Vera Elizabeth; 17 years old; Christian; Aussie; Germany's Biggest Fan;
Living The Life For Jesus;

Just be patient, watch this space and something cool will appear...one day...
I promise

Emily; Nikki; Hayley; Amber; Ozzie;
Photos From Germany; PostSecret;
Disaster MB; StarGirl; Y.F.U

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So, in my daily posts I will talk about school...because that's all that really ever happens in the day.

Hmm...So in music one of the girls started crying while we were singing a song. Yes, in music we must sing songs! It is very infuriating.
In Computing I wrote a test, and I am feeling really good about it, because I actually understood all the questions and answered them all...plus computing is sooo easy!
I also got a test back in Chemistry, 11.5\27, my best mark yet! Whats even better is that in one section of the test I got 6\6. Oh yeah, I was very proud!
I also was fed Wurstchen for lunch. It tasted suspiciously like hot dogs...And I hate hot dogs!
Right now I am talking to this guy in Adelaide and doing this, Dagmar just went to English evening school and Nina is studying, but...hey!

Tomorrow I can sleep in, because I start school in the second hour, but it is Oliver's birthday, and I think I might get up a little earlier so I can eat breakfast with him, hey, I gotta be respectful of one's birthday! It is a big deal in Germany.
In the afternoon I have German lesson with Pablo again, every Monday and Thursday, and then when I get home we are eating coffe and drinking tea on the new garden tables they got about an hour ago.

One thing I have noticed is that alot of people over tan here, I mean really really over tan, and it is oh-so-wrong. So ugly!
And that alot of people have really cool clothes...but maybe that is just compared to mine.

Yesterday Dagmar went thorgh my cubboards and stole EVERYTHING and washed it, then out it all back in nice and neat, so that was nice...but ultimatly weird that she had nothing better to do that that.

That is all thats happening in my life right about now, how about you?
Have fun,
Vera

OK, so I think it's about time I updated this thing.

I feel bad because I never update it, but always think of somehting to say when I am at school or somehting, and I am always trying to find something to do yet never actually update this.

Right now, I can't believe I am doing this, but I am, I am searching ebay, just for something to do. I think it has something to do with my desire to shop right now, and my desire to have new clothes.
I have this urge to go and shop for some more clothes, I don't have enough clothes over here! You wouldn't believe it , but I have found some really cool stuff on it...if only I could afford it and whatnot. And yes, I can't afford things on ebay.
But then there is some pretty ugly stuff, like this retro green shirt....ewww. So wrong.

Anyway, right now you are probably wondering why I am talking about this, and I'll let you in on a secret, I don't know either!

On the weekend...

Friday arvo I went swimming with Ines and Anne, two of my friends from school. It was really fun. The I got home, ate dinner by myself, because I was the only one there, and hung around.
Mum rung and then we talked for about an hour, then I went down because my parents got home and I ate a second dinnner. lol.
Pretty fun.
When Nina got home I was laying awake in bed, but I was really tired. Apparently we were talking and I was talking in German. The weird thing is I don't even remember speaking to her at all, let alone in German. All I remember was saying gute nacht. Weird...
(Yes, I know Friday isn't REALLY the weekend, but it may as well be!)

On Saturday, well, I hung around at home. I was on the internet for alot of the day. Nina went to a wedding, her boyfriend's uncles. It sounded like it was fun. I was invited, but by the time it came to it I was too late saying I wanted to go. Plus I don't have any friggin' clothes! So I spent the rest of the day hanging around.
I think it was on Saturday, but it could have been Sunday, that I got some photocopies of some things that I am colouring in, they are totally rad! I love them so much! (That was a great description, these things...)

Anyway, on Sunday I got up, logged on again, ate breakfast, logged on again....that was what I did all day. I also did something totally random and out of the ordinary...which was take Trixie for a walk!
I alos talked to Nikki and Emily...Maybe that was Saturday actually. I don't remember.
So, then at about 4:20 we left for Magdeburg to go and see Hundertwasser house. It's this really cool designed house. It is still being built, but it is a major tourist attraction. I'm just searching google now for a good website.

OK, some web pages if you wanna see...

http://www.magdeburg-jk.de/hundertwasser.html

I also took some pictures, so when I put them on my space I will tell you.

