Working...of a different sort

As you know, I really wanted to do something in my summer here that was purposeful. But as my internship experience fell through I have something else to really put my energy into and that is my health and fitness.

My dad back in Australia is really into exercising and eating well and before I left for the US he said to me, "Don't come back fat!". I pretty much laughed it off as I highly doubted I would gain weight as I'm pretty fussy with my food anyway and I don't like lots of condiments/grease/sugar/etc. If anything I thought I'd lose weight! How naive I was. A big change when I arrived in the US was that I wasn't used to having so much control over the amount I ate. My host parents encouraged me to eat more and didn't tell me to stop eating certain foods(like my mum would "That's enough now.") and I pretty much took full advantage of that. I became addicted to tortilla chips and at my old host family's house we didn't have a lot of pantry space so the extra-large packet of chips would be left out on the counter and I would just keep snacking at them way beyond the point where I became full. I'd almost lost sight of what 'being full' even meant. And then I was invited to various parties/gatherings which is not something I normally would do in Australia so I'd have free reign of waaaaay too much food- tortilla chips galore! Then as things started to go downhill with my old host family, my foreign exchange sister, Hannah and I would be left at home on the weekends we would pig out and spend our days eating food and watching Desperate Housewives. I think I really suffered from emotional eating at that point. Of course, when I went to New York with the exchange students I wasn't depressed or anything; I was eager to take full advantage of the delicious food NYC had to offer! Such as the amazing Hale and Hearty Soups stores which sold delectable deli sandwiches and salads and of course plenty of amazing healthy soups. [Such a brilliant idea for New York where a soup is just what one needs in the cold weather!] I even went to my first Indian restaurant(since being in the US, I mean) there as well as an Italian restaurant which I thought was amazing but the Italian exchange student didn't think it was anything fancy, go figure!

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Anyway, where was I? Oh, right. So basically I'd gained 20 pounds in the US. It sounds so much more when it's in pounds than in kilos. Moving to a new host family really gave me a fresh look at things and an opportunity to start afresh. I love america's teen magazine, Seventeen and recently they came out with a new exclusively health and fitness issue. I knew I needed to change up my exercise routine as I was just doing strength exercises and I just wasn't seeing many results. So as I have lots of free time this summer I've taken up their 4 week 'Best Beach Body' plan. This is my third week on the plan and it is really working for me. I'm feeling fitter and I can no longer do my 'pregnant stomach'. Actually my stomach is looking lovely and flat at the moment, if I may say so. Basically a typical workout according to the plan starts with 5 mins of skipping. Then I do one of the cardio dance moves for one whole song. I alternate with my own dance moves because it is very tiring doing two side-lunges, a spin and then a squat; continuously for a whole song. You're supposed to do 6 songs in total but doing three is plenty enough for me. I would like to at least work up to four but if I'm sweaty and red in the face after three I think I'm good. Next is usually a strength workout for a different area of the body. There are different ones for butt, legs, arms and abs. Then as a cool down I do some of the yoga moves in the magazine, which are hard! I've definitely become more flexible now though.  I do this in the morning, usually after breakfast as the workout is so much harder on an empty stomach and then in the evening I got for a 'speed-walk' round the block a couple times. I've been trying to do a jog around the park nearby too but I keep getting shin splints which makes it difficult.

Of course, food is a big part of my new body overhaul so I'll let you know what I'm up to in that regard in an upcoming post.

4th of July Weekend

Saturday:

Myself, my host sister, host mother and her boyfriend went to a wedding of a family friends'. I realised it was my first actual wedding(I once went to a vow renewal ceremony) that I've attended. My host mom was quite suprised when they get invited to at least two a year. It was a very traditional ceremony held in a catholic church with a very bold colour pallet of hot pink with the secondary colour being bright lime green. Not what I would choose but I was told it represented the bride perfectly- a very loud and out there woman, full of life. I was absolutely ravenous at the reception waiting for the food to arrive and dove right into the bread basket. Even though I'm not a dessert fan I was fond of the chocolate cake(not the icing or fillings though) and so my host sister, Tiffany and I went round and nabbed a couple more plates of cake from those who had vacated to the dance floor. Stuffed to the brim, Tiffany and I later went and danced off some of our calories and as per grad nite I really went crazy by the end of the night, most obvious when they put on the slow songs....I kid you not. 

Sunday: 

I didn't eat a single meal at home. We had breakfast at this award-winning American diner/cafe. The breakfast menu items such as 'biscuits and gravy' as well as 'pork ribs and eggs' scared me into ordering a lunch item- a chicken/pesto/sun-dried tomato wrap. We went to the beach later on in the day which was so so foggy!

