I had my first day of school today. All I can say is "wow". One thing to know about my school is that it is kind of like two schools (a public school and a private school) put together. It started out as a public school (that is, anyone could go there) but last year, they started the "private school". I don't know if people have to pay for the private school, but the students have to apply and be accepted. Most (if not all) of the public school kids are Juniors and Seniors, while all of the "private" school students are Freshmen and Sophmores. Apparently, I was accepted into the private school, because those students were in my classes. The only kind of bad thing about this is that because the oldest private school students are Sophmores, I am now also a Sophmore. Hey Daniel, we're in the same grade!

Because today was the first day, Semra and Gulderen (Yilmaz and Ece's mom and a teacher at my school) both walked me to school. When we got there, all of the students and teachers were standing in the courthouse in the middle of the school. The students were all lined up and were listening to the headmaster's "Start of the School Year" speech. He talked for literally 20 minutes, but, once again, I have no idea what he said. When he finished all the students turned around and walked towards their classrooms. Gulderen, Semra, and one of the school's English teachers helped me find my classroom. We went into one classroom, and the English teacher introduced me to the students there, but it turned out to be the wrong classroom, so we went to a different one.

The second classroom was the correct one, so Gulderen introduced me, and then she and Semra and the English teacher left. The minute they were gone, every student got up and rushed towards my desk. They all began to speak at once, asking me questions in both English and Turkish. Most of them can speak at least some English, so I was able to talk to them. People kept going outside to get other people to come meet me and students from other classes kept looking in the classroom at me, and then leaving. On the first day of school in Turkey, classes don't really exist and during some periods, teachers don't even come into the room. Therefore, I talked to people for 2 hours straight until the bell rang for lunch. We have an hour for lunch and we can leave school if we want to, so Gulderen and I went home for lunch.

When I went back, there were even more people I got to meet, and I actually met one of my teachers. I met my English teacher and I found out that English is the first class I have after lunch. I also met a girl who lived in Louisiana before moving to Turkey, so I talked to her for a while. During the last class period another teacher came and I found out that chemistry is my last class of the day. I spent a lot of that class period being confused (I wasn't even sure what subject she taught until I asked someone) because she talked the entire time in Turkish. Gulderen told me that the actual classes will begin tomorrow, this should be interesting.

Everyone was very nice and interested in talking to me though, so I hope that the goodness of meeting all these new people will outweigh the fact that I don't know what is going on in any of my classes.

By the way, the uniform that I wrote about is not the one that I actually wore. That uniform is the one for the public school, but because I am in the other school, I had to get a different uniform. This one is a red and gray plaid skirt and gray sweater. The only accessory that I can wear is my watch (no bracelets or earrings) and my necklace has to be tucked in. The boys have to wear suit pants, a jacket (green for public, blue for private), and a tie everyday. School in Turkey is more formal than it is in America, everyone stands up when the teacher comes into class (students stay in one class all day and the teachers switch).
Well, it has been a very exhausting first day, so I am going to take a nap, bye everyone!