Home Sweet Home

America. Culture shock. Wow. It was so weird getting off the airplane and hearing EVERYONE speaking English. I mean, even though I go to an American school, you're always hearing Russian or Spanish or Portuguese or German and the chances that the English you're hearing doesn't have funky accents and a whole bunch of foreign words thrown in is pretty slim. And the fact that food is cheap...
I got home and while everything is the same, its not exactly how I remembered it. I feel like I've grown a foot. The sink is a lot shorter than I remember it being, my bed is smaller and bigger at the same time, the refrigerator is short... I don't know what happened because I didn't grow more than two inches. The mountains are all small and...small. The sky is big because I don't have a huge mountain behind me and an even huger one across the valley that block off most of the sky. I think tonight I will go stargazing, since at boarding school you get locked into the dorm at 11pm at the latest and hence can't get up in the middle of the night to go stargazing.
But I'm home now, and really jet lagged (I think) and I want to go to sleep even though its mid-morning.

Packing

Packing implies leaving. Sarah is having a hard time convincing herself that that's what she really wants to do because its all snowy and sunny and prettyful, and its just so gorgeous and sparkly and finals are over and I just want to go skiing and never ever leave here and frolic in the snow with my roomie and friends and have fun and eat chocolate and fondue and read good books and listen to music and live happily ever after in the merry old land of Swizz.
Song of the week: John Denver's Leaving on a Jet Plane. If you don't know it, you're....(fill in the blank). If you don't like it, I guess I can forgive you, but only barely.

So here's what I did during study hall last night after *hopefully* acing my math exam (I can't say for sure, but I know I did well). I figured I could take some time off from studying. My hope is that hopefully everyone will recognize what picture this is, otherwise I did a very, very, very bad job. If you can't tell who/what it is, please let me know. PLEASE. Again, comments, compliments, and constructive criticisms are all welcome.

Actually, I changed my mind. This sketch might not be that recognizable. The face is too wide, one eye is much darker than the other, its unbalanced, etc, etc. My shading and bridge between light and dark is all wrong.
So heres the original. I like to compare my drawing to what I'm drawing to see how close I am, so heres the real thing:

Cravings

I'm not just craving Kataluma. There are some foods that are just plain impossible to get in Swiss Boarding schools. There are some foods that better be in the house when I get home (note-Mom-shopping list!!).

Bagels, for one. I haven't had a bagel since August. Right now, I want one with cinnamon-sugar and cream cheese, or blueberry with strawberry cream cheese. I miss the Bagelry.

Squash. I want butternut squash.

Ice cream with stuff in it. All you can get in most of Europe is plain flavors. Chocolate, vanilla, coffee, etc. Swiss ice cream is much creamier than American ice cream, and now I know why. They put lactase in it. Lactose makes ice cream grainier, so by breaking it down with lactase, you get nice, smooth lactose-free ice cream. Benefit for those of us who are (supposedly) lactose intolerant (although I really don't think I am because I've been pigging out on cheese and yogurt and dairy for the past three months with no problems). But oh, what I'd give for some moose tracks or that coffee with fudge chunks.

Chili. Living in a ski town and not having chili is also a problem. I want some good EDGE chili-the stuff I would fill up on on cold, blizzardy powder day lunches.

The Swiss are masters of chocolate, but somehow they missed out on the peanut part. They've got hazelnuts down to a tee, but something about peanut butter and chocolate didn't fly here. And of course, Swiss candy bars are much different than American ones, so that means no Reeses Peanut Butter Cups. Which is bad. VERY BAD. While Bounty is freaking amazing, it can't make up for Reeses.

There were a whole bunch of other things that I can't think of at the moment. Part of what I miss about food in the states is that its cheap. At home, the thought of paying $15 for an entree is really expensive. But here, thats pretty cheap. I miss the $0.99 menus at Wendy's and McDonalds (not like I ate there often), because it sure beats 4 Chf for a burger. OOH! and Chipotle. I haven't had a burrito full of happy goodness since I've left either. The closest I've gotten are Kebabs, which don't seem to exist in the states. Unfortunately. Because they are really good.

I'm getting sick of school. I have fourteen hours total of final exams left, plus a whole bunch of studying, and after that I can sleep. Today school made me miss a great day of skiing. Nobody would go skiing with me because they were studying. STUDYING!! When they could have been skiing. What is wrong with these people? Anyway, I should get back to reviewing math because I have a final tomorrow. crepes.

So Sketchable

This is perhaps my favorite photograph of all time. Steve McCurry's Afghan Girl. Such beauty, such power, such honest truth. Theres a look in those eyes that is completely indescribable. And photographically incredible. Theres a beautiful red-green contrast throughout the photo. How anyone can see this photo and not be moved by it is beyond me. Either they are unfeeling, or I'm seeing things that others can't. As you guys know, I've started sketching. I spend about fifteen, twenty minutes almost every day with my pencil trying to replicate an image, so I decided to be ambitious and try my hand at some famous photos, especially my favorites. This is the first in a series that will include some more pictures from me, my friends, the web, national geographic, and everywhere else. If you've got a great photo you think I should try, let me know. Again, its not a finished product. This sketch didn't take me very long, and I know the shading is way off and nowhere near complete. I just have a thing for sketching faces with great eyes. I like drawing eyes. they're fun, theres so much more emotion. They can be so powerful, they're like doors into the soul. I know that's been said before by many people, but I think it really takes drawing them to understand how true it is. Every pair of eyes is different, different in every photo, every moment. You can only capture them once, you can resketch them, rephotograph them, but you will never twice get the same eyes. They're such a challenge to get right sketching. If you've got lines a little bit off in the hair or folds in clothes, its not a big deal because it doesn't change the overall appearance. The eyes, however, hold the key to all emotion. Any stray line, any problems with shape or position--it COMPLETELY changes the drawing. Its the challenge that makes the eyes so intriguing. I think I need to work on my skill with noses too. Please let me know what you think (and preferably more than just "its good" or something generic like that).

Happy Monday

I'm sitting here, bored in English class, supposed to be revising a journal entry that I actually did well originally. So I'm not bothering to revise it, because it's fine the way it is. We're listening to some music all calm and acoustic, and its snowing again. The temperature finally dropped enough to turn the weekend's rain into snow. Happy Monday. I never thought I'd think of Mondays as being happy. They're mondays. Happy Monday is almost as oxymoronic as saying Good Morning (ok, well for certain people. I happen to like mornings on occasion). But today is a happy morning and a happy monday. To have a happy monday morning is just...weird. Already it's snowed about an inch. With any luck, it will continue to snow here to get a nice solid base on the mountain, and it will snow some more back home so that more runs will be open when I go home to ski over winter break. Hey! Speaking of winter break, this is the last monday morning I will spend in class. Next Monday morning I will be studying for my Monday afternoon exams. The semester is almost over. I don't really know how I feel about that. I mean, I'm excited to go home and see everyone, but I think the semester went by too fast. Before I know it, school will be out, and I might not get to come back here for another year of school. For that reason, I don't want this semester to ever end. I love being this age, having these opportunities. I don't want to let any of it go. New Years isn't a celebration for me, because it symbolizes the passage of time. I wish I could just press the pause button on life, freeze, and live these past three months over and over again. I don't want next semester to go by quite so fast as this one did.

Craving Kataluma

Today I was in Vevey to see The Nutcracker. It was great. When it was over we went to dinner and then I settled down at Starbucks with a nice cup of steaming hot chai with whipped cream. Their single flavors only in hot really made me miss Kataluma's twenty-five or so flavors in hot, iced, blended, and milkshake varieties, with all their toppings and deliciousness. The first thing I want to do when I get back home is to go to Kataluma and get some chai. My flight home is going to seem so long knowing whats waiting for me on the other end.
I've never been away from home this long. I think I got through the past three months by blocking out all the things aside from friends that reminded me of home. But now as I only have two weeks left until I can see the familiar landscape, the mild roll to the hills I once considered mountains. I hadn't looked at any pictures of my room until yesterday, because I was afraid of feeling like this too soon. And while I don't want to leave this place--I'll never want to leave here--theres a big chunk of me that wants to go home for a little while. I don't want to go home for a long time. The thought of having to go home in June and perhaps have to stay there all of next school year scares me like none other. Its hard to make a change when you know its for the worse, or even when you think its for the worse.

