Harvard for one month and he will go back in twenty days. I think my b. mom will go with him for a week in the U.S. But, back to the exciting part. He brought back things from the U.S. for everyone and he brought back....a...guess.....A NINTENDO WII!!! I feel so much more at home now. I was really starting to miss video games but now i am happy.
In other news, i love it here alot. I'm excited about the portugues classes because i need to learn more. I can understand a good bit of what is going on around me now but id like to be able to do simple things like answer the phone. of course, the fact that i dont speak portugues hasnt stopped me from answering the phone. i always forget and pick it up. sometimes they speak some english but, mostly they just hang up on me. haha.

sorry this is so short but i promise i will do better later this week!!!