Thursday, December 23, 2004
Merry Christmas
Wednesday, December 22, 2004
Vetur, sumar, vor og haust - eg gaeti elskad thig endalaust
School's Christmas ball was so much better than I expected, the people were amazingly happy, the MCs were brilliant, the band was fantastic and overall it was a good evening.
I even won a Japanese "bodyshopbasket". It's not Christmas if you don't get soap.
I liked the fact that I won it in a lucky draw, my number being the unluckiest around.
44, in Chinese it sounds like "sei sei" which sounds like "die die".
You even get buildings with no floor with the number 4 in. 4 - 14 -24 -24 - 34 - 40 - 41 - 42... all missing! So if you live on the 53d floor... it's not really the 53d floor.
The only downpoint was that Ambra brought Alexandra and the two Italians were literally "too cool for school".
Yesterday I had a school BBQ which was so much fun, the games were good and everyone enjoyed themselves, I was at the beach, getting sunburnt, on December 22nd! That's never happened before. After this I went shopping with Chi Ying and wow, I now understand why Chinese people enjoy shopping so much, it's not like shopping in Europe - there's no stress, it's just walking and talking and laughing and nice.
The day was extremely fun but it also had it's low points.
Samuel announced that on the 2nd of January he leaves for Canada to return in the end of June.
So I will probably never see him again.
Ever.
He's the reason I took physics, the best first impression anyone ever made and a whole lot of fun. Samuel and Chi Ying are 2 of the people I look forward to meeting every day at school but next year they'll be gone. I love them and know school won't be the same without them, they're irreplacable. I just hope they have a good time in USA/Canada and that we'll be able to keep in contact.
I even won a Japanese "bodyshopbasket". It's not Christmas if you don't get soap.
I liked the fact that I won it in a lucky draw, my number being the unluckiest around.
44, in Chinese it sounds like "sei sei" which sounds like "die die".
You even get buildings with no floor with the number 4 in. 4 - 14 -24 -24 - 34 - 40 - 41 - 42... all missing! So if you live on the 53d floor... it's not really the 53d floor.
The only downpoint was that Ambra brought Alexandra and the two Italians were literally "too cool for school".
Yesterday I had a school BBQ which was so much fun, the games were good and everyone enjoyed themselves, I was at the beach, getting sunburnt, on December 22nd! That's never happened before. After this I went shopping with Chi Ying and wow, I now understand why Chinese people enjoy shopping so much, it's not like shopping in Europe - there's no stress, it's just walking and talking and laughing and nice.
The day was extremely fun but it also had it's low points.
Samuel announced that on the 2nd of January he leaves for Canada to return in the end of June.
So I will probably never see him again.
Ever.
He's the reason I took physics, the best first impression anyone ever made and a whole lot of fun. Samuel and Chi Ying are 2 of the people I look forward to meeting every day at school but next year they'll be gone. I love them and know school won't be the same without them, they're irreplacable. I just hope they have a good time in USA/Canada and that we'll be able to keep in contact.
Monday, December 20, 2004
Don't jump in the water if you can't swim
I can't believe how close Christmas is. There are no cookies in my house and no snow on the streets. I'm not even bored with Christmas songs, they're not being played 24/7.
Today I cleaned the apartment, it's shining！:) I also cooked dinner, for 4 people for 60 Hong Kong dollars. I was very proud since I usually spent about 250 for just me and one friend in Iceland....
Today my mother* also told me about people who'll try to steal all my things from my hotel room in the night. The important thing is not to show that you wake up - if they think you'll recognise them they'll just kill you. Tralalala, decided to tell my grandmother about this when I come back to Hong Kong safely, so she won't worry.
The debate
I froze, in my first speech I said something wrong, this is when I felt like I was living in slow motion for a minute. I then repeated it - wrong again. Then I said something which still wasn't right, started sweating and thought I'd stutter. I remember thinking "I blew it" and hoping the girls would forgive me. Well they did and we won. Jenny was Speaker of that competition and wow, I was proud!!! During my second speech I just trembled, it was terrible - the judges loved the speeches though... I have to practise delivering them now. But yeah there's something to that feeling of winning a competition as a team. It's pretty unbeatable. I don't know when's the last time I felt so proud of anything. Jennifer and Jenny were fabulous, obviously Jenny won The Best Speaker, Jennifer was the only one in our team who remembered to do some rebuttal, we won, we won, WE won! The captain of the other team ended up saying "we agree with the other team that war never ends", which was the equivalent of taking a shotgun and shooting yourself in the head! (The topic was "War is essential to peace and they were for it)... It was truly wonderful - hopefully I'll get some pictures of us and put them here. Now I just have pictures from Christmas balls.
Haha, the AFS Christmas ball.... well I can show you pictures :)
At first it was as if I were high I was so happy, so I smiled and smiled and smiled.
I've learnt that Chinese people generally like you if you smile a genuine smile.
Then I started delivering my speech, Alexander was translating into Cantonese.
The party was bound to suck, it was an AFS thing - that means a lot of poorly organised games and everyone just wanting to eat and chat....
So I couldn't help being sarcastic, I actually tried to be sincere but this picture is me saying "I think we're going to have a lot of fun":
Notice the look on my face.
Anyway the rest of the ball I was trying to keep a straight face, be professional but then I made the vital mistake of saying "I hope you all enjoyed that game" (the game was terrible) and Alexander said "haha" at which point I just started laughing and then I continued to laugh for about 30 seconds. So I said "I hope you all enjoyed that game, hahahahahhahahhahaha" which wasn't very polite, but it was funny - they all laughed :)
Incidents like this are why I just laughed when Ming told me that Alexander and I were doing a good job as MCs. Liar!
It was fabulous when she told us that You Ching was going to have afew games and I kept asking Alexander whether I was saying the name in the right tones. He ended up answering with "what the fuck? Since when do tones matter in ENGLISH?" - the guy's name is "Eugene". Oops :)
After this a few of the exchange students went to Tsim Sha Tsui which was good, met Christina but now she's gone to the Philippines and then she goes to USA again. Why is it that I "hate Americans" but every individual American I meet I like? Hmm...
After this me and Dominic went to TGI Fridays which was brilliant :)
I hadn't eaten all day and finally I had a big hamburger, french fries and a good cocktail :) Dominic took a picture of me which he promised to send me, well it was great to celebrate that we've both won debating competitions in Hong Kong. He won his school debate and I was on a winning team of the first round of the Inter School competition. Good stuff :)
I love going to TGI Fridays with Dominci, when we've been married 10 years and come back to Hong Kong.... hahaha!
On Sunday I had a Christmas party with my family, it was good - very elegant. It was my mother's piano teacher's party, I agree with my dad that I should've played Mary Had a Little Lamb on the piano for them! After this we drove around Hong Kong which is brilliant, wow... and had a seafood dinner with my mum's family. I drank tea.
So yeah - I'm happy :)
*Mother (Daphne)/ dad (Ricky)/ brother (Brian)/ sister (Angel) - Hong Kong family, mamma (Imba)/pabbi (Sigvaldi) - Icelandic parents.
