New Family!

It has been a really long time since I have been able to write a blog,but I have been a bit busier lately...which is probably a good thing. Since I have posted last quite a few things have changed. After I got back from my trip to Switzerland I had one day left with my first host family and the next day I changed families. It took me a while to pack all my stuff but after a few hours I was finally finished. I already have way too much stuff and that was kind of stressing me out, but I think at the end of the year everything will work out fine. I won't have some of the stuff that I have now because I still have quite a few gifts for host families and other people to give away. I know I will also be sending a lot of stuff home with my mom when she comes. The day I changed families we had planned to have a brunch with my two first families and my counsellor at my first house. After we ate I carted all my bags to the car and we drove to my new house. My new room is really big and I like it a lot! It took me a couple hours to get settled inand then afterwards I went for a walk with my new host mom, Nathalie. We had a nice dinner with my new family, which consists of two host brothers and one host sister and a host mom and dad. The family is really nice and they made me feel welcome right away. None of my host siblings live at the house but there are some weekends that they stay there.

Since then I have done quite a few things with my host family. Every Sunday evening we go and play badminton with some of their friends and then come back to the house and eat dinner all together. One weekend we went to one of the only concentration camps in Belgium which is now somewhat of a museum. It is called Breendonck and it is in the flemish speaking part of Belgium. It was a museum that really made an impression on me. Breendonck is one of the best conserved concentration camps because it is made out of all concrete and before the Nazis took it over it was used as a fort for the army. We walked through the whole museum. Through all the old bedrooms, solitary confinement cells, torture chamber, washing area, and many other rooms. We had audio guides and there were so many horrible stories that were told and information. It was very sad and heavy but i'm glad we got to go there because it was also very interesting. I have gone to about three other museums as well with my host parents. We went to the Musée des Beaux Arts, The Aviation Museum, and a museum which is pretty much a huge excavation site. In 2001 I think a team of archaeologists found a huge site right under the Palais Royale in the centre of Bruxelles. It turned out that there was actually the remains of a castle from the 12th century that was buried there when they decided to reconstruct that area at Bruxelles hundreds of years ago. They had to do some reconstruction but it is preserved really well. It is not very far underground at all and you can even hear the trams going by overheard. When you are walking around down there you feel like you are really walking in a city under the city. There are different streets and everything. The museum was really cool and if you ever get the chance to come to Bruxelles I would recommend going there.

The same day that I saw that museum. I had been invited to a girls birthday part in my class. Her birthday party was a masked ball so I had to go buy a little mask and wear a dress and everything. My friend, Janelle, came with me and it was pretty fun! I have also started playing soccer here! I'm really happy that I was finally able to find a team. My team is really nice and the coach is good but it is pretty different from playing back home in Canada because it is a team made up at all first year players. They have never won a game but I think they are pretty good for it being their first year. The only thing that is disappointing is that the season ends in a month and I just started playing. I have been trying to find a club since September, but I guess thats just the way it goes.
Everything has been going pretty good lately and I'm really excited for these next couple months because there is a lot of good things that will be happening.


