India - The Land Of Dogs, Camels, And Cows

Hiya! I just came back from India. It was very interesting. We saw lots of temples and animals. Since cows are holy, they're everywhere, even walking right across the street! We also saw tons of dogs. It was so sad to see them just lying there with their eyes shut and their fur filthy with dust and dirt and fleas. Anyway, we also saw lots of camels. Camel-carts were a popular way of transportation, so were these little yellow cars that sort of looked like taxis. Well, here are some pictures -->




- I forgot the name of this temple already, but it's pretty!

- I remember the name of this temple. The Taj Mahal.

- Me picking up the Taj Mahal. Always a classic.

- I'm not sure what this temple is called either, but then again, India has a lot of temples!

- Me inside a camel-cart. It was a very bumpy ride!

- Me riding a camel. This was even more bumpy! And even more terrifying!

- Cows!

- More cows!

- We also saw a snake charmer!

- Dogs!

 


       











                                                                      That's all for now!
                                                                         ;) Ariel                                        

Italia

Hi. In this post I am going to write about our recent trip to Italy.
Let me start from the beginning. We first took a bus to Gatwick airport. It was very long. Then we got off the bus when we reached Gatwick airport. Then we checked our luggage and went to our gate. We waited for our plane for a long time. Then we got on the plane. Then our plane took off.

  Then we rode the plane for approximately two hours and four minutes. Then we landed. Then we got off the plane. Then we picked up our luggage from baggage claim. Then we walked outside. Then we took a taxi to our hotel called Hotel Naples. Then we got to our hotel. Then we went to dinner. Then we went to bed. In the morning we went on a very long bus ride to Florence where we got a tour. We also went to a very famous museum and saw a very important statue called David. Then we went off to Rome and saw the Coliseum. While we were in Rome, we decided to

visit Pompei. I got to take back some of the volcanic rock that buried Pompei. We got to see some of the bodies that perished in the volcano explosion. We even got to see the ancient remains of the version of a Pompei fast food restaurant. We also had lots of pizza and pasta while we were there. Well that's all for now. Thank you. - Ariel                                          

This is me at platform 9 3/4 at King's Cross Station in London.

This is me flying into a wall.

This is me.

This is me with the one and only (back from the dead) Babe Ruth at Disneyland Paris.















 That's all. Bye.
                                                                      -Ariel

School News

Just some exciting school news to catch you up on:

1. There are 4 houses in my school. Red, Blue, Green, and Yellow. There are about 100 or so people in each house. Every house has 2 captains; a boy and a girl. I bet you can already guess the rest of my story before I write it but in case you don't I'll tell you. I got to be girl captain!

2. My school decided that because there's so much rain maybe we should get astroturf (fake grass) so the real grass doesn't get all mucky. They decided to make this a really big thing and have a contest for a logo that would be displayed on T-shirts, bags, the website, flyers, water bottles etc. Originally I wasn't going to enter a logo, but on the last day it could be turned in I decided I would. At my school's autumn fair, or fayre, as they spell it here, they announced the winner and it was me!

3. The Jack FM Breakfast show came to our school and interviewed each of the classrooms on what they had been working on through the past months. The teachers chose 2 or 3 people to speak for their classroom. I wasn't one of the people but I got to say "Good morning!" with about 13 other people who sneaked in with the speakers right before the recording.


                                         That's all for now! 
                                                            -Ariel

School pics

These are just a few picture of Laurel and I in our school uniforms. Enjoy!

