Holiday Greetings from Simone Lokke
Hello Sue & Philomath Rotarians!
Here in Denmark I am doing very good! This past year has been great! The same summer I came home from Oregon, I started at "Holstebro (a city) Handelsskole" and "handelsskole" translated to English is "trading" school / business school. It's a school you go to if you want to work in the world of business - I don't quite know yet what I want to work with later on - or what I want to study later on.... But at least I'm heading for some kind of direction ;-) so I have been at that school for one and a half years now, and I'm doing really well! I miss speaking English every day - so I'll have to be satisfied by the 3 lessons (1 lesson = 1 hour) a week that I have :-( my grades are really good though and I made so many great friends there - I keep making new ones all the time - so I'm really enjoying it! Even though this 2nd year is supposed to be the hardest (I have one and a half year left before I graduate) - and I can feel it. We just had lots of exams here before Christmas - so yeah, LOTS of school work! When I'm not in school, I actually work a lot - it's nice to earn money :-) -
I still work at that beauty store that I have been working at since October 2009. It's a good place! I'm saving for when I'm moving out (won't be another 2 years because of my year-off when I'm done with "handelsskole")... The money will probably be spent before I move out since I will be traveling a lot during my year off. Well well... Life's about experiencing (and that would surely be by traveling) so that's okay ;-)
I actually stopped playing Squash since I needed a break. I have been playing that game now for 10 years so I started working out in the gym where I join classes such as Zumba (a new kind of dance - most women join this class - you've probably heard of it) and kick boxing etc. It's lots of fun!
Along with school, work and fitness I try to find time with my friends as well. Both with my new friends from where I go to school, but also my friends from my own town - it's kind of difficult though some times... The day should be extended from 24 to 28 or maybe 30 hours a day :-D that would help a lot!
The two following days we walked in the woods, watched a Christmas movie, ate more food and visited family for a Christmas reunion. Now I'm working again and soon it's New Year's... New Years in Denmark is always a HUGE party-day! Everybody goes crazy and it's really a big holiday for us! Lots of fireworks all day long - everywhere! It's great!
Oh and also, I should tell you, that we had the most amazing trip this summer to Oregon and the rest of the Western America. We had a lovely time visiting back in Philomath - I'm sad though that we didn't get to see each other. But I really expected everyone to be at the Frolic dinner, but not very many from the Rotary Club was there :-( sadly... And I didn't have my phone (well, Kelly's old one) so I couldn't just call you to meet up... We were so busy seeing all kinds of things while we were there - and we had a great time with all my families. We stayed a couple of days at the McLarens and a day at the Keese's. It was great to see everyone again!
One evening we had a "reunion" at American Dream Pizza where my parents bought everyone pizza and we sat and ate on the roof! Oh what a lovely night! Carson's family came too and a couple of days later his family and the Keese's went with us to the Philomath Frolic and Rodeo - my family was very entertained by the annual tradition :-) sadly Carson was not at home during my visit - he is in the Army - doing great of what I hear - we are still in touch. During the stay I bumped into several people all over the place - so I definitely got to see some of my friends from PHS - It was great!
Say hi to everyone in the Rotary Club from me! I miss you all very much!
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all of you!
Love, Simone |
Merry Christmas to you and your family as well! I hope you get the days off between Christmas and New Year. Me and my family we celebrated together this year and I just barely made it to Hamburg because I was flying from London to Luebeck on the 18th of December; the last flight that made it out of England for almost 5 days!
The girl grew up (1 inch, to be exact), went to Journalism school, became an English teacher, lived in France for some time, is presenting a radio program, is a manager of the building where she lives in. 'Enfin': she became an adult... However, all these years, I never stopped thinking about Oregon and what that experience meant to me. To be quite cheesy, I left Philomath but Philomath never left me. I'd never think I'd miss rain so much! 
Whenever you need some sunshine in your lives, you are more than welcome to visit me here in Brazil. I am not part of any Rotary Club but I've learned my lesson when I was there: you have to make the world small, after all. :)