El Aniversario de Colegio Coya

In the United States we have homecoming, but in Chile the closest thing we have to homecoming is the schools anniversary. To celebrate, the school is divided into two different teams that compete in many different competitions for three school days and in the end the team with the most points wins. This year, my school had the Red Alliance and the White Alliance and my classroom was part of the Red Alliance. Similar to homecoming, both teams spend many long nights preparing for all the competitions and practicing the dances. Many people asked me to participate in the dances but I was very confused about what was going on and instead agreed to take part in the sport competitions. I planned on playing soccer, running, and playing volleyball. Little did I know, volleyball was full, there weren't enough girls for girls soccer, and the schools track is being redone at the moment so the track competition had been removed. At first I was a tad disappointed, but I knew I would have a good time watching and cheering on my friends. I was soooo right! The talents of my schoolmates are apparently never ending. I got to spend three school days being entertained by all sorts of happy dancing, singing, and music-playing Chilean kids and it was awesome. Friday night, everyone returned to the school to find out who won. My team got in a circle and we all huddled up and waited anxiously to hear the final outcome. The other team ended up winning and a lot of people in the Red Alliance were very sad and some of the girls even started crying. I hugged them and tried to cheer them up but they had worked so hard for this competition and felt as if it had all been for nothing. One thing I strongly dislike about speaking in my second language is that I cannot express myself in the ways I would like to. For me, it's easy to help out and say the right thing and cheer people up in English, but in Spanish I am lucky to say "I hope you feel better" correctly. Nevertheless, I wasn't upset that we lost. I had a good time cheering on my friends and even though we lost I think they were amazing. I was also happy for my other friends in the White Alliance who had won. They were so cheerful and smiley! Afterwards each alliance had their own party but my parents wanted me to come home so I did. I was exhausted from screaming for my alliance. Hahahah, that's the other thing! For the anniversary of the school, there are a series of different chants that everyone (except me) knows and hollers out on an hourly basis during the celebrations. The problem is, they are too fast for me so I just sort of make noises that are similar to the words and clap my hands and everyone laughs at me. Some of them are really weird and make no sense but they are super fun anyways. :)

This morning, I woke up and felt very refreshed to have a nice sleep after all the crazy activities. I went for a run and then returned to the house and ate a late breakfast. Around lunchtime, my parents drove me to Colegio Coya because the school was having a celebration of the 18th all day long. I hung out with Dani for the majority of the day and we just talked and walked around. It wasn't a very eventful day but it was a nice one! I like how the fact that my Spanish is improving is making my friendships stronger. While having a bunch of really nice people around me is fantastic, sometimes it's hard to be surrounded by people who want to know about who you are when you don't have all the words to tell them. This is hard but I think it's also good in many ways. One of which is that it gives me the opportunity to show people who I am instead of tell them, and I think that is a lot more real anyways. 

Okay that is all for now. Chile is amazing and the world is amazing and you are all super duper amazing as well. Goodnight!