MYEXPERIENCE

England is a beautiful and place I would always wanted to go. Its a historical city. friendly people everywhere , always open to help you. The travel was fabulous around of england, i interacted with different people. Classes were really interactive, the last days i was feeling kind of sad because I was really happy and I thought that my english was improve.

MY LAST WEEK: ACTIVITIES - CLASSMATES

HASTINGS OLD TOWN

AQUARIUM

AQUARIUM

AQUARIUM

MY CLASSMATES

SIMONI

BYE BYE HASTINGS

LONDON

LONDON 
at 8 o’clock we went to London, by bus , we arrived at 10 o’clock. we went to Buckingham Palace near to Victoria Memorial. we saw typical lions in a big park ,then we went to Piccadilly Circus and we had our free time , in our free time. Our group went to Mac Donald’s and took our lunch there. we went to M&M´S WORLD ,it’s amazing it’s so big and wonderful chocolate world I couldn’t believe ,in M&M´S one big toy hit me ! Then we bought some souvenirs .
At 2 o’clock we went London eye , we were tired but we always want to met more ! In london eye we could see all London , we could see Big ben it was pretty amazing , at the night we went to LONDON BRIDGE I was so nervous because I have seen in many Disney movies , this trip to London remember me that I can come true my dreams ,because I saw many things that I never thing that I would see and finally I had the fortune to see my dream coming true. although I was tired I thought it was worth it. Ciro told us that we had to love our parents and tell them our experience and the most important we had grateful whit God because he gave this amazing opportunity .
In our second day in London we went to MADAME TUDDAUDS , I only can say that I met ROBERT PATTISON AND IT WAS MY BEST DAY IN MY LIFE

Our last day in Hastings

Friday... after 27 day full of experiences it as time to say goodbye,that day we all had mix feeling, it was good know that we would be back to see our family, friends and everyone that we love but also knowing that we will be leaving behind the place that had been your home for almost a month, where we had proven everyone that we are capable of taking care of ourselves and that we had been totally free, free of responsibilities.

In class I say goodbye to all my partners and good friends that I made in the last month, I thanked everyone for everything, and I share the last class with them.

After coming out of class we ate the last lunch in England and after that Dexter had one last activity planned for us... we shared a cake goodbye and that was it, out last day of school...
Then we went for the last time to the town center and did the last minute shopping, drank the last milkshake and bought the last candies in Poundland.

When I came home I finished packing and had the last dinner, then I got ready and when it was time a said bye to my mom, Sabrina and of course poppy and then I left. I got in the bus that would take us to the airport.
We got to the airport with five hours of anticipation, finally we did the check in and got just in time to the airplane. I sat down  and was there when i realized that my time in England was over...

MY THIRD WEEK

So, in our third week we ate fish and chips. I didn’t like. we always went to town center , mostly because we love shopping ;we drank shake and we had our favorites stores , went to accessorize or clairs for bought presents it was cheaper than others. On Thursday we went to cinema, we saw Paranorman It was kind of boring and stupid; when we was in the cinema Ciro slept during the movie.
more students Arrived to our class, they were from Kuwait; somebody of them came from India , he was 16 and he was like Justin Biber he also had a friend from Turkish , in the group of new classmates was aslo a chinese guy !ELVIS! , every time we saw him we shout him: HI ELVIS!! And his answer always was a smile.

ELVIS!!!!

Rye...

Thursday... That day we went to Rye a small town with and interesting History, there we saw a show base on a model of the city that told the history of the city,  The city has charmed many important artist such as Johnny Deep who was really interest in buying a property of the city.

Alexandra Park

Tuesday... We went to Alexandra Park that afternoon, that  park is the biggest park of Hasting it has many lakes inside it and nature predominates, as we walked we could  hear the birds, leaves falling the wind passing by, that  was an excellent place to get way and forget about the world for a while.Then we went to a Cafe and share a cup of coffee and a piece of cake then we spend the afternoon there surrounded buy the nature breathing fresh air.  

PARIS! Je t'aime

Paris!!
I love Paris, Paris it’s a big city, the magical dream most of us have, get to the romantic and classic Paris. The favorite city where many movies had taken place, histories like Ratatouille, or different kind of love histories! Paris is magical, stweet for relationships . you must go there when you get marry .We went to EIFFEL TOWER, its magical, it’s big, it’s AMAZING!!.In the top floor it was a bar. On Sunday we went to NOTRE DAME I remember my sister because she loves Quasimodo then we went to MONTMARTRE .after that we went to VERSAILLES , it has many rooms and rooms and it’s so big. Fabulous view with the amazing gardens. We could only had the view, we didn’t go there because we didn’t have time. finally we went to LOUVRE ,I met Monalisa!

