An update finally!!

So to update all y'all!! I know it has been awhile, but here goes... Belgium continued to be great and my host family there was INCREDIBLE!! It seems that every host family I stay with is so different and yet they all are wonderful!! To highlight Belgium a bit, we performed two shows on our show day there and I think the first show was my worst by far. I remeber being told in the beginning of our trip that we will all have a bad show at one point or another, but I never believed it and for the most part was pretty consistent. Then came Belgium... during the first show I did so many things wrong and I seriously felt like my body was detached from my brain at moments. So to fill you all in, the show started and everything was going great until before the rythm portion of our show. I had been moved to mic groups for the song before rythm and then during rehersal my enterance for the bucket portion was switched to the other side, so I got off stage after mic groups and was saying something to a cast mate when all of a sudden I heard the intro music to rythm and got this look of "oh crap" on my face and sprinted to the other side of the stage so that I could grab my bucket and go but by the time I got to the other side I was way late so I instead got to watch everyone else do buckets instead. I know this doesn't sound that bad, but believe me, it gets better. So I was really mad at myself for not paying attention and not having my head in the game as well as it could have been but it was not a big deal cuz it happens to everyone at some point in time or another and so i tried to brush it off and just continue with the rest of the show. Then we get to the Culture Jam portion of our show and I am in mic groups for the American swing dancing song. So I am up on the mic platforms jamming out because you are suppose to just have a good time with the song and so I was really getting into it, then we came to the part where we all throw our hands up in the air repetidly from one side to the other. So as I go to do this I forget that the mic is in front of me and completely knock the mic over and see it fall in slow motion and hit Yui (one of the main dancers) in the head and then hit Chris (her dance partner) and then proceed to fall on to the floor with a loud thud and a high screech....ooops :( So at this point I would have loved a picture of my face because I am sure it was probably one of complete horror and then turned quickly into an "oh my gosh, what do i do now!" face!! Then I recomposed myself and kept jamming out on the mic platform, trying to pretend that nothing had happened when in fact I thought that after the show I would be killed by Gaby (the head of the tech team) because in staging they gave us all a big lecture on how to properly carry a mic, and how you treat a mic which definitely didn't include throwing it on the floor... But thankfully they didn't kill me cuz otherwise I wouldn't be able to tell this story to all of you today. I did however feel so bad after the little incident that it was hard to get back into the rest of the show, but what made it even more wierd was that the tech team never said anything to me... Seriously not a word, like nothing ever happened... I expected to never live it down or to get a rediculous nickname out of the entire situation, but seriously, nothing. the next show however did go 85 times better than that show did, I guess we are all just allowed a bad show at some point and I had mine. So that was Belgium and I think my host family would agree with the fact that it was probably my most clumsy city. I seriously dropped something on an hourly basis there.

After Belgium, we boarded the plane and headed to Atlanta, Georgia! We actually stayed in a suburb of Atlanta called Gwenitt County. My host family here was also very great! To highlight what happened in Atlanta, for community service, we did our first Stand for Peace in Creekland Elementary School for a bunch of 6th graders and it was FABULOUS!! I had such a blast with the kids there and I can't wait to continue doing SFP in other schools in the states. After SFP, we performed a mini show for all of the 6th graders and it was so great! Officially one of my favorite noises in the world is a gym full of kids performing Stomp on the bleachers with us!! I think it just goes to show how easy it is to have a positive impact on young kids if you just take the time to spend with them. Also in Gwenitt County we spent some time at the Boys and Girls clubs in the area. My favorite time there was playing touch football with a bunch of 10 year old boys that didn't think I would want to play or could play!! I am glad my coordination was working on that day because I really needed it! I had such a blast with those kids! And one final highlight of Georgia was going with my host family to Stone mountain and seeing the lazer show there. One of the very first songs they played at the lazer show was the song by Bon Jovi and the girl from Sugarland and I think it is called something like "Who says you can't go home" but in the song it talks about going all around the world and that no matter where you go or how far you travel, home will always be there when you want to go back. The song made me really think about how by the time the program is over and I fly back to Minnesota, I will have traveled all the way around the world and how i will go back to my home looking at it through different eyes knowing what I know now, but I also think I have gained more of an appreciation for it and the people there! So it was such a great feeling to know that I have loved all the places I have been, will continue to love all the places I have yet to go, but still have a love for where I have came from!! So that is great I think!! That caps up Georgia and from there we headed to Winston-Salem, North Carolina!

I have been here for just 2 days now and haven't gotten the chance to do or see much, but we had a discussion today about tobacco companies and the positive and negative affects on people and communities that tobacco has had and continues to have. We discussed this because Winston-Salem was built on tobacco companies and so it is a topic that is interesting for this region! But that is all for now, my hands are exhausted!! Lots of love to all and goodnight!