<3 Sarah

Fall Like Rain

It is December First. In Switzerland. And its raining. Yes, RAINING. What is wrong with this picture? Its december, its winter, in the mountains: its supposed to SNOW!

Powder Monkey

My ski season, days three and four. Perfect and perfecter. Zermatt rocks my ski socks off. Actually, it rocks my ski socks on, because rocking them off would mean I wouldn't be able to ski. Rocking my ski socks on would be the first step to rocking my ski boots on, at which point I'd have my skis over my shoulder and be halfway to the lift before you knew it.
Saturday was cold, foggy, and snowing. The light was flatter than flat and the snow softer than soft. I couldn't see any contours in the snow in front of me, and I was going pretty fast and hit a bump. I did an awesome double ejection over my tips did some sort of belly flop-roll into super soft squishy snowand got snow all up the back of my jacket and down my pants and in my goggles. It was sick. Best wipe out I've had in ages. So that was Saturday. Then Sunday the sun came out, and things only got better.
Theres really nothing like having a boot-top wind-blown powder run all to yourself with an awesome almost-360-degree view first thing in the morning, when the sun is shining, you're standing on top of the world looking at the backside of the Matterhorn from the Italian side, and there are snowy peaks spreading out as far as you can see in every direction. For all of you who think the view from Rendezvous is nice, you haven't been up here. And then you start skiing, first down perfect corduroy and rip like none other, and its one of those moments you want to just let go and shout "WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!" at the top of your lungs, but can't because you're skiing so hard you are out of breath. And then you come around the side of the mountain and hit that big, long, wide, somewhat steep patch of powder off the side of the trail, and burn your quads so much your legs are screaming for a break, and your heart and head are screaming for more and cursing that red fence that directs you back onto the corduroy. The best part is, the wind is blowing at just the right angle and speed that the tracks fill in, so by the time you get down to the bottom and wait for the gondola, and get back up to the top, you've got another perfect run of freshies on the same line you skied 45 minutes earlier. Yeah, the snow wasn't quite as light and fluffy as Colorado's finest champagne powder, but as far as November goes, it was great.
Its hard to go from a weekend so perfect and powder-liscious to being forced to quit at 1:15 on Sunday to get on a train and then a bus and come back to school to go to study hall and do homework. You know you've got an addiction to snow when the sine waves in your math homework start looking like ski tracks. That addictive, white, crystalline powder has so much control over my mind...

Snowball

I'd pack up all my hopes and fears
Those icy flakes of frost
And mix it with the frozen tears
And the memories I've lost.
If I thought that I'd be seeing you any time soon,
I'd pack it all between my mittened hands
And throw that snowball to the moon.

Snow angels are my thoughts transformed
When snowmen line suburban streets:
The aftermath of my winter storms
Melting in the afternoon heat.
If I thought that we'd share a blizzard any time soon,
I'd stop kicking ice chunks down the road
And punt those snowballs to the moon.

winter wonderland

The great thing about living in a small school where you know almost everyone, where the buildings are all spread out and you have to walk somewhere between all your classes, is that when its snowing, break (aka passing period) becomes one big snowball fight. Walking to the cafeteria and walking back becomes a snowball fight.
The world is bright and white and fluffy and the flakes just stopped coming down a few minutes ago. At the moment I'd guess we're at about a foot. The ski area is opening this weekend, and the skier inside me is sort of happy that I didnt end up getting to go to Copenhagen. Of course, I would have rather gotten to go back and see my friends, but its not all bad. I'll get to slaughter all my friends in a really long snowball fight, and drink hot chocolate by the fire downstairs in the lounge, and maybe go out for fondue and chocolate mousse, and most importantly, I'll get to sleep, because I definitely haven't been getting enough of that lately. I really want to curl up in bed with a good book, and then get distracted and stare out the window at the beauty of a frosted world, enjoying the fact that while other things might not be so super stellar (homework really), I'm so freaking lucky.

RC Cola and Moon Pies

I don't understand how I can be the only one in my math class who hasn't done calculus, derivatives, and integrals, and yet nobody else in my class has had RC cola in class. Yup, we're doing matrices. From the very beginning. Again. I really hate how IB curriculums don't line up when they are supposed to. And of course, it gets worse. IAs. I'm pretty sure I'm doing one of last year's ones again. The matrix powers... AHHHHHH! thank goodness I finished my TOK journal otherwise I think i'd go completely insane. Oh wait, I already am. hmph.

Melting

The weather warmed up a little. Its been sleeting now on and off for a few hours. Its supposed to warm up tomorrow and then get back to snowing on tuesday. I must say, the sleet tonight and tomorrow are going to be hell. I have so much homework to get done. I have a cultural report on my trip to Florence, which at the moment, I'm somewhere between a third and halfway done with and on page 14 typed. And then I have another essay for TOK, an essay for english, and a french project all due tomorrow. I really shouldn't be online. Too bad for homework... except s***... its all in the classes that my grade is so close to popping up on... GAH!

I <3 The Snow Gods/Goddesses

Its still snowing. I'm in that serene, peaceful, content, untouchable mood. Not even homework can kill it.
By the way, I'm not really sure why my blog seems so depressing because my life is really quite amazing. Maybe I'm just more likely to write when I'm having a slightly bad day. I've been under a lot of IB stress over the past two weeks, so maybe thats had an influence. Things are picking up though, and after Monday things shouldn't be so tough.
Last night I went for a walk with two of my friends. We were all bundled up, in warm jackets and hats and fuzzy mittens, and we made snow angels and had a snowball fight. Then we went and stood under a street lamp and stared upwards. It you've never looked straight up into a snowstorm at night where all the snowflakes are illuminated against the inky blackness of the sky, you should try it. When you look across at a snowstorm, you see everything from the side, linearly. You see each flake falling from top to bottom, just the way the world works. But when you stand underneath and look up, its like you stop time. You see top and bottom layered on top of each other. The flakes don't fall in the same direction, you see them swirl and float, you can see the wind, no matter how little of it there is, at it changes the direction that the flakes move. It looks like millions of little fish, some changing direction together, others going on their own, all tiny little dashes of white against a black backdrop. It looks like a million shooting stars all at once. And then you stick out your tongue, part your lips a little, and feel the frozen water molecules tingle a little as they melt in your mouth, you close your eyes for a moment and listen to the flakes hitting the ground and feel them melt on your eyelids. You smell the air, because snow has that distinct smell you can't find anywhere else. Maybe its not so much a smell, but its a quality you can only pick up by breathing in snowy air slowly through your nose. And then you go stand by a car when its really really cold, and smell that deisel-ey ester mixed with the icy-ness of the air. Most people hate that smell/sensation/whatever it is, but for me it reminds me of my ski area, the buses, getting there early in the morning before an awesome day of skiing. Its a feeling thats akin to licking a cold metal pole, with your tongue just sticking a little and not getting TOTALLY stuck to it to the point where it really hurts to pull it off. I really am walking in a winter wonderland.
SNOW IS JOY. SNOW IS PEACE. SNOW IS LOVE. SNOW IS LIFE.

SNOW!!!

ITS SNOWING!!! In the words of one of the other Sarahs here: "WAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Its been coming down all day off and on, in that sort of pellet-ey dippin-dot kind of snow. So far theres about an inch accumulated, but its supposed to keep snowing all weekend! Its going to make it nearly impossible for me to do what I need to do and focus on what I need to do, but I don't really care. Its snow, snow means happiness, snow means skiing, skiing means happiness. Therefore Sarah=YAY!!

