Memories of the World Cup 2006

4 years ago in 2006, Italy was going to verse Germany for the semi-final. My mom was hoping that Germany would win and I was hoping Italy would win. We could not decide which flag we should put out on our balcony in Turin, Italy, so we put out both flags, Italy's and Germany's, each one in a corner.












Finally, it was the day of the Game. My family watched the first half at home. While we watched the game we heard people honking and yelling, until we heard a loud shout, "Togliete quella bandiera di merda!" Which means: Take down that flag of sh**! During the commercials, my dad and I walked to Piazza Vittoria to watch the second half in public. My mom stayed at home with my baby brother. We went to see the first 20 minutes among Germans at the Goethe Institute. The rest of the second half we watched among a huge Italian crowd in front of a gigantic flat screen. At the end of the second half the score was 0-0. During the break before the overtime, my dad and I went back home to see the end of the game with my mom. A couple of minutes before the end, Italy scored and won the game. I was very happy, but my mom cried. During the World Cup 2010, my mom and I did not argue much: since Italy was out so early, together we cheered for Germany!

Sadly I was wrong...

Germany is Totally Going to Win
the World Cup!

Food! - An Update

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This food is very spicy.

This is Chinese food

I ate at my dad's
final work dinner

Chinese people love
duck tongue. Even my
brother!

Popular

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Chinese people like curly hair because they all have straight, black hair. Once my brother got a lollipop with a toy in it. While my mom and dad went went shopping my brother and I were building the toy. After about 2 minutes we were surrounded by people, taking turns to touch our hair.


Many Chinese also like to have their picture taken with us.

Italy is Disqualified From the World Cup!

Ever since I lived in Italy, my favorite soccer team was Italy. An Italian family invited my family to see Italy versing Slovakia on Thursday! If Italy wins or ties, Slovakia would be disqualified. If Slovakia wins Italy is disqualified. Finally, it was Thursday. I first ate dinner then I watched the soccer game. 20 minutes after the game started Slovakia scored. 1-0. For the rest of the first half Slovakia took shots but missed them, while Italy complained about fouls. after the second half started Slovakia scored. Everyone thought Italy had no chance of scoring.Luckily we were all wrong. After 32 minutes past the second half, Pirlo passed to Quagliarella. Quagliarella passed back to Pirlo, who shot. The goalie blocked it. Then, Di Natale ran after the ball and he kicked it. GOAL! 2-1. 5 minutes after Di Natale scored Quagliarella took a shot from far away. GOAL! 2-2! Right after Quagliarella scored, he went to get the ball in the goal to celebrate. Then the goaly punched Quagliarella right in the face! After Quagliarella got punched both teams got into a fist fight! When the fist fight ended the refree gave a yellow card both to the goalie and to Quagliarella. After Quagliarella and the goalie got a yellow card, Pirlo passed to Quagliarella. Quagliarella tapped the ball towards the goal. I jumped on the sofa and yelled, "GOAL!" WHAT! NO GOAL! WHY? OFF SIDES! The goalie took the offside kick, which the ball bounced off an Italian defender and went out of bounce. A Slovakian defender took the through in. He through the ball over the defenders' heads. Another Slovakian offender ran after the

ball, the goalie ran forward, and the Slovakian offender kicked the ball over the goalie's head into the goal. 3-2. I was so disappointed. Italy is disqualified from theWorld Cup and arrived in last place! At least now I have America and Germany to hope at least they win.

Weather

Here in Shanghai it has been raining most of the time. When it is not raining, the sky is usually gray. When the sky is gray it is very hot outside. Instead, when the sky is blue, it is very windy (perfect for going sailing). Rain or shine, I wear my summer shoes. My favorite weather is when the sky is blue, because the sky looks beautiful and it is perfect for doing sports.

This is on my dad's university campus. His office is in the tall building in the back.

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Chinese Lessons

Every morning I get woken up early for
Chinese lessons. During my Chinese lessons my teacher, Guannan asks me questions like: How do you ask someone what their name is? Guannan also asks me questions in Chinese and I have to answer them, in Chinese. This is an example: "Ni hao ma?" And I answer, "Wo hen hao." During my lessons, I also write numbers in Chinese characters. After I write all the numbers in Chinese characters, Guannan writes a number character, and I say what number it is in Chinese. On Wednesday, I got a book to practice my Chinese characters for some words like big and small. Chinese is a lot harder than I thought it was!

The Expo - The World's Fair

My family and I went to the 2010 Expo in Shanghai, China. When we arrived at the Expo we looked at our map and saw that there was a puppet-show going on in 5 minutes. When I saw the puppets on the stage and heard it was in Chinese, I was already bored! My mom showed me the map again and something caught my eye: The word "soccer". There was a soccer demonstration at the other side of the river. Now, that sounded like fun! I was so exited! I got my brother and we headed toward the ferry station. We waited there for about 40 minutes. finally Hallelujah! It was my group's turn to go on the ferry boat, everyone was running like crazy to get onto it! Luckily my mom and I were very fast so we got the best seats and we saved some for my dad and my brother. My family had the best view of the river! When we arrived on the other side of the river it was 2:20pm. Oh, no! We missed the show! I was very disappointed. My mom said,"Don't be sad. Now that we are on the other side of the river we can see the national pavilions!" A pavilion is a project a country makes that is very, very big. These projects are made for people to see and go in them.

Spain Pavilion
Inside them they have objects and other things that people in that a country are proud of. The first pavilion my family went into was the Netherlands' pavilion. In the pavilion there was a colorful bunny toy. It was the Dutch kid's favorite fable character. There was also a picture of a Dutch D.J., who was one of the world's 100 best D.J.s. Second, we went into Africa's pavilion. Even though Africa is not a country, most of Africa's countries did not have enough money to build their own pavilion.

United Kingdom Pavilion
(click on it - it looks really cool)

Next we went to Nigeria's pavilion. There was not much there; however, farther on through the pavilion, there was a Nigerian man dancing. My brother Inua started dancing with him. After Inua danced a while, the man gave him 10 yuan (1 dollar and a half), which is a lot of money here! Now he could finally buy himself the Expo 2010 Mascot!

We also visited the Slovenian and Libyan pavilions. Last, we went into Argentina's pavilion. In it, there was a white floor with light blue crosses. There was a small T.V. showing a skilled instrument player. There was also another T.V. with Argentina's team playing soccer. The Expo is fun but also tiring. I hope you can also go to an Expo one day. The next will be in 2015 in Milan, Italy.

Food!

These are different kinds of food that I eat in China...

My favorite Chinese food
is sweet and sour pork,
I like it especially with rice.
It is pork with fruits in it.



These are fried dumplings.


This is my brother's

favorite Chinese food.

In a Japanese restaurant:

This is a Japanese cook about to make fried bananas.






The fire is made to fry
the bananas quicker.


Now the cook is frying the bananas.