Exchange isn't a year in your life, it's your life in a year.: Grand Rapids

This past weekend I went to the Central States Rotary Youth Exchange conference in Grand Rapids. There were about 1300 people overall- volunteers, parents, rebounds, inbounds, outbounds, and Rotarians. I met so many wonderful people and became a lot closer to the people I already did know. Here's an incomplete breakdown of what we did at this conference:

Thursday July 11th
We had a long bus ride- left Green Bay at 7, arrived in Grand Rapids at 6 (Michigan time). Registered, ate dinner, checked into our rooms, missed our first meeting because we were late, and hung out with tons of exchange students. We were all out on the lawn in the middle of the campus and pretty much just running around looking for people who were from, going to, or back from our host country. It was nice to have conversations with people from all over the world; so many of these exchange students were such great ambassadors for their countries, and I learned about countries I didn't know much about before. Over the course of the weekend I met 1 girl from Argentina (besides Flor and Paz, the wonderful inbounds that I roomed with at the previous conference), 1 rebound back from Argentina, and 3 other girls going to Argentina. Out of the 3 other outbounds, 1 is leaving in August, and the other 2 are leaving in January and don't know where they're going yet. That night we also had a dance, which was so amazing. Exchange students are great dancers, it's a fact.

Friday July 12th
I woke up early and because none of my roomates were up yet I decided to go to breakfast alone. I love that at this conference you can just sit down at a table and people will fill you into the conversation and you're instantly friends, there's no awkwardness about it. Throughout the course of the day we had various meetings, which were really helpful, but probably the highlight of the day was the opening ceremonies. This was the first time everyone was all in the same room (all 1300 of us filed into the auditorium), the outbounds carried in the flags, everyone was cheering, and the energy from this point to the end of the conference was just fantastic. We had some wonderful speakers throughout the conference, and they were great. On Friday night we had another dance which was so much fun, high energy, and there was great music. I'm not sad that I'm going to miss prom at all- dancing with exchange students is a thousand times better, plus we got to eat pizza and there was not nearly as much drama as there would be at prom.

Saturday/Sunday
These days were by far the best, and I'm grouping them together because we didn't get any sleep and they really just blend together. We had meetings which were fun, but we also had a Brazil vs. the World soccer game- Brazil won, pin trading (where I completely ran out of pins, but got some really cool ones), a "Welcome Home to the Rebounds" ceremony, a variety show with some SERIOUS talent, a great dance, and then curfew was one on Saturday, but we all went to the basement and talked all night. At 5 Sunday morning we all came upstairs, watched the sunrise together and then played a game of beach volleyball, which was definitely hilarious. It was 6:30 in the morning, and literally none of us had slept in 24 hours, plus we're not really athletic to begin with, so it started out as volleyball but ended with 'let's just chuck the ball over the net and see how long we can hit it back and forth'. We had breakfast, packed the bus up and left. One of my favorite outbounds, Christy, couldn't ride the bus, so I was kind of a mess during breakfast, and it was hard saying goodbye. We all slept the first half, but after we stopped for lunch in St. Ignace, MI, the bus was a lot more awake. We realized that this would be the last time we see each other until Grand Rapids next year, or even after that. It's so weird to think that exactly a year from today not only will my exchange year be done, but so will next year's Grand Rapids conference. We'll all be near fluent in another language, have tons of new friends and memories, and have changed for the better.

I'll be leaving somewhere around a month. That means I have less than 5 weeks in the United States to finish getting ready. I feel like I'm in between right now- Grand Rapids is over and now I'm just anxiously waiting for Argentina. I'm so confused; my emotions are being pulled in all different directions- I love the people I've met, as I feel like I've known them all my life, and I can't wait to meet more, but there are people I've actually known all my life who I'm going to miss. There's a world of unknowns, which is why I'm scared and excited and nervous and anxious and happy and sad and confused. It's only a year, but so much will change. I feel like it's all starting to feel real. The emotion that continues to overpower everything is excitement!

I'm just SO EXCITED.

Here's a picture from the conference with some of the most amazing people ever. I really wish I had a picture of all of the outbounds, as they're all so great, but here's 5 of the 24. Photo credit to the wonderful Sarah Bauer.