The site is really good, go down and there is heaps of pictures at the bottom, but look throught he whole thing.
Its such a cool house, but I think it was ruined by painting it pink.
There is a story to that. Hundertwasser designed it to be pink because the bank next to it is blue, and he siad he didn't like that colour, so the oink is the opposite. (That was Dagmar and her bad English speaking, so it might be wrong! Dont hold me to it)
Anyway, the house is really cool, but it is really expensive to live in. It costs 8-9 € for a square metre, thats about...$17 I think. Well, last time I checked the currency exchange thing, which was two months ago, but I don't think it has changed.

Today at school was boring. I went to the German lesson with Pablo after school. It was OK today, we spoke about Germany. Did I tell you about this? We do German lessons together, but the teacher we have refuses to speak to us in, well, for Pablo Spanish, as she is the spanish teacher, and I odn't think she can speak English. Which maes it harder, because she can explain things to Pablo, which she has done, but she can't to me. Which just defeats the purpose of a lesson like that.
Anyway, I got home today and now...here I am. No homework today, just alot of colouring in to be odne!

I think I might try and update this alot more...these posts are always really long and it is better to have lots of small ones that one big one, because no one actually reads the long ones. I bet you aren't even reading this, just going to see if you are the first one to comment! Anyway,

Have some exciting news! It is Oliver's birthday on Wednesday, should I buy him a present? And what do you buy someone who has everyhitng when you have virtually no money?

Well, better be off now, I can hear my colouring calling me...

Vera

Hey all again.

I just wanted to say this, and I'll say it loud. The person I'm talking to, you know exactly who you are.

The person with the website that tells their story. I don't know if you are reading this or anything, you have said that you are, but I don't know anymore.
Anyway, I'm not going to say your name to everyone, but you know who you are, and possibly some other people know who you are as well, but I don't know.

I want you to know how proud I am of you for telling us your story. You have no idea how proud I am of you right now, I'm smiling alot. I think you are incredibly brave and, well, you probably know how much I care about you anyway.
I think you are amazing. You make me laugh so often, everytime I talk to you, so your mission is complete.
You told the whole world your story, without leaving out anything because it was too painful to remember or recall. Good work.

Keep your head high, no one can ridicule you for doing what you did.

I am very, very, very proud of you.

All my love,

Vera
P.S My next post is about Germany. Go read it!

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On the weekend I went to a YFU meeting in großkorbetha, its a really small town, which is funny, since groß means big!

It was great fun.
We had the option of going on Saturday, the students and host siblings and staying the night, or coming with your parents on Sunday. I chose to go on Saturday though.
I met Pablo, the other guy from YFU here at the train station at 12:10 and the train left at 12:19. We waited around for a little bit, then got on the train and pissed off to großkorbetha.
Pablo kommt aus Chile, he comes from Chile and he can speak English, so we talked on the train heaps. His German is even worse than mine. The train we were on went to Halle, and then we had to get off that one and get on another one.
Amidst the squealing, squeaking, groaning of the train and Pablo and my jokes of "oh, someones dying in the next carriage" and "before you know it this part of the train will break off and we'll be going the other way", well, nothing happened. The only thing we could do to enteratin ourselves was make jokes about the train.
When we got off the train we were the only people on the platform, then these two guys walked up the stairs and walked towards us. The were people from YFU who came to take us to the place we were staying.
There is 28 people form Sachsen-Anhalt now. When we got to the place, I think, well, I don't know what it was, we got out of the car, got shown by this midget from Romania where we could put our stuff and got our name tags. We were originally going to sleep in tents, but then looking at ht e weather we decided it was too damn cold to sleep outside, and we all slept in a room together.
There was already 4 students there, a girl from Romania, two from China and one from Finnland. We sat down at the table and ate some cake, then we got talking. Well, I talked as much as I could.

