22 Aprile

Life has been continuing on like normal.. if normal even exists for an exchange student! Italia is amazing and each day its becoming harder and harder to realise that I will have to leave! I have been attending school like normal and meeting some amazing girls, eating lots of pizza and gelato of course and shopping is definitely occupying my time! Host sister Giulia and I made cupcakes the other day!  Im off to the discoteca on Wednesday night and hopefully will go to Milano with Giulia on Saturday! I have been in my host family for just under 3 weeks but already it feels like I have been here forever and know them so well, I have settled in so quickly and just enjoying every minute now!

pizza con patatine- certo

cupcakessss

14 Aprile - Lake Como

On Sunday, Sophie, another exchange student from South Australia that is attending the same school with me in Merate invited me along with her host family to go to Lake Como! We had so much fun touristing around together and just wandering the beautiful streets while eating gelato, it was the perfect day for sightseeing and we had many laughs on the way home, from getting stuck in a traffic jam, to getting lost and ending off with running out of gas! Soph and I get on so well from talking about how much we miss different Aussie things like Curly Wurlys and meat pies to singing Somer Heights High, its amazing having another australian <3

There will come a point where reality will lift you back down and you will soon realise that the day to start packing your belongings and memories that have been collected during your exchange is here! To me I feel that day will never come, but as I look at my countdown reading 61 days tears are quickly brought to my eyes, how on earth am I going to leave my second family that has done everything to make me feel at home, my friends who I feel I have known forever, the boring road that I walk to catch the early bus to school every morning, the hill I have to climb to go to the town center and always reward myself with a pizza or gelato for my hard efforts. How am I meant to leave "my world" and slot back into reality which I have had on pause for so long while everyone else has been moving forward. I thought that leaving my home country would be the hard part but the only difficult part about being on exchange in my new country is leaving it all behind and one day having to come back and visit knowing that the people I once saw at school everyday will no longer be around and the man I always say ciao to when going to get my chocolates might  not be there to say hello to anymore, everything changes and thats the sad part!

This has been my life for the past 3 months and it has made me grow more then I ever thought possible, but for now I have 8 weeks left and I am going to make all of them count! 

11 Aprile

Since Wednesday 6th I have been living 20 minutes from the amazing city Milan this is really going to challenge my shopping addiction I think! My new host family consists of 3 daughters, Susanna, Laura and Giulia, only Giulia is living at home and is in my class at school! Ennio and Marielle are my host parents who have perfect english but are really helping me to improve my italian, they are all so lovely and welcoming! I have had 4 days at my new school and am really enjoying it, there is a few other exchange students and its really good we have private italian lessons together most days which is helping me a lot and Marielle takes me to Italian lessons in the town twice a week which is very sweet! She is an amazing cook and I swear in the last week I have doubled in size! There is an australian exchange student at my school with rotary and it turns out we were on the same plane to Bangkok which is a little crazy but shes amazing and its the best to have someone to talk about all our "aussie" things that we miss with!

So at the moment I'm still settling in but really feeling at home and making the most of the time I have left!

25-31 March EASTER HOLIDAYS

So for the easter holidays I did a lot of what I think is well deserved relaxing and more travelling in places like Florence and Rome, I visited the Colosseum in Rome but unfortunately it was closed and couldn't go inside, just another excuse to visit Rome again! Easter was very different to back home, not as much chocolate which was very sad for me but the many course made up for it!

GERMAN GRACE

One of my best friends Grace who I have known since primary school is in Germany on exchange aswell! Grace is keeping me sane with our often skype sessions and our daily messages when we are in school bored, she is one of the only people that can truly understand everything I am going through! Love you to Germany and back Graceyyy! ich liebe dich <3 <3

She has an amazing blog aswell


http://gracecrosbiegermany.blogspot.de/

19-22 March - Firenze STS

On Tuesday I caught the train from Arezzo and went to Firenze/Florence to meet some of the other exchange students! I had the best time of my life meeting so many new and interesting people and some one that can finally understand everything your going through! There was 9 of us all together, so just a small group, 3 Canadians, 2 Americans, 3 Australians and 1 New Zealander ! In Florence we saw so many exciting things like the Duomo, Ponte Vecchio, Siena and of course the amazing Firenze Shopping! We ate lots of gelato and every night was a late one as we had so much to talk about in such a short time! It was so sad to leave them this morning but we are going to try to meet up again soon! 

Ponte Vecchio- my Aussie Tahlia and Canadian Rachel

Florence

Florence

Siena - Rachel and Kyle

Florence - Rachel

STS

STS

Siena