Almost 2 years...

Hey guys!

Few more days and I can say that I am in USA for 2 years. I can not tell you how fast the time flies. 

So what is new?

I am not an Au Pair any more...I am an International student on Essex County College with major in Social work. School started on Januray 19th and currently I am taking 4 subjects. English, Math, Psychology and History. Let me tell you a little bit about them..

English:

Hmm...so far I am not exactly sure what we are doing because we are just reading articles in the book but I am sure we will come to the writing very soon. We should learn how to write better in this class. Let's see...

Math:

Well in Math I am in lover level because math was always problem with me. And so far everything is going good. First quiz I got 100% on. Yes it was easy but it made me happy anyway. 

Psychology:

We are learning about what Psychology is and right now we are learning about how human being is being born and about DNA and genes. It is quite interesting and similar to the one I was learning in Slovenia.

History.

We are learning about acient history in Persia and Egypt. Soon we will start with Greece. It is interesting to know where the first civilisation lived.

So far I still like to go to school. But I am not very sure how long this will last. haha. What is different between College here and in Slovenia...

- first thing is that the classrooms have not many electronics in

- the seats are different. One seat with attached table - we do not have this in Slovenia

- no bell

- class is 1 hour and 20 minutes long without break

- in my college the majority of teachers are male ( all my teachers are male)

- you can record the class

- if there is snow there is no school

- books for school are sooo expencive! For example: English book: $60 , Math $210, Psychology $240, History $130 !!!!! Thank God there is some web services that allow you to rent the books for much smaller price. 

So what else is new? Now I am 25 years old and I still feel like 19 :) I was home in December for Christmas to get my Student visa and to spend some time with my family. It was really nice to have some time for myself, my oldest friends and my family. But honestly I wanted to come back here as soon as I could. After 2 days I was so borred at home. It is the weirdes feeling ever. When you know you have people who care about you around you but you still dont feel like you used to feel around them. I am not saying I dont love them anymore or that I dont feel  comfortable around them it is just harder to adapt back to your old self. I changed a lot and I am proud of it. And other people changed too in other directions. For example when I come back home everything feels the same...same streets, same buildings, same people doing same things...but if you ask people in Slovenia they will say how much everything has changed - for example: they changed their job, have kids, got married, got boyfriends, got girlfriends, moved out of their parents house....and all of this is awesome! It is hard to explain and I have a feeling not many people will understand what I want to say...Bassicly I am saying that no matter how Slovenia and Slovene people change, I will see them the same because I do not see this changes from here. Like people from there dont see my changes and think I am the same :)

Last weekend me, my hostmom and my host kids went to Pennsylvania to a family resort tubing for 1 night. What is tubing? It is like sleding but you are not using sleds..you are using a big tire kind of looking circle - tube. You sit on it and slide down. It is pretty scary and at first I did not want to go but my 5 year old one was going all the time and Jayden the 3 year old one wanted to go so bad and than i had to go with him...I admit it was awesome! And once again the saying YOU WONT KNOW UNTIL YOU GO prooves itself right :) 

The week before that I went to Ajdas place in Connecticut again. I was so happy to see my monkey after 7!!! weeks ! This is the longest we were appart. WE were together every weekend before so it was strange not to see her for so long! She is doing great and we had a lot of fun. 

Oh what is new is that I learned how to make sushi! Omg it is amazing to know how to do it because you can save sooo much money :) hahaha !!!

We also had a hudge snow storm 3 weeks ago. It was called Blizard Jonas and it brought us quite a lot of snow. We could not go anywhere this Saturday. :)

Yesterday I went to NYC to a Broadway Musical called Finding neverland. It is about how a writer thought of a story of Peter Pan. It was pretty cool. And after taht we went to Brooklyn looking for a rainbow bagel and in time we find it they were all sold out :( Well I guess we will need more luck next time! Also yesterday was Super Bowl and I did not watch it. Dont judge me! I am not even interested in soccer so why would I watch football on which I have no idea what the rules are. I saw the halftime show and honestly said....I was NOT impressed! I dont know I just think last years with Katy Perry was much better! C'mon she came in on a Tiger!! But Lady Gaga singing the Antem was pretty awesome ! But this are just my oppinions.