Sad Songs and Sketches

What do you do when you realize that how you feel for one thing can't change how you feel about another? What happens when you realize what you thought was all you wanted wasn't as great as you expected? How do you go back when so much has happened? You can't always pretend it never happened, there are some mistakes you have to accept. It's correcting them without making anything worse thats the tricky part. But how do you do it without hurting anyone? How do you do it without hurting yourself? Why do I have enough insight to know that in the long run, it will be worth it to do what I need to do? But what if I'm making the wrong decision? What if I know I'm not? Why haven't people commented on my last five posts? Why do I care? Why do I keep bothering when there are more important things I should be doing? Or when there are more fun things to do?
I've gotten really into sketching lately. I thought I had no talent with drawing, but someone showed me some great techniques There also aren't enough things in my room that are cool to draw, so I'm sketching from old photos on my computer (and taking pictures of my sketches of those photos and putting them back on my computer). Brownie points (and maybe an extra bar of chocolate at Christmas) to anyone other than Hannah who can send me an email telling me who's eye this is (and even more if you can tell me what picture its from, although I'm sure nobody else has spent nearly as many minutes looking at that photograph as I have). It doesn't really look like said person's eye. But as I progress with my drawing, the other eye, the nose, the mouth, the hair, maybe, just maybe it will become more clear who it is. When that happens though, I won't be able to post it here. I'll only share it with certain people. In all reality, if you read this, you probably are one of those people I'll share it with, but there are the few exceptions.
I should really get back to my homework. I really don't want to. But I want to go to sleep more, so that means doing my homework so I can sleep. Really, what I want to do is sketch some more, write in my journal, and read a book, curl up on my bed with a nice cup of chai, in my fuzzy pajamas and listen to relaxing sad songs, then go to sleep.

Mushrooms and Religion

There's this book called The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross (if you ever get your hands on a copy of it, let me know!) that one of my teachers was talking about a few weeks ago. I was procrastinating (go figure) and decided to look it up online and came across this article that is really interesting. Check it out if you are bored and want to hear some really crazy stuff about religion.

Finished

One day, Sarah decided that school was taking over her life. She was opposed to the idea of homework. She thinks that teachers should do more in class and give us less work to do out of class. The realization that, with homework, she was working much, much more than forty hours a week made her slightly annoyed, especially when coupled with the fact that she was only getting about 24 hours of sleep during the school week. That one fifth of my week spent sleeping, as opposed to one third, which is what is recommended (eight hours a night!) So Sarah is tired. Sarah has been to tired to go stargazing, and hasn't seen an incinerating bit of cosmic dust in a long time. Sarah no longer knows which planets are which when she looks up at the sky, and she can't remember most of the constellations. She hasn't listened to her astronomy podcast in a few months, and she misses her hobby. Unfortunately, she isn't let out of the dorm after 7:30 on school nights, so no stargazing for me, except on weekends. She misses the stars. She misses keeping track of the moon. She misses being super nerdy, especially when she can't keep her GPA up to her nerdy standards.

I finished my presentation. Presented it. My teacher said it was "good." Whatever that means. She's a really harsh grader so I guess that just plain good is good enough. I have to wait until Monday to find out my score. So now is when my weekend really begins. I get to go skiing tomorrow, but that means finding someone with a key who can let me into the ski room to get my skis. Preferably before too late tonight so I can sharpen my edges. And then I have to find people who are going that are my level that I can ski with. Maybe today I'll go for a run, and practice my flute and take a nap.

Love, Sarah

Almost

I'm almost there. I just have to practice my IB English Oral a few times, iron out the kinks, and go to sleep. Then I have to wake up, go to my English teacher, and stare past her head at the sexy poster of Aragorn on the wall and go through my presentation one more time, just with her taking notes while I do it. It doesnt sound that intimidating. But the thing is, I hate rehearsing out loud. I just can't bring myself to talk to my computer screen about the use of color to contrast time periods in The Handmaid's Tale. And I don't want to distract my roommate, who is much farther behind on hers than I am. *sigh* I should really practice instead of updating.
I get to go skiing on Sunday. That is really what's been motivating me this week. If I get through tomorrow morning and all goes well, I deserve to go skiing. If tomorrow morning doesn't go well, then I'll need to go skiing to bring my spirits back up. Either way, I want it to be Sunday morning already. I miss my skis. . . but tomorrow I get to get them out of the ski shed, and maybe I'll sharpen the edges. *yay*

How Far

How far can my teachers push me before I fall apart? How much can I do in one week, and come out the other end with my sanity and my grades still in tact? Its a test of my endurance, my homework doing speed, my mental strength, my determination, and my ability to survive with no sleep. Thanks to all the people who and looking out for me and making sure I get through the week (although most of them probably aren't reading this), and know that I will reciprocate when you need me. Its greatly appreciated. I understand that other people are under stress too, but it really, really puts me off when someone gives me the, "oh thats nothing, look at how much I have to do" line. Its a classic sign of unhealthy IBism. I don't see why bragging about how much work you have to do is so great. Its completely backwards and illogical. We really shouldn't be proud of our procrastination problems. And I should really shut up because I probably sound extraordinarily hypocritical. I can only hope that all my work will pay off, and IB will have actually been worth it. If not, sucks for me, there go two years of my social life and I'll just hope I can make up for them later.
Love, Sarah

Running

I ran a 5k today. At least, everyone told me it was a 5k, but it felt a lot shorter than that. I hadn't really been training, and I managed to run the whole thing while talking, and I had a really strong sprint to the finish. I didn't feel dead at the end, like I used to with 5ks. The race was untimed, so I don't know how fast I ran it, which would give me some hint to how far it was. I feel sort of accomplished, because about halfway through I felt like my legs were going to fall off, but, by the end, I was so pumped... its hard to feel like you worked really hard when you finish with a ton of energy left to burn. I guess my breakfast finally digested halfway through the 'race' and gave me a last boost of energy, but I felt great. Now I understand how my ex-twin was always so energized after running while the rest of us were wiped out, because thats how I felt today. I was seriously ready to get up and go run it again after I stretched. Whats even better is that the run/walk/bike (some people even unicycled the whole thing) was for cancer research, so it was win-win all around. But now I'm all sweaty and smell bad so I should probably go take a shower.
Love,
Sarah

October

Today was one of those cool, crisp, and clear October days that make the fall romanticize-able. In general, the fall is my least favorite season. It's got all that lousiness of going back to school, with all the waiting for snow and skiing, without the fun. Normally, the best things about autumn are apple pie and crispy leaves to step on and jump in (see pictures on facebook, or email me for them) and getting to wear sweaters without having to wear ski parkas and mittens (which are great when its freezing, but not until then). There are days like today breezy and chilly and bright, that follow frozen-hot nights, the combination of which is... perfect. Of course, you throw PSATs and losing your keys(which are ridiculously expensive to replace) in there, and suddenly things aren't quite as bright, but its like someone just put a little dimmer on the fluorescent light bulb. Things can't be too bright or they'll blind you and you'll never see anything for face value again. Thats why s*** happens.

Feelin' like a princess

Today Sarah is feeling like a princess. Not one of those silly princesses who gets locked in a tower and has to sit there embroidering and doing all manners of other silly things until Prince Charming comes to collect her. Actually, this fairy tale doesn't have anything to do with prince charming at the moment... my life is SO non-sequential. Anyway, Sarah feels like one of those princesses who is out there slaying dragons and totally kicking the evil wizard's butt. Let me explain. My life for the past month and a half has felt like a fairy tale. You know, the kind where all the princes and princesses and children of diplomats and other rich people in the fairy kingdom go to boarding school, the fairy tale that takes place in that tiny little village out in the middle of nowhere surrounded by huge mountains. The places where the streets get covered in leaves in the fall and you look forward to the weekend when you have time to scoop them all together and make a big pile somewhere and go jump in it (totally doing that on Saturday after PSATs!) The places where you go for a bike ride for the weekend and you can ride to a different fairy tale kingdom (aka France) and ride past all sorts of cool chateaus and such. Everything is so picturesque, well, everything except the amount of homework and lack of sleep and that sort of thing, but we can deal with that.
Unfortunately, I can no longer take pictures of the picturesqueness because my camera is relatively dead. Hopefully my new one will be here by the end of the week, before I go to Italy.
By the way, I finally got milk and sugar so I can have chai now. And I found this cereal that tastes just like Kix. yay! still waiting for Cinnamon LIFE to get here. I might have to bring back an entire suitcase of food when I come back after Christmas. Sorry, but I'm not going to pay CHF 1.20 (about $1) for a pack of Ramen. Thats just ridiculous. And I was going to write something about chocolate except I forgot what it was. Chocolate is amazing.
Love, Sarah

