Why Host?There as many great reasons to host an international exchange students as there are families and students participating in exchanges each year. But don't take our word for it - what will your reason be? Letter From a California Mom"Let’s go ahead and do it!" Within a few days after filling out paperwork, our YFU Area Representative came over with profiles... Strangely enough, my husband and I picked the same exact "daughter" to come and live with us. She was a Japanese girl named Akiko. She was 16 years old and an only child in contrast with our family having three very young children...
After weeks passed, we finally received her official packet of information and started writing to her... We sent pictures and wrote about our city, the school, and the weather. Her parents also wrote and said they were worried about her adapting to such a different culture. We finished getting her room ready and had a welcome basket on her bed and finally August 16th arrived. Our family got up early and we painted a poster, "Welcome Akiko." We had ordered a cake decorated like an all-American hamburger and bought her a bouquet of flowers and balloons to hand to her at the airport... We waited and watched from outside in the heat; as her plane landed, my heart felt such relief. Then we saw her from a distance, a Japanese girl walking toward us. "What was I going to say?" and then all of a sudden the young girl turned and talked to somebody else. Quickly though, she came to us and sadly told us that our Akiko had missed her connection from San Francisco... I immediately felt the "Mom-Daughter Connection" because I was overwhelmed with anxiety and fear. We called YFU and were immediately assured that she was going to arrive on the next flight and that she was not alone but had YFU staff with her... The next flight arrived and... we were relieved and excited to see her step off the plane and come directly toward our sign and not stop until she came into our family. I thought at that time [it would be] for only a year, but I can honestly say she came permanently into our family for the rest of our lives. Akiko said that everything was so open in America... so much open land. We had never really stopped to think about it but from that moment on we haven’t stopped looking at our surroundings as though they are new each day. I’ll never forget her comments that made our house go from a house to a home. She said over and over again that our American home is big and so cute... and [she] immediately started taking pictures of every room. We live in a fairly small 3-bedroom, 2-bath home, but had never really appreciated it until we saw it through her eyes.
She is part of our family and home now. Over the year, we had a lot of good times and occasionally a misunderstanding, but for the most part, every day was special. We shared a lot making us a closer family, doing a lot more meaningful things together. Yesterday was the day that Akiko left our "house." I call it a house because she is still part of our home. It is the most difficult thing that I have ever had to do as a Mom because Akiko truly became our daughter the day she arrived in America a year ago... The airline staff told us several times that she needed to board the plane now. Finally we let each other go and she stepped into the plane... While at the airport, Akiko had handed us an envelope and told us that we couldn’t open it until we got home. It was the longest ride home... Finally we arrived... and opened up her envelope which took us through her heart on a treasure hunt finding little notes which led to our surprise... a lengthy letter filled with so much of that emotion I missed already... There was also an audio tape of her voice talking to us on different occasions... There was also another card addressed to everyone and also to our next foreign exchange daughter but with instructions to open it now... a gift certificate to our favorite Japanese restaurant so that we could remember her and share a part of her with our next daughter. We thought that we were taking in a student to teach her about the American culture and instead, I think that we learned the most valuable lesson of life... to love one another no matter where you come from. It’s a small world... WE LOVE YOU, AKIKO Love, Mom |
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