By Faith Morse, Greenheart Regional Director & Host Mom
After having hosted off and on for 16 years, you’d think I pretty much know everything—I’d think that too, oh no, not so! One of the real joys (and adventures) of hosting is that every year, every student, every culture, country, and family is different. Just as you could know a family with three kids here in the United States and each child in the family is distinctly different, so it is with exchange.
Some of the reality of hosting involves helping students find their way through the maze of interpersonal relationships in a country, language, and culture unlike their own (it’s okay that’s what they are here for!) Years ago, while hosting an adorable French girl, Ele, I remember stumbling on some great advice. As turns out, this first part came from my own lips but this year, this year, I Iearned something even more profound. Golden advice reveal to come…no spoilers yet…“You know” I said, to Ele (years ago), “you can’t make instant friends…it’s not like popping soup in the microwave and thirty seconds later everything is warm and yummy.” This was offered as Ele was lamenting to me that it was nearly Christmas, (it was really only nearly Thanksgiving, but I didn’t dicker) and she still didn’t feel like she’d made any “real” friends.
Rain Comes Before Rainbows
I remember that I asked Ele to tell me about her friends back home—her “real friends.” She immediately and enthusiastically launched into a colorful description of her best friend who she confided everything to, who finished her sentences, and who knew everything about her. I asked simply, “And how long have you known each other?” Ele offered cheerfully, “Why, since the first day of second grade.”
“And how long did it take you to become best friends? Were you best friends all year in second grade?” I asked, “Oh no,” Ele responded and her nose began to crinkle about the moment she finished saying, “We didn’t become best friends until the end of third grade.” I went on to describe that her friendship with her best friend took time, that all relationships need shared experiences, moments of triumph and laughter. That when something goes terribly wrong and you have that feeling that connection in common, that builds the relationship.
The opportunity for great success or failure, offer the building blocks to create the key connections you come back to and laugh or lament over later. This is the time that binds teens together in the amazing and incredible exchange year, the same as what binds teens together in France, or any other country, the same kind of times that she had already shared with her best friend at home. I explained that while there is no instant fix to cement friendships, she had already been banking those moments, at lunch, during physics class, and at her daily track meets.
Ele’s Happy Ending
Ele did make lots of friends that year, though I don’t know if my advice actually had anything to do with it. She was a bubbly adorable kid with a heart the size of Alaska. By her birthday, March 10th she had to ask me how many friends she could invite to the house for her party and by the time she left in June we had outgrown our well-proportioned cape and had to have her going away party at the bowling alley in town.
After she left, the kids at the school talked about Ele for years, much to the chagrin of subsequent exchange students. At least three local kids found a way to get to France to visit Ele in the 10 months after she left, and those kids and a few more have kept in touch through the years.
Finding a Pot of Gold
Now I promised you a golden nugget and here it comes! Years later, and just a few weeks ago, I was telling my current exchange student about Ele and her desire to have this instant friend connection. I proudly described the idea of common experiences creating the bond needed to fuse friendships between exchange students and their local peers. I asked Elena, my current exchange student and Italian daughter if she could see the connection between sharing time and experiences and forming bonds. With wide eyes she nodded, “I guess then” she said, “that’s the same as it is for host families and exchange students, right?”
I stared at Elena, OH MY GOSH…BAM…in all of the times of recounting this story, encouraging, not just my own exchange students but other students I’ve known or monitored, to have patience, wait, and put in the time connecting, not once had I applied this great advice, to the relationships between exchange students and host families.
Moral of the Story
So, for all of you who might have slightly dozed off somewhere in the middle of this story, here is the take home golden nugget. There is no miracle microwave 30 second, instant exchange student host family connection either! The family connection, exactly like the friend connection, takes time. It needs that moment at breakfast when dad forgets his coffee in the microwave and can’t find it and when you discover the cat ate the puzzle pieces. The long car trips, where it turns out you really should have taken the left when Siri said to, and the late night sitting in the dark on the couch after you can’t figure on what watch and end up just hanging out talking. Actually, all real, meaningful relationships take time, and now you know!
My advice, Host? It’s never too late to learn great lessons in life. Sometimes it’s been right in front of you, and you just need a wise-beyond-her-years exchange student to point it out. Thanks, Elena, for this golden nugget!
Are you interested in opening your heart and home to host an international high school student? Visit HostWithGreenheart.org to meet students like Ele and Elena and apply today to host!
Do you know of a family who might be a good fit to host? Visit ReferWithGreenheart.org and if they become new hosts with Greenheart, you earn a reward!