Monday: 

My older host brother, Edi likes to make weird faces

My hostmom, Diana and her boyfriend, Jesse

It really was a team effort to get all the food ready for 4th of July as there were eight of us all up that went. My host mom's boyfriend loaded up the esky, my host mom sliced up the salad items and everyone loaded stuff into the cards including tables and more than eight chairs(I think we had 11....). We went up to a little beach shopping strip where people hiring bikes that were all decked out in 4th of July gear. USA flags were everywhere. It was very different to Australia day. People are so proud of their country here. Even though we ended up being way too far away from the actual fireworks that night and the water at the beach was so cold is made my feet numb I think everyone could agree it was a brilliant day spent with close family and friends.

Those are some brave men, the water was so cold my feet were numb!

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Beach Bum

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I'm quite fond of the beach now, I must admit. I don't see myself becoming a beach junkie any time soon but I definitely see myself frequenting it more often and just lazing around there. To kick off my summer holidays I spent a couple days down there with two of my foreign exchange student besties- Hannah from Austria(whom I live with) and Ngan from Vietnam as I really needed to spend some quality time with both of them before they'd leave for their home countries. We went to Pismo Beach- a popular tourist attraction as they have lots of little stores selling cute beachy souveneirs such as shells and me and Ngan both bought these $4 canvas drawstring backpacks as I told her we needed to go jogging. I wanted to burn off the pizza her hostmom had fed us and running in the sand means more resistance which means more calories burnt. Of course, we got tired of that  very quickly. Our real mission however on that particular day was to send a message in a bottle. You see I have this little book called '101 to do before you're old and boring'. Whilst I have done many of the tasks I thought it would be a brilliant list to complete in America. I've run up an escalator the opposite way before but not in America. I've sang in front of an audience before but not in America. I've made a paper crane before but not in America. You get my point. So Ngan and I(on this particular day, Hannah was wandering around Hollywood- lucky thing!) ate frozen yogurt(my healthy weakness) at Pismo Yogurt which on my fro-yo scale is very, very close to Pinkberry. Whilst we munched(munched doesn't seem the right word for such a soft food....) on our healthy goodness we wrote our letters, slipped them in zip-lock bags and put them in plastic water bottles along with a shell. For someone whose second language is English, Ngan wrote hers really nicely- better than mine. I kept mine short and sweet but I'm sure if someone finds it they'd be quite pleased all the same:

Dear Stranger,

Congratz bro'! You found a message in a bottle! Please send an email stating who you are and where you found this to: shivi_the_sheep@live.com.au

I'm Shivi, I'm from Australia and I'm 17 years old but I'm sending this from Pismo Beach, California! I'm an exchange student doing high school over here and loving it! The American high schools are epic- the cafeterias, yellow school buses and all-over school spirit are so awesome! I take drama, marketing and US history plus I used to do track and field- although I always came last! I just finished school for the year now and even though I'm a junior they let me participate in the senior graduation and wear a cap/gown! 

 Just so you know, Australians don't ride to school on kangaroos and we don't all surf- me included! I guess I should take some lessons here at Pismo!

I'd love a reply, Shivi xx

Wow. It seemed so much longer when I had it written out. Anyways, Ngan and I went out to the very end of the pier to, well, 'dump' our bottles. We didn't want to get in trouble for littering so we tried to do it very conspicuously although on my first try the wind blew my bottle backwards and hit some woman. It didn't dawn on us til then that the bottles could very easily just drift straight to shore. Sure enough as we walked back down the pier they floated along with us. Eventually we lost sight of them but for all I know I could get an email from someone in Pismo. Fingers crossed it gets to Vietnam or Australia. I think then we just lazed around on the warm sand, went on the swings, watched the kite surfers do their thing and attempted to throw my boomerang although I didn't really know the proper technique. It sort of came back to us but I think that was just because of the strong wind. 

I also spent a couple days down at the beach with Hannah too where we saw three guys in a line rubbing sunscreen into each other's backs-somewhat disturbing. I also attempted to throw my boomerang again as by then I had watched a tutorial on youtube but I embarrassed myself even more as it went straight down into the ground, meters from where I threw it. Ngan had a go herself and although I warned her about throwing it when there were beach-goers nearby she took her luck and almost clipped two groups of people. We also asked a couple to take a picture of the three of us and when they started talking I fell in love- they were British! Accents enthrall me nowadays, especially now that I realise how similar Britain is to Australia(the same cannot be said for the US and Britain though). Oh and we 'munched' on more fro-yo and some green beans and hummus we'd brought from home. Last but not least; it was a perfect windy day for kite-flying!