Guys If you have any questions do not hestitate to ask. Let me also post some pictures for you :)

Blizard selfie

New York never gets borring

Math test

Yesterdays Broadway show Finding Neverland

Our view out of the room in Woodloch resort

Manhattan

soooo much snow!!

You see how much snow? oh my goodness

Subway in New York

Lets go tubing!!

Snow snow... do you see the brown line in the snow? well that is the bench haha

Sushi made by Sabrina

Typical classroom

AN AMERICAN STUDENT ....

Hey guys how are you doing today?

I need to admit I am pretty good. Why you ask? Because I got all my papers from College that I need to apply for student visa and it looks good so far.
Maybe some of you dont know that I am trying to study here in USA.  It is very expencive if you compare it to Europe where it is for free. I choose Human sciences - social work so let's see how it goes.
But first of all I need to go home and request my student visa. I got my date already so now I am just waiting that the date comes.

So what else is new? Not much I would say. I am happy that my friend Mafer from Mexico found a family in Short Hills wich means she is gonna stay here longer wuhu :) haha I am happy about that.

The whole weekend we were in bed watching tv. It was very relaxing hahaha.. and this friday the 30st of October I am going to see my friend Ajda in Connecticut where I am also be for Halloween. Not sure if I am gonna do something tho :) Not a child anymore hahaha :)

Oh yea I am going home to Slovenia from 17 to 27 of December!! and I am so very excited because I will see all my friends family and than also my friend Melissa and Valentina are comming to visit me from Germany and Italy! that is so awesome and every time I think of it i feel so excited :) we will have so so so much fun!!

And Oh God how did I forget that??? My very good friend Amelie from France got married !!!! :) I was so excited for both of them and they are just so very cute together and it was very nice ! I will put some pictures here. It was an awesome day! Lovey couple . I wish them many many years of love and luck! And I was so honored I could be her vitnes.

 Amelie and Elina

 This is seriously the biggest sendwich I have ever seen in my life! Oh America...

 Having fun in the woods with Ajda. It was a very very nice afternoon !

 The whole weekend in bed :)

 Amelie and Hugh

 Elina, Amelie and Jayden posing haha

 I was first time on the real football field. It is hudge !!!

 Hugs friend, Hugh, Amelie, me and Mafer :)

 Oh yea just one of the hudge cars that drive around here :) picture made out of Mercedes...

 Jack o latern...it is scary right? haha some craft with kids for Halloween 

 Loooove Korean food! This is kind of soup with tofu and shrimp. 

Love this girl to the Moon and back :* Best friends for ever :)

I miss you ...

It is just hard being an au pair from the aspect where all your friends leave at some point. Even tho they are still your friends of course its not the same at all! It is so sad when There is a group of people and than a minute later you find yourself alone. Today was very very hard for me to control my feelings and not to cry. When I started to think that most of my friends left...it is just crazy...

I miss you Melisa !!

Oh sweetie I miss you so much! You were the one who always draged me out of the house, always wanted to do something, never gave me 10 minutes for myself but I loved and I still love you for all you did for me. You made me more social, you made me laugh all the time and you were so silly with me! I just miss this sillines and I miss beeing around you all the time. I know you are still my friend but we will never again have this days when you would call me and say : c'mon move your ass let's go for a coffee or for lunch... I guess I will miss that for ever! I love you so much and I hope you are enjoying your German life now. miss you girl!

Lilly I just can't find words how I miss you too! I miss our farm trips, or just hanging around in my room sitting on the floor and eating cupcakes! You are my first friend here in Usa and I wil never forget about that! I miss you so much but I am happy for you that you choose a path that is better for you! Please come and visit me soon !