MY FRIENDS!

NOTRE DAME

LOUVRE

ARC DE TRIOMPHE

St Leonard..

Monday.... As always was raining and we went to other part of Hastings, St Leonard, we walked through a beautiful park while Dexter was telling us the story of the that part of the city, then he took us to look the Hastings Graffiti and graffiti made by Banksy, Banksy is a well known graffiti artist around the world and his work criticizes political, morality and social and economic structures, and then we went to the beach,although it was a rainy afternoon we play a little with the waves, we started running when the waves came to us, other girls didn't mind to get wet and went into the sea.

That night we did a similar walk around St Leonard but this time was a ghosts walk, Dexter took us to the places that had legends of ghost being around. some off the girls scare off easily and other took advantage of that and took every opportunity to scare them off , it was quite funny but it was also cruel

ALICE`S BROTHER!

Camila always say her : "Alice i want to be you sister-in- law"

My second week

 We went to Hastings old town and we went to museum about fisherman. It was small we took around 15 minutes to walked around it ; we went to a typical house that has a scary history because it was a barber shop and when barber killed who killed every man that goes to that place , they also say that her wife made cupcakes whit parts of body. It was a scary history because Aidan (Alice´s brother, he was a singer) told that the demon barber of Fleet Street was inspirits for that history!! .on Wednesday we went to the swimming pool, i love go to the swimming pool and i enjoyed it . Then we have dinner at Mac Donald’s .On Wednesday evening we change our host family , we were alone whit Stefy and she hates us, we were loosing our change to practice the language .our new family was amazing!! they were old but they had 1 child her name was William ,he was a gentle with us . On Tuesday went to BodiamCastle . On Friday we went to our trip to Paris!!!! 

BARBER

WILLIAM!

BODIAM CASTLE

Madame Tussauds...

Sunday.. That day we went to Madame Tussauds it is the most recognized wax museum of the world, there are important politic figures, singers, bands, actors, actresses, athletes,the royal family people that have change the history of the world and character of really famous movies and TV series all made of wax. It's incredible how those figures look so real.  I was thrilled when I saw actors like Johnny Deep, Leonardo Di Caprio, Brad Pitt and George Clooney , also a took pictures with The Beatles, and Elvis, I sat in the desk of president Obama, and I put on the Iron Man suit.Also inside the museum is a 4D experience of the Avengers, there you had to joined the avenger on a mission to safe the The Majesty the Buckingham palace and London from a giant robot.

In the afternoon we had free time to go shopping in Oxford street where you could find  many many designer shops.

London...

Saturday.. Our first day in London, that day we took advantage of every single second we had there, as soon as we arrived we took the subway to Green park, we walked through the park to go to the Buckingham Palace,the palace is the home of the royal family, when we arrived we were just in time to see the changing of the guard at the palace, the ceremony is beautiful it lasts 45 minutes and it is when the old guard that is at the palace  it's replaced by the new guard, the whole ceremony is accompanied by traditional military orchestra and what everyone expects to see are the guard dressed in their characteristics uniforms and their funny long black hats.

From Green park we walked to Piccadilly Circus, I thing that what caught  the attention of everyone were the beautiful fountain located in the middle of the street and the M&M's world that was there, The store was exclusively of M&M's, candies, clothes, accessories, everything of   M&M's.

After being in Piccadilly Circus,we walked to the Big Ben Tower, and off course we took as many pictures of the monument as we could , from there everything is close so we walked to the the Westminster abbey and  then we walked along the Thames river enjoying the beauty of the city that surrounded us.

Around six in the afternoon we were at the London eye (also known as he Millennium Wheel) it is a 135 mts high giant Ferris wheel and it was finished in 1999, when we got in we had the most spectacular view of London at the sun set, the tour lasts about half and hour, 35 minutes and from the highest point we could see London's emblematic places (The Big Ben for example). When we came down of the London eye we went to the London Eye 4D experience.

Then we continued walking along the Thames and after walking for hours we finally got to the tower bridge, things over night change and that is true, the bridge was all illuminated it looked perfect, at that point we were all exhausted, we had been walking the whole day non stop and the only thing that we wanted was to go to bed but seeing the bridge was our reward and it gave us the power up that we needed to finish the day. We walked through it enjoying every detail of it knowing that that moment was unique and special.