                                                                                   
                  




























                                         Well, that's all!
                                               Bye for now!
                                                        Ariel

Taiwan

Hi! I haven't written for a while but I'm back! Since we couldn't connect to the blog in Taiwan, I have a lot to write about!
First of all, the weather is extremely humid! Which on some days was okay, because sometimes it got really cold in our hotel room. Speaking of our hotel room, we originally were put in a hotel that was still under construction! The hotel room was extremely small and stuffy which didn't help at all since it was so humid outside. The breakfast was okay but it didn't offer much. One time, when we were waiting for the elevator to come the one that came was nothing but a rough wooden box. no mirrors, no wallpaper, (or walls!), no railings, nothing. My mom said to get in but my sister said that she was definitely not going in an elevator that looked like the real Hollywood Tower of Terror! On our second day at the hotel, we got upgraded to a hotel that was much better than the other one. It was called the Dandy Hotel and it was really nice! The breakfast selection had a lot of food to choose from and most of it was pretty good. The rooms were amazing though! Each one had 2 twin size beds and a flat screen TV! Next to each bed was a nightstand built into the wall and a touch screen control panel that operated over 5 different lights in the hotel room! The toilet was one of those fancy ones that had a bunch of cool features you could pick from with the touch of a button. The experience we had in Taiwan was even better though. On one day we went to the 2nd tallest building in the world! Up until about 2 years ago it was the tallest building in the world! It is called Taipei 101 because it is 101 stories off the ground. Another day, we went to the Taipei Zoo and saw one of the world's most endangered animals. The Giant Panda. We also went into a nocturnal exhibit and it was really funny when a chinchilla would come down from his corner and jump around at the bottom but whenever Laurel came around to look at it, it would run back into his corner and stay still. Laurel was convinced that it wasn't moving from its corner, but whenever she left it would come down again! After we went to the zoo, we took a gondola ride up a mountain and got off at the top. We walked along the road for a bit (totally lost) but having walked 1 1/2 miles, found ourselves on an abandoned street. we realized that the only way to get back to our hotel was to walk 1 1/2 more miles back down the road and take the gondola back down the mountain where hopefully a shuttle would pick us up and take us to the city. Thankfully we got back to our hotel, but our feet were so sore that a few days later my mom, Laurel, and I all got foot massages! Laurel and I both got a shoulder rub and a foot spa but it was actually really painful because they pressed really hard on your back and my back was even more sore after it than before! My dad couldn't join us because he had to teach that day though. Speaking of which, my sister and I got to spend a day at the school but it was really weird because everybody was surprised that I was only staying for 1 day. I didn't even get to eat my lunch because I had brought a peanut butter sandwich and of course I had to be assigned to sit next to Sophia, who had to be allergic to peanuts, so I had to throw half my lunch away! While we were in Taiwan we also got to go to an awesome water park! One of the rides was really scary but really fun! You had to hold on to a rope and swing on it and then drop 50 feet when you were right above the pool! Another one of the rides was really painful though. It was also 50 feet above the pool but it was a slide. You were supposed to sit down with your hands behind your head and then slide down. What I didn't see the first time I went on was that at the end of the slide the water pushes you really harshly and if you were sitting up straight (like I was) it would send you flying into a 50-foot drop and landing in a belly flop. That's exactly what happened to me. Ouch! Well, I've written quite a lot now and you're probably getting bored of reading it all (if you're even still reading it) so I'll write more soon!


                             Bye for now,
                              Ariel

Rhythmic gymnastics and other random things

Hi again! Ariel didn't want to post anything right now, so I'll update you on what we've done. :) So, a few days ago, we went to our last Olympic event. We saw rhythmic gymnastics! 

It was definitely my favorite event to watch! The individual gymnasts preformed with either a ribbon or clubs (for juggling). 

It was really fun to watch, but after the 1st hour, all of the 'acts' pretty much looked the same. 

The entire event lasted 4 hours!!! It got pretty hot and stuffy in that building! (Is stuffy even a word???)

America didn't do very well (and Great Britain got last place). It wasn't a medal round, meaning that they were just competing to qualify for the final round and no medals were given. The top 8 got to go to the final round. I'm not sure which countries made it to the finals, but I know it did NOT include USA, Great Britain, or Canada.

The 2nd half of the event were group performances. I found those a lot more interesting to watch!!!

