Pre-Departure Orientation

I suppose I should write about the PDO I had to go to back in May before I completely forget what even happened. It wasn't terribly boring, but it wasn't too exciting either. There were only six or seven students that were going to be outbound this year, and there were a couple of adults who were holding it there as well. One of the supervisors was actually the same woman that interviewed me before I got accepted to the AFS program. The interview was pretty quick; I just had to answer a few questions that were supposed to help them place me.

Anyways, when I first got to Arrowhead High School (where it was held), no one else had arrived yet so I just kind of talked with the supervisors by the doors. Once we got to the library, most of the students had already arrived through a different entrance, so we had basically been standing there for no reason at all. It started off kind of slow and no one seemed to want to talk, but as the day wore on, it got better. We had to introduce who we were, where we were from, and what country we were going to. Seeing as I've waited so long to type this, I can't exactly remember what country everyone was going to, and who it was that was going there. From what I can recall, Karen was going to Germany; Lucas was going to France; another boy was headed to Japan; one girl was going to Hungary; another girl was going to Spain; and I can't for the life of me remember where the last girl was headed. We did a couple of corny exercises that were supposed to give us an idea of what the culture shock was going to be like. We had to write a few things with our left hand (which I was hilariously terrible at), and it was supposed to be the whole thing where it feels so awkward at first, but after a while you would get used to it until you don't even see much of a difference. After that, we drew pictures of what we expected to gain from foreign exchange, and then what we were worried about. I think I did something lame and generic like Perspective and Not Knowing the Language. In between eating bagels and drinking lemonade, we wrote a letter to ourselves that our parents are supposed to send us when we're halfway through our exchange just to see how things have changed, and how we had felt at that time -- this was probably my favorite exercise. Lastly, we did a quiz on how well we knew the AFS program and its history; we were supposed to read a booklet they had sent us a couple of months ago, and I ended up reading it the night before the orientation at 11:00 at night -- hooray for procrastination!

With around an hour left, our parents showed up as well as three people who had returned from foreign exchange in the last couple of years. One had gone to France, another to Argentina, and Mikhail -- who went to my school -- had gone to Austria. Luckily, the parents left for a while and talked with one of the supervisors, because the returnees had to start doing these cheesy role plays to try and show us how to handle potentially dangerous situations. It was pretty hilarious. One was about not letting someone of the opposite sex lead you off into 'the sand dunes' alone. I assume you can see where that one went. The rest was mostly about drinking and hitchhiking; those of us who were headed to Europe were basically told that we can expect a lot of alcohol during our foreign exchanges. I had jokingly told my mom prior to this that I was sure to come back as a complete wine-o. We started making jokes about all the drugs we were going to encounter, and so some of us started asking really stupid questions about what we should do. Someone asked what would happen if our host parents turned out to be drug dealers, and the mattress they gave us was stuffed with pot. I couldn't stop laughing at that one.

After their exuberant theatrical skills were displayed, everyone sat down to ask questions about how the returnees' foreign exchange experiences had gone. After that, it was pretty much over. With all things said and done, it took around 3 hours. It was worth it in the end, and it made me look forward to this experience that much more. I wish I could freeze time, though, because I don't want it to end and it hasn't even begun yet. I'm not even sure if that makes sense, but maybe it will in a year.

Tot ziens en Hou van Altijd.