Part 1 of Castles

Orava Castle/ Oravsky Hrad

Each Chair had an important symbol carved into them

Castles have the best views of their surroundings

Orava

My family and I didn't do the whole tour but we saw most of it
which ended up being over 660 stairs

A very young child's shoes.

There was a room full of different animals, I forgot the exact
name of this one but it had two heads!

I've seen crosses like this and small buildings all around Slovakia,
I've even seen a man praying at one before.

A well of luck&wishes or bad luck&nightmares if you drop anything
but money in it.

Who knew a crack in the wall could lead to beautiful things?

This area was roped off but a man was inn there so I went in.

Mountains every where you look.

When I'm older and rich I'll build my own castle
(probably not)

Something Like SlovEnglish

Today marks my third week across the pond and over some land, located in Slovakia. My Slovak has gotten better; I for sure can count to at least a million but, I don't exactly know when that will become useful. I've realized that instead of trying to make others repeat what they said but in English it's better to have them repeat their sentence but just slower. This helps me catch a few words I've learned and have a new sentence I can use in the future. Communicating with my host family is still a struggle but that's to be expected. All of us are trying our best and that's all anyone can ask for.

 I'm not getting any weather shock because it is VERY similar to Oregon which I love. Except in the winter there will be a lot more snow which I can't wait for. I've been on at least 5 hikes since I've been here and there's been something incredible about all of them. There are so many more I can't wait to see! 

No matter where you live in the world school is school and eventually everyone would rather be at home sleeping. I love my classmates and schoolmates, most people are very kind and want to talk to me. There are still people that I haven't talked to because they aren't comfortable with English but I have been starting to communicate more in Slovak so hopefully they'll feel more comfortable. One day at school I was in a very negative mood, I was tired of not being able to communicate with anybody. I didn't want people to feel like they had to translate every time I was around. I felt very much on the outside and I felt very lonely. It wasn't that I wanted to go home but, I just wanted a friend from back home or even another exchange student who knew what I was going through to be there. After sitting in this sucky mood for a couple of classes I talked myself into really stepping out of my comfort zone and just talking to people in the very little Slovak I had known. My day I had gotten better and the days after it too.

Everyone has there own perspectives of the worlds they don't live in and I think it's world travelers that give others the opportunity to learn correctly about the outside world. I've come across many curious minds about the U.S. One of my teachers is very blunt but she is also not very good at speaking English so what she says can come out harsher than she means (or maybe she means to be rude.) She is really interested in my ethnicity and ALL of the U.S.'s problems. She asked me where my parents had come from in Africa and after many questions realized that neither my parents or grandparents are from Africa and it's my ancestors that are from there. Once that was finished she wanted to know my ancestors EXACT location but, I had no idea (I've always been curious though), she then insisted I ask my mom where exactly and the next time I had her class to tell her. I forgot and she was kind of upset. I feel that most African-Americans have no clue where there ancestors are from but I could be wrong. I've never been asked about my feelings involving demonstrators from an outsider so when the SAME teacher asked how; and I quote "felt about the black boy last summer being shot by the police" I had no idea how to respond (I was very surprised.) Of course I don't agree with the situation but I don't know all of the details because the media can be very misleading. In the end I just laughed it off (uncomfortably) and said I didn't want to talk about it because I didn't feel like it was my place.

Last weekend I got to meet over 80 incredible people from around the world, excluding Europe, that all decided to leave their normal comfortable lives at home and live in two completely different countries then what they're use to. I've found some life long friends/travel buddies. They are people who get me in ways friends from back home truly can't and might not ever be able to. Last night I went to a birthday party and a student that went to California last year for exchange was there and I just got to talk about everything I was feeling and it felt GREAT. I figured out that a very important ingredient for an amazing exchange is support. All most people need in life is reassurance that what they're doing may be crazy (example exchange for a year) but there's someone who has your back.

So thanks for reading, sorry it was so late, and as always thank you for the support,

Emani

Introducing My New, Crazy, & Adventurous Life

          Ahoj volam sa Emani! Now if you did not understand what I had said then you obviously don’t know Slovak. That’s okay though because I’ll translate for you- Hello my name is Emani! Now you have some Slovak stored for the future. A little about me, I’m 16 years old and I am from Salem, Oregon which is on the west coast of the United States, and I am currently living in Zilina, Slovakia but to be more specific my village is called Dolna Tizina. You’re probably pronouncing it wrong because 1. You do not speak Slovak and 2. I don’t know how to add all the special markings with my computer. Anyways you’re probably wondering how I found myself in a little European country that many people still think is Czechoslovakia (it is not the country split in the 90’s.) The exchange program I am going through is Rotary Youth Exchange, in short RYE. I am sponsored by District 5100, which is northern Oregon and a small part of south of Washington, and am hosted by District 2240 which is Czech Republic and Slovakia. This program has many more branches besides youth exchange which happens to be a huge plus for anyone involved with it. I will be living in Slovakia until the end of June or the first two weeks of July 2016. I arrived here August 29^th 2015 so as you can tell I’ll be here a little over 10 months. Throughout my blog I’m not going to sugar coat anything, I’ll give you ALL of my highs and lows. I’ll also attach fun/interesting pictures from my time spent here. Dovidenia!  Goodbye! 

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