One week in Belgium – a multicultural experience

The first day in Belgium we spent in Brussels. It was very impressive to walk through the old part of the town and its streets. It was quite hard for me to walk so much, because it was very exhausting after spending half of the day in the train. But I enjoyed the good atmosphere between teachers and students.
Late in the evening we got to the hostel and I was very happy to fall on my bed and to just sleep.
The next morning we had get to up early, because there was another day filled with activities and visits. (Sorry to the teachers, that we were a little bit too late)
It was interesting when we were in the ‘Atomium’ but it was more interesting being in the European Commission.
It was great to hear about the activities the men told us about. But at the end of our visit it was too much information, so that I couldn’t keep it all. Fortunately we had the possibility to take some magazines and papers, which gives us much information, too.

But the whole day I was looking forward to the moment I would meet my host student and her family. I am very happy, that I could spend my time with THIS family. They were all very lovely and we talked a lot, so that I felt, that I really belong to this family.
It was truly a multicultural experience, because first I had the feeling being in France because of the language, second it was the fact that I had the possibility to talk to the host father in German or English, third we had at one evening Chinese food for dinner.
It was a lot of fun, talking during the dinner with the whole family. The father often spoke to me in German and then went on talking with his daughters in German as well. And the same situation was when he talked to the girls in French and than started to talk to me in the same language.

I enjoyed all activities we did in school, like learning the folkloric dance or just joining in the tournament, which I won together with a French teacher (the funniest thing at all was to play with and against him). But the best was being in my host family and talking with Clara and her sister. I was surprised, that we got so close to each other. We (Clara’s family and me) did a walk through a part of the Ardennes and visited the castle of Hazer.
We talked about dreams and plans for the future, about boys, families and great
experiences we had in the past.
from the left: Sara Line, Clara, me and Zoe (my host sisters)








Time passed too fast, so I was very sad about the fact that I had to leave the family. I got a present from the little sister of Clara and I was tearful because she showed with this attention that she liked me a lot.
I also got close to Clara’s friends and it was a lot of fun, spending the time with them in school and at the funfair. We laughed a lot and I was VERY HAPPY, that we had no problems with communicating.

To sum up, I would like to say, that I will never regret to join in the COMENIUS Project and I’m very happy that the choices of the families for us students were made so well. (Thanks to Mrs Holzinger and of course to the Belgium coordination!)
Olesja