Introduction

Hey everyone! First off, The name's Miranda and I'm 17 years old, which makes me a Junior in high school. At the end of January here, in 2009, I will be leaving my home here in Fargo, ND (USA) for Roclincourt, France where I will be spending the next 6 months. Roclincourt is a small town of less than 800 people. It's located in the Pas-de-Calais region, which is in the northern part of France. I will be going to school in a neighboring town by the name of Arras. While in France, I will be living with a host family. My mother is the mayor of Roclincourt and my brother is 20 years old and has downs syndrom. I don't know much else about my family yet, but I am very excited to meet them.

I have been getting more excited each day as the date of departure gets closer. I can't wait to get to France and meet my family, see the town, and go to school at a French "lycee" (high school). I'm really excited to meet people my age and take classes there. I've been taking French at school since eighth grade, so that should help me with the comprehension at least some of my lessons. This immersion in the French culture should help me improve my French, as well. I really want to be able to speak it fluently, so I'm going to try really hard to pick up as much as possible. I might even feel confident enough to write a few entries in French after a while. :)

As eager as I am to go and experience all of these things, I am also feeling a little uneasy about leaving my family, friends, and everything familiar behind. I'm going into a whole new culture with completely different ways of living. That is going be be overwhelming at first. New foods, new people, new family, new ways of communicating, new school, new town, new house, new everything! It will be challenging at first to get used to all of these new things, but I'm up for it! :) I like challenging situations, because after I work hard and pull through them, I feel like a much stronger and more accomplished person. This experience will probably be one of the most challenging and rewarding things I've ever participated in, and I will probably return home in July a completely different, more grown up person.

I plan to update this blog at least one more time before I leave, and then as much as possible during my trip. I'm hoping for that to be a minimum of once a week, so if you're interested, I welcome you to check back occasionally for updates. The purpose of this blog is to allow readers to follow me as I encounter different situations, both good and bad. I'll share as much as possible with you. Please feel free to leave some comments, too. It'd be great to hear from all of you who are reading this. :)

A bientot!
-Miranda


P.S. If you're interested in going abroad like I am, you can visit the AFS homepage to get started.