Bonjour! My name is Mariana Early but you can call me Mary. I am 15 years old and will be going to France for a long-term exchange for the (2018-2019 school year). In the USA I am a sophomore at South Urban Academy and love mathematics and biology. I am very excited to start my journey and create new experiences and memories. I love sports and music I plan to play as many sports as I can on my exchange and hopefully play a lot of music also. I am fairly introverted so I think this exchange will give me an opportunity to become more open and social and meet lifelong friends. While aboard I hope to visit many great places and monuments in France. I have begun taking french lessons and while it is fairly easy it is also really hard at times but I feel like I will do very well in France. These past several months working with rotary have been some of the best months in my life. I have met so many great people and made so many new friends. I just want to thank the Columbus Rotary Club and District 6690 for giving me this once in a lifetime experience and for preparing and supporting me every step of the way. Au revoir!

 

October 1, 2018

Bonjour!

I can’t believe it’s been a whole month since I’ve arrived in France, where has the time gone. I arrived to an amazing host family waiting for me with a sign.I didn’t really know french well but my host family was very helpful and nice with trying to figure out what I was trying to say and they welcomed me with open arms. After a 2 hour drive from the airport, I arrive at my new home in L’Estructure, France. Here I live with My host mom and 2 host brothers one age 16 and the other 14. My host mom owns a restaurant in Saint Jean Du Gard which is about 10 minutes from where I live and that is where I spend a lot of my time either at the restaurant or around it in the village. There I have met my youth exchange officer. She owns the restaurant with my host mom and she is a really amazing and caring person who is so helpful I couldn’t ask for a better youth exchange officer. The weekend after I arrived I had a welcome party, I got to meet so many new and amazing people. The party was great we played games and got to know each other which I think was the best part. At first I thought it would be difficult for me to make friend’s but no I have made so many friends and its great. One of my best friends I have here is another exchange student from Russia he is so cool and easy to talk to. I have recently started school at Jean-Baptiste Dumas. The students and teachers have been very welcoming and they have made adapting to school really easy. A few weeks ago we had a rotary integration weekend  and it was great all of the exchange students are amazing. There I joined the interact club which should be really fun. As you can see my month has been amazing I have met so many new people, tried new foods, and seen so many amazing things it’s so great. Thank you so much for this once in a lifetime opportunity. Can’t wait to share the rest of my year with you. Until next time.

Au revoir!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

November 1, 2018