It got really cold in the shade, so we moved out into the sun. It was still cold. We sat around some more, more people showed up and we got to know them all. Then we started playing games. We played some name games and German memory games, then it started raining. We moved under the shelter, then more people came.
I usually hate those games, but, well, yes, they were very boring.
We sat around for quite a while talking, and then we realised there was a soccer ball. And so began the tradition. YFU peopl from Passau played dodgeball, we play soccer.
It started as Robert, me, Emmi and Robert's host sister Jana just kicking around, then more and more people joined in until it became the cool thing to do.
I think we must have done that for about two hours, then we had dinner. By then I think there was about 10 students and two host sisters. Dinner was good, I ate these really good hot bread rolls, which I am totally addicted to now.
After dinner we hung around for a while, then the Romanian showed us around her town Großkorbetha. It's pretty small, we ended up going to the soccer field. We hang around at the soccer field for quite a while, maybe for about half an hour. Jana, Robert, Emmi and I were talking, they're all really cool people.
When we finally realised it was dark we thought we should probably leave. We got to the gate and low and behold, it was closed! We ended jumping over the fence, because that was the only way we could see out.
I got over the fence second, and then alot of people started climbing over all at once. It was about my height.
I took a look around and on the other side of the building that was beside the fence was an open gate with a spinny gate barrier. I was telling all the people, but none of them heard me.
Finally everyone except for one was over the fence, and she refused to climb over it. We told her there was a gate on the other side of the building, but she wouldn't believe it. People had to go back in and get her to prove it to her.
We walked around for a little while, some people wanted to go to the shop and buy something, but when we got there it was closed. So we walked back.
I talked to Jana for a little while on the way back. Although I thought she looked a bit dodgy when I first saw her, I got talking to her and she is sooo nice! Sure, she looks a little rough, and is a bit rough, but she is totally genuine and caring. She is the host sister from Robert. She went on the YFU program to Latvia, and she is now hosting Robert, from Latvia. They seem really close.
Then I talked to Robert and Emmi on the way back. We talked about our language course, our experiences and our reasons for coming on this exchange. We all had such different reasons.
We got back to the campsite last, because we were walking slowly and droped behind, and by the time we got back there were two little fires in a trash can. We were really cold, so we reserved our spot next to the fire.
After a while we got sick of standing, and Robert said he would take off his jacket and we could sit on it. It was so sweet. We sat down for a while, and then the smart people thought to crack out the chairs. We sat on the chair and started talking again, and then Jana came and joined in.
We got hungry, so we went into the dining room and there was apples and lollies on the table for us. We grabbed a handful of lollies and an apple, then went upstairs, Jana got her easter choclate and I got the chocolate Omi Margit gave me for the trip. We sat around the campfire eating apples, lollies and chokky. It was good.
Some people wanted to go to sleep, so we all went into the room we were sleeping in, made our beds and some of us went to sleep. By then it was a little colder, but we went outside and sat around the fire again. About an hour later most people had gone, but Emmi, Jana, Robert, some YFU guy and I were still there. We talked some more near the campfire, then Isa joined us. The fire was slowly but surely going out, but I had to be the person I am and get a stick and play with it. When the fire went out we went inside to the dining room and ofund alot of people in there talking.
There was the Asian block, the Spanish block (with two people) and the English bloc. Quite interesting once again. By then we were all full of chokky and lollies. Robert told us that his friends told him by the end of the year that instead of walking down the street, he would be rolling down the street because he wil be so fat. Pretty funny.
Highlight of the evening, well, one of them:
Robert: Wie spät ist es? (What time is it)
Xiaolong (Crazy Chinese guy): Jetzt? (Now?)
Me: Nein, in zwei Stunden. (no, in two hours)

