Rodeo

    Riding horses was a common activity for people who I met in Oregon. My host family also owned a horse so I had 2 lessons of riding. I found it very exciting. Then they had to sell the horse so my lessons stopped. It is also normal when you go out dressed like a cowboy. I wore cowboy clothes for Halloween – jeans, leather boots, a shirt and a hat – but some Americans did not recognise that I was wearing a mask because these clothes are common for them. I felt like in the Wild West though.

    Listening to country music is nothing unusual too. Actually, it was my host mom’s favourite kind of music. She preferred Tim McGraw and his song Real Good Man. We always listened to it in the car. Her second favourite kind of music was Christian songs. I could tell you that some of them were quite good.

    My host mom, her friend from a ranch and I visited a rodeo once. It was only a small performance but it was better than on TV. I liked that they didn’t kill the animals as in Spanish corrida. There were disciplines such as bull riding or barrel racing but the funniest one was calf roping. Cowboys had to catch a calf by throwing a loop of rope around its neck and tied its three legs together in as short a time as possible. Some of them were very skilled and you could only see one roll and it was finished. I rode a bull too but it was a robot bull in front of the arena. I felt like a cowgirl on its back but then when you fell on your back and the rodeo was over.