Oh! And for those of you who were wondering, USA didn't win this either!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I thought I would do another 'batch' of leftover pictures from various parts of our trip!

We saw this sign outside of a pub! It said, "Showing Here... That Sporting Event 

we aren't supposed to mention!!!" I guess that you can't advertise the olympics without permission! My mom found it really funny!

We went to Stonehenge!

This was the only real 'Modern Art' that we saw at the tate modern museum ;)

We saw Matilda the musical a few days ago. It was not my favorite! I couldn't understand what the kids were saying half the time and the special effects weren't all that special! I wouldn't really recommend this show, but it could just be me! I think Ariel liked it!

Mind the Gap!!! They say this everywhere here! "Please, mind the gap between the train and the platform..." Make sure to read this in a British accent!!

Tomorrow we are going to China for a week, and then to Taiwan for a week! It should be a pretty interesting week! I am not really sure what our internet will be like because I heard that china like, limits your access or something.... I hope this week will go by quickly!!!! I really want school to start! Yes, you heard me right. I think we are having a little too much family time. Anyways, I really need to go to sleep now. We are catching an early flight tomorrow! Wish me luck! -- Laurel :|

Olympic Soccer and Beach Volleyball

Hi it's Laurel again. We have had so many people tell us how much they enjoyed Ariel's last post, so I'm not sure if I'll be able to top that! ;) I'll tell her to post more soon though.

The day after we came back from France, we went to a Beach Volleyball game (part of the olympics.

We saw both men and women play. The men's teams were Latvia vs. Norway and women's teams were Holland vs. Brazil. Latvia won this match!

The women's game was very very close, but Brazil ended up winning.

This was a lot different from the gymnastics because it was outside, so it was super hot!!! It was still fun though.

The other event that we went to was Soccer (or 'football' as they call it here :) The teams that played were Japan and France.

Our seats were pretty high up!!! We had a really good view though.

And here we have my only problem with the game.... This guy decided to wear a super tall hat and sits directly in front of me!!!! Seriously?!?! Sweden wasn't even playing that day!!!!

Eventually, it bugged me too much so I made Ariel tell him to take it off........

....... Which he did, for about 10 minutes! Then he decided to be a genius (not) and push it down an inch! Thank you. That helps sooooo much.... :P

Japan ended up winning, but the game was so close! There were so many times in the game when France could have tied them 2-2. Like when France had a penalty kick and missed the goal by like, 5 feet! After the game ended we had to wait in a huge crowd to get on the train to go home! There were sooo many people there!

That's all for now! Keep watching the olympics! Go America! Thanks for reading! -- Laurel :)

P.S. Stay cool! I heard it's like 100 degrees in America! I hope you all survive the heat!

Tate Museum

Today we went to the Tate Modern Museum, and it was just as boring as all the other museums. The only thing that made this one different from all the others was the really weird paintings. The whole art gallery had things that were seen every day yet they became famous! Now I have hope in becoming a famous artist! Here are some pictures of the weird art pieces:

     Scribbles! Can you believe it?
     A two-year-old could have done
    this! I can't believe it became famous!






 


      A block of marble? This art is 
     supposed to be by adults, not toddlers!




















   This person probably just found some
   dirt on his porch and made it art. I 
   guess it isn't that hard to be an artist!


















  This looks like a toy that a dog would
  have played with. Maybe the artist's 
  dog got tired of it.





















  I could barely see this piece. A piece of
  white construction paper cut into a 
  deformed hexagon is what it looks like!

  
  Can you believe that this piece was 
  called "The Snail"? I see NO 
  resemblance to a snail in this!

  The Tate Museum DEFINITELY
  wouldn't be the same without this...
  um... block of wood!






















  For all I know this person spent
  like 2 minutes making this!

















  I don't know if this is just a vent
  or an art piece. Because in this 
  museum it's hard to tell! 

  Even the workers were bored!
  I don't blame them!


















 That's all for now! Thanks for reading!   Ariel :)