AMSTERDAM!!! (continued)

The next day, we wake up when it's dark.
Breakfast is the best thing ever! There's no "recycled food" like in Village Camps. Everything is fresh and well cooked. I make myself a cheese sandwich and drink some juice. Since we were quite late, we finish quickly, take the things we need for the festival and hurry to the bus.
The school we were performing at is called ASH. I thought it was something like the "Amsterdam International school" or "Amsterdam School of whatever...", but I was wrong. The school ended up being "The American School of Haag". Yes, the AMERICAN school of haag.
As I enter the building, I realise that it's not that hard to tell that the school is American. My eyes hurt from all the colours around me. There are so many posters and drawing and flags and more posters.....
We find out when and where we're preforming and go to the "hang-out" place. It's a big room with many chairs and desks. We leave our stuff there and start to practise the songs.
Yasmin and I walk around, exploring the school. It's so colourful. The posters shout "Be yourself!" "Speak up!" "Show us your personality!". There is even a poster that said "I love both my dads! I have a perfect family!". It shows a picture of a little girl holding two man by the hands. The background is the rainbow flag...

There's nothing wrong with homosexuality, but it's just unacceptable to put posters like this in a school! Some people don't see anything wrong with it, but I do! I don't think you should be open about these things with people! Especially, in a school! There was also a poster that said "be who you want to be" with a picture of a men dressed in women's clothes.... You don't put things like that in a school!!!
A school is supposed to be a place for learning. It's supposed to make you more mature. You don't put toys in a classroom! Maybe, preschoolers... Ok... They're small and everything... But a 4th grade class with stuffed animals.... No!!!
They want to make their students responsible, but instead they do the opposite! They just tell them facts (eg: being racist is bad), but they don't explain it to them. They make the decision, instead of letting the children choose. So how does it make their students responsible?

My performance with the choir goes quite well. Unfortunately, we only have six people with us...
After the choir comes our duet with Yasmin. I'm nervous, but also excited. We sing nicely and the judge is happy with us. I'm very proud!

Yasmin and I go to the big cafeteria and buy a snack. There are large flags on the walls.
Next to us there are long tables. There's a chess competition. Suddenly, a wild idea appears.
Yaz and I come up to the players and say, "Do you know where chess was invented?" As the kids shake their heads we say, "Chess was invented in India in 600 A.D." and point at the Indian flag.
Zoum!!!

In our school agendas there's a fact for every week. That week the fact was "Chess was invented in India in 600 A.D.

We left the HORRIBLE school in the evening, when it was dark.
Dinner was amazing. We could take anything we wanted.
Since it was Gemma's birthday we also had a delicious cake! Omnomnom!

We also got ribbons for participating. I got a blue one and a red one! Red is for div.II and blue is for div.I

We left the next morning........ Sad face....... =(

IT WAS THE BESTESTEST TRIP EVERRRR!!!!!

Special thanks to:

Franny for the photos (youtube: StyleChicFrancesca)

Yasmin for being an awesome kazooa

Rachel, Gemma and Nina for being the cool people

AMSTERDAM!!! (day1)

Even though I only spent there three days, it was the best trip ever.

Friday morning. Sleepy me, driving to the airport. My brown and beige, giraffe suitcase is full with my clothes. I brought everything I needed; my Totoro onesie, a CDL concert T-shirt, my favourite shoes and... Kopatych (yes, I brought him too). School bag on my shoulders, suitcase in hand, I enter the building to find my friends. Yasmin, talking about the food she brought and Franny, thinking that her bag might be too heavy, are there with me. We compare our passports and laugh at the photos, excited.
Yasmin and I listen to nyan cat, while waiting for the plane.

As the plane lands, we try to hold back the scream of excitement. We can't believe we're in Amsterdam.
We get our suitcases and go outside. It's quite cold. The snow under our feet is frozen and icy.
The bus is waiting for us right next to the airport. Yasmin, me, Nina, Gemma and Rachel get the back seats. From now on, we're the cool people.

We stop in the city centre to get some lunch.

 

Our beautiful Hibiki!

 

And there's Ogtay....

 Walking around the streets, admiring the beautiful architecture of Amsterdam, we start to get hungry. We stop by the pancake bakery.
Yasmin and I get some coffee. It is delicious!
They bring us huge, yellow pancakes. Yasmin ordered one with bananas and rum. Later, she couldn't stop talking about how she had coffee and alcohol like an adult.... Oh, Yasmin....

Oh, Yasmin.......

After that, all of us go to Anne Frank's house. I have a feeling that I'm not really going to enjoy it as I hear one girl say, "OMG!  Can you believe that we're gona see that house? I mean, it's not just a house! It's Anne Frank's house! It's like royal!"

The museum made me realise quite a lot about myself and the world in general. Especially after I visited the souvenir shop. There was a movie about Anne Frank, copies of her diary and.... A cartoon-version-comic-book of it! I don't know about you, but I didn't want to stay in that house or study any of the objects in it. I just didn't like the whole.... I don't know how to explain my feelings! I don't have anything against Anne's story, but she wasn't the only girl who wrote a diary. There were many other girls like her whose life was worse than hers. I'm sure Anne's diary is a good book and everything, but a cartoon version of it is.... It's just OTT!



After visiting the museum and walking around the snowy streets of Amsterdam, we go on a boat ride. It's dark. The lights fall on to the shiny snow and the cold, still water. Slowly, our boat travels across the shiny, narrow canals of the city.

