Let me introduce myself, I’m Stan Fidder. I went to Spain for three months in the end of the year 2014. I’m 16 years old now and when I was in Spain I was 15. I was there with one of my closest friends, Luuk Wilkeshuis.

It is easy for me to say that this experience has been one of the best experiences in my life so far. I have learned a lot in the 3 months I was away from home. I think that that is the biggest thing that I have learned when I was away, how to live by yourself. Of course you had a host family and you had friends at school but in the end it mostly comes down to you having to do much more by yourself than what you are (probably) used to.
Another major thing that I have learned in Spain is, Spanish. This might not seem like a surprise but I did learn quite some Spanish in Spain. I think that Spanish is a beautiful language but also very hard to learn since there is a big difference when you compare Dutch to Spanish. This made it hard to learn but in the end I managed to understand quite a few conversations and more importantly the lessons at school.

Coming back to the lessons in a foreign country. I must say that this is something that is hard from the beginning and will probably stay hard till the end. For example, in our math lessons in the Netherlands we are allowed to use a calculator but in Spain it was strictly forbidden. Also following lessons in a language you don’t speak at all is very hard. In Spain we had the problem that 90% of the teachers didn’t speak any English at all. This meant that Luuk and I had to make tests which were written in Spanish and also had to answer the questions in Spanish. This obviously led to some bad results on tests. Luckily these test didn’t count for our final marks which meant that it didn’t really matter that we didn’t get really good marks. This however did not demotivate us to do our best in school.

There are quite a lot of things that I would say are an unforgettable experience. First of all lunch and dinner time. In the Netherlands we lunch around 12 and have dinner around 6 PM. In Spain we had lunch at 3 PM and dinner at 9 PM. This might seem a little strange but these are some small things that will always stay in the back of your mind. It’s these little things that makes this experience such an unforgettable one.

One of the other things that I remember very clearly is that we went to the Hospital because my exchange student, Raul, had just gotten a new nephew. This really shows that life still goes on normally for everyone and that these kind of things can happen in 3 months. This includes things like birthdays, deaths, holidays (Halloween, etc.), and births.

I won’t stand here and say that it’s always rainbows and butterflies. There are definitely some downsides, but I think that if you are willing to go on such a journey for 3 months that you should accept before you even go that it won’t always be nice. You should however look at the benefits and think about it this way: I will have a damn good story to tell to my grandchildren when I’m 80!