Food, Derivatives, Restrictions

Sarah got back to her dorm after school and immediately changed into her warm fuzzy fleece pants and warm fuzzy hoodie and warm fuzzy socks and ate her way through one apple, two Balisto bars, three cookies, and four squares of chocolate (The Very Hungry Caterpillar, anyone?). Then she drank a mug of soup. Back to Balisto bars: if you've never had one of the purple ones, I pity you. If you don't even know what they are, I pity you even more. And then, after switching back into first person, I went through half a pack of kleenex, two cough drops, and a whole bunch of water. I am so glad I don't have an activity today.
Anyway... Calculus. It confuses me, although it would have made physics last year a whole lot easier. I can tell I'm going to have a love/hate relationship with derivatives.
I'm looking forward to this weekend, when I have another bike trip. But that means I probably have to do homework Friday night instead of passing it doing other much more interesting and fun things. Maybe it wouldn't be such a bad thing to get a restriction, then I wouldn't have a choice of what to do Friday night--be a good girl or a fun girl? And, as studies have shown, choices don't always make us happy (http://anjamerret.com/?p=285, thanks to someone for the article!) But anyway, if I was going to get a restriction, I would want to get it doing something really nifty. Having a messy room wouldn't cut it. So, what's the worst thing someone here can do and get off with just a Friday night? (and just for your information, I'm not being serious, because I know theres someone who will read this and think I've turned into a delinquent!)

Homework: society's definitition of perfect

Why don't we spend time in classes being more productive and do less for homework? Teachers (or one specifically) spends half a class period almost every day complaining about how they keep cancelling school days and how much of the year has gone by and how much we still have to cover. Just shut up and teach it already!!
And then we get these huge projects and essays and such . . . I'm too young to have this much work. Why can't childhood just be all the fun and games its supposed to be? Yeah, I may be only two years from college, where I "get kicked out of the house and have to fend for myself," but didn't I essentially do that to myself two years early by opting to go to boarding school? I guess it would be a little presumptuous to ask for the freedoms of living away from home without the responsibilities too. So yeah, I know I'll always have homework. ALWAYS. It never ends, even after college and you get a "real" job, or any job for that matter, whether its bumming as a ski instructor for a few years or traveling the world as a journalist, or doing research for something scientific, or I don't know what else. Theres always more work that has to be done.
So why not live our lives? Why do all the work all the time if, in the end, it only makes us more stressed, more tired, less lively? What if, on my deathbed, I look back at life and realize that I never lived my life because I spent the whole thing working? I am so afraid, SOOOO afraid, of dying with that regret, or any regrets really. I'm afraid I'll run out of my youth and innocence too soon, that things will go too fast, and before I know it I'll be all grown up wondering where my adolescence went. Sweet Sixteen, its supposed to be SWEET. In many, many ways it is sweet, but in others, its a LOT of work. I just don't want to be thirty, wishing I could go back and re-live sixteen. Or sixty, looking back on thirty. Theres a time in life for hard work, but now isn't it. Work hard now, and you fall into the trap of working hard your whole life. Work your ass off to get good grades in high school to get into the perfect university, where you work your ass off to get into the best graduate schools, where you work your ass off to get an amazing job, where you work your ass off to get ahead, but by the time you get to the point where it all pays off, haven't you missed out on everything along the way? Maybe its just the procrastinator in me shining through, saying screw around now and work later, but theres the other half of me that is stuck to society's ideas of perfection. You know, the perfect 4.0 student, involved in everything, smart, funny, athletic, attractive, social, studious, the one who gets into Harvard/ Yale/ Princeton, grows up to be a doctor or a lawyer, charitable . . .and then I realize that this is who I've tried to turn myself into, totally unintentionally. Or subconsciously. In some ways it was intentional. I've always prided myself on being unique, an individualist, a non-conformist, but then I look again, and whaddayaknow, I'm doing exactly what society wants me to. What happens when I die, and realize that I never knew who I really was? I mean, I think I know parts of who I am, but I probably just know the parts of who I've made myself become. Is that really me?? How do I know? How do I figure out who's behind the mask?

I'm Seeing Stars

The stars here are brighter. Maybe they just seem brighter because life is so good, but I'm convinced that the milky way shines out much more clearly than it does at home, and the stars twinkle more, and the satellites are easier to spot. Maybe we just had a perfectly clear night last night, and the moon is nearly new, so it wasn't blocking out the stars, but we were close to my dorm, where there were lots of lights on, so the stars should have seemed dimmer. Maybe, just maybe, the brightness of the stars doesn't have that much to do with light pollution, and its just a perception. Maybe it's who we're with, what we're doing, and our emotions that are reflected in the brightness of the stars. Obviously theres still the pollution stuff going on, but I think we see the world around us in relation to what we're feeling, so when life is amazing everything seems a lot brighter and we can appreciate the beauty of our surroundings more. Or maybe I still can't accept that this is reality and I'm feeling kind of dazed and seeing those kind of stars you see when you hit your head really hard and are dazed and confused.

Shattered Glass

WHOA!! 85% Cocoa is pushing my chocolate tolerance a bit. It's got the amazingly rich Cocoa taste, but it is SUPER bitter. I can't even eat one square of it. *sigh. In general, the darker the better though. I think around 60% is just right, maybe up to 70%. After that stuff though, Milk chocolate tastes like straight sugar.
Anyway, back to what I was ORIGINALLY going to write about before I took a huge bite of really, really dark chocolate...
Today was a string of embarrassing moments in the cafeteria. At lunch, I turned around w/ my tray and ran into Meghan, and my cup went flying and shattered on the floor. It happens almost once a day to someone, so I figure if I do it once at the beginning of the year it won't happen again later. It was hilarious though, it landed on the ground and I swear I saw half the cup bounce up OVER the table and land on the other side. Regardless, there was glass everywhere, on the table (thankfully nobody was sitting there anymore), on the chairs, on the floor. We were laughing really hard after the initial shock though. And then, tonight at dinner, I corrected Sam's knowledge on a particular subject that she found particularly interesting (if you don't get it, read the post from September 25, and if you still don't get it you probably aren't supposed to). Anyway, Sam totally dropped her fork and jumped up and screamed "No, you didn't!!" or "You aren't" or something like that really, really loudly. The whole cafeteria just stopped... and while Sam was rolling on the floor in shock, probably laughing, I was laughing so hard AT HER that I was almost crying. It was hilarious. Awful and embarrassing, but hilarious.
But theres finally something in my life that is making me happier than I've been in a long time (four months, and then before that, a full year), so I feel sort of impervius to things like accidentally drawing negative attention to myself. My happy little bubble is a lot tougher than some shards of shattered glass. I don't think that even the wall of reality could pop it right now- reality is just being too good to me. Sometimes I wonder how I managed to get so lucky. I have great friends, awesome people in my life who really make me feel good about myself and make me feel like I matter, I live in one of the most beautiful places in the world with incredible opportunities, not even the quality of the cafeteria food and the lack of a chai place can bring me down.
Oh, and if anyone is looking for a really amazing dare, I've got one up my sleeve, so don't hesitate to ask! (random, sorry, but that's why this blog used to be called "the random ramblings of my life")
On other random notes, today in English we read a really short excerpt of Politically Correct Bedtime Stories. They are so satiric its amazing, and certain people who I know read my blog would probably really enjoy them. (cough*emily*colin*john*kelsey*cough)
So, have fun reading really politically incorrect bedtime stories and do your homework and go to bed! Wait, thats me thats supposed to be doing homework, not you. Oops.
Love,
Sarah

Fire and Ice

I'll start with fire. We had a fire drill at 9:30pm. The last one was at 6:30 am and it was raining, so I grabbed my ski parka not knowing how cold it would be, and went outside in my pjs with everyone else. It was warm out (just warm enough I didn't get cold because I was thinking warm and fuzzy thoughts about warm and fuzzy things that kept me warm and fuzzy, but cold enough that most of the girls in the dorm froze), and the stars were super bright and it made me get lost in thought. Why do firedrills always do that? Make me get lost in thought, I mean...

