‘How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard’
-Winnie the Pooh

Well here it is, my last blog.
To make this blog not too sentimental I’ll start by telling you about prom and graduation which was the 25^th and 29^th of June.
Prom started as a normal day. We didn’t have school anymore so when my friends were texting me that they were stressed out about doing their hair and their nails I was still in Pj’s watching my favourite television show. What can I say ? I guess most of you know me ;)
But at 1:00 I had my hair appointment so I there the ‘prom journey’ started for me. I think it took about an hour and fifteen minutes to get my hair all curled up. After that I was just sitting at home again, watching a movie since the wind was blowing so hard it would mess up my hair. Normally I don’t really care but oh well it was prom so I listened and stayed inside.
Around 4:30 I started getting ready and around 5:30 our photographer Donna would come by and take some pictures. I don’t think I can say ‘some’ it should probably be ‘a lot’ ;).
Pictures with mom, pictures with Ashton, pictures with nanny and grampy, pictures with colton and Adrian etc. etc. At the time it didn’t make me really happy I must admit but now that I’m home and look at my wall full of pictures with my favourite people I’m so happy we took them after all.
So for everyone who might read this and is thinking about doing a year abroad please remember to take a lot of pictures, they are so important for when you’re back.

After all the pictures at home we went to school where (you might already guess it) more pictures were taken. After two hours of smiling the muscles in my face were dying but as I said before it was all worth it. After pictures we went inside to dance a little but after like half an hour Sanne and I went home to change into more comfortable clothes and shoes. After prom its fairly common to go to a prom party and so did we. I’m not gonna say too much about it but let’s just say I had a lot of fun ;)

Monday the 29^th was graduation. Unfortunately, we as internationals weren’t allowed to walk over stage and wear a gown if you weren’t graduating which was kind of a disappointment. But I joined the graduation choir and since it would be a little weird to have all the girls in gowns except me, they let me wear a gown too. The whole graduation ceremony took about 2 and a half hours merely to the fact that every single student was called up on stage to receive their diploma and any scholarships/awards that they had won. I don’t know if I would want a ceremony like that in the Netherlands. One side it’s great that every student gets their moment in the spotlight in front of everyone but on the other hand sitting in those chairs for over two hours and clapping every 10 seconds might not be worth it. Anyways, it was great to experience.
After graduation we had ‘safe grad’ where all the graduates went to a sportscentre in Halifax ( there were two options, this year they chose Halifax). Originally it’s to prevent the graduates from partying after graduation and doing ‘bad stuff’ but I actually think it’s a great opportunity to celebrate graduation and for all the graduates as kind of a last ‘bond-moment’ as graduating class. They should definitely do something like that in The Netherlands too.
Around 6 in the morning we came back at school where breakfast was waiting for us. I speak for myself but I also think for a lot of other internationals when I say I wasn’t really hungry that morning because saying goodbye to everyone was near-by. You don’t really realize it at the time but a lot of people I said goodbye to (or didn’t) I’ll never see again in my life and that is really weird since some of them especially in the sports teams were a major part of my year in Canada.

That Tuesday and Wednesday might have been the hardest days in my entire life. I never had my heart broken before in my life but those two days I think my heart broke more times than it will in the rest of my lifetime. Saying goodbye to each and every person who has meant something for me the past 10 months. Who have become family.
Even though saying goodbye was so frigging hard I never regretted doing this year for a moment. Meeting, getting to know and loving all these amazing people makes it all worth it.
Building up relationships while you know you gotta leave at some point is pretty scary but most of all very special. You just get so much closer,

I’m home for a week now but it still doesn’t feel like home. The first two days everywhere I looked I recognized people from Liverpool in random Dutch people, don’t ask me why haha but it was fairly confusing.
My mind has stopped playing tricks on me now but ‘home’ still doesn’t feel like home. Canada has become my home and I don’t know how long it will take to change that or if it will ever change.
My plan is to come back to Liverpool next summer and I’m already counting down.

Here is to everyone who read my blogs this year and have followed me in my adventure. Thank you !
Writing blogs was part of my experience this year that I didn’t always wanna do but thanks to the people who encouraged me to write another one because over 10 years I can look back at this and smile by all the memories I wrote down for you guys.
Feel free to ask any questions about my year, I would be happy to answer them :)

Canada, I’ll see you soon !
Love,
Big Sanne