We stop at the Hard Rock cafe to have dinner. Yasmin and I annoy the people at out table by being super perverted. It's really fun.
We run to the bus. The cool people take their spot at the back.

At first, the hotel seems strange to us, but as we enter we realise that it's the best place ever. It reminds me of India and China at the same time. There are carpets, blue, red and purple sofas and golden framed mirrors. There's a swimming pool, a gym and a sauna. The restaurant is next to our rooms. It seems like we're outside since there are many plants and water fountains around us.
Yasmin and Rachel are in the same room as me. There are two big beds with soft, comfy pillows, a blue armchair, a red chair with wheels and a large cupboard. (Yaz and I even got inside the cupboard and pretended to be Indians.... Love our inside jokes!) But that's not all. The most exciting thing is the big TV.

THE worst day ever

If last week was the best week of the school year, yesterday was probably the worst day of my life. It was also Pongal and Makar Sankrati in India.
I was very excited on my way to school, but then, I realised that the first period was sports. Last week sports was fun, but this week it was the opposite. We had to do what they call "gymnastics". It's basically front rolls, back rolls, cartwheels, etc. I can not do any of these so the coach was lecturing me about how imortant it is to make decisions in life. "If you have a difficulty in your life are you gonna ignore it?" My response to his lecturing was "Well, there's life and there's sports class. It's different, you see?"
The day before yesterday Yaz and I were preparing for the following day. In our minds we were practising the whole day. I even packed myself a picnic lunch. We also took hair pins, so we could open locked doors as they do in movies.
We checked the music rooms, but all of them were locked. So, we went to the auditorium and realised that both doors were locked. We tried using hair pins. It doesn't work in real life, trust me! We wanted to "break in", but instead we "broke". I mean that instead of opening the door, the pin got stuck in the key hole. We took in out, but some of the paint stayed inside.
We didn't give up and tried opening the fire escape door. To our surprise it was locked and there wasn't even a door knob you could hold on to.
So we went back to class. And guess what class it was? It was English!!! The worst subject in the world!!! Yasmin and I sat together (even though our teacher gets mad at us when we do). I guess we made her happy by wishing her a happy Pongal.
English was meant to be for studying for the vocabulary test we were going to have later that day. I knew most of the words and could easily guess the meanings of those I didn't know. So Yaz and I started preparing for our duet rehearsal. We also doodled in our agendas.
The next thing was history. Yasmin asked Mr Woodbridge if he can let us practise during history. He agreed, but Mme Roussel, my history teacher, didn't.
At lunch, we checked the music rooms once again, but all of them were occupied. We wanted to see the security guard (we call him The Dog) to ask him if he has the keys to the auditorium. He said he didn't. The one who had the keys was this mean guy who we didn't want to talk to.
So we checked the music rooms over and over again, but the people wouldn't leave. We even checked the changing room, but it was locked.
So, disappointed, I went to get hot lunch and got this pumpkin thing (whatever that was) on my dress!
Furious, we ran outside, shouting that we were depressed. Luckily for us, the music rooms were free. We came in and started singing the song we are going to do for Ammy. We did quite well, but our voices weren't the best.
Since we missed homeroom, the next thing we had was languages. I had a German test that I didn't know about!!! How could that day get any worse? The teacher corrected the test straight away. I got a B.
After German, we had English (AGAIN!). This time Ms Manchala didn't allow us to sit together (sad face...). Yasmin told me that she failed the test. I think I did quite well (at least I didn't fail).
Yasmin borrowed her mum's phone for the day. It had the school wifi code in it, so we could use it to go on youtube and listen to the song we were practising. Yasmin never brings any electronics to school so she's not quite used to carrying it around.
Last recess we wanted to go to the music room because during Period 8 we had to sing the song to our music teacher. On our way out we forgot to take our jackets, so we camу back inside for them. Yasmin doesn't have pockets, so she had her mum's phone in her hand. She didn't notice Mr Barrow (the main "phone-confiscator" of the school) standing by. He told Yasmin that she will get it confiscated. We started telling him that it wasn't her phone and that she couldn't give it to him. He accused us for arguing and sent us to what we call "Alice's Wonderland" (the discipline office).
Alice there, talking to two boys, while pictures of little kids appeared on the screen of his computer. We stood there for at least 20 mins. At last, he let us come in.
We kept telling him that Yasmin needed the phone, but he wouldn't let us speak. His face was bright pink. He was shaking.
We were trying to sound as calm and as polite as possible.
"WHY ARE YOU SHOUTING AT ME?" screamed Alice. "I'M NOT SHOUTING AT YOU!"
There was nothing we could do, but apologise. He was the one shouting, not us, but he wasn't even listening to us!
"YOU WON'T LET ME TALK!" interrupted Alice. In reality, it was the opposite. He was the one not letting us talk.
He told us to get out and keep the phone in a very rude way, accusing us for being disrespectful.
On our way to class we saw Mrs Gilbert looking for us. She was very angry and asked us where we were.
During the rehearsal we were almost crying. It wasn't my best singing since my throat was dry.
Next step was maths class. As we rushed to class, we shouted how depressed we are, scaring the people around us. And then it hit us.... We had to bring a ruler, a compass and a protractor. We had neither of these things, so we could not do anything...

Moral: do not celebrate Indian festivals!