We have a Rotary exchange student living with us. This is the second time our family has hosted an exchange student. I highly recommend the experience.
Rotary likes the students to live with more than one family, sometimes they live with two, and often with three different families. They come for a year, arriving before school starts in the late summer and leaving about the same time the following year. They stay with each family for a few months or a semester before moving on, staying in the same school for continuity.
The two required classes for exchange students to take are English and U.S. History. Most students also take a math class, a science class, or another core class, but the rest of their classes are electives. This year won’t count for them when they go home, except as an experience. Since the credits don’t transfer, there is no point in taking a full load.
Our first exchange student came from Thailand in my daughter’s sophomore year. Her name was too long and difficult for Americans to pronounce but we all called her Sine. We were her first host family, she lived with us during the first semester and went to another family for second semester.
Sine had a tough time with English. English is so far removed from Thai that not only was pronunciation hard, the syntax, and the way the words are used was not easy to translate. The word “freedom” had a very different meaning for Sine than it did for us. She asked me why they spoke of freedom so often in U.S. History class. I told her that freedom was very important to Americans. She said that she was free, too. She felt that freedom when she rode her bike and her hair was flying behind her. American freedom is a little harder to describe, so I asked her “Do you love your king?” She said “Of course! Everyone loves the king!” (In Thailand the kings photo is placed above people’s heads and no one speaks ill of the king.) Then I asked “What if you didn’t love the king?” She said “But I do, everyone does!” and I asked again “Pretend you don’t, what happens?” She put her hands over her mouth and looked worried. Then I said “Pretend I am from Thailand and I don’t like the king.” She gasped. “You must like the king, everyone does.” This was the start of our conversation about the meaning of freedom.
Sine loved to eat and wanted to taste every food that she could. She took hundreds of photos of food, as well as everything else she encountered. She had times of being homesick, she turned 16 just after she arrived in the U.S. and missed her parents. Sine was shy but she worked hard at socializing to get the entire American experience.
Our second student, Julie, came from France. She and my daughter already knew each other so when she came to live with us for the second semester, it was an easy adjustment. Julie makes fun of herself. She laughs about everything. Julie wanted the total American movie-style experience just like High School Musical or Mean Girls or one of the other teen movies. She became a cheerleader – something that doesn’t happen in France. Julie had no idea about American football or basketball but she danced and yelled and enjoyed every minute of it. French culture and even French language is not that different so learning English was easier. Julie is immersed in the culture, so much so that we sometimes forget she is French (until she puts mayonnaise on everything to remind us).
Julie’s original Rotary counselor was big on education and placed Julie in a full schedule of core classes. She struggled with her grades but did her best so she could stay on the cheer squad. For the second semester, her new Rotary counselor took her out of some of the tough classes. This makes it easier to do well in U.S. History and English and it makes it more fun for Julie.
Julie lived with two different families before coming to live with us. Our original commitment to Rotary was six weeks, but Julie is easy to live with and we are happy to have her here until she heads back to France. My daughter is an only child so having someone else at home is great for her, too. As I write this I can hear the girls laughing and talking like sisters. It is a sound that reminds me of my childhood and makes me want to call my sisters and hear their laughter, too.