Valentina I know I did not spent too much time with you but I do really miss you. I miss your positive attitude and just everything about you. I never saw you in bad mood, you were always smiling and that gave me energy to be happy myself! Hope to see you in December

Jordaaaan ! Where should I start with you? My freaking movie partner! Now I always need to go alone and it is borring !! I miss you and I miss your happines and sillynes and love to act..you are jsut the funniest and happest and most honest guy I know. Miss all our panera bread evenings and also all your sillines when you got drunk :) Come baaaack :)

Martina ! You are the last one who left me! You silly honest girl...I just think you are seriously the most awesome girl ever. I love your hairstayle, I love your jokes and I love your seriousines...haha you were always telling the truth and you did not give a sh*t what other people said or tought of you. I wish I could learn from you ! I will see you soon ! I promisse I will visit you !

I just can not express how sad I am that theese people left me ! They were just so awesome and every and each of them is just so much different but all together we were perfect match ! I would love to turn the time back but I think this is not gonna happen... guys it was awesomet ime when we were together and I will never forget it! I know each of you have a new life now but I just can not exclude you of mine. You were a big part of it and still are ! I love you so much and yea...It is even harder for me to let go because I was the one who came first and I am the one who is still here and all of you left me  :) I know it is not on purpose It is just life but sometimes this sucks ! I wish we could be neighbours for ever !

Take care and don't you ever dear to forget about me !

your crazy Sabrina XOXO

Baxter Lane, West Orange, New Jersey, United States of America

Hello my lovely ones...it is time for a new post :)

As you can se in the name of the post I am gonna tell you something about the place where I live. It is almost 20 months now since I am here and when I first came to Baxter Lane in West Orange I was so surprised. All the houses looked the same. I was wondering how am I ever gonna remember wich house is ours without looking at the mailbox with the number 35?!? 

Well eventualy I got used to It and now I can find a way to our house with closhed eyes :) I love our neighbourhood because 1.) It is called Bel air of West Orange ( I feel like fresh prince of Bell air :) 

                                     2.) The area is very very nice and neat

                                     3.) Free pool and gym at the clubhouse where we can also hang out with friends

                                     

 Yea I admit it was hard in the beginning to go anywhere without navigation. Even to find my aupair friends, every time I put their adress in the navigation  the navigation took me on different route. It was crazy but now I know how to go to most of the places that I usualy go without navigation. I can even find my friend Ajda in Connecticut without navigation and I am very proud of that. It is about 2 hours driving away. And NO my friends...streets here are deffinately not like steets in Slovenia. Highways are much wider, more exits, more names...exits do not have names but numbers....so for example...to go to Ajda I need to :

- go to I280 (interstate)

- turn right to Parkway north (yep very easy confused with Parkway south)

-follow until exit for Teppan Zee bridge

-follow to exit 9 S-N

-follow to exit 42 and than few more turns and you are there...

Its not like from Krsko to Ljubljana:

go on A2 and follow it from Krsko to LJubljana hahahaha :)

Ok let me tell you something about West Orange. Yea before I came I was laughing about that name (zahodna pomaranca :) ) but now it is very normal to me. Around West Orange we also have Orange, East Orange and South Orange. I would say West Orange and Sounth Orange are the most safe of all Oranges. East Orange is quite dangerous. I would not go there in the night. And unfortanately West Orange is the only Orange without a train station, so I need to drive to South Orange or to Orange to go on a train for New York City. But it is ok it is only about 10 minutes away. Not too bad. 

West Orange is very known after Thomas Edison. Yep that is the one who invented the light bulb. When I first saw that he was from here I was pretty excited. Who knew I will once live where the light bulb was invented :)

Anyway even tho I am here for so long already I did not go to the Edison museum jet wich is very sad. I promisse I will go and I will write more about it than. 

We also have ZOO in West Orange and it is very very cute.

So now you know a little bit about the town where I live and I hope you like to read my blog. Let me post some pictures...