À Bientot

Switzerland/Christmas

Salut!
So right now I am on the train travelling back to Belgium from Switzerland. I’m currently stopped in the middle of nowhere and I have no idea why. When I was going to Switzerland the train was really really slow going through Belgium so I hope that won’t be the case again now. I should be getting into Brussels at 10:45 tonight (Jan.7) so hopefully its not too late! I had a really good stay in Switzerland with Cecile but it was very hard to say goodbye to her! A lot of me wishes I could’ve just stayed there with her but I know that wouldn’t be possible. I know it wouldn’t be the same if I was going to school and actually living in Switzerland but its just really nice to go around and do whatever we want and its just really nice to be back with a real friend again. We saw so many cool things while we were there and we spend A LOT of our time on trains! I think everyday expect maybe two or three we took a train somewhere. I got to go skiing in Switzerland with Cecile and that was really cool! The mountain was very nice and the scenery around was beautiful! I missed the mountains so much! There was basically a hill you could see outside of Ceciles house and I know if I were back in Canada I wouldn’t have though that was a mountain but it seemed pretty big to me now that I’ve been living in flat Belgium for the past 5 months! And yeah that’s pretty crazy that I’ve been here already for 5 months! Everyone that I’ve talked to says that the last few months fly by so that’s what I’m expecting. My return date to Canada is confirmed for the 7th of July so that is pretty exciting. Between now and that time I have a lot of things to look forward too as well so I’m happy about that. In March I’m going to Amsterdam on a Rotary trip and in April I go on the Italy trip which is 11 days long. I also might have a few people be coming to visit me from back home and that is VERY exciting! After my Italy trip I have another trip to Prague in June and then school is over! I have to admit I will be very happy about not having anymore Belgian school! I’m not too sure if I will be looking forward to be going back yet but I don’t think it will be too bad! At the end of June until July 4 I will also be going to a big music festival in Belgium called Rock Werchter with a few of my friends! I already bought my tickets and it goes on for four days. Really good bands go to the festival and this year there has only been four bands confirmed at the moment but already the bands confirmed are Coldplay, Kings of Leon, Iron Maiden, and The Chemical Brothers! Coldplay and Kings of Leon are a couple of my favourite bands and I never thought I would get to see either of them live! I am so excited and I can’t wait too see which other bands will be playing. There’s usually about 10 bands that play each day and you camp there with your friends.
But I should write more about what I did in Switzerland! I already said that we went skiing one day and that was a lot of fun! The snow wasn’t super great but it was a beautiful blue bird day and it wasn’t too cold so it was nice! I also saw a really nice Church my first day in Switzerland with Cecile’s family. I can’t remember the exact date that the Church was built in but I just know it was really nice and really old! It was kind of funny because outside of the church there was a sign that said Beware: Roof Avalanches and we had Cecile’s dog, Onya, with us so Cecile’s parents tied the dog to the sign while we went inside the church as a joke. Cecile and I also went to the French speaking part of Switzerland to a city called Lausanne and also another city called Geneva. Cecile hadn’t even been to those cities before so it was new for both of us. We saw a really nice Cathedral built in the 1200’s I think and also a castle built around the same time period. We also went to a big museum while we were in Lausanne. In the museum they had artifacts that dated back later than 800 B.C. It as crazy! They had found a lot of artifacts from burial grounds from around Switzerland and they even had a few coffins with skeletons in them and a lot of jewellery. We thought that museum was really cool and it was free so that was a bonus! Cecile and I also went to apparently Europe’s largest waterfall in the north of Switzerland . I was kind of expecting it to be a lot larger but it was still really nice! It was really wide but just not very tall. In order to see the waterfall you actually take this bus for about 25 minutes to an old castle and then there are trails that lead down to the viewing point. It was really cool except for the fact that Cecile forgot her wallet on a bench while we were waiting for the bus to go back down to the city. She only realised about an hour later that she left it up there so then we had to take the bus for another 50 minutes. In the city there was another castle that was built in the 1500’s. We got to go inside of it into this huge brick room with pillars in the center and we also got to climb this spiral staircase to get to the top and see the view of the city ! It was so cool being in something so old! Yesterday we also took the train to the capital of Switzerland, Bern, and had a tour of the Swiss parliament buildings. I couldn’t understand the tour because it was in German but Cecile explained the main point of it I think. We did a lot more stuff as well but I think this is getting a bit too long so I will stop writing now. I will just have to post this tomorrow or something as well as the one I wrote on the train when I was going to Zurich!
À Bientot!

