News and Trivia

Tuesday, February 28, 2006

February 21. , Tuesday

We met at 8.30 in front of the school, and at 9.00 the whole school started its trip to Egilsstaðir, to another town in the Eastern part of the country. In every year, the three schools meet in one of their towns, where they compete against each other, taking part in several sports competitions. This year there were 4 teams, one was formed by the teachers (Katalin also took part in it), they had to fulfill different tasks, e.g.: Bandy, fitness, and ?dwarf throwing?.
The hosts took this little competition a little too seriously. Finally the hosts won, our team became third, and the team of teachers came to the fourth place. We also had lunch there, which consisted of several biscuits. At 5 o?clock we started our trip back to Höfn, and finally we arrived at 8.30. After this the partners went home.


Iza and Valdís
February 20th, First day in Höfn

This was the first night of the Hungarian team in Höfn. Everybody was amazed by the hospitality of the families. In the morning the headmaster of FAS gave a speech and talked about the events and tasks of the open week. Then every student of FAS and also he Hungarian team had to take part in an orienteering game in Höfn. We had to walk to stations where we got tasks to fulfil. E.g.: singing and dancing J. After this event we had lunch then started to work in groups. Everybody had to be member of one group. We are members of the media group and have to design the newspaper of FAS. We left school at 4 o?clock, then had dinner at home celebrating the birthday of Kalli?s mother. Then we celebrated Elvar?s birthday in a bar at 9 o?clock. It was a good party.

Kalli & András
February 19th
The iciest day in Iceland so far


We woke up early, at 7 o?clock when Hjördís knocked ?quietly? on our doors at the hostel. It was very hard to wake up but we all knew that a great and exciting day was waiting for us. We had breakfast together: Icelandic butter, toast, cheerios with milk?etc.

Then we got on the bus at about 8 o?clock, and it was still dark! From Reykjavík we drove to Hveragerði (where the Icelanders grow their ketchup, as Emil explained us before), where smoke comes out of the Earth and there are many greenhouses heated by geothermal water. After visiting the greenhouses we went to the Eden, which was exactly the opposite of what the Hungarians imagined Iceland to be?

Our next stop was Skógafoss, which is a huge waterfall surrounded by beautiful and high mountains. The sun was shining and made a rainbow in front of the waterfall. We got under it and of course made a wish. The waterfall is 60 meters high and according to the legend there is a gold-case behind it.

Then we drove to Iceland?s most southern point, Dyrhólaey, where we had to be very careful because ?if we fell down nobody could find us!? For the first time in our (the Hungarians) lives we saw the western side of the Atlantic Ocean! From there we could see Reynisdrangar very well, which are rocks standing like dwarfs from the ocean and as you can see Sara got that Kodak-moment when Mimi was holding the rocks in her hand.

From the bus then, on our way we saw the desert of black sand, and Iceland?s biggest volcano, Hekla, which has just erupted, in 2000, reforming the countryside.
Then the most amazing stop in our trip: The National Park ? Skaftafell. We walked to the glacier-tongue, and as we got closer and closer to it, it was becoming colder and colder?
This is part of Europe?s biggest glacier, Vatnajökull. This was formed in the Ice Age and has a greenish-bluish colour. We were very lucky with the weather, we could see everything, even the highest peak of Iceland, Hvannadalshnjúkur (2110 meters high).

Now we were getting closer to home, but there was one stop left, Jökulsárlón. This is a glacier lagoon, which is always changing, this day the ice-blocks were quite low, sometimes they are much higher. Next to the lagoon it was cold again. There we took the Christmas-card picture 2006 of us, but you´re not going to see that here.:) We were there for half an hour but we had to leave because it was getting dark.

On our way to Höfn from Jökulsárlón we couldn?t see anything but fog, but no problem because by this time we were very tired. Soon we were in front of FAS (the school), and our families were waiting for us. They were all very nice. So we found our mom and we drove home which was a very long way, about 1 minute, along the ocean! We both got a rose, because it was women?s day. We packed out, then had a very delicious dinner together, chicken and salad and the typical Icelandic browned potatoes, which is potato with sugar. We both took a shower after the long day and because we had no power left, we went very early to bed.

Sara Tölgy & Mimi Björk

Monday, February 27, 2006

February 18, Saturday WATERFIRE and the LANDing!

It started early in the morning. We gathered in front of the Zalaegerszeg Plaza (like in October), and left for Vienna at 1 am. We were at Schwechat Airport (Vienna, Austria) by 4, and after 4 hours? waiting, we were on our way to Copenhagen, Denmark. We had some more hours to wait for the connection flight, and eventually we took off 4 hours later including a one-hour delay.
Altogether we flew 323O km before we landed at Keflavik Airport.
Most of the Team had their first flight in their lives, and we all enjoyed it in the sunny weather. It was great to see the sea of clouds and then the Atlantic Ocean and the Icelandic coastline and snow-covered mountains.
We were all excited about meeting our Icelandic friends who were waiting for us. It was good to see each other after four months, when we said good bye to each other in Budapest.
The first program of the two weeks was a REAL treat: relaxing in the hot seawater of the Blue Lagoon, a really unique spa with white medicinal mud, after 36 hours without sleeping.
When we got to the hostel in Reykjavik, 4O km away, everyone was hungry as a wolf. Hjördis took care of us and made pasta and salad for the Waterfire Team.
We tried to get to bed early because we knew that the following day would be a long one: 47O km, a few stops and some 11 hours till we get to Höfn.

Kati & Laci

Wednesday, February 01, 2006

Photos from Linz...

As you probably know Laci was on an international conference in Linz representing our project on the 13-14-15th of february. It was like some kind of exhibition. Every country had their own pavilion representing and advertising the eTwinning connections they made.
Like at the market: 'Come here we're connected to Iceland! We are the best! Check out our homepage! Let me give you a brochure...'
I was just joking... :) But its true that it was a big show...

And the father of eTwinning talked about our project>
(He was only talking about only 2 projects. One of them was ours!)

But let the pictures talk! There would be lots of them because some other hungarian e-Twinning participants want to download some, so I published them on an another site, because it was easier.

so you can check them out at: http://kep.tar.hu/tacu/
It's hungarian but I'm sure that you can find your way around the page...
Just look for the 'Pictures in Linz' script...

Only 12 days left... :)