happy day!

new haircut, Mountain Dew at lunch, AND a package from home! What a good day...

Thanks to all the Southside people. I was so excited to get everything! particularly the kool-aid...that stuff is like gold here. I don't see why the rest of the world hasn't picked up on what an amazing invention kool-aid is. It's cheap, tasty, and conveniently packaged! While they're at it, they should start selling vanilla extract. They sell vanilla flavored sugar instead. It isn't the same. We also tried to buy brown sugar the other day. We thought we had found it -- the label had a picture, and the name translated to "brown-sugar." Easy, we thought. Imagine the surprise when we tried it and realized it was actually brown-colored sugar that was strawberry flavored (also available in lemon and cinnamon). We've been told that there actually is brown sugar here, but I'm not quite sure how else to find it!
Oddly enough, it is easy to find Cheeto's. Who knew?

I have been testing out the wide variety of candy bars available at the local CBA, which is like a mini-mart down the road. I worked up the courage to try the most Hungarian of all treats, the Turo Rudi. Most Americans can't handle it, but it wasn't bad. Just...strange. It's a chilled bar with dark chocolate covering some kind of cheese, similar to ricotta. So apparently this turo stuff can go into both lasagna and dessert! Weird.

Parent orientation was last night. Not many high school parents came, but it was fascinating to see the wide range of students here. There are naturally a lot of Americans, but also Chinese, Korean, Estonian, Brazilian, Hungarian...there was even a sign language interpreter for the deaf! It's amazing to me that a school of 200 students has 15 different nationalities represented. What a cool place to work.

pics of the hair coming soon... let's just say it's a big change! :)