OXFORD

CAMBIRDGE

Excursion to OXFORD –CAMBRIGEOn Saturday we went to Oxford, luckily it was a sunny day! we went with Austrian women and men, they was in our school for a few weeks; I like oxford because is an university city that is old , it had a lot of history . In oxford many intelligent people go there and study. Due to it’s a well known university you have to have a lot of money . I think if you want you can do it!! .when we had our shopping time I went to STARTBUCKS COFFE and also I bought a sweater in Primark then we went to Christ church as seen in Harry Potter movie , I didn’t like because I hate Harry Potter.On Sunday we went to Cambridge it was a rainy day. In Cambridge we went to kings college, also history places and then we had our free time, our shopping time, however I didn’t buy many things only a cup of coffee. I went to Primark with my friends then we went to our meeting point and it was incredible because camila saw a Spain boy that we met on my birthday!!

Brighton...

Thursday... We went to Brighton that day, the weather was perfect the sun was shinning, it wasn't windy and there was not a single cloud in the sky. We got there by train and it took us about 40 minutes to get there from Hastings, there we visited Brighton's Pier, it was really beautiful, on the pier it was an amusement park with everything that a park has, it had roller coasters, an arcade, a horror house,bumper cars and all the things characteristic of it. We had an awesome time , I laughed a lot, with and of my friends, seeing their  shocked faces at the roller coaster and when they screamed when they saw the sea coming to them, their expressions where priceless.

After spending sometime at the pier we had free time to do what every woman loves doing... going shopping.

Hastings town quiz..

Wednesday... that afternoon the weather was awful... so  we stayed at the school, we played a game,kind of a trivia, the questions were about general history, English history and Hastings history, they were three different round and at the end of each round each group would score point for each correct question that it had, so at the end the group with more points would win. My group and I won that game, for half of a point ( but it doesn't matter, we won) our price was a beautiful medal, and a bucket of chocolates, we had lots of fun that day,at the end what really matter was the thing that we had learned...

Hastings castle and Smuggler´s caves

Tuesday...  that day we went to the Hastings Castle (or well what is left of it), this castle was an important part of the English history, it was built by William of Normandy  in 1066  few days before of Hastings Battle, it was built as fortress to help prevent form invasions, part of the castle was destroyed because when the cliff that it was built on collapsed because of the weather.

In the old days when the government raised up the taxes Hastings was a strategic place for smuggling, the smugglers imported thing from France without paying taxes to the Royal family and most of the people in Hasting was involved because smuggling was a really profitable and lucrative activity. Now in Hastings there is a place where called smugglers caves where the history of the smugglers' is told, also the mean of smuggling and the routes the the people used, there are like some games to show the life of the smuggler and short plays that make the experience more interactive. 

My first week

we arrived to London al 10o’clock, i was so nervous because i was living my dream! and i was so tired and angry because ONE OF MY suitcases didn’t have one wheel and in the plane i COULDNT SLEEP , in the plane i met a German women and she told me that she loved Colombia, in deed her husband was from Colombian . AFTER WE ARRIVED , WE TOOK A BUS to Hastings at 12 o’clock .and then we went to our houses. my family was from Indian. They were nice whit us, they live in a loVely house with their son Sammer ,who was born in 2004 , and their daughter Nirvana , who was born in 1997.when i saw our at first sight I liked it, it was small and comfortable. Our mother told us the rules house : we had to do for made our breakfast and lot of things in the house that i didn't usually back at home . in the morning we WOKE at 8 o’clock , we took a shower, we organized our room , made our beds. Then we went downstairs, to the kitchen exactly after we made our breakfast (toast and nutella ) in the kitchen. There was another student her name was stefy and she was from Colombia too however she never talked to us in Spanish ,she showed us the way to our school . in our first day of class we met our teacher, her name was Valerie, she was old she looked like my grandmother . in our first week we had a lot of activities, like : went to Easbourne , Eastbourne was a small town but it was a good place for shopping ,we went to roller disco i love it, i learned skate (roller skate) . On Friday I turned 16, yes, it was my birthday !!!!!! we went to bowling tough I was bad at it. Then I went with my friends to the town center and where we met some Spain boys!

My classroom

Our meeting point

Our last day in Paris.. :(

That day we didn't have the whole day because we had to go back to England, but we had enough time to visit the Louvre, it is one of the most important museums of the world, most of us recognized  because inside of it it's one of the most controversial and known paintings of the world: The Gioconda or the Mona Lisa the most famous work of  Leonardo Da Vinci, from him there were other famous pieces like The Virgin of the Rocks,La belle Ferronière and St. John the Baptist, but beside that the Louvre is home for art collections of all parts of the world (Egyptian antiquities, Near Eastern antiquities,Greek, Etruscan, and Roman,Islamic art, Sculpture,Decorative arts,Painting,Prints and drawings), it has 445 000 pieces in display and 60 500 m² are galleries. Something that I loved of the museum were the ceilings, they were master pieces, hand painted and each one was different from the other one,  some of the paintings were as big as a wall. Also inside the museum there is a replica of  how the apartment of Napoleon would look like.

