Youth Leadership Program - The adventures of Estonians in the USA

Hello guys from Bloomington! We've been here since Friday and for me it have been really awe some time to be in U.S. But lets start with Friday - we ate breakfast and learned some teamwork, individual things and packed our things. When the bus took us, we drove to Bloomington. It was really sad to leave because there was so many amazing people around you. But the knowledge that we are going to meet  our host-families, today, took over all emotions. Baltic States youth before meeting their host-families in Indiana University Now the next thing - host-families. New family for two weeks. We get their names on Friday and about 3 hours after that we met them. I were so exited because I didn't knew nothing about them. My and Agathe's host family: (left) Agathe, Carmen, Vanessa, Ryan, Carsyn and Ashlyn. On Friday we talked and got to know everyone. On Saturday we started day with garage sales, which was amazing and everything was so cheap. Why don't we ha

After the adventures in New York City we boarded a plane to Indianapolis at around 10PM, which means that we arrived at 1AM but that wasn’t the end of our trip because we had a bus waiting for us. After a sleepy trip on the bus we arrived at Rawhide rancho, by that time the clock was past 2.30AM. The next morning we had breakfast at 9AM, where we met the lithuanian group for the first time. For breakfast we had something really american: slices of fat pancakes with maple syrup, bisquicks with gravy, sausages and smashed eggs. The food was great and filled up our empty stomachs fast. After the meal we had team building games, where we got to know each other and meet the people we are going to be with for the next 3 weeks. The games were tricky, because we had to communicate with each other and use our best leadership skills. In the end we learned the most by failing at some tasks, after which we examined our mistakes and improved upon them.  As time passed we were hungry once ag

We have said here the word adventure a lot of times - our way to USA really was an adventure. We are more than happy to invite you to the road to Indiana with us... Sorry, to New York! At 5am in the morning waiting for our flight at our beautiful little airport in Tallinn So it begins! On the early morning of 17th July we started our journey from Tallinn Airport to the USA. Everything was going smoothly until the captain of our flight to Newark announced the delay of plane because of the weather. And soon even more surprising news were on the way: our flight to Indianapolis was cancelled. Which ment for us a whole day and evening at New York City. This turned out to be a wonderful evening exploring the Time Square and an amazing day visiting Brooklyn bridge, walking around Central park and discovering Chinatown. Of course not everything was going smoothly, but it was an awesome surprise and now looking back on everything, it turned to be a breathtaking adventure. We were tr

Greetings ladys and gentlemen! My name is Paul and I am one of the Estonian adventurers. In this post you will get a general understanding of who I am. I'm a 16-year-old boy and my birthday is on the 10th of August, so I'm gone celebrate it in Washington! I go to the Tallinn Secondary School of Science. I study STEM and medicine there. Besides school I do fencing. I have done it for three years now and I absolutely love it. I have won the second place in team fencing on a national level twice! Before fencing I did dancesport for five years. In the 9th grade I tried to play saxophone, but unfortunately I didn't have enough time to practice it in the 10th grade, so I had to stop it. But my huge love for music still remains with me! I also enjoy reading and traveling. I am very excited to go on a such adventure. I think it is gone be AMAZING! I hope I will learn a lot about USA's culture and economics and get so called cultural-shock. I would also like to meet a lot of

Hey! My name is Eero Ääremaa and I am a student at Gustav Adolf Grammar school in the capital of Estonia - Tallinn. On the second day of the program I will be turning 18 :D When I am not traveling the world I am the IT-manager for my school. It means that it's up to me to make sure that all the 400 computers at my school work fine and teachers don't have any technical problems. I have a team of four people, working in four buildings. I have been the manager of the schools IT-team for a year now and I will be in this position for another year, after which I will finish high school. It's a huge opportunity for me and it's an honor to sit at the board of my school, still being a student. But I have another role at my school as the teacher of coding. I have been teaching coding to kids from the ages of 7-14 for three years by this point and two years ago I started a coding club at my school, which last year expanded to four groups. It can be challenging at times but see

Tervist! I'm Gerda and I'm one of the lucky ones, who  will travel to America tomorrow. On daily bases I study in a local highschool, dance folkdance and study music in a city nearby. I enjoy sunny weather, travelling, beautiful people, unpredictable books and days without homework. I believe America has been a destination, which I didn't dare to hope visiting until I'm at least an adult. But now given this chance I'm going to enjoy every minute of it. I'll see you when my english is 10x better, Gerda