And now for ice. My ski area has pictures of snow coverage on the whole mountain. They open in one month, and for the first time in I don't know how many years, I won't be able to ski it opening weekend, or on Thanksgiving, or hike Tucker, and Spaulding might not even be open by the time I leave from winter break, and then I'll also miss sunsation and closing day. It came as a shock to me to see pictures of Copper and realizing that I won't see it for another two and a half months. Of course, by that point the bowls might be open, which would be awesome... but the first day of the season has always been special for me, and to not get to celebrate it at Copper this year will be... different. Of course, I'm loving the fact that this winter I will be able to ski all day Saturday and Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, and from what I heard today, I may even be able to get in a run or two on Wednesday mornings instead of sleeping in. So, skiing four, maybe five days a week. D***, that means I'm going to need to buy more ski socks, a boot dryer, learn how to wax and tune my skis, and figure out how to get my homework done when I'm supposed to do it.

Chai!!

In general, I am very anti-Starbucks. Who wants overpriced coffee when the little cafes and coffee shops are so much better? But for once, Starbucks came through for me today--with CHAI. I hadn't had chai since I've been here, but that one cup in Lausanne today was...heavenly. Yes, they did rip me off and charge 6fr. for a small, but it was worth it. A starbucks chai once a month isn't exactly a fair replacement for a Kataluma chai once a week, but it is a step closer than no chai at all.

Life is Good

When life really started to get going here in the land of chocolate and cheese and cowbells, my happy little bubble mended its holes and is now floating along again as if it never smacked into the wall of reality (if you don't get it, start with the very first post of my blog and read the whole thing!). Everything here seems so perfect its unreal. AKA, life is good. Life is way good (and yes, I know that that is way bad grammar...). Really, the only things that would make it significantly better would be better food in the cafeteria, snow, more heat in my dorm room (its freezing in here!!) and no homework...and maybe a few more things to DO in town. I'm not asking for much anymore, am I?
Love,
Sarah

Praying to the Snow Goddess

Its been really cold and rainy for the past three days. It is almost miserable, and it sort of feels like funeral weather. If only it'd get colder, I'd be celebrating. Its been hovering between 3 and 8 degrees and if it'd just get to zero, the precipitation would be frozen and crystalline and I would be celebrating like crazy.
Snow is my happiness. Snow means skiing. Snow means that the world is calm and peaceful, and everything is beautiful and right. Snow just makes me happy, and puts me in one of those super mellow moods, where everything is perfect and nothing can bring me down. Snow is bliss. I'm just waiting for the day when I can stand outside and stare up into a street lamp and watch the snow fall down, feel the flakes as they melt on my cheeks and lips, and catch them on my tongue, and blink as they get stuck in my eyelashes. I miss being able to appreciate the silence of snow, so complete that you can actually hear snowflakes hit the ground. I miss the way people look, when they've just come in from a snowstorm, with their cheeks burning red from the cold and snowflakes stuck in their hair. I miss the way the world glimmers and shines up at you, dazzling and bright and blinding. I'm just waiting for the day when I can bundle up in my parka and mittens and fuzzy hat and throw snowballs at my friends until we're all exhausted and frozen and I have snow down the back of my neck, and then get to treat myself to a nice cup of hot chocolate.
I can't wait until I can see my skis on a regular basis, instead of having to trust that my babies are ok in the ski shed. I can't wait until my ski boots aren't just taking up space in my closet. And, strange as it sounds, I miss the feeling of freezing my toes off in my ski boots, and then taking them off at the end of the day and putting on warm, dry socks. I can't wait until I can feel that rush that only ripping down the mountain can give me. I miss the feeling of flying, gliding, soaring, ripping down perfect corduroy with total control and incredible speed, and edge angles high enough that my knees brush the snow. I miss moguls and glades and all my favorite powder stashes in Union Meadows and Upper Enchanted and Spaulding and Seventeen Glades. I can't wait for that slight jolt of nerves right before plunging off a big cornice into a steep chute, and then looking back up at what I just came down. I can't wait until I can hike for my turns, because they are so much better and more satisfying when you work for them. Honestly, I can't wait until I can join ski team because I miss getting better, and I hate knowing my skiing has gotten a lot worse over the past two years (although the new skis really did help!) I just plain can't wait for ski season and snow.
Maybe, just maybe, it will get cold enough tonight, and tomorrow everything will be clear and sunny and lightly dusted with snow, just enough that you can hear it crunch under your feet as you walk, and see your tracks behind you. Strange, isn't it, that just a couple degrees can make the difference between miserable weather and perfect weather?
The first day it snows here, I will be the happiest girl in the world.
Love,
Sarah

August 26th to September 25th

It finally happened. One day short of one month. Who had the closest bet?
(again, if you have any clue what i'm talking about, email me.)

Moving On

"How do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on, when in your heart, you begin to understand... there is no going back? There are some things that time cannot mend. Some hurts that go too deep... that have taken hold." -Frodo, LOTR3 (movie)

How do you say no to something that just a few months ago you would have been begging for? What do you do when you discover it isn't all you ever wanted? How do you change the past, and say all those things you wanted to say, just so you wouldn't regret not saying them today? What if those things needed to be said before, and now they can't be? And when you discover that now you can't have what you could have had if you had said/done something differently, how do you forgive yourself? When something makes you happier than you ever thought possible and you let go of it, how do you snatch it back? How long can you search for it's replacement, when the original lies shattered at your feet? When do you give up and try to glue the original back together, although you know it is pointless? Would it make you feel better to try, or only make it's destruction hurt more? How can life seem so perfect one day, and the next day so complicated? Why does a change of scenery help so much?

If anyone has any clue what I'm talking about, send me an email.

Love,
Sarah

Matters Of The Matterhorn

I just got back from a weekend in Zermatt, which is possibly the most majestic and beautiful place I've ever visited, aside from perhaps Wengen. And they have year round skiing, which makes it complete paradise. Unfortunately, I didn't get to go skiing, but had to silently suffer as all the racers came sauntering through town with their skis and boots over their shoulders. It was the definition of jealousy. I can't wait until it starts snowing and ski season gets going and I can ski four times a week. I'll be in heaven.
Anyway, back to Zermatt. Zermatt is thehome of the Matterhorn, the most famous mountain in Switzerland (just look at the Toblerone box!) Theres this train (the GornergratBahn) that goes up the valley across from the Matterhorn, and has the most spectacular and impressive views. Your depth perception gets all messed up, because the mountains appear really close, but when you look at the lack of detail on the glaciers you realize how far away they are, which makes them seem twice as big. Its crazy. Everyone back home thinks that the Alps are small. But, as a matter of fact, the Matterhorn is 4478m (~14,690 ft), but the base (Zermatt) is only 1620m (~5315 ft), which is only slightly higher than Denver. But Colorado Mountains don't start in Denver, they start at 2700m (~9000ft). Therefore, the Alps are bigger than the Rockies. End of story. Aside from great mountains, Zermatt has good food, and amazing crepes. Crepes make the world go round (ok, not quite, but close enough.) Crepes with chocolate and powdered sugar, crepes with ham and cheese, crepes with lingonberry jam and ice cream (although thats a Scandinavian thing, not Swiss)... Crepes are just amazing. As are Gaufres (waffles) with chocolate and ice cream. They are sweet waffles, not breakfast waffles... and then theres ice cream and chocolate mousse and all matter of other delicious, fattening foods that will come back and kick my metabolism's butt one of these days. Oh well. Live life to its fullest, and forget about its problems, right?

Six Degrees

There's a theory that everyone in the world is connected to every other person in the world by six or fewer degrees of separation. It is sort of mind boggling, and the more people I meet, the more convinced I am that its true.
If you think about it mathematically, it make perfect sense...
There are 6.5 billion people in the world, and lets say that each person has a network of friends/family/acquaintances/teachers/etc that has at least fifty people that the majority of their friends DON'T know. I'm assuming this is fair, considering the majority of my friends have over fifty friends just on Facebook, and that doesn't even begin to count all the people anyone knows. So lets just say 50. So, I have fifty people in my circle. Each of them has fifty people in their circle...Its exponential. Fifty to the sixth power is 8.3 billion people, within six degrees of separation. But almost everyone knows more than fifty people!
So, six degrees...think about it. Play with your brain.