Ahh, robert and I burst out laughing. For the rest of the night and the next day everytime we asked what time it was and whatever we would say that. Hilarious, but a little immature. Whatever.
Most of the English bloc went to sleep, it was only Robert and I left, we talked ofr a while and then we went to bed. We got up there, got our stuff, got changed and stuff then tried to sleep.
The sound of people talking was drifting up the stairs, and Robert and I lay in our beds talking in whispers, mostly complaining about somehitng or another. Mainly the cold. The we realised a window was open, but we were too lazy to get up and shut it. We spent the next half hour argueing about it in whispers. By about 12:30 Robert got sick of hearing Chinese, so he got up, we downstairs and said "Alright folks, parties over. Go to bed now or shut up" Then he wlkaed up the stairs and got into bed.
After about another hour of whispering we got told to shut up, so we lay in our sleeping bags awake. I think I got about two hours sleep. Every so often we wold make the occasional sarcastic comment about how comfortable the floor was or how war it was. Well, actually he was complaining about the cold.
Halfway throught the night Jana started sleeping on my feet. For about an hour I was paralysed. Ironically, this is when I got my sleep. When I woke up, Jana was still on me, so I kicked her off. Then I turned around to the other side and Robert was lying in very close proximity to me, with his head on my makeshift pillow of my jacket.
I woke him up, or tried, then I kicked him off it.
For the next hours I watched the room get gradually lighter until the first person stirred. It was Claudia, one of the host sisters, then Jana and Robert woke up. We all sat up talking and eating Jan's chokky. MMM...

Hmm, I've written alot...

We sat around talking for a while, got brought coffee in bed and then got changed and ate breakfast. It was really good, there was those rolls and yogurt, which I have become addicted to now.

After breakfast we played some more soccer until about 12, wehn the parents came. We sat and talked about our home countries, Lorena the Colombian, Robert, Jana Emmi and I, then we went and sat down at the tables, because we were asked to.
We had to introduce ourselves and our families, and my family walked in just in time.
After that we ate lunch, talked for a while with people and then us soccer people went and played soccer. I met this really nice girl, one of the betreuers, ( a leader kind of person who takes care of you.)
More poeple came and joined our soccer circle and we had more and more fun.
We played for ages. In between my family and I got our photo taken.
At about 3:30 we left. We took Pablo with us, because he lives in the same town and his parents weren't there.
I felt sad saying goodbye to Emmi, Jana and Robert, because we had become incredibly close over those 24 hours. Especially Robert and I and Jana and I. But I will see them agian...Thank god!!! I cant wait to see everyone again!
We walked ot our car, got in and drove away. The nice betreuer and some people were following us, because they didn't know the way out.
I hope Robert and Jana got home OK, they had to catch the train.

On the Autobahn our car got up to I think about 230 km\h. How cool is that? Travelling at that speed seems normal now, travelling at 110 seems so slow now! I htink the people here are alot better at driving though.
We finally got home and I was tired, but I didn't go to bed.

Today Pablo and I went to our first Deutsch lesson, its good and all, but I don't really like the teacher much. Shes old, scary and fat. lol. But if it helps me I'm all for it.
I thikn that's all.

My wekend was so amazing, and I met some great people. I can't wait to see them again. We have a monthly meeting in Magdeburg and are having a Christmas\stay the night party at Xmas, which I am really looking forward to.

One more hting, I think I might see my friends from Passau again. At the end of the year there is a seminar in Berlin for all YFU people in the whole of Europe, so hopefully I'll see my friends there. Hopefully I get to go.

Oh yeah, and Blue Heelers Complete Season One comes out on DVD soon, on November 3rd. How cool is that?? If any of you want to get me a chrissy pressie...:)

Tschüß.
Viel Spaß

Vera

So, some of my friends have already returned to America, and some of them have already changed families.

Katie #2* has been emailing us for a while, updating us on her situation, and seems her situation isn't too good. YFU America didn't send her transcripts, so she had alot of trouble enrolling in school. Then she had some trouble with her family, and she was virtually homeless for a while, because she had to get out of her home and she had to stay at a lady from YFU's house.
She is only here for 6 months, which is harder, and considering she is doing school in another language, she will be failing for most of that time.
She has worked very hard to get her grades back home and she said she won't jeapordise them, so therefore she is going back home. I think she has had a bad experience from day one, what with one thing and another.
I can't believe it.
When she sent the email I replied, and today she sent me another one, telling me one of the guys from Passau has also already gone home because of the same thing.
I can't belive it, two members of our group are gone\going on Wednesday\Thursday and one of them was so close to going as well.
It is so weird, to think that I won't ever see these people I am so close to again.
Katie #2 was an amazing person, she still is, and so was the guy. It is so weird.

What else?

I have just found out that for two weeks in January I will be doing the practikum, or however you spell it, which is basically like work experience. We went to Magdeburg last night and we were in the car talking about what I could do. I told them I want to do something to do with communication, so they suggested the newspaper or radio station. I think that they would be interesting. What do you guys think? I am thinking of doing one of those.

