This morning at school we watched and helped the first graders make cookies and crème de leche. I’m allergic, so I wasn’t able to taste it, but I heard it was very good. After that, we did some activities with the 5th graders. The first activity we did was answering different questions about our everyday life in America and compared them to different aspects of living in Argentina. The second activity was playing various games to bond together. My group played Pictionary, and it was a pretty entertaining experience. In the afternoon, we played paintball, which was a first time for me. It was very fun, and we played for the whole afternoon. By the end of it, I was extremely exhausted, but I had fun, which was all that matters to me. —Nathaniel
Rianna and I woke up at 6:30 after a sleepover. We’d stayed up late watching the Argentina vs. Chile game the night before. My exchange partner’s cousin made us chococcino, which is kind of like hot chocolate mixed with coffee. It was the perfect warm start to a cold morning.
The drive to Colegio de North Hills took a while because of traffic, but we still managed to be the first students to arrive, right at 8:00. Our first activity was making chocotorta with the first-year students. It’s made by dipping Chocolina cookies in milk, layering them in a pan, and spreading a mix of cream cheese and dulce de leche on top. You just keep repeating the layers until you run out of ingredients. I’d made it before, so I knew what to do, and it turned out just as good as I remembered.
Next, we met with the fourth years for a cultural exchange. We asked each other questions like “What are some similarities or differences between our cultures?” It was fun hearing their thoughts and telling them about our exchange trip, especially since some of them might sign up to go next year.
In the afternoon, a group of us left school early to go paintballing. When we got to the venue, all of us from Cary were surprised at how realistic it looked. It honestly felt like a little battlefield. We split into two teams, green and blue, and played a few rounds. Getting hit with the paintballs definitely stung, especially on bare skin. Sometimes the hits left behind more than just yellow paint. After three rounds, I was exhausted, so we headed home, showered off the paint, and took a quick nap before dinner.
That night we went to Zhao, an all-you-can-eat sushi place. It was pretty good, but I think the sushi back home is better. After dinner, we walked to Bruno’s house, Aaron’s exchange partner, since it was only about a ten-minute walk. Getting into his gated neighborhood was kind of a hassle with twenty of us showing our IDs, but we eventually made it in.
Rianna and I ended up leaving just a few minutes after we got there. It was already 1 AM and we were both wiped. My exchange partner’s cousin picked us up and we went straight to bed as soon as we got home. —Olivia