Ngan tried Vegemite on crackers for the first time

All in all it was quite wonderful and I am pleased to say I didn't get burnt(minus a small ring of red around my thighs where I obviously didn't put as much sunscreen) which was quiet an achievement considering I am so 'white'. I'm actually the palest exchange student in our group which is quite hilarious since I come from such a hot country and all the other students are from cold European nations. The Italian student, Tommy, told me that I was the whitest person he'd ever seen. I shall take that as a compliment. 

Graduation 2.0

It is now officially summer holidays in America which seems really weird as back in Australia it's winter and they're all still stuck in school. The last day of school went really well as I got to attend graduation with all the seniors along with the other two foreign exchange girls at the school. It felt much more like I was graduating(compared to my graduation in Australia) due to the whole cap and gown ensemble plus I got to wear a pin from doing choir for the semester and us three foriegn dudettes got to wear silver 'honors' cords for getting a good GPA which we were all very proud of. Before all the seniors gathered and got lined up in the gym we had time to spare to say farewell to our teachers.

 

Me, our drama teacher and Ngan

Our attempts at gang signs...

 I took a drama class this year with the vietnamese foreign exchange student, Ngan so we went into the class and said our final goodbyes to our teacher, Ms Calvert and our class. It was so nice to get such a warm welcome from everyone- we could tell the class had really enjoyed having us that year and that really made my day more than anything. All the seniors then lined up in pairs, with all the girls being given roses to carry with them. All the foreign exchange students got to line up near the front of the queue(<--- apparently some americans don't know what this word means....), there was only four of us though; Ngan paired up with the guy from Finland and I went with my exchange sister, Hannah(who's from Austria). As we walked over to the outdoor stadium, I was paranoid my cap was going to fall off- even though I'd anchored it down with various bobby pins. Just my luck it blew off as everyone was walking in the big long line. After I'd put it back on some guy further back was yelling "Someone lost their tassle! Someone's not gonna graduate!". I soon realised it was my tassle and ran back to grab it, holding onto my cap to make sure it didn't fly off a second time. It was somewhat embarrassing as everyone was laughing as I was running back to try and find my place again in the line.

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The ceremony was amazing, people in the stands made signs to congratulate their kid and there were noise makers, confetti, streamers and even a condom someone had blown up. The seniors also snuck in beach balls and were hitting them around. Although whenever the wind carried one out of the seating area for the seniors the security guards would take them away but then 5 minutes later you'd see another one being hit around. My host mom said that when her daughter graduated there were all these blow up penises being bounced around and that the staff were madly trying to gather them all up- I would have killed to see that!

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Then at the end of the ceremony all the seniors swapped their tassle from the right to the left side of their cap and threw them in their air. It really is like the movies. Although my cap didn't go very high when I threw it so I tried a second time to no avail but gosh darn it was amazing all the same! After the ceremony, we walked out onto the baseball field where everyone was greeted by their families and heaps of balloons. Lots of photos were taken. We took lots of mid-air photos but it seemed my feet were always on the ground in all of them!

I must admit, my second high school graduation definitely topped my first- it was a lot more entertaining.

Now I just have to tackle summer....you'll see what I mean in my forthcoming posts.

Grad Nite

One of the reasons I'm always jealous of Americans is that they have so many cool events, concerts, performances,etc that I wouldn't usually get access to in Australia. So finally I got a chance to participate in something exclusive to American seniors, Grad Nite.  It is literally 'the night of all nights' and I say that because I honestly believe it beat out prom. Actually I can't really judge because I missed my American prom as I had booked to go on a cruise to mexico with my foreign exchange group but attending grad nite definitely made me feel like I hadn't missed out on anything. If you're a little confused about Grad Nite, let me explain. Basically Disneyland gets opened up after hours from midnight til 6am to graduating seniors from California and even from interstate! They do it over the course of several weeks because of the amount of schools attending but this didn't mean that a couple schools had the park to themselves for the night(or should I say morning?). There were approxiamately 30 000 teens jam-packed in there!