Switzerland/Christmas

Hi!
So as I’m writing this I’m sitting on a train going through France right now! I’m bored so I will just write this and then upload it on my blog when I get a chance. So I’ve been on the train since 7:37 in the morning and right now its 3:15 in the afternoon. The train was very very slow going through Belgium and I overheard people saying it was more than an hour and a half late now. My friend Janelle slept over at my house last night because she was also going to Germany this morning from Brussels. We went to the train station together at 7:00 AM and then just went and bought a sandwich and stuff for the trip. When we looked at the board with all the times of the trains on it, it said that my train would be 45 minutes late. I wasn’t very happy about that because I didn’t want to be late for meeting Cecile in Zurich but Janelle was pretty happy because now she didn’t have to wait by herself for such a long time. Then I randomly looked up at the board when it was probably around 7:36 AM and the board changed and now it said the train was on time!! Me and Janelle freaked out and started running through the train station trying to make it on time. Right when we got to where my train was supposed to come it pulled in so I was soooo lucky. If I had missed that train I don’t think there would have been anything I could have done! So I was very relieved when I got on the train! I slept for the first couple hours I think and after that I’ve just been watching some tv shows in French with English subtitles and reading. It seems like I’ve been on the train for such a long time and I have a really bad headache right now. Before I wasn’t sure if we were going to be going through Germany or France but we ended up going through France. But then when we got into Strasbourg I really thought that was in Germany but I guess not? I was a bit stressed out because the people sitting across from me told me that this train doesn’t go straight to Zurich anymore and that I have to change trains in Basil Switzerland. I was pretty stressed out because I bought my ticket for Zurich and I don’t want to have to pay more money just to get to Zurich from Basil. Also because Cecile was going to be meeting me in Zurich at 3:57 when my train was SUPPOSED to get in. I felt really bad for Cecile because she would be waiting for me for a really long time. I remembered that I had her cellphone number on an email so I tried to call it but I didn’t have the right area code so it didn’t work. I asked the lady across from me though and she gave me the right numbers. So I just got a hold of Cecile and I told her that I would be really late. I don’t know how long it will take me to get from Basil to Zurich but I hope it won’t take very long! I’m really looking forward to going to see Cecile and being in Switzerland though!
As for Christmas, it went pretty well. It was really really hard being here without my family and friends and it was a very different vibe than in Canada, which I already explained in my last post. I was supposed to go to my host sister’s dad’s house for Christmas eve but that didn’t end up happening for some reason so I went with Ines to her parents house in the south of Belgium for dinner. The roads weren’t very good on the highways or the roads and everyone was driving very slow but I don’t think Ines really had a problem with the snow. Ines’ parents house was very old but it was actually pretty nice! Usually I don’t like old things but the house was very cool. It was built in 1850 and I felt like while we were eating it was like I was in a movie. There was also a church and a cemetery behind the house and the first part of the church was built in the 1300’s! I thought that was pretty crazy. For Christmas Eve Dinner we ate soup, fois gras, smoked salmon, and cake. The dinner was very different than any other Christmas dinner I’ve ever had in Canada and I think I prefer the one back home better than the one we had here. After dinner we opened presents and I got a T shirt that says Brussels Belgium 2010 from my host mom and a cd from Ines’ parents. The next day we just hung around the house, ate lunch, and then went home. I was really happy when I got home because I got to skype my family while they were opening presents and that was really nice! I also got to talk to Alex so that was really cool as well! But anyways hope everyone back home is having a good holiday and that Canada

Christmas Eve

Hi Everyone!

So Merry Christmas to everyone back home! I will basically be getting Christmas one day earlier than you and that will be kind of weird! I would really like to talk to my family and maybe some of my friends on Christmas so I hope it works out with the time change and everything! These past few weeks have been a bit weird but just because I really don't feel like it's Christmas at all here! When I go downtown I do feel like it's Christmas a bit because of all the Christmas markets and decorations, but other than the last couple days there has been no snow at all and there are no decorations whatsoever at my house. Its really weird becaus

e no one has Christmas lights on their houses and I don't know about other families around where I live but we don't have a Christmas tree. I know a lot of my other friends' host families do have Christmas trees though so i'm sure its not a Belgian thing to not have one. Its not a huge deal or anything it just feels a bit weird. Today is Christmas Eve day for me and I feel like its just another day. Usually back home there is a lot of Christmas baking and music and the tree and I don't know there's just a vibe but not here. A lot of schools actually still have classes today which I think is really really dumb. I had to go into school just a little while ago to get my report car

d which wasn't very good. I got a TB in english and in gym though which is the best mark you could get so I'm happy about that. It was really frustrating though because I had to have a little meeting with my Titulaire which i guess is kinda like a homeroom teacher type thing. And he was just saying that he knows that i'm really shy and that its hard but he thinks I shouldn't be spending so much time with other exchange students who speak english and that I should try to spend more time with Belgian people. It really frustrates me when people tell me things like this because it seems like they think I don't want to be friends with Belgian people from my school or that I don't try. But I really do want to be friends with people from school and I do try really hard! Everyone including my host mom thinks i'm the shyest person in the world and that i'm scared to talk to anyone but I have no idea why. At school I have no problem talking to people. I ask questions about what they did last weekend and ask them sometimes if they would like to do something with me but they are always busy. Maybe my host mom thinks i'm shy because the few times that we have dinner together with her boyfriend and his kid they are always talking about things or people that I have no idea about. Its kind of hard for me to join into conversation when I don't know who the people they're talking about are. The teacher was saying maybe he will try to do something to help me but I don't want him to help me make friends! I'm seventeen and I know he's just trying to be nice but I told him that its okay he didn't need to help me and I would continue trying. It just gets really frustrating and a bit sad when you try so hard and no one notices it. But yeah sorry that was my little rant I guess. Its just pretty hard today because i'm away from my family and all my friends on Christmas

