Hi,

I'm now in England. First we went to London for two days. We stayed right in central London in the flashest hotel. It was very nice and very nice in the price too, if you know what Imean hehehe. We went and saw lots of places: Trafalgar Square, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben (its huge), we saw the swapping of the guards. They all go out front of the Buckingham Palace and march around and then a band marches down. It's all very traditional and very cool. Then we went inside the Buckingham Palace. It is so big, its HUGE!!!!!! and so beautiful. There's like 450 room, 150 bedrooms and 78 bathrooms. its amazing! And the garden is about 5 acres big. Now i'm in Heathrow where my cousins are. Ihavent seen them for 9 years so its great to ctach up. We're staying at their place. Tomorrow i'm hopefully going to go to a fun park with them. It has a roller coaster with the most loops in the world. I'm very excited! So hopefully I'll get to go. I'm still having heaps of fun anyway. But am looking forward to coming home and seeing everyone!

Bye for now
Monette

 

Hi,

I'm now in Paris. We're only here for two days but we're making the most of it. We went to Arc de Triomph (don't know how to spell it) and the Eiffle Tower. The Eiffle tower was just brilliant. We went at night so it was all lit up and then it started to sparkle with all these lights, it looked like a huge christmas tree. We went to the very top and the view from up there is just amazing especially at night. All the lights were so pretty and you could see practically the whole of Paris. Paris is sooooooo busy. Nobody goes to sleep even at 1am the roads and restaurants are still packed. Last night we had a nice little tour of the undergorund train station. We got lost down there for an hour, it was pretty funny. We also went to dinner at a really posh restaurant and had snails for dinner. They are really quite nice actually.
Today we went to have a look at the shops. They are all designer shops and are sooooo expensive! The cheapest piece of clothing you can buy is $600!!!!!! It was nice to look.
Tommorow we are going on the train to London. I'm having lots of fun but can't wait to get home.

For now..... Aurevoir
Monette

 

Hello,

We are now in Italy. we arrived last night. Today we went sightseeing and saw the Vatican, the Sistine Chapel, the Trevi Fountain and the Pantheon and the ruins of the old city. It was beautiful and the city is so old and antique looking. the food and drink are sooooooo expensive here! We bought a banana and a nectarine for 8 dollars and a milkshake for 14 dollars!!!!!!! hahahaha.
Our hotel is very nice and comfortable. The weather is still pretty hot but a lot better than Athens. I'm having a lot fun but it's all very tiring sometimes.
Well, tomorrow we are going shopping, at the markets, and to the Saint Peter Church.

Hope you're all well, miss you lots and i'll see you all later,
But for now arevidichie! (dont know how to spell it hehehehe)

Luv Monette

 

Hi everyone,

I'm just writing a short letter to say hi and that everything is going really well up here (apart from my stress fracture in my shin) we're all having so much fun. We've met heaps of the Aussie athletes and heaps from the other countries too. Everyone is really nice!
The competition was really good! And the stadium was huge! It was just amazing! It was really great to be out there!
At the moment we're just training in the weights gym and sitting by the pool everyday. Very nice and relaxing. We haven't been out much just to the diving which was really good. After Allana finishes competing we'll be able to go out and see more sports and hopefully go shopping aswell.
It is so HOT here! Like 38 degrees everyday, but my tan is coming along nicely though. Well i have to go now and hopefully I'll be able to tell you more about it all a bit later.

Missing you all sooooooooooo much
Luv Monette

 

OMG! I MADE THE TEAM! YAY! Along with Allana, Lisa, Steph, Danielle, Melissa and Karen as reserve, How exciting! After we finished our comp last night we had an individual meeting Peggy where she told us if we made it into the team. It was the scariest moment of my life. Iwas in such shock that I came out crying. Then we went out to where all our parents were and got officially anounced. It was so amazing!
Well, this is where all the hard work starts now. So wish me all the best.

cya all soon
Luv Monette

 

Hi guys,

How are you? I'm pretty good and training camp is going well. We're all training very hard are ready to compete on Sunday & Monday. It should be good! We're all missing home greatly! Thanks heaps and wish me luck. Hopefully I won't see you all till after the Olympics.