Yesterday in the city of Magdeburg there was a big demonstartion by the Nazi's and the soicialists. We couldn't go to the city, because they said it is very dangerous, but we wen't later that night. On the way in I saw about 20 police cars coming back from the demonstration. We went to a party in tha park kind of thing, and I went on this really cool bobsled thingo. It was fun, but there was signs at every corner saying brake, and I didn't know what they said, so obviously I didn't brake. It was funner that way anyway. Then we walked around there for a while, then we went around and saw all the churches in Magdeburg, because on Saturday nights they have open night things.

Next weekend I am going to a YFU meeting for all the people in Sachsen-Anhalt. I'm looking forward to that. There is another YFU guy here, and we are meeting tonight, because we are taking the train together on Saturday to the meeting. (Our families come on Sunday)

What else?
I don't think that there was anymore else for me to tell you. Nothing comes to mind at least.

Vera

OK, so I was sitting at school, thinking of home and dreaming of going to sleep. And then I decided that when I got home I would make a list. A list, all of three things. And here, it begins.

3 THINGS ABOUT ...

Germany
1. They drive on the right side of the road!
2. There is so many cathedrals and stuff around its not funny.
3. There is 80 something million people here, 4 times the population of Australia, but it is about a 2oth of the size.

Australia
1. It seems to be very big compared to here
2. It gets so much warmer than here
3. I can't think of somehting.

German
1. It is an incredibly hard language.
2. Even the Germans agree.
3. So many words...so confusing...

School here
1. They start it so early and everyone takes so many subjects.
2. They treat their teachers so formally, like they stand up when they enter the room. ARGH!
3. My art teacher looks exactly like Robin Williams

Food
1. They eat dinner for lunch and lunch for dinner!
2. Everyone eats an incredible amount of wurst!
3. Everyone eats nutella as well.

My house
1. It is so big. Before I came the girl must have had a whole floor to herself!
2. It is always so clean, something I am not accustomed to.
3.The toilet is quite weird and the keyboard is different.

Random Stuff
1. The bakeries here are really good and they just keep popping up everywhere
2. The kids here don't use school books, they use these weird thingos.
3. The trains are really cool.


3 THINGS I MISS ABOUT...

School
1. Being able to understand everything
2. Being able to crack jokes with the teacher and relax a little
3. All my friends!!

Home
1. Being able to turn the music really loud and not being thought of as disrespectful or anything.
2. Being able to leave stuff on the living room floor without feeling guilty.
3. My family

Australia
1. Vegemite
2. The friendly people...who talk English!
3. Being able to drive on the left side of the road.

My friends
1. Always laughing with them
2. Having so much fun
3. So I spent about 10 minutes on this, because I couldn't single out just three things. I miss everything!

My family
1. Alec's annoying spiels about nothing in particular just to piss me off
2. Peters annoying guitar playing
3. I don't kno what else, I can't pick just three things.

So...thats all the categories I can think of right now.

What else do you want to know?

I know...

Your Brain's Pattern

Your mind is a creative hotbed of artistic talent. You're always making pictures in your mind, especially when you're bored. You are easily inspired to think colorful, interesting thoughts. And although it may be hard to express these thoughts, it won't always be.

Very revealing...
I have nothing to say, so I think I will leave you in charge and go to bed.

Vera

Hi everyone!
Hope you are all having fun!
This is going to be a short post, I am just telling you all that I have now put up my pictures form Germany on my msn space.
http://spaces.msn.com/members/queenvera/
If you go there then you will find a post informing you of the fact that my photos are up.
For all you computer illiterate people...(Mum! I know you are reading this!) there is a link to the photos up the top between "blogs" and "lists." If you click on the photos link you can see the big version of the pictures, or you can stay at my home page to see them slowly moving.
View at your pleasure...
Vera

Do you know what is weird?