and everything is so different. Its not like I want to come home or anything and I know this is a really really good experience for me but it is hard sometimes and today is just one of those days where its a bit harder than others. I think its probably normal to feel kind of homesick on Christmas but yeah I just wish I would be less homesick less often.

But anyways, I will fill you in on what i've been doing for the past week or two. So yesterday my friend and I went to Brugges. While we were there we did a little bit of last minute Christmas shopping for our host families. I thought I was going to go to My host sisters dads house for Christmas eve because thats what my host mom told me so I bought him a bottle of wine but now I'm not going there anymore so I guess I will just give the wine to my host grandparents when I go to their house for dinner tonight. In Brugges we also went to an art gallery which was really cool. I really liked the art and a couple of the paintings at first I thought were really boring because I thought it was just a photo someone took of limes or roses but it turned out it wasn't a picture it was actually a painting. I couldn't believe how good it was! After we saw the art gallery we went to this Ice Sculpture exhibit near the train station. The exhibit was huge! There were ice sculptures from 30 different countries around the world and they were all very good. They had 3 ice sculptures from Canada which were an Aboriginal person, A cowboy, and a totem pole.. maybe the igloo was also supposed to be part of Canada but that would be pretty dumb I think. It has been getting kind of cold here these past couple days as well! It has been -5 and -6 which is pretty cold for Belgium. There has also been quite a lot of snow. I think there

has maybe been 20 or 30 cm. Just with that amount of snow the entire city and basically all of Belgium is shut down. Today there are now buses running and no trams and no cars here have 4 wheel drive. They also don't have winter tires. When I was driving to school this morning with my host mom I really thought we were gonna get in an accident Every single corner we turned we just slid and trying to get up the little hill to get to the school was basically impossible. I think its pretty ridiculous how unprepared everyone is for winter here. Everyone is freaking out and a lot of people refuse to even leave their houses because of the 30 cm of snow. They don't even have snowplows and barely any salt trucks. The highways are closed down after 7:00 PM and my host mom was telling me they wouldn't even let the salt truck go on the highway a couple nights ago after 7 even though it was only trying to do its job and make the roads safer! I don't know I just think a lot of things they do or not do for winter is really stupid. Its not that hard to be prepared for a little snow. But yeah I think I will stop writing now and start wrapping Christmas presents for my host family. I hope everyone has a really rea

lly good Christmas back at home and you should eat pie and cookies and whatever else for me!!

I miss everyone!!

<3>

Christmas!

Hi Everyone!