Sarah

Quotes

One of the things I've started doing this year is writing down all those crazy, meaningful, funny, or downright weird things people say during class at the bottom of my notes. It makes reviewing notes more fun (because, you know, I just study my notes SOOO often), but it also makes TAKING notes somewhat practical. So here's a collection of some of the random, funny, (and not so random nor funny) things I've written down in class. Most of them are from math and TOK, because my teacher, Mr. Sharp, says some of the craziest things ever.

"All causes need a martyr." --Mr. Brown (History Teacher)
"That's life....That's death....That's biology!" (Three people in my bio class)
"I never let school ruin my education." --Mr. Sharp (TOK & Math), quoting someone famous.
"Tinned food does not have sex with other tinned food to make more tinned food!" --Mr. Sharp
"I don't want to live my life believing lies."--Mr. Sharp
"Every summer when I go on holiday, I take a new calculus book with me. Its the only way I can guarantee nobody will talk to me on long flights." -Mr. Sharp


My dorm "mother," Mrs. Moore, is hilarious. She is British and has that "prim and proper" finishing school attitude, although she is really, really nice. At our dorm meeting the other night she said something like. "Young ladies should have clean rooms, clean sheets, clean bodies, clean clothes, and clean mouths. Bad words are called bad words because they are BAD for you. If a boy ever says bad words around you, you should ask him not to speak like that in front of you." The way she said it was totally hilarious, because she was so serious about it, and. I'm bringing my camera and a pencil and paper to the next dorm meeting so I can catch the next quote perfectly. I've heard to watch out for her "boys and sex" speech that she gives once a year, because it is one of the funnies things you will ever hear, but you only get to hear it once... I love documenting these things as they happen.

There's nowhere else on Earth I'd rather be (eating)

So now that I've ranted about the beauty of Switzerland and all the amazing things there are to do here, today I will rant about all the amazing things there are to EAT here.

First and foremost, there is chocolate. I've already spent about 20 francs on chocolate. GOOD INVESTMENT. There is dark chocolate, milk chocolate, white chocolate, chocolate with hazelnut, Toblerone and Toblerone knockoffs, mousse noisette chocolates...almost every kind of amazingly delicious chocolate you could possibly imagine. Its gotten to a point where if I don't be careful, I will gain weight from all the chocolate. Its so easy to eat so much of it! But I love chocolate, and every pound I put on due to chocolate will be completely worth it. There is so much to do here and everything involves walking uphill both directions, so we joke that we burn all the calories from our chocolate anyway. But who gives a D***!! Its CHOCOLATE!
After chocolate, there is chocolate fondue. Its amazingly amazing and easy to make. Step one: Put a bar of milk chocolate in a pot and melt it. Step two: Dip things in it (like cookies, apples, pineapple, bananas, strawberries....). Step three. EAT.
The third most amazing thing there is to eat here is chocolate mousse. I haven't actually had any yet. When my family traveled to France and Switzerland when I was little, my brother and I sampled the Mousse au Chocolat at every restaurant. There is a very subtle difference in texture and flavor from place to place, although it always remains amazing!
Number four is Ice Cream. People from Europe don't find it at all extraordinary that you can buy ice cream everywhere. But those Extreme Chocolat cones are all part of the non-American experience. I don't care if they are CHF 2.50, those things make Switzerland, Switzerland.
Fifth is cheese. My close friends know that I don't eat Swiss cheese unless it is imported Swiss from Switzerland. Well, here if its imported I won't eat it. Simple as that. I'm in the land of cows, cow bells, and fine Gruyere. There is good Swiss cheese on the side bar of our cafeteria at every meal alongside the peanut butter, jelly, butter, Nutella, and sandwich meats. I love it.
Numero six! Along with Chocolate fondue and cheese comes cheese fondue. There's this fun game that you are supposed to play with fondue. You get a big group to get fondue, and then you sit in a circle around the fondue pot, alternating boys and girls. While having a ton of fun, you eat the fondue. If your piece of bread falls off your fork in the fondue pot, then you are supposed to kiss the person on your left. I've never actually played this game before, but it sounds interesting.
Numero sept...Veal. Go ahead and cry for the baby cows, but they are delicious! Lip-smackin' good.
Eighthly, for breakfast everyday I eat cornflakes with strawberry yogurt. People don't eat cornflakes with strawberry yogurt back home. Its just something I started eating here. But it is really delicious. You should try it some time.

And thats it! The eight amazing things you will eat in Switzerland: Chocolate, Chocolate, Chocolate, Chocolate, Cheese, Cheese, Cow, and Cereal (and Carbs). Those are the Eight Cs of necessity.

Love and have fun eating!
-Sarah

This is me.

So yesterday I ranted about how beautiful Switzerland is. Today I am going to rant about all the things I can DO in Switzerland.
So, school requires that we are involved in at least two after-school physical activities. Many of my friends would say, ugg, sports... but the list is amazing. Here's just a sampling of the best activities I've considered doing: Rock Climbing, Bouldering, ski conditioning, cross training, running club (formerly cross country, but with no meets), track, ultimate frisbee, curling (I know! where else am I going to have an opportunity to curl??), hiking, avalanche awareness, slack line/hiking/ bouldering combo...the list goes on, and thats just for fall activities. As soon as ski season starts there will be weekend trips to Zermatt and Gstaad and all those other amazing places, and I'll get Tuesday and Thursday afternoons off to ski, not to mention free weekends...I'll probably be on the hill three or four days a week. Maybe I'll make the ski team, otherwise there is a possibility of doing patrol or "Ski Ambassador' and I can get my Swiss Ski School Certification! None of these cool things were offered back home. Maybe that's why I was so bored--there were no activities (aside from cross country) that really turned me on.
In addition to all of those, there are these amazing weekend trips.
I spent the past two days riding a bike from Aigle to Lausanne and back, along Lake Geneva. Riding through the vinyards between Vevey and Ouchy, looking down on the perfect crystal-clear blueness of the lake, dotted with sailboats, with green mountains soaring in the oh-so-close background... it was paradise (see picture above). Couple that with the thrill of flying down through the vinyards on a bicycle, on a perfectly clear blue-sky day, not too hot but just warm enough that you start sweating, with the breeze flying in under your helmet...The only activities that have ever made me feel so great are surfing, skiing, and jumping off forty-five foot cliffs. You should try it some time. Maybe its about the thrill and the beauty of my surroundings, but something about it makes me feel alive. Yeah, I've said all this before.
But anyway, next weekend there is a trip to climb Dents Du Midi, but unfortunately I didn't sign up in time and the trip was already full with an uber-long waiting list. Maybe next time... And then the weekend after that my "family" (a group of three teachers and about ten students that become our "family" for the rest of the year) is going to Zermatt, unfortunately not during ski season, but it will still be great... and there will be trips somewhere almost every weekend. Too bad IB is going to limit how much I can do. It's enough to make me consider dropping down to certificates instead of full diploma, but I don't want to be bored in any of my classes. I'm already dying of boredom in HL chem. Sig Figs and unit conversions were easier than pi the first time around, the second time it is torture. TORTURE, I tell you. And we aren't supposed to be getting to Lewis Dot Structures until the spring. I was hoping that we'd be reviewing it within the next few weeks. But I'm not here to rant about how much chemistry sucks, I'm here to rant about all the amazing things I can do in Switzerland. My point being: the opportunities are endless, and everyone should come visit me so I can take you to go do coolio things.
Love,
Sarah

Here I am.

