On Saturday we had a wee little potluck since it would be the last weekend that all of the NSE students would be here. I wasn't able to make it until later in the evening because the same day I had my boat trip for my PE class and I still had to finish up some homework. There was still delicious food and desserts to be eaten, but I picked up some chocolate covered cream puffs and we ate the entire package because they are the most delicious thing on earth...maybe not the most, but they come in at least in the top ten. I am the only remaining student from the NSE group that came in January and I still have 65 days left until I return home. I will have been living away from home for over 6 months.
It was a learning experience for me, which according to my father, is kind of the entire point of being involved in an exchange program. The things I learned are that I am not good at living with people and having a roommate is difficult and I don't ever want to have to make someone put up with me ever again because I am an excessively difficult person to be around. I also discovered that people are quick to make judgements against you when you do not follow the typical life course that women are supposed to and that people in the mainland assume that because we have higher standards of living, we should all be given those standards at all times even when they are not available to us. I am just as guilty of that as everyone else.
I am also guilty of creating immense run on sentences, but I digress. The point is, people can be awful and wonderful all at the same time, you can offend and hurt people and they will forgive you. You can also allow the hatred that you have for someone to consume you and pick apart every piece of a person that offends you and turn them into a monster. I was told that I am selfish, self-centered, a horrible daughter, immature beyond repair, and undeserving of going to China. Yes, I acted selfishly in some regard, but I paid my penance for it. I continued to act selfishly because I was furious over what had happened to me and I refused to let it go because I didn't deserve the treatment I had been given. I guess in the end, I was able to let it go but I will never forget how much it hurt. I might be selfish and self-centered and sometimes completely unaware of my behaviors, but I have never treated someone as cruelly as I was treated while I was here by some people and I have never made such terrible conclusions of someone over something as stupid as what happened to me.
On the plus side, I met amazing locals that feed me all the time and let me hang out on their couches with their families, also, their kids love me.
Maybe at 29 I am immature, but I sure do have a hell of a lot of fun for a 29 year old, sometimes lady.
65 days until I come home. Only two more months left and one of those months, I will be in China. The experiences I have had here, I could write a sociological dissertation on it. Its been worth it.
My Lauren, one of the sweetest girls I have ever met. She is definitely my island little sister, I certainly love her like a sister.
A really dark and terrible photo of the pool at Delante's condo.
People standing around at night.
Lauren and I keeping warm or at least attempting to keep warm. The pool was heated and the air was cold. Sometimes you feel cold in Guam. Strange, I know.
Paolo and Delante being cold in the pool. Neither one of the have enough body fat to sustain heat. I don't know how they survive. They also jumped in the pool with all their clothes on, as you can see from the photo. We were breaking all the rules that night.
You can skip ahead about one minute because Paolo's act of spontaneity involved him removing his socks and his shoes. I started recording a little to early apparently.
They were actually entering the first stages of hypothermia at this point.
The ONE time I make a stupid face, neither one of them do. Paolo never makes normal faces in photos and then he does this. I look like a moron..but thats basically all the time so it doesn't really matter.
Just a big ol' group of weirdos.
Marie kept running away from me while I was taking her picture and when I finally got it she wanted to approve it because she knows I'm a blogger.. don't worry Marie, you look lovely, as always. And so does Leah.
Chilly and tired after midnight swimming.
Making faces.
View of Tumon from the balcony..not too exciting looking from the viewpoint of my camera, but oh well. You can hear the screams of people as they fly around the in Sling Shot, kind of funny.
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