 The sighns for streets are a little bit ( a lot ) different thatn in Slovenia :)

Also speed limit sighns are different ! this is 30 miles per hours 

 One big difference between here and Slovenia is that here they have most of the electric and phone wires in the air when in Slovenia they are mostly underground.

 Well....if anyone wants to write me a letter here is my adress...yep all the houses have the same mailbox here in our neighbourhood. 

Our house and the car I drive whenever I am working :) my room is top right window :)

Talk to you soon peeps, your crazy travel lover Sabrina

Let me talk about my kids...

Hey!

Today is Wednesday and it finally started to rain! After a long hot summer this is what the earth needs. There is a lake here and its half empty and the gras started to grow because there were maybe 3 days that rained this summer...so yea..only a bit scary fact is that a huricane is coming our way...but it shouldnt be soo good.

Ok...today I want to talk about my kiddos....I am taking care of 2. Elina who is 4 years old and Jayden who is 2 years old. They are asian and very very cute. My hostmom is from Korea and my hostdad is from Taiwan wich makes them cute mixture :) haha...

They are very very good kids who listen to me 88% of the time :) they are not very spiled wich is very very good !!! In 19 monce since I came I really love them as they would be my kiddos. They can be hard sometimes but they are kids...who is not crying sometimes for nothing :)

Now they both started school from 8.30 to 12.30 wich is awesome because I have way more free time. I love it :) They are visiting Montesori Christian preeschool and its very cute and very expencive. Well at least for me...in Slovenia you don't need to pay so much for preeschool. They are paying 6.000$ a year for 1 person. its crazy right?

Anyway...Now I am sitting in a waiting room of Honda service center because the car did not start yesterday...well crazy...they said baery was bad and they are gonna change it.

Oh and I think I am getting stressed with everything - visa - school - weather - people leaving me...

Oh I could talk about people leaving...literally everybody is leaving...

Today Martina is leaving (Italian aupair) and It makes me so so sad I cant believe it. It is devestating. Anyway... than Melisa left, Tjasa is moving further away, Ajda is 2 hours away...thank God Mafer is still here ! She better stays !

This is the hardest thing ever in living abroad.. people leaving and moving away. But I will talk about that in my next post.

have fun guuuuuuys... coments are welcome :)

your crazy traveler Sabrina :)

What is different?

Hey guys!

So seeee as I promissed I am back! Today I will try to write some differences between Slovenia and USA.
There is many but let me just tell you about some :

1. Right turn on red traffic light.

Yes you heard right. Here in US on most of the traffic lights you can turn right even if the traffic light is red. You have exeptions on big or dangerous intersections of course but otherwise I think this is a pretty good thing. You still need to stop and yield to all the cars that are comming from your left but once they are gone you can go. I am happy oh so happy about that rule :) I think all of you know how painful it is to wait if there is no cars :)

2. Football is NOT soccer !

Well this is still hard for me sometimes even tho I am here for a year and half already. When somebody asks me: do you like football? I need a second to realize they are talking about American football and not Soccer. I guess it is hard to get used to it because we call soccer football in Slovenia...Oh well :) 

3. Free refills 

Oh God this is killing me! Everywhere you go (well almost everywhere) where you can but food and get drinks you get a free Refill wich is very dangerous. Well at least for me. If I know I can take more drinks for free of course I will drink more of crapy soda :) haha... but sometimes I think it is so silly...because they ask you if you want small, medium or large drink... but if you have free refills...doesn't really matter if it's big or small because you just refill it...hahahah :) I am not sure if they will ever do that in Slovenia. I guess we are just to greedy.

4. Vacations

America is the country with the least paid vacation in the world. Yes they are free some days like labor day, christmas and 1st of January...but that is about it. Do you know what is the week between christmas and New Years called here? NOTHING! because they need to work. :) haha... In Slovenia most of the companies close their doors before christmas and open them again in January...well...not here..

5. Mail

Nobody here really uses mail but you get tons of mail in the mailbox every day ! Yep it is like that. If you go to the store and buy something they will send you coupons and sales for every thing they have. And nope...you can't really get rid of it. It is very annoying.

