First Day of School

First thing I learned today: follow the advice of people who went before you. Against everyone's advice, I decided to wear a dress. I love dresses and I wear them all the time at home so I thought it'd be normal! When I got to school, I was the only girl not wearing skinny jeans and converse. I could not have stuck out more in my pink dress. Everyone looked my way when I walked by, knowing I was new. The good thing about today is I didn't have to talk much. Just like back home, the first day, the  teachers talked about their class, expectations, blah blah blah. At least I could understand it back home. Here, no matter how hard I tried to pay attention, I would space out after 5 or 10 minutes. By last period "Lengua" (Language) class, my brain was fried.

me on the first day!

I expected people to be more welcoming. The teachers never really addressed me, but it was clear they all knew I wasn't from Spain. Only the biology teacher tried to have a conversation with me, which only lasted a minute or two because there was nothing we could talk about. As for the students, they were as chaotic, troublemaking, and talkative as any highschooler. The hard thing is, I know that if I were back home, I'd be the one socializing with my friends in the hallways, running up to people I hadn't seen all summer to give them hugs. Today though, I was that awkward new kid. I went to the class I was suppose to and I sat where I was suppose to, without talking to anyone. I've never been a new kid before, so it was odd. I did think though, that the students would be more welcoming. At least at my school back home, whenever there's a foreign exchange student, everyone wants to get to know them. No one would ever be mean to a foreign exchange student. But this school is not my school. At their equivalent of recess, I was once again awkwardly standing with a group of my host sister's friends and a group of guys kept looking at me. They would say something, obviously I don't know what, and then point, or laugh, or jump around from excitement. I just hated it because there was nothing I could do, definitely nothing I could say, so I just stood there and let them make fun of me.

Sometimes during the day, it took every once of strength I had not to cry. Being in a strange school, with a bunch of kids I have never met, all speaking a language I know just a little about... It was a lot. Everything at once is hard. Having a hard time at home, and then going to school and also having a hard time.. it's just not fun. It's only the first day so I hope that it will get better. Everyone keeps saying it will but they don't have to live through the hard times.

I really wish I had someone to go to. Not someone online, someone who's actually in the room with me. Someone who can comfort me and give me advice and make me laugh when I'm about to cry. I miss having that.

So the first day of school was hard, and i'm sure there will be many more hard days, but I'm still hopeful. I'm not giving up.