Chinook Winds - July 19

Today two big things happened to our group.  First of all, we played a totally fun game called Bigger and Better.  This game is based on a famous incident involving a Canadian from several years ago; through a series of trades, this young Canadian man traded a red paper clip for something bigger and better, eventually ending up with a real house in Saskatchewan.  While chances of us ever getting a house were slim, we did start out with a red paper clip.  Accompanied by our teachers, but split into smaller groups we went from door to door in a neighborhood here in Calgary, explaining who we were and offering to trade our paperclip for something bigger and better.  It went better than you might expect as Canadians seem like friendly people and it was a great chance to speak English to random people.  All of our groups made several successful trades and some of the things we ended up with included a small coffee table, some puppets, a box of puzzles and even some artwork!  Great fun and a lot of walking, so we got the chance to see Canadian houses and neighborhoods. The other big event that happened today was the arrival of many more students into our group; some 3 dozen in fact!  Most of these new arrivals were from Italy, but other nationalities were present; France, Germany, Taiwan, Austria, and Mexico.  The new group had to take a brief language assessment test just like the first group had to when they arrived.  We joined the new arrivals for a picnic style dinner which included a game that forced us to talk to as many people as possible asking and answering questions, so we quickly were able to break the ice.  It was a great way for all of us to get to know one another.  After dinner, we played some fun games before the events of the day caught up with us (and jet lag caught up with the new arrivals) and heavy-lidded we headed off to bed. [AFG_gallery id='67']