6. Tips !!!

Tips are very important here in US and it can get confusing. For example: if you are in slovenia and you go eat out and you want to buy a meal that costs 8 dollars and you have 10 dollars you have enough money for the meal (and you probably can buy a drink too), but here in USA it's not like that. If the meal is 8 dollars your 10 dollars wont be enough. Because after that 8 dollars comes the tax wich is about 8% and in the end you need to tip at least 15% of the bill so yea...if you have 10 bucks...you will be hungry.
Tipping is far the most annoying thing ever here ! and if you don't tip good...you are not really welcome to that restaurant anymore. I guess that is why we go to Taco bell or Burger king or Chipotle more often...no tip :)))

7.  Drink options

There is so many different options of drinks in America!!! Cola, Diet Cola, Chery Cola, Vanila cola, Lemon Cola, Cinamon cola, Diet chery vanila Cola... Diet pepsi, Chery pepsi, Strawberry pepsi, and I can go on and on and on also with waters, sprite and million of different drinks they have. In slovenia we have Cola and Diet cola. That is about it. Why do they do so many tastes? It is just silly.

8.  The weather channel

haha there is a channel on TV that has weathr on all the time. Weather at 8 am, at 5 pm and at 12 am. It is just silly.

9. Cars beep when you look them

How annoying is this? Every time you look the car it makes the silly sound. And yea every brand of car has different sound. Funny story...when I went home in February and took the car to go to store I locked it and did not hear anything (like every normal car in europe) and was standing there in front of it pressing the lock button talking to myself in english : why dont you lock? I even unlocked it and went to open and close all the doors again... oh well :) silly me haha

10. Language and traveling

When you travel in Europa you should know a bit of the language to where you go or at least speak english. In America. Wherever in USA you go they speak english. They have the same stores...it's not really so different from each other. In Europe we have 24 different languages and here...they just speak english. In Europe every country is different...here everything is pretty much the same :)

Well I think that is it for now and I promisse I will be back soon !

If you find any other interesting difference let me know in the comment !

Sabrina

Hello

Hey everybody !

Let me introduce myself. My name is Sabrina and I am from Slovenia. Slovenia is a little country next to Italy, Austria, Hungary and Croatia. Since February 2014 I am here in USA as an Au Pair. I need to say at first I was very homesick but after few months West Orange (NJ) became my home. I can not really imagine going back home and live ''normal'' life again. Anyway...what is normal?

In a year and half I did see a lot of things and got to know many people.

I visited New York, Connecticut, Atlantic City, Philladelphia, Washington D.C., Chicago, Texas, Arizona, California, Nevada, New Hampshire, Vermont and Dominican Republic. I also went home this February to surprise my parents on their birthdays and to get new Visa.

I may got home again in December or January to get my Student Visa. Yes my hostfamily decidet to sponsor me for studying so I am gonna try to get the visa and stay here for few more years. Everything here is just so cool and my best friend is here...what else do i want? And as we say - If you don't try you won't ever know.

Many people are asking me if I am missing Slovenia or at least my family and friends. The answer is YES !! Of course I miss my family and friends !! I thing everybody does. There are days that my life seems horrible and I feel miserable but again, I can not imagine going back home and live my life anymore.

My last trip was actually a camping trip to Vermont with my best friend Ajda. She is also Slovenian and we had so so much fun! We left Saturday morning from Connecticut where she lives and studies. Driving around 4 hours we came to Bristol in Vermont and put out our tent. Let me say that was the frist camping trip for me so I was very excited at the begining. After we did it we went to find a river to put our hot legs in because it was very hot and humid. We found awesome Bristol falls and tried not to swim at first but at the end we kind of both fell in :) We had lots of fun and we were laughing a lot. After we went and turned on a fire for dinner. We were grilling some corn, sausages, mushrums and zuchinis. It was so tasty. When the time came we went to bed and I was so scared I was just shaking and somewhere in the back (far far away) I heard the Wolwes hauling. It was so scary so I woke up Ajda and asked her if she can go with me to the car wich was literally 3 meters away but I was just too scared ! hahah yes I am silly but oh well... :) Next day we put tent away and start driving - meaning we stopped everywhere where was something interesting. We were driving trough some parks and had a very nice view of hills wich you don't see in New Jersey. We stopped at waterfalls. At the end we find a park called The Polar Bear Caves wich is a cave park and you need to climb trough tiny caves and it was so funny for me because I am not the skinniest and it was a challenge :)

Anyway in the end we had a lot of fun time.