Our school was lucky enough to have the Blast Off! pre-party included on our night which meant from 9pm til 12pm the seniors could 'take over' California Adventure(Disneyland's adjoining themepark) and get a free meal. It was just amazing seeing so many different American teenagers, especially since the school I come from has a large majority of Latino students so seeing lots of white/black teens and listening to their stereotypical american accents was pretty darn cool! And I swear, none of these kids had been hit with the ugly stick- the girls were all so beautiful and the guys were all so tall, broad-shouldered, buff and totally swoon-worthy!

You could tell everyone was just brimming with excitement and they started playing songs on the loudspeakers like 'Teenage Dream'(very fitting song I would think) and my group of friends just linked arms, started singing and skipping along. There are not many moments in life where that is appropriate! We only managed to go on one ride, the Tower Of Terror which is a free-fall ride but the queue was definitely worth it, especially when some black guy asked our group where we were from and I got to brag and say 'Australia!' which of course had to be followed up with a "Crikey, mate!". As you do.

At midnight everyone flooded out of California Adventure and over to Disneyland. They aren't kidding when they say that it's the happiest place on earth. The music was pumping loud, there were lights everywhere and this feel good vibe surrounding everyone. They had lots of dance clubs basically dotted around the park so we went to the closest one but it seemed it was just for the 'show-off' dancers. Not that that's a bad thing but basically people just form circles around the kids who can dance like a match has been lit underneath them. Everyone else just kind of stood around. Luckily we found a 'dance music' club that you actually had to queue to get in to and everyone was dancing not just the cool 'shuffle' kids. Every day I'm shuffle-in'.


We basically spent the 'morning' club-hopping. The hip hop club was definitely interesting. For some reason it seems only Americans have embraced the style of dancing known as 'grinding'. Really appealing name. Which as it suggests involves a girl and a guy rubbing up against each other and somehow it's called dancing. A foreign exchange friend of mine, Sophia likes to call it "Sex on the dancefloor". An experience in itself was when towards the end of the event some random attempted to grab my waist and well you know...he soon realised I was not digging it though. The best dance location was right in front of the pink castle and luckily when we first got there it was just before 1am when the fireworks were due to start and that really was spectacular as we got a front-row view and there were professional dancers living it up on stage, some wearing light-up costumes. And the whole time all the seniors were dancing and I learnt a bunch of snazzy dance moves that night. I really just let loose after a while and whilst we were walking around the park I would just bust out a move but I was definitely not the only one. Like a real-life musical where people just burst out into song and dance.

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Oh and I can't forget the fashion of the night. Some girls were wearing sky-high stilettos. No idea how they survived the night. Then there were these three guys who took the Pauly D look to a whole new level they had their hair gelled glued straight up in the air, it was about 50cm(20 inches) high! The more sane seniors of the event wore the graduation caps you could buy there that had mickey mouse ears sticking out of them and most bought light-up items so that we were all walking disco balls.


Grad Nite completely made up for skipping prom. No expensive dresses or uncomfortable heels, heaps more seniors from all around the state and beyond, the option to go on rides(although we waited an hour and a half to go on space mountain), more than one DJ and the location being Disneyland- it owns prom any night!

Ginseng Oolong

More than a year after I bought this tea set and ACTUAL Chinese tea from Beijing(when I went there on a tour with my school) I have finally used it for the first time. I bought the tea and teapot as a gift for my mother and once the Ginseng Oolong tealeaves started to brew, all the memories started to come back; the hustle and bustle of China, the smog filled skies, the seahorses on a stick, the cheap gimmicky Chinese souvenirs, the Chinese french fries and just the general atmosphere. In particular it brought back the memory of the Chinese tea ceremony I went to with other students from my school. The ceremony was just so relaxing and beautiful and was held in this small room with ornate chinese drawings covering the walls,glass table and chairs. We tasted all these delicious teas and they told us all these interesting facts about tea in China such as the fact that you're meant to drink tea out of the miniature cups in three sips - which is very hard when it is boiling hot! Plus at the end we had the opportunity to buy things from the tea store next door which sold all these handmade clay teapots. I specifically remember one which looked similar to a pumpkin and another that had three life-like clay frogs attached to the outside.

It's school holiday time at the moment and I've been inspired by the lifestyle section in our local weekend newspaper to get fit and healthy before Christmas as they're having a 6 week week get fit/healthy guide. I try to eat healthily but I just find myself pigging out when I haven't organised meals and I definitely don't do any exerecise so there is most certainly room for improvement. I think what's really going to help is filling in this health contract that you have to re-write each week where it states what your goals are and you have to sign it at the bottom. I'm also going to be writing a health diary where you record how you're doing each day and how you can improve. I'll let you know how it goes once I get into the swing of things :)