Winter Wonderland

Some of you were maybe already a little bit concerned, but I survived my trip last weekend. After a very very busy week with Review Board for my future Exchange Participants and Elections for the new Local Committee President (which after 3 ties were won by my dear Brett) I went to party thursday night. We had picked a rather interesting location: THE RANCH!!! This is the place where Canadians from the whole area dress up in Cowboyclothes and go and dance to Countrymusic.

I found this very interesting at first, but after a while and some cowboys who asked me for a dance I got used to the idea and enjoyed myself. I have some pictures but not may which I will upload later and my friends who I went with will probably put theirs on facebook too.

The next morning it was time for me and Brett to go West as well and we took the bus to Windsor. It took us five hours to get there, we met some nice people in the various buses we used and then we arrived to Windsor. Dickey (whose real name is Richard but noone except for his parents uses that name) picked us up, gave us a nice detour of the town in his car and then, because there was nothing else to do before the other AIESECers came to his house for our party, took us to the mall. Which is exactly like the Guelph mall, but okay. This gave us the opportunity to go shopping at the monopolist for the party. I hadn't been in a while so once again it became clear to me how nice Europe is, for sooo many various reasons. We then went to Dickey's house and I cooked mashed potatoes, Sauerkraut and gravy, better known as zuurkoolstamppot in the Netherlands. I had also brought some other Dutch cookies and liquorice, so we had fun times and some AIESECers came to visit. Dickey's parents were on vacation and so we had the whole high school feeling of being home alone and house parties. Those fun times...We played werewolf for hours and hours and I finally overcame my nervous me that does not permit me to be a good werewolf. When I was a werewolf I lied and betrayed and of course I won. Unfortunately I was so good that noone wanted me in the game anymore and in the next two games I was killed in the first rounds. Late at night most of the AIESECers went home, some stayed the night and we talked and shared some interesting stories until early in the morning.

On Saturday, I was excited to go to Detroit and see how bad it really is, but unfortunately we only woke up after noon and everybody was too tired to do anything. The guys also decided that Windsor by daytime is kind of boring, so we went to see the new James Bond movie. Which was not as good as Casino Royale, but still quite entertaining. Especially the scene with the Canadian Intelligence Agent in the end made us laugh sooooo hard. Either you get it yourself or I will explain to you when the time has come. After the movie we went for dinner, to hang out at Danielle's place and then to the Casino. Since I had never been to a Casino before I found that very exciting. All those lights...noises...people. I didn't play though. But it was nice to hang out there for a while. Then we went home, because Brett had to leave at 7 in the morning, he had to work in Guelph. I stayed in Windsor and slept very long on sunday. When I woke up I met Dickey's mum who had just returned from vacation late at night. Since there was nobody else awake, I chatted with her for a bit. Then Dickey woke up and I wanted him to go to Detroit with me, so he started to think of something to do there. It was snowing and really cold, so we couldn't come up with anything except for shopping and it was just not the right time for that. So we went for a snowwalk on Windsor's riverfront instead, which is very nice because you can see Detroit's skyline. After that we had coffee and nice Sushi Lunch/Supper and I got back on the bus to Guelph. The first bus was late, so I got a little bit restless about my connection in London. The bus was also almost full by the time I got on, so I had to sit all the way in the back, getting slightly sick. The weirdo sitting next to me asking me creepy questions also didn't really help. Later a nice girl came who went all the way to Ottawa (which is very far) and sat between me and the weirdo, so he talked to her instead. And she told me about Ottawa which was also very useful. I caught my connection in London, but then there was an accident on the highway and the second bus was also delayed. Luckily my bus to Guelph waited in Kitchener and I finally got home, after 6 hours on different buses. I also met some of the people I got to know on friday. So I had a nice little meaningless Canadian chat with them. Guelph was covered in snow by the time I got here and the ground was also frozen and slippery. I somehow managed not to fall until now, but I better start wearing my helmet again.

I did lots and lots of AIESECwork ever since. Yesterday I unfortunately couldn't find a reason to get up and stayed in bed for half the day. But yeah, things have to get done. Cold makes lazy though. Now I also really have to pack my stuff, because tomorrow at 7 in the morning I am taking the bus to go to Ottawa for the weekend. It is cold, but not snowing there and I am very very excited. Three days in Guelph have already made me want to go away again!!! Even though I really like my AIESECfriends here, I am already looking forward to go home in a month. It's probably a combination of my AIESECwork being almost done here, cold, boredom and wanting to get on with my life...so I have to seek some distraction for now.