Second day in Paris.

Montmartre

Montmartre is a hill of 130 meters high, on the top of it is located  Sacré Cœur Basilica it's 80 miters high and it was finished in 1919 after the end of the WW I,  behind it it's located the painter square,as the name  says all the artists congregate there to show their talent and amazing work, beautiful and unique paintings. when we came down of Montmartre we went to the Moulin Rouge the famous Parisian Cabaret. 

Notre Dame 

Notre Dame is a Gothic Style cathedral, its was built it was finished in 1345 and it was dedicated to the Virgin Mary, It is one of the most important places  of Paris. Inside the chapel the light doesn't come so the cathedral is really dark, also inside it there is a museum that was clothing of the priest and religious elements most of them made of silver and gold, and with embedded diamonds. On the outside of the cathedral you could see the gargoyles so characteristic of Notre Dame.

Château de Versailles

Or Palace of Versailles, it was finished in 1692 and it was home to the king Louis XIV, also was the political center of France in the XVII century, the palace is a magnificent building, everything is gold plated and everything is characteristic of the wealthy royal family, the palace has many many room and each of them is decorated with unique paintings, the ceilings are like a huge paintings, all the building if full of sculptures, behind of the palace there are the representative gardens of the palace that has over 200.000 trees.

  

First day in Paris...

When arrive to Paris we drove around the most important and emblematic places of the city, we went through the Arc de Triomphe, Champs Elysees, The Parliament, The obelisk, The French Academy of Music, Louvre Museum and many other places.

When we got to the hotel we just had time to leave our luggage. Then we left the Hotel and took the subway, when we got off of it we found ourselves in front of the Eiffel Tower... I thing that the first time I saw it was one of the happiest moments of my life, to be that close of it is something inexplicable, I think that going to Paris is the dream of every little girl and finally being there knowing that your dream has come true is priceless. We all started to take pictures of the tower from all the angles and positions possible.

We all wanted to go up the tower but first we went on a tour in the Seine river, the river crosses all the center city so that was the best way of knowing the most important parts of Paris, each one of us had it own audio tour that told the history of each place that we were passing by.

The Eiffel Tower...

After the tour in the Seine, we finally could go up to the Eiffel Tower. The tower is 325 meters high, 325 meters of magnificent structure,as you come close to it, it becomes more impressive, it has 3 different viewpoints, the highest one is located at 280 mts high (281 mts. if you are really tall), from there you have the most amazing view of the city, there I forgot about everything that was around me,about the problems, about everything that worried me... There I felt free. I was with a friend and we took all the time of the world to go down of the tower by the stairs detailing every single thing of it enjoying every second  and recording everything in our memories.

Trip to Paris...

We had the amazing opportunity of going to Paris, so the day that we started our trip our day started really early, or well it didn't kind of started because it was really dark, the bus had to left the school like at 2 am, it had to be that early because the trip was long and we had to catch the ferry that was leaving at 4:30 am and from Hastings was two hour drive to Dover port. From there was an hour and half by ferry to until Calais the port in France,and from Calais was a three hour drive to Paris.The whole journey was unique, we didn't mind to wake up that early because we knew that it was worth it

Bodiam Castle..

Thursday.. That afternoon we went to Bodiam Castle, it was a typical castle of the medieval times, on the outside it kept the image of an ancient castle,on in inside it was a bit deteriorated over time and it was surrounded by a lake.

The castle still had it towers, so if you went up to the highest part of them you could admire the beautiful landscape that was around the castle. Also an old lady that was there explained to us how a dinner with the king would have been at that time, the food that would've been served and how the people at the time would be and look like

That night we had the visit of Sor Gilma, she was there in a business trip, but she took some time to go and visit us, she was with us that night and asked us how our experience had been so far, she also had a present for us brought directly from Colombia, she had for as yoguetas!!,yes its true that English candies are really good but there is nothing like a Colombian candy when you are far from home.  

View from Bodiam Castle 

Hastings old town..

Tuesday... Hastings is divided in 3 sections, one of them is Old town, in the old town are located the best pubs of the city, that day we walked through that part of the city knowing parts of the city history, we passed  by the original house of Sweeney Todd the demon barber, before moving to London he lived in Hastings and all the killing thing started there because the woman he loved didn't love him back so he decide to kill her.

We also passed by a house that looked as a slice of cheese and we visited the fishermen museum, there was explained all the fishery activity, and the importance of it in Hastings. 
   
                                                           Sweeney Todd's House

                                                               
                                                                  Cheese House

                         
                                                              Fishermen museum