My friends from primary school in year 10 are already selecting colleges.
I got an email from Tanya the other day and she mentioned which college she was going to and that got me thinking.
I can remember, in year 4, sitting in the courtyard and talking with my friends about where we would go to high school and college, and how we would go through the whole of school together.
Then year 6 came and somehow we all ended going seperate ways. well, most of us. And then we lost contact. well, again, most of us. We might see each other every once in a blue moon. most of us. some of us see each other every day or quite regularly.
Then somehow all this time went, and some of us are choosing which college we wil go to. And we won't be at the same one.
It seems like only yesterday that we were saying we would be together forever, and that didn't work out. ANYWAY.

I might tell you more about school.
It is funny, at school there is a Lindsay Lohan look alike, a Ashlee simpson with blonde hair, a random girl from yr 10 and a lauren c. weird.

Today we are going to a birthday party for some poeple. This is the second one now. The last one I went to was fun. As the night wore on, everyone got progressively drunker and the shouts of prost got louder and more frequent i couldn't help but laugh. I hope the next one is fun. (With some good cake!)

Last night there was fireworks, hence the name. I thought that after Alec paid out all my names I should come up with something more original, but I couldn't, so here I am!

Maybe I'll show you some more photos, I really have nothing to say.

These are both from Munich. The first one is a church in the city and the second is a view from the top of these 310 steps that we walked up to get there. But it was worth it, the view, I could see the alps!

There you go.

This photo is great.

It is when I got off the train at Hannover. I was crying and bawling and I didn't want to leave. As yiu can see we were, by then, sitting in second class once again. I think it is a cool photo. That is Camy, Ceciley and Hilary, hanging out of our compartments window. They were the last people I saw from Passau, ahnd I have pictures of them leaving, because it was a big thing for me, but I am sure that they are not as meaningful for you as they are for me.
Anyway, enough of this stuff. I should go. I hope I have fun at the party tonight!
Vera

As promised, here are some pictures from my time in Passau, I will put some more on next time. I have finally figured out how to put them on! Hope you like them!

Now this, this is my school. After the long arduous journey up the hill it is a beautiful sight. One day, after the school holidays started, we finished our lesson and went to go home, only to discover that they had locked the gates and we were stcuk on the inside!

<----This is the cathedral in Passau. It is real nice in there. It has the worlds biggest pipe organ, with over 17000 pipes!
This is Passau in the early morning with fog over it. I swear, who gets fog in summer??? This picture was taken from the hill. Now for some photos for my lovely friends ...
Now I really like this picture, it cracks me up every time I see it. The boys being retards. ahhh... Left to right: Camy, David, Donald and Nate. I love this picture.
This is a picture of the lovely group. I believe it should work, if it doesn't I will be pissed. It was taken on our last day after the scavenger hunt, the only person not in it is Andrea, she was taking the photos. This is a very good photo!
From left to right back row: Aeisha, Vanetee, Jessica, Ceceiley, Donald, Nate, Chelsea, Camy, Hilary, Chelsea and Petra.
Front row left to right: David, I don't know what that incredibly hot person is and Ashley.

Well. I guess, school.
School here starts at 7:15am! I am not used to that, nor will I ever be used to it. Personally one thing I love about home is that school starts nice and late!
They take sooo many subjects, like Astronomy (??), Physik, Chemistry and Biology instead of just one science, well, you get the drift. They also have to do both French and English, so the kids here can speak three languages!
The only subject I have not been to yet is sport, which was my favourite subject. Speaking of sport, how are you guys going with sportsgirl back home? What's going on with that?
They have a ten or fifteen minute break in between every subject, and two 20\25 minute breaks. It is like college, you have your lessons until a different time each day, then you can go home. The only day I go home early is on Friday, I go home at 1:05, but the rest of my class has French! The other days I go home at 2.
I like it, although it is bloody hard. I have made some friends and I even met some really hot guys today! He asked me if I know ac\dc and I told him I had. Then he offered to me to listen to them on his headphones, but the beel went off. Damn. He was the hottest person so far!
Also this arvo I went to the other school for older people and met the members of the band, because I am going to be in the band. One of them is pretty hot as well.

Anyway, I think I will go now, I am getting bored,
More next time,
Have fun

Vera
P.S. Tell me what happened at assmebly when I was not there to get my certificate...? Was it funny? Tell me everything about the social and the goss, man, I need some gossip!!!