Hello girls & boys,

eventually, I found time to write once again — sorry for having you wait more than six weeks. Ironically, that’s around the amount of time which I got left here. Admittingly, the year has flown by quicker than I ever dared to imagine. Anyway, I hope you’ll have a nice read learning about what happened in here the past weeks!

Firstly, from March’s end until April’s one, Aveiro was home to a comparably adorable funfair, going by the name of “Feira de Março”. Throughout different occasions, I got to be there three times in that very time span — one time with a few classmates, the next one with my little hostbrother and the third one with some friends. Naturally, I went full sassy mode and just conquered one single — for my standards scary — roller coaster in all of these three times. Other than that I actually managed to bloodily wound my knee in one of the many bumper car rides I had and I still have absolutely no idea how that scratch came to be… Even though my natural antipathy against funfairs, I have to say that I certainly will remember this one in a more positive way!

Another story worth to be told is the one about the night, in which I came to dance on stage with Portugal’s most terrible singer — Maria Leal. (A video of an appearance on television, in which she completely embarrassed herself, went viral with actual 4 million clicks on YouTube.) All started off with the German exchange student girl, who I previously had visited in São João da Madeira, coming to visit me for two days. Since it just had to be we — what a cliche — went out the night she stayed, together with the older one of my two hostbrothers. At first, we got ourselves a hang of Aveiro’s nightlife and ironically there actually was an AFS volunteer meeting in the city that night… When we met a bunch of them on the street, they were telling us not to drink too much while questionably blinking. So until 1AM or something we stayed in the city and after, we came back to the village of Vagos, in where we attended a Maria Leal concert, which actually took place there in some coffee shop. I got to admit that seemingly 99% of the people just came to take selfies and gossip about how bad she sings. Well, not so the german girl and me — being not completely sober any more, we thoroughly celebrated her terrible show and when she started calling out people to come on stage, we saw our chance. In the end, her, my little hostbrother and me came to perform hilariously furious dance moves next to Maria Leal — living the Z-list celebrity dream… The next day there actually was posted a cringeworthy compilation of that concert on Maria Leal’s Facebook page, which was — gently put — terribly horrifying, viewing it soberly. On top of all of this comes that that night actually was my older hostbrother’s first one going out — perhaps an unforgettable one.

Farther, the week after next, my school was to host an annual event for a few schools, going by the name of “Colour Run”. It ended up being some strange race through the city with people splashing colour over us approximately every 100 meters. At first, it kind of made me pretty mad that we had to run behind some guy cycling in front of us for the first two thirds of the track. Just then we could put in our effort to go fast, which in my case actually got me to win the whole thing it in the end. After that, all the participants got to throw the previously acquired bags of colour in the air on the square in front of my school, creating a giant colour-cloud monstrosity. All in all it definitely was a cool and unique experience, which I wouldn’t have wanted to miss!

The following weekend, I eventually got to visit the beautiful city of Braga. I was able to travel to there within an AFS Aveiro “flash trip” together with a few other exchange students and volunteers. The tour through the city actually was the first ever activity organised by the just recently iniated AFS committee of Braga — and it was awesome! At the beginning of it, we had breakfast next to a super picturesque square including a church. Then, after having stopped at some NGO to drop off some rice for refugees, we got to the real deal: visiting most parts of the town while completing a previously started paperchase, which Braga’s volunteer squad created for us. Even though we didn’t get to see the famous Jesus statue because of time limits, we were able to see a lot of Braga’s picturesque centre and sights while also grasping the city’s inherent spirit. Braga certainly is one of the most beautiful and historic cities in Portugal and well worth the toil to go there!

Eventually, past week, there also were some noteworthy things going on. Firstly, there came some lorry, which was carrying the trophy of the European football championship 2016 and the shoes with which Éder scored the deciding goal, to its stop in Aveiro on its way all around the country. People were able to go there and take a look and since most Portuguese are overly obsessed with football (these two objects are practically like national treasures for them) there naturally was quite some rush. I also went there to take a brief look, accompanying a football obsessed classmate and later on summing up my personal emotions towards football perfectly with an overly vague and seemingly weird Instagram post.

Secondly and unluckily, I managed to get myself a nasty shoulder impingement that week — after living the Muay Thai grind in expectation of an amateur bout for a few weeks. The injury is holding me back pretty heavily and hence really pisses me off. By now I have spent a noteworthy amount of time researching it and — stupidly proud as I am — going the route of self-treatment. Concludingly, I definitely don’t wanna let this thing get me down!

And thirdly, I watched this year’s version of the Eurovision song contest, which ironically was won by Portugal’s Salvador Sobral, yesterday evening. The one amazing thing about that (and the reason for me to be obligated to mention it in here) is that he and his sister, who wrote the beautiful song he performed, both once were AFS exchange students in the US — while he went there back in 2007/08 she did so 3 years earlier. Anyway, I have to say that the song was inherently beautiful and even more so by being able to understand the Portuguese language, in which it is written, what I actually do pretty well by now.

To find some fitting ending words… I’ll certainly try to enjoy the weeks, I have left, to the fullest! I am indeed kind of psyched for my return since I finally will be able to largely experience in what ways I changed. Also, I do already know that I will host a Norwegian guy next school year — and I’m definitely looking forward to that as well! On the contrary, I inevitably will leave some part of myself in here, but it doesn’t really affect my mood since I simply know that I’ll certainly return from time to time. I still love you, Portugal. (And you too, steady readers!)

Julian