Lots of people have been bugging me to update my blog. I didn't realise THAT many people read my blog. I'm sort of flattered. Actually, I find it sort of amusing how low you guys have stooped to procrastinate. I've been procrastinating too much too. And not just with updating. With homework....BAD way to start a school year, especially in a new school.
So yeah, I'm here in Switzerland.
I feel like giving the full details. you can skim if you want :-)
So... my journey begins at DIA. I checked my bags. Went through security. Got on the plane. Got off in Newark. That's where my journey REALLY begins--getting on the plane in Newark (which is a terrible airport, if you ask my opinion, or even if you don't ask it) So here I was, getting on the plane with my backpack and my DI duffel and my hot pink pillow, walking down the aisle of the plane towards my seat. I was looking for my row when I spotted this guy who appeared to be about my age, putting his stuff in the overhead bin above my seat, and then he sat down in the seat next to mine. And then I sat down, and he asked where I was going. "Ummm, Switzerland, duh. This plane is sort of going to Geneva, not Kansas..." Actually, I gave a one word response. "School." "Where?" "Leysin" "me too" and that was how I met Nick. Only seen him twice since I got here.
If you've never flown trans-Atlantic overnight, I pity you. If you fly it frequently, I pity you. It's something everyone should do at least once or twice or more in their lifetimes. It is really extraordinary to watch the sun set and then the sunrise in the same flight, in the span of about 8 hours. And if you can eliminate glare out your windows, the stars over the Atlantic are amazing. Trans-Atlantic flights tend to have better food for breakfast. They also have individual TVs that now have hand-held remotes and even have games, instead of just movies. They also plot your airplanes course, so you know exactly what you are flying over. It just so happened that I was flying over the English Channel and listening to Spirit when the sun came up. Here I am!!
Flying in to Geneva over the Lake reminded me how much I love this country. It is AMAZING!
Anyway, we got in to the airport, and it took me forever to find my ski bag because it didn't come off with everything else, and then one of Nick's bags got lost and he made me stay with him while he filed a report.
Speaking of baggage... I was so worried before I left that I would have way too many bags and wouldn't be able to get them through the airport in Geneva. That was with a ski bag, two rolling duffels, a day pack and a mini duffle. There were some people who showed up with their whole families in tow with at least twice as much stuff as I had. Now I'm here and I feel like I didn't bring anything with me.
Back to how much I love this country... Something about the mountains here just isn't the same about the mountains back home. They come up higher on the horizon, partly because the valleys are deeper, and partly because the mountains are steeper and closer together. They just feel a lot bigger. Yeah, there are no 14ers here, and I'm living at 4,500 feet (1500m) as opposed to 8,000 ft, but I feel like I'm in the mountains more than I do back home. For me, there is a sense of comfort of having mountains wall me in. There is something completely RIGHT about looking out across the valley and seeing snow-capped peaks in August. There is something homely about hearing cowbells when you stick your head out the window in the late evening. There is something truly amazing here that I've never had before, and that is loving where I am. If I had to move somewhere and had to live there for the rest of my life, I would pick Switzerland. Maybe not Leysin, necessarily, but perhaps Wengen. I just got back from a bike trip to Lausanne and we rode through Vevey, which I loved too. I think I'm just in love with the country, the scenery... Vinyards nestled into the hillsides, overlooking Lake Geneva, with snow-capped peaks looming in the background....It makes me feel alive, the way only certain things can. Maybe it is just love that makes me feel alive, whether for a person or place or thing. Oops, that got dangerously close to being borderline TOK. And now I am really, really tired so I think I will get some sleep, sleep in tomorrow morning (no classes, WOOT) and then maybe, with any luck, I won't be tired anymore. But that's just wishful thinking.
For now, that's all I have to say.
Love, Sarah

Dedications

This may well be my last post before I leave. So theres today, during which I'm packing, theres tomorrow during which I'm hanging out, theres Saturday during which I panic, and then I go poof off the face of America. YAY! But before I leave, I really want to say thanks to all the people who have influenced me in the good 'ol state of Colorado (or influenced me when I happened to be elsewhere). Friends, family...what am I going to do without you guys? Find some new ones, I guess, and try to hold on where I can. I'm not a big fan of holding on to the past, but this is one of those cases, as I'm about to leave, where I'm having a hard time looking forward. It's just going to be so new and different, somehow its easier to look back. I see everything I'll be leaving behind, both the good and bad. There are some friendships that will be greatly changed by leaving and others that it won't really have any effect on. You probably know which category you fall into. Regardless, I don't want to lose any friends as a result of it.

Before I leave, there are three guys and three girls that I particularly want to send a shout-out to, as I know I won't be seeing you where I'm going (and if I do, well, it wasn't in my plans).
First, to my brother. The day you left, I was setting the table and put out four plates, then nearly cried remembering that you won't be back for a long time.
Second, to my best friend. I don't know if I've ever told you that you are my best friend, and I don't really know if you know that you are...but I've known you for nine years (as of the start of this school year, you should know who you are now) and I've been through more with you than with anyone else. We've had our issues, but are all the closer for it. I don't really know what I'm going to do without you.
Third, to the one I ran to in middle school. We've never been super-super-super close, but you've always been there for me. You are one of the few who will listen to me, no matter what I have to say or complain or rant about, and I do the same for you. I'm going to miss you extremely, because email just doesn't work as well for talking. You rock my neon socks off. You know who you are.
Fourth to an Outward Bound instructor who changed me more than I would ever have guessed was possible.
Fifth, to my other true friend. I guess I've known you for a while but its only over the past two years that we've gotten close. We've definitely had our ups and downs, but they don't seem to matter in the long run. You probably think you should be on this list but can't really figure out which one you are.
Sixth, to a person who taught me how to live, love, and love living. I love you.

And then of course, there are my parents. I owe them so much. My DI team. Girl Scout Destinations. The two teachers (4th/5th grade, Soph. English) who have really helped me grow not just academically but in my thinking and how I view the world. My skis (thank goodness I don't have to leave them behind!) and previous ski instructors and ski buddies. My flute and flute teacher. But most especially my FRIENDS. I don't know where I'd be without you, but I certainly wouldn't be about to embark on the adventure of a lifetime. So here I am, about to say just about the saddest two words in the English Language: Good Bye. Fare Well. Au Revoir. Adios, Amigos. I'll be back.

Love,
Sarah

The Times They Are A Changin'

The times aren't the only things changing. My hair for example. Its all gone now, just in case you wanted to know (ok, not ALL gone. Theres still some left. I decided I wanted to share the bottom ten inches with some poor cancerous child, and giving that away didn't leave me with much. check out www.locksoflove.org if you want to lose your hair too!). My hair isn't the only thing thats gone. My brother is too. For four whole months... And in a week I will be too. Well, gone from here, but not GONE.

The Kite Runner

Of all the books I've read for school over the past few years, there haven't been many that I've really enjoyed. In thirty years am I really still going to be touched by the Great Wrath of Gatsby's Grapes? Or is it the Great Grapes of Gatsby's Wrath? I can't even keep it straight. When I found out I was going to school overseas, I was THRILLED I wouldn't have to read Dante's Inferno for summer reading. Instead, I was assigned The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, which is one of the most powerful, moving, haunting, and thought evoking and books I've ever read. So, sure, you could analyze the heck out of something like the Great Gatsby, which in my opinion is little more than a soap opera with a boat-load of symbolism, or The Old Man and the Sea, which is just the boat-load of symbolism without the soap opera...but just because it makes for good literary discussion doen't make it REAL. The Kite Runner is one of those really, truly REAL books, a novel that perfectly paints modern Afghanistan, shows the contrast between old and new, love and hate, peace and war, happiness and fear, and a whole bunch of other conceptual noun pairs. Not only that, but its littered with brutally honest quotes, like "A land mine. Is there a more Afghan way to die?" Why can't more of our required reading be books like that, ones that really give us a better understanding of the world while still having symbolism that you COULD analyze? Well, except that there are so many better things to discuss regarding this book, I don't really see why you'd want to look at the literary qualities (symbolism, themes, blah, blah, blah) so much as the quality of the story and characters and ideas behind it. . . .

Today I found out that they made a film of The Kite Runner, which is scheduled to come out in November (do yourself a favor and read the book before you see it!!) My first thought was, "Oh $h!t!! they're going to screw it up so badly!" I mean, how many books have been spoiled by their movies? There's Harry Potter, just to name 5, soon to be 7, that Hollywood has murdered. So I started poking around, checking out the trailers (don't watch unless you've read the book, they sort of give a really good part of the book away)...and then I stumbled across www.kiterunner.org and was shocked. The actors are real Afghani boys, who were taken to China to shoot the film, and now live back in war-torn Afghanistan...and they are terrified. Unless you've read the book, you won't really understand, but theres no way to make this movie and NOT toe the line at least a little. It's controversial not in America, but it certainly will be in the Middle East, and the actors and their families have every right to be terrified of what the consequences and burdens their associations with this film will cost them. Their friends, their social standing, their freedoms... So, read the book, check out www.kiterunner.org, and let me know what you think!!

