What your mind wants

Often times, what you really wish for does not happen and in the instances it does you become confused with reality and what the future brings. I will admit that in January when I found out I was going to Poland I felt–surprisingly–indifferent. I wanted this my whole life and I felt nothing. However, now I cannot be more excited; it is so hard to concentrate. I get random burst of happiness that I can't even control myself. Every day at school I wonder how different it will be to move to a country and not speak any english it all. Like on an alien planet, I feel as if it is all a world apart. This all materialized in my head and that's when the blue moment comes in. In beginning of the year I felt like I was not going to miss anyone, yet for the first time, while riding up to my first orientation, I realized how for a whole year I won't touch my family or friends, I won't see them, I won't laugh with them. Nevertheless, I also realized that I will have so many new great people to meet. I, hopefully, will also have in Poland what I have here. How lucky is that? To have those types of relationships on two sides of the world! To think that the polish radio that I listen to everyday will translate in my brain to real words and phrases!

And that brings me to main point: Rotary Outbound Orientations. Orientations were a mystery to me and I never knew what went on in them. I just knew they were essential to a successful exchange. In essence, we learned how to be able to approach people and introduce ourselves as independent people, as well as say where we were going and I was so excited to know where everyone will go. I also got to see my inbound friends again and many other kids got to meet the inbounds( remember to check the glossary) for the first time. The inbounds are all pretty much crazy and yell "Kurwa!" while rotarians are speaking, but the rotations don't seem to mind and everything is just hilarious. We learned skills to learn new languages and the professor with small rimmed glasses and gipsy skirt  kept singling me out because she heard I was good at languages, so I felt a tad awkward the whole time. A valuable thing I got from it though was to listen to your host language as much as possible even if you do not know what they are saying. Rotary could not express enough the importance of the correlation between success and language level, so for anyone thinking about exchange start as soon as possible. Other than that we got to talk to other outbounds which is very assuring knowing they feel the same. They are all great and I am sure we will all become closer friends. Finally, we got measured for our blazers!!!!!!! DYING TO PUT PINS ON. We also received our huge country pin which is really awesome.

My second and penultimate orientation is the second week of March where we will talk more in depth about scenarios and travel. I will probably not post till after that so you will have to survive, if anyone even reads this. It is also from 8am to about 9 pm sat and again 8:30 am til a bit after noon sunday, so I will have lots to write about. I also have a ten page essay due for May about Poland and for next orientation I must give a mini speech in Polish as if I was in Poland telling my host club thanks for hosting me and introducing myself and various other little things. To do this we have instructed to study our host language 2 hours a day–it becomes enjoyable I swear.

So until next time bye and don't hesitate to ask any questions.

Angel Salas