Luv always Monette

 

Hi everyone,

I’m in Athens at the moment and it's great! I did really well and came 2nd overall and 2nd on beam YAY! It’s been so much fun and a great experience. The venue is coming along but they've still got heaps of work to do! I hope they'll be finished in time. The gym venue is great though, and it's huge. The atmosphere in there will be awesome!
I got to go shopping while i was here which was good. They have about a million and one Olympic souvenir shops! I also got to go and see the old Olympic stadium where they had the first Olympics ever! It was amazing! I think they’re going to have the archery and the end of the marathon held there too which should be good. I also saw the Acropolis but only from a distance, but hey at least I got to see it lol!
I’m actually leaving today and I cant wait to get back and see everyone.

Luv Monette

 

2003 WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS
Anaheim, California

I've been away from home for 8 weeks preparing and competing at the World Championships in USA. But it was all worth it because we made history by being the first ever Australian women’s gymnastics team to win a medal at the world championships, coming in 3rd place.
Myself and 9 other gymnasts, from around Australia, went to Canberra on the 7th of July. We trained together for two weeks. At the end of the two weeks we had a competition to select the team. The team was cut down, form ten, to seven girls of who were Allana Slater (WA), Belinda Archer (ACT), Danielle Kelly (QLD), Lisa Skinner (QLD), Jacqui Dunn (ACT), Stephanie Moorhouse (VIC) and myself.
We stayed in Canberra for around another 4 weeks, which consisted of grueling training three times per day and the weather was unbelievably cold. It was like –5 degrees every morning, it was absolutely freezing! While we were in Canberra I celebrated my 15th birthday. My parents came down to visit which was nice. I also received an enormous amount of presents from my parents, coaches, teammates and even my friends back home sent up some stuff.
Then from the 9th-25th of August we were in America. Our first competition, team qualifications where we had to get in the top 8, was on the 18th. We did pretty well and came in 7th place so we just made it in. Apart from that it was just training and occasionally we would be aloud to go in the spa and pool. The weather over there was really hot, about 25-30 degrees every day, which was really nice. I think I got a bit of a tan.
Finally it was competition day, team finals. I was very excited. We all did really well (obviously). We were one of the first teams to finish the competition so we had to wait for the other teams to finish their last apparatuses. We were currently in 7th place with Spain, Russia and China, the top countries still to finish. Once Spain had finished we had jumped up to 5th. We were already overjoyed because the best Australia has ever come before this was 5th. So we were just sitting around watching the competition and suddenly one of Russia’s gymnasts fell twice off beam. We were like Oh my god! We just might be able to get 4th. Then one of China’s gymnasts fell on floor but China was so far ahead of that we would never be able to catch up. But then to everyone’s amazement China fell on floor again! We were like ‘Is it possible, could we come 3rd ?’ We couldn’t sit still in our chairs. We thought to ourselves just be happy with 4th. After everyone had finished we were waiting for the results on the scoreboard. It was the longest moment of my life, time felt like it stood still. Just waiting and staring at that scoreboard. The results came up and there was Australia in 3rd place! We just screamed! Then we started crying and laughing all at the same time. It was the most unreal feeling; I can’t even begin to describe how it felt.
We went up on the podium and received our medal, which was pretty heavy. Then we received our flowers and held them up us the crowd of 10 000 people cheered for us. It was the greatest moment of my life and I will never ever forget it!

Speak to u all soon.
Luv Monette

 

Hi everyone,

How are you? I’m great. I’ve just been to California, Anaheim for tri-nations competition. (AUS v CAN v USA) It was really fun! First we went to training camp for a week. It was pretty demanding but fun and rewarding to know that after the hard traing we can get to go to California and show them what we’ve got.
Day one of competition was teams comp. Stephanie Moorhouse, Danielle Kelly, Jacqui Dunn, Lisa Skinner, Hayley Tyrell were in the team. We did pretty well but came 4th. The Canadians just beating us by 0.15. I did a pretty good comp. I only fell on floor but it was ok because it was a new skill. I was happy with my comp though.
Day 2 of competition was apparatus finals and I got into beam and vault. We had to do 2 vaults. My first vault was really good but I fell on my second vault which was a bit of a bummer. I made up for the mistake on beam by doing an excellent routine.
I had a very enjoyable trip. It was great experience and will be good preparation for world championships in Anaheim in August. Everyone was very supportive and I’d like to thank everyone for writing to me.

I’ll speak to you all soon, lots of love
Monette Russo.