P.S. I know people have been reading my blog so if you are one of them then I would really appreciate it if you would leave me a comment (or email if you don't want everyone to see it) and let me know what you think of me, my writing, my ideas, my blog, whatever.

Disease

Disease. I just LOVE being sick. My dearest thanks go out to my friends and family who gave me such a nice, lovely gift. I've gotten to spend the past day and I'll probably spend the next two or three at home in bed with it, savoring every last minute during which I'm not wasting my time online. Now see, during the school year, I might be celebrating, especially if I so conveniently happened to fall ill on a major test or the day something I neglected to finish is due. Either that or panick because it means makeup work. WAIT!! Why am I talking about school? I still have eleven days before I officially sell my soul to the Devil (aka IB). My regrets go out to everyone at LHS who only have seven more glorious days to spend with their souls before they get locked in Ms. Tucker's office for two years. For those of you who decided to be IB drop outs and not have your soul locked in hell, well, lucky you. The rest of us will have a party to pity those cowards. (sorry, I really do love you guys, whether you stuck it through or not or never were in in the first place...)
Anyway. ELEVEN days until I get on that airplane. YAY! I am so ready to get out of here.

Realizations from 3am

There is something strangely exhilarating about being online at 3 in the morning DURING THE SUMMER when you have absolutely every right to go to bed as soon as your non-existent homework is finished. Yay for non-existent homework during the summer. See, during the school year, if you are up at 3am, you either have a procrastination problem or you procrastinated. Either that or you don't have a life. Some people (me included) do these things called extra-curricular activities, which, when added to homework, make the student ridiculously exhausted and want to go to bed immediately upon completing one's homework. Even if thats at 9:30...which it rarely is for me because I have a procrastination problem. Sucks for me, doesn't it? So anyway, back to the point. What am I doing up at 3am during the summer when I could just as easily (actually, more easily, because I wouldn't have to find things with which to amuse myself) have gone to bed six hours ago?
Here are some possible answers.
a). Its the peak of the Perseid Meteor shower so people who love shooting stars stay up late to watch little bits of cosmic dust convert their matter into energy while entering the atmosphere, giving off lots of light. I don't really know WHY watching the incineration of bits of dust left behind by a comet is so amusing, but it is. Shooting stars (aka meteors) rock my world.
b). I have a friend over. What's lamer than NOT staying up till odd hours of the morning talking about random stuff?
c). I enjoy reminiscing about long-forgotten elementary school friends.
d). All of the above.
People who think they know me would probably pick answer A. People who don't know me would probably pick answer B. So I chose answer D just to prove all those sorry suckers wrong.
But the truth is, its now almost 3:15, and I am getting sort of tired. The last time I stayed up this late was reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows the night it came out. The time before that I was writing an English essay. And procrastinating, talking online with three of my friends who were actually supposed to be writing their essays too. I think I was probably on paragraph 2. I still got an A. So anyway, I'm not used to being up this late because I have no life. I wouldn't even have a blog if I had a life with which to otherwise occupy myself. So once again, Sarah has proved that staying up till 3am is a strange, strange occurrence, and the next time it happens her friends should refuse to speak to her unless convincing her to actually do her homework or go to sleep. Oops...back to third person. That didn't last long.

On Day Two...

On day two, Sarah decided she was bored and got angry at her blog because its connected to her Google account. Don't get me wrong, I love my Google stuff, but I have two accounts. So I can only be logged into one at a time, otherwise use two browsers and IE makes me angry...So Sarah figured out how to attach BOTH Google accounts to this blog. In other words, Sarah now has an alter ego. Which is great, because then she can act like Gollum and argue with herself (like she doesn't anyway). And then Sarah decided that third person was confusing and she made a mental note only to use it on special occasions.
So last night, I couldn't get to sleep, and I started thinking about Harry Potter, which I had just finished reading for the bazillionth time, and at the same time I was thinking about Lord of the Rings which I had just watched for the bazillionth time (I have an alter ego, so the two halves of my brain can be thinking totally different things at the same time...) and then whaddayaknow! I got confused. Suddenly Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter were merged and it dawned on me how much J.K. Rowling stole from J.R.R. Tolkein, (I will post a somewhat complete-ish list at some point). So I started thinking and used that big black void inside my cranium and pulled out some random bits of information that I picked up somewhere and started thinking about how much both of them stole from Greek and Norse and Roman and other mythologies. But then I realized the things JKR stole from Tolkein weren't the things that both of them got out of myths. So then I convinced myself that JKR was a thief. And if JKR, who is undoubtedly one of the most creative authors of all time, is a thief, then there must not be any such thing as creativity. I know, DI blasphemy. But really, hasn't almost everything been thought of before? OK, so there are things like technology that keep getting better, but better rarely turns into new. And when it does, it takes people like Einstein who just happen to divide one equation by another and come up with the speed of light, and then from which create the theory of relativity. Or something like that. I don't really know what Einstein was doing. I can pretend. Its called BS. Thank God IB taught me that skill. Anyway, its sort of like sheer dumb luck combined with a high IQ. Eventually we have to stumble across something new. So, human brains have no such thing as creativity. I mean, evolutionarily we don't need creativity. Yeah, back when we were cavemen it might have been a little more useful. But really, I think we're just good at stumbling across those little nifty tricks that nature threw at us. None of it depends on brain power. Sometimes it takes and IQ above 100 to recognize those tricks...but thats besides the point. And what this has to do with J.K. Rowling being a thief I don't know.

The beginning of the end

In the beginning, there was light. Then there was a power outage and God had forgotten to save his program and all was lost, so then he had to rewrite it. Sad day. Or however millions of years writing that program took. So God tried again.
In the beginning, there was light. Then there was Sarah floating along in her happy little bubble, until it smacked into reality. Wait, glitch! Reality hasn't been created yet. So once again, God rebooted his computer, edited his program to fix the error and hit run one more time. This time there was a big BANG and his computer exploded, killing him in the blast and spewing out all sorts of radioactive matter that eventually turned into stars and planets and big macs. Somewhere between that tragic point 13.6 billion years ago and today, the lovely Earth came into being. And sometime within the Earths past three revolutions around the sun, Sarah's happy little bubble smacked into reality again and she realized it was time to get out of bed and go see the world. Of course, God hired Gilderoy Lockhart (where he came from only J.K. Rowling knows) to use the Obliviate charm to modify Sarah's memory, so she has no memory of smacking into that wall of reality the first time, or what the universe was like when it was just her and her happy little bubble bobbing along in the light. Maybe one day Voldemort will come along and torture her and she'll finally remember, like he did to Bertha Jorkins, but something's telling me Sarah would rather not know what life was like way back then.
So anyway, now the universe in all its vastness has a planet earth and a sun and a Sarah and her happy little bubble, which has popped at the base of the wall of reality. Still seems kind of small and pathetic, huh? How about, just for fun, we throw in some friends and good books and other things to do, maybe some mountains and an ocean and a moon. Just for the sake of watching people wreak havoc on each other, lets give Sarah and all her friends and acquaintances and the other 6 billion people on earth that she has never met some food and water and politicians. Oops, bad move. Now we've suddenly got war and peace, love and hate, and a whole bunch of other conceptual noun pairs to play with. Add some verbs, some heavy elements, and give humans brains with which they can't figure out what to do, and you've got a pretty amusing planet to laugh at. Lets just hope that theres some other planet on the other side of the galaxy that DIDN'T have so many errors in the program so they can take over our solar system once we have successfully eradicated ourselves.
Anyway, now that Sarah and all her friends and the internet exist, along with a whole bunch of other things unworthy of mention, she can start writing her blog and see how long it takes to successfully bore each and every one of her friends and readers that intentionally or accidentally stumbles across this page.
WARNING: In case you hadn't already figured it out, this blog is subject to a fair amount of politically incorrect ramblings, pointless rants, and maybe if we're lucky some deep philosophical thoughts about the number 42 (if you don't get it, go read Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy instead of this blog). If you don't like me, don't know me, or don't even want to know me, you may be better off clicking that little red X up in the top right hand corner of your screen. Of course, if you've made it this far, you probably do know me or find what I have to say at least somewhat amusing or interesting, in which case I take no responsibility for addling with your mind, driving you insane, or otherwise damaging you by means of this blog. Nuph said.