I am gonna try to write this blog more often - at least once a week.

If you guys have any question about how to become an au pair or how to apply in Slovenia or in general let me know. I would love to help you !

This is where I live :) all the houses look the same like in the movies :) 

 Going to Ed Sheeran concert with my Italin friend Martina was very amazing. It was my first live concert and I loved it. It was in Barklay Center in Brooklyn, New York.

 Our tent in Vermont. Everybody got their own little space where you could camp and not be botthered by other campers. It was very nice, hidden and cute. Maple Hill Camping near Bristol Vermont.

 I visited Grand Canyon in July when my mom was visiting. On the right on the picture is my friend Lindsey who lives in Flagstaff  Arizona. I met her in Austria when I was Au Pair (nanny) there. She is the sweetest lady ever. Love her very very much !

 Philadelphia in winter ! It was actually March but we still had a lot of snow ! This picture is taken on the top of Rocky stairs.

 I forgot to mention it abowe but we also went to visit Canada. This is in Toronto where we stayed for 3 days. It is amazing ! And one thing that I loved is that you could buy Kinder Egg without any problem. In USA they are banned. No idea why but I just feel this is stupid. I went with Mafer from Mexico and Julian from Germany.

 This is me and Melisa in Atlantic City. Yes winters here are long but that doesn't stop us from exploring around. Melisa is from Germany and she was my closest friend here but now she is gone...back to Germany :(

 Me and Ajda in Washington D.C. . I was in Washington D.C. twice and I loved it both times ! We also went to see the gardens from White house. Pretty cool.

 Niagara Falls with Mafer and Julian. WE went here when we were in Toronto. It was about one hour driving. In the back is Canadian part of waterfalls.

 When we were in Arizona with my mom we also went to California for few hours. Hollywood sighn...was just my dream to see it !

 With Ajda camping and playing Indians and Cowboys hahaha :)

 My mom and me also wisited the Hoover Dam. You can see it in every movie that is why it was very exciting to see it.

 And of course we did not forget Las Vegas.

 I was in Chicago twice. This is my second time when I visited Melisa. Love that windy city.

 Antelope canyon in Arizona. If you are ever going to Grand Canyon please don't forget to get here too !

 View from WTC center in New York. The tower that is in New York instead of the twins.

 Times Square

 Santa Monica - California

 New York from New Jersey. Next to Hudson River.

 On the Yankee baseball game with Jordan from France and Camila from Colombia. It was my first game and it is pretty interesting !

 About 2 weeks ago my host family went to London and I went with them so I meet my 2 friends there. They are both from Slovenia too. On the left is Sabina and on the right Jasmina. This is in my hotel room in The Ritz hotel London!

 Sometimes I am just so amazed how I can live so close to New York City and Manhattan. I am really lucky.

 Well...because we are Slovenian girls living in USA we decidet to get maching tattoos with Ajda. New York skyline with coordinates that represent Slovenia.

 Bristol Falls in Vermont. Water was freezing but it was so clean and awesome.

 Grilling some corn in Vermont.

 Bristol Falls

 Polar Caves in New Hampshire. Lemon squeze :)

 Somewhere in the middle of Vermont. Looks like Slovenia right?

 Kissing bridge in Polar caves.

Memorial of 9\11. Very emotional to see this lights shining once a year. Look from Jersey City.

I tried to show you a bit of my life so far and more is coming next weeks.

Love you

Sabrina