So these past few weeks have been pretty good! I've been going around to a few Christmas markets and I really like them! In Bruxelles there's a really big one with all these little huts selling all sorts of little things. There is even a Canadian booth at the Bruxelles christmas market! I was really excited when I saw that. They were selling things like maple syrup and smoked salmon. In the middle of the Bruxelles christmas market there is a huge outdoor skating rink which I haven't skated on yet but I did skate on the one in the middle of the Mons Christmas market, which is a different city in Belgium. There's is also a really big ferris wheel at the market in Brussels. Its very festive at the markets and actually makes something feel like christmas around here! Not much does...there's no snow, no tree, no decorations well at least not at my house. Its kind of sad but oh well thats okay. I got my Christmas shopping done last weekend so thats kind of a relief. I got my host mom a tea set that I think is really nice and i got my host sister pijama pants and hair elastics and lip chap. Last week there was a holiday called Saint Nicolas here in Belgium. It was the first time I celebrated that holiday and it was pretty cool i guess. Saint Nicolas for me is basically like Santa Clause but he comes on Dec.6 and gives kids a little gift or candy. There were some signs that were addressed to Saint Nicolas telling him they've been nice and that he should come at this hour. It was pretty cute I thought. Saint Nicolas apparently did not come to my house but thats okay I saw a fake one at school which was just one of the guys in my grade dressed up. It was a little bit embarrassing because everyone in my class was chanting my name telling me i had to go sit on his lap. So I did in front of everyone but it was funny as well. On Sunday one of my good friends in Belgium went home to Australia and it was pretty sad! Me and a few of our friends went to the airport to say goodbye to her in Bruxelles. It was also funny though because her bag was 9 kg overweight and she couldn't fit anything else in it so she was wearing 3 scarves, 3 hoodies, and 2 jackets! She looked like she was very hot but she didn't even get charged for overweight bags!! She was really lucky. She also gave me and my friend bags of her clothes she didn't want anymore. I think i'll probably have to do that when i go home too. This week is exam week for all the high school students in Belgium but I don't have school until wednesday because i only have to take 3 of the nine exams. I'm taking history, religion, and science. I studied all day today for history so hopefully i'll do okay! The teaching style here is just so different though here. Its all about theory and why someone would have done something and not just about the facts and practical stuff. They never get worksheets its always just like the teachers lecturing and then they have to write a debate or essay or something. For me, I DEFINITELY like canadian high school better. Being here makes me miss school in Canada. But yeah i think thats most of what i've been up to lately! I have a formal rotary dinner with all the wives of the rotarians so hopefully that will go well on friday. And hopefully i can get a few questions right on my exams..

À Bientot!!

Remembrance Day

Hi!

So yeah i'll just fill everyone in on what i've been doing with my life for the past few weeks since I haven't updated in a little while. So two weeks ago I had a four day weekend which was nice because after coming back froma week off of school I only had to go to school for two and a half days. On Wednesday my friend slept over at my house and in the morning we went to a town called Ypres for Remembrance Day. Ypres is the site where there was a big battle in the war and its the place where the Germans first used gas on Canadian soldiers. It was very very cool to be there for the Remembrance Day ceremony. The weather was very bad and it was raining so hard but I couldn't even use my umbrella because it was way too windy. That day we had plans to meet up with 3 other Canadian exchange students but on the train we also met 4 other Canadians who were also going to Ypres, so that was pretty cool. They were all on exchange as well but they were with University Programs. When we got to Ypres we were able to see the ceremony and a bunch of army marching bands and then we went to see the Arc with all the names of the soldiers who had been killed. There were so many Canadians on the wall it was actually surtprising to see how many there were. There is a war museum there called In Flanders Fields museum but I will have to go back there another day to see it because we didn't get the chance that day. When I got back to Brussels from Ypres I had been invited to two girls birthday parties from my school so I packed my stuff and went to that. It was fun and it was also very nice of them to invite me. I have also been going to Rotary Meetings twice a month. Last week I went to a meeting and there was a presentation given by a really young doctor about Polio and research he has done about incurable diseases and the importance of still vaccinating people who have polio. I was very interesting even if I didn't understand everything he said.

Also last week I met up with Brodie Lamarche from Terrace who had been touring around Europe with a home base out of Munich in Germany so that was really nice to see someone from home! We went to a couple different cities and hung out with some of my other friends here. It was a lot of fun! Tonight I have another Rotary meeting but I think its the meeting where its just a dinner. Hopefully the food will be good tonight..haha.

Trips

Hi!

So these last couple weeks have been pretty good! First of all I had holidays from school from Oct.30-Nov.8 and now I have Thursday and Friday off as well because of Remembrance day! I really really enjoy not having school! I know thats part of the exchange though going to school and I know it really does help with my

french, I just don't like the schools or at least my school really in Belgium. My school is incredibly strict and yeah there are other reasons but some of the rules I actually don't understand at all. For the holidays I had signed up in the summer for two Rotary trips organized by BRESA. I signed up for Paris and London. Paris was the first trip and it was for the weekend for 3 days. We left on a Friday and took a bus to Paris. There were 40 exchange students on that trip and I think that was one of the smaller trips. There was so much traffic on the way to Paris so the

