Gabon

Kaya is now in some African country I've never heard of. But I don't really care. THIS is Rebecca, by the way. Not Sonali. She has been hogging my blog FOREVER! But it's OK I guess. I kind of want Kaya to come back too. Our school seems smaller without her.
I'm working on a story, and my signature...........but other than that......life is getting boring.......(sigh). Kaya actually said she may come home earlier, but she wants to see a few more places. (re-sigh)...........
ITS SO BORING OVER HERE! Any ideas on what to post about?
Rebecca

BIG HUGE GIGANTIC HAPPY NEWS!

Kaya is now in Fiji. Oh, yeah, she is going to Albert PARK today or what not, but Srajana is going to the park too! THIS IS THE BEST DAY OF THE WHOLE MONTH! Akkkk!!!

SRAJANA'S REALLY, REALLY GOOD FRIEND, AW., WHO LEFT FOUR WHOLE YEARS AGO FOR D.C., AND THEN FOR LOUSIANA, IS COMING TO VISIT! AND WE WILL GO TO THE PARK TO GET SNOWCONES! YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Srajana actually wrote that. She likes writing about herself in the third person, but NOW I am here. Yay me! Sonali!

So...........yesterday I was busy working on a book I am reading. I also am trying to write a book, but it's harder than it looks! I filled out a money order to send for some new books, because our librarian takes all the library books at the end of the school year home with her. (don't ask me!)

But yeah, the summer is kicking off well, I guess. I just hope Kaya has fun traveling the world, and will come home SOON!
Sonali

Ecuador

Kaya is now in Ecuador. She is going to Galapagos National Park today, and is very excited. She said it's a nice change after the bustling city of Copenhagen. Next, she will be going to Fiji, and can't wait.
I am busy practicing my flute, but I have been taken more and more interest in the piano and violin. At our school, we are required to take music, so Neela takes singing and plays the ekdara, Julie plays the drums, Rebecca sings, Ruthie plays violin and a little flute, I play flute and a little piano, Felicity plays guitar and sings a little, Gwen plays the harp mostly and violin sometimes, and Kaya played the drums. Julie was very reluctant to share her drum set, so Kaya decided to play the timpani. And she is very good at it! Ruthie was practicing a tarantella the other day on her violin, and I just listened, dazed by the material of the piece.
I sat down at the piano, and played the hardest piece I KNEW. It was the the famous Bach minuet that every pianist can play if they have been playing more than two years. I'm not very good. Srajana's friend E. can play Cat and Mouse by Aaron Copland. She just started, but she is at a flying speed! She says she needs to work on it at least the whole summer! Wow!
In the evening, I worked on my summer homework. It was to write a gavotte or tarantella. I decided to make a gavotte, because they are generally shorter, and easier to play, so they must be easier to write, right? But no! The notes float in my head easily, but I can't remember what the octaves and rhythms are at all! Oh-well.
Sonali

Hot! Hot! Hot! Plus Denmark.

We went through a scorching period of hot-ness here in the Northwest, and I cannot believe how hot it is still! 83 degrees. The other day, Srajana and her friend, who I will call by her first initial, A., walked to the nearby Dollar Tree. They came back, only to check the thermostat to find that the weather a whopping 98 degrees! (Those of you that live in Arizona, Texas, New Mexico, I apologize if this seems like low temperature to you. But it goes the same way for rain in other places-a drizzle for Oregonians here is like a warning to tourists-Don't step outside! But anyways....)
Two days ago, Kaya left Cambodia for Denmark-actually Europe! People are pretty upset over there apparently because of their crushing defeat by the Netherlands. But an audio walk of Copenhagen helped her stop listen to the complaints. She said she could understand most of it, but not nearly all of it. She said she saw a flyer for a "treatment" today, and did not understand what it was, but the person in the future looked very happy and relax, so she signed up. She then found out what a spa treatment was and had her nails painted and her hair curled. She said "I never go to a......spa....." Her next stop is Ecuador! Lucky girl.
So, I am sitting in the flower garden posting this, when I SHOULD be doing distributive property equations. Oh well. Even though school is out, if we are not visiting family, we have to repeat the class we did worst in. Mine is math, and Neela's is social studies. I barely scratched out a 90% in pre-algebra, and I never understood the distributive property......so, yeah. Gwen can't afford a flight to Minnesota and back, so we time travel back a day so we can. Since we are modern dolls, we can't time travel back to "our own time period" so we either need to catch a plane, or time travel back a day. I am the only modern girl who can time travel in our whole school, so I take Gwen with me sometimes. But I miss Kaya so much! I never know exactly where she is, so I can't really meet her in Ecuador, or Fiji, where she is going after Ecuador. Oh well.
Sonali

Cambodia

I have my mp3 in my hand, listening to Ashokan Farewell as I write this. Our school only allows instrumental music, and only fiddle style, or classical. Ashokan Farewell is my favorite violin song, and even though I play flute, I try to play the song on my flute sometimes, since they both use the treble clef.
Kaya is in Cambodia now, and she is visiting Angkor Wat, the second wonder of the world. She said that it is very beautiful, and she likes Cambodia. She liked lying on the beach and then playing in the ocean, but now seeing the beautiful temple complex makes her gasp in wonder. She said she stared up at the top of the building for a whole, full hour. She will be here three or four more days, depending if her flight to Denmark is delayed or not, because she thinks there is a chance....I don't know, complicated airport stuff!
Srajana is scrapbooking, reading, and songwriting. She is trying to make the most out of the summer, and she is hopefully succeeding. She also wants to try soap carving.

Sonali

The Bahamas

Kaya is now in the Bahamas, and she sent us an E-mail.

"Friends at home, I am in the Bahamas. There are very beautiful beaches and there is very much to go. I am sad to go Cambodia. I love the Bahamas! Here is my paper of new English."



We started making a chart of where Kaya is. I will put it here.
July 1: Afghanistan-Kabul
July 2: Afghanistan-Herat
July 3: Afghanistan-Bamiyan
July 4: Bahamas-Beach
Sonali
PS: I need to help Ruthie find a violin paper she wrote. She wrote a book on the violin and wants to get it published, but she can't find one page!

Goodbye, Kaya

Kaya is leaving our school. It's like she came to this school just to know English so she could travel the world. It's awfully sad. She'll be traveling exactly a year, and then she will come back. She will be traveling to all kinds of places. Some more than others. She started crying yesterday when she told us. She will be leaving for Afghanistan tomorrow. Hopefully, she will have fun traveling the world. Kaya insisted on posting this post, so here is what she says;

"Friends of the world, I want you. But I want to look at the world. France, Italy. Uruguay, Costa Rica. To speak Chinese and Spanish. THAT is where I want to be. I."

Kaya is going to a place where they don't speak much English though. Persian is the main language. I hope she will be able to survive away from family and friends.

Sonali