Bio

Nadja's Bio

Hi! I am Nadja Häfliger, I am from the beautiful country Switzerland, no, it's not the whole year cold. I live in a little town called Grosswangen it is near to Luzern. I am 16 years old and I have one brother, he is 13 years old. I live with my mom, my dad, my brother in a house. My aunt, my uncle and my two cousins live in the same house, that is beautiful.

I used to play handball. I also like other team sports and swimming. I would like to learn surfing - who knows, perhaps here I get the chance. And for sure, I like snowboarding - the Swiss Alps are beautiful to do this. I also like listening to music, or reading and I love shopping. And of course I like to do something with my friends. Here in Florida I also like to lie on the pool or on the beach, or just see something new from the country and learn new things.

When I heard I will pass my exchange year in Florida I was just happy. When I was young I always wanted to go to Florida and swim with dolphins. I really like this weather here, it's so nice warm. I really like it here, it looks very different then at home but whatever, I love it, the other nature fascinated me really. Since the 4th of August I am living in Coral Springs, near to Fort Lauderdale. It is a nice village, I really like it here.

Now I wanna say thank you, thank my parents for giving me this chance, thank my sponsor club for all they did, thank my host club for all they already did and will do. And last but not least I wanna thank my host family, they took me so nice and gave me a really welcome feeling. I really like them, they are all so nice. They already showed me a lot of different things from America so I know a little more about the American culture.

October 26 Journal

I can't believe it, I am here for almost three months, time is going by so fast but it's a good time. My first school day wasn't so exciting, you have every class with all other people but now it's getting better and better. The school here is very different from Switzerland - you can choose all your classes, you have every day exactly the same schedule, sometimes a little boring, and we have every day off at 2.40, that's actually pretty cool. After school I have swim practice.

Then we had the inbound orientation, that was an amazing weekend, it was so cool to meet all the exchange student who are in Florida, but the time was too short, but it was so cool to see all these different cultures. You could tell that everybody feels the same like you, that's so amazing between exchange students, they all know exactly how you feel, and it's good to see that you are not crazy and that there are other people who feel the same like you.

My family is so nice, they are always here for me and show me new things. Once I went for example golfing with them, it was really fun. And I know when I need something or when I have a problem they will help me, that's pretty cool. They also took me to the beach, just after I got here, that was so cool, I mean for me the beach is vacation, always when I saw the beach I had to drive for at least five hours and then I was there for two weeks and then I had to say goodbye for a least one year, now I live 20 minutes away from the beach. But because they live so close to the beach it's nothing so exciting for them like for me, so they don't go so often.

We had a district weekend, that was so awesome. We learned a little bit more about the region around Miami. We went to the everglades and we saw alligators. Then we also made a boat trip and we had time to swim and we saw dolphins, that was so cool, when I was little I always wanted to see dolphins, now I actually saw, was pretty cool. When I saw all these things I had to say to me, you are actually here, sometimes I still can't believe it, I saw all these places before on pictures or TV and now I am actually here, that's so cool.

I went the first time in my life bowling. It was so much fun! It was a bowl-a-thon from my host club, yes, I really had fun.

It's the time around Halloween and Americans getting crazy, they're decorating their houses with Halloween stuff. In the Universal Studios in Orlando are the Halloween Horror Nights, I went there on last Friday with Yuki, it was so much fun and scary. There were people dressed like characters from scary movies on the streets and they scared you. Even though they weren't allowed to touch you I got scared. They would stand in front of you with their sometimes ugly or scary face, and just stare at you, and if you got the best, they would make noises, I really got scared sometimes.

I see here so many new things and I am pretty busy all the time, but that's good, so I can see more and learn more about the country. Because I can already tell how fast the time goes by, I don't feel like I am here for almost three months.