bus was basically just crawling along the highway the whole way. For Friday in Paris we were supposed to go to Versailles but we weren't actually able to because of all the traffic and we missed our time. I was very very dissapointed because Versailles was the thing I was looking forward to the most before I left for Paris. I really hope I will be able to go back and see Versailles another time while i'm here. Paris is only about 4 hours away by car and i'm not sure about train...but not very long. So instead of going to Versailles when we arrived in Paris we went to Champs Elysees, the most famous shopping street in Paris and saw the Arc de Triumph. It was really cool to actually see the Arc de Triumph in person and I was very excited to see it. After we looked at that for a while we had freetime to walk around the Champs Elysees and do some shopping if we wanted or just look at things. On the street there are a lot of high end designer shops like Louis Vuitton etc. but there's also shops like H&M, Quicksilver, Sephora etc. So there's shopping for everyone. I did find it a bit more expensive though and I didn't buy any clothes in Paris. I just bought some souvenirs. That night we ate dinner at an Italian restaurant and then had a tour of Paris by night in our bus. That night was the first time we saw the eiffel tower and it was all lit up and when we drove past it it started glittering and it was so pretty! Everyone was screaming and oohing and ahhing it was so cool. Throughout the bus tour one of our trip leaders was explaining what things were and would say "..and on your left you have ___" so everyone would run to the left side and the same for the right side it was really funny. That was the end of the first day! The second day we went to the Musee d'Ors

ay and the Louvre and those museums were AMAZING. The paintings were all so incredible as well as the sculptures. I saw so many masterpieces in both museums it was overwhelming. The Louvre was gigantic and was definately very overwhelming! I was glad I had a map and circled all the paintings I wanted to see beforehand because if not i'm sure I would have missed so many things. I saw the Mona Lisa and it was cool to see her in person but its a pretty small painting and I think there are better paintings in the Louvre haha! I also saw Napoleons apartments and that was amazing! I really felt like I was walking through his apartments and not just a museum. The museum itself was so beautiful. All the staircases and floors and everything were really really nice. After the Louvre we ate dinner at a French restaurant and then had a tour of the Seine river at night which was really cool! And after the tour of the Seine we went to the Eiffel tower at night and we went all the way to the very top. It was very exciting to be able to see the Eiffel tower and to go up and look over all of Paris at night! It was an experience that I really will never forget! And that was the end of the second night! The third day we went to Notre Dame which was soo cool. When we were there, there was actually a mass going on so we got to hear the choir singing and the priest talk and everything. I stayed with the trip leader in the church and I learned a lot of cool information from him. That church took 700 years to build! It was very very beautiful inside the church. After the Notre Dame we went to Momart and the Sacred Coeur church. And after that we had lunch at the Hard Rock cafe and then headed back to Belgium. It was a very tiring trip but it was so much fun!

London was a really good trip as well. This trip was organized by the ROTEX so it was younger people around in there 20s. There was 72 other exchange students on the trip so it was bigger than Paris. We took the ferry across the channel to Dover and then drove to Canterbury to see the cathedral. The cathedral was very nice but I think I prefered the Notre Dame in Paris. We had audio guides for the cathedral so I was glad to learn more information about it. After that we drove into London to Picadilly Circus and ate dinner, and then went back to our hotel. The next day we went to Windsor Castle, which was my favourite thing that we saw while we were in London. The castle was huge,and there were so many artifacts and old weaponary and things Britain had taken from the countries they conquered. It was amazing! They also had a room for Princess Mary's dollhouse and that was really cool. It was a really really big dollhouse with everything miniature and everything looked real. There was even a miniature electric vacuum in the dollhouse! After our visit to the Windsor Castle we went to Madame Toussauds wax museum and then had dinner at the Hard Rock cafe in London. That night we saw a musical called "Blood Brothers." It was amazing! It was the best musical or play I have ever seen and I was so happy we went to see it. At the end some people were crying and everyone gave them a standing ovation. The third day in London we had a walking tour which took a few hours and we saw a lot of the typical London attractions like the Big Ben, London Bridge, Buckingham Palace, etc. I was very tired at the end of that but then we went to the Br

itish museum and that was really cool as well. They had all these artifacts from the Native villages around Terrace! They had totem poles from The Nisga'a nation and also Haida. I thought that was really cool. It was like their opening exhibit in the museum and I was very surprised to see those totem poles. After the museum we had freetime until 10:30 when we would have to go back to the bus and make our way back to Belgium for the night. I didn't like travelling through the night and I was sooo tired the next day but it was all worth it because I got to go to London!

The trips were soo amazing and I can't wait for my next trip organized by Rotary!