Have you ever been to England/USA?

[sweetashoney]

I was an exchange student in Jackson/MI about 4 years ago (too long ago =((. It was the best school year I ever spent and I am really grateful that my whole family supported me SO much and made my dream of living the American way of life true! Although I encountered several rough situations as for example in living out in the bunnies and my hostparents repeatedly leaving me there for weekends without a car or any friends close to hang out with, I also had a lot fun times eg I went to the Bahamas and made great friends. The weather wasn't really that nice because it felt like winter until July (so, I was pretty glad to come back to the wonderful very HOT summer here in Europe =)). Anyhow, I am just so happy that I could experience a new culture thoroughly and that I met the man of my dreams there! I can't wait to go back to Michigan and visit all of my friends there this christmas! (I haven't seen them since I left in 2003)

[ledoell]

well...I've been to Great Britain in 1997 with my family. First, we spent a week in London, watching all the famous sights...unfortunately, I was only 11 years old by then, so I couldn't really enjoy all the great cultural possibilities that the city offers too much...visit the shakesperean theatre, the hyde park (speakers corner), the british library and so on...and of course all the lovely quarters like notting hill, greenwich, west end, east end etc....after the week in London, we headed for Cornwall to the coast-sided town of Bude where we tried to swim in the ice-cold sea ...nice landscape there, too...

in 2005, I've been to New York for 8 days...here, you have so many possibilities (at least in the cultural field), you have to pick some few important ones...we went to Columbia University, the Museum of Modern Art, the Natural History Museum (which is close to Strawberry Fields, the John Lennon-Memorial in central park)...morover, we did some jogging in central park (the famous way round the basin), visited most of manhatten and some parts of queens and brooklyn (where I went to a concert of "stereophonics"), visited liberty island...because the central park is so huge and situated right in the middle of manhattan, it creates a really comfortable atmosphere...you can stay all day long in the park, doing whatever and the step right out to the scyscrapers ...

[apple]

I`ve been to England twice.
The first time when I was 15. The journey was organized by my school, unfortunately we just stayed for 5 days. We lived with guest families in Hastings near London. Of course 5 days are really short, so we did not see that much, but tried to use the time as good as possible by visiting London and some sights of Hastings.
I was really fascinated by this country and was sure to come again some day.
My next chance to visit GB came to me at the age of 17, I think (I´m not quite sure about the age ). I took part in a student exchange and stayed at a guest family in Brighton with a friend of mine. This time I had 3 weeks to see a bit more . Unfortunately the familiy I lived with wasn`t as nice as the one in Hastings. There was a lot of quarrel between the parents and between the parents and the two little children. But in spite of it we had a good time. In the mornings we went to „school“ where we and some other german students were taught English by Native Speakers. After school we went to the beach (it was summer) or to the shopping centre. In the evenings we went to cinema or to theatre or just met at the beach or at McDonalds. This leads me to a very negative point of England- the food !I really hate English food . We had cornflakes and coke for breakfast (for 3 weeks !), vinegar crisps and fat sandwiches for lunch at school and strange microwave-food for dinner, for example steak with peppermint-sauce. So McDonalds was paradise for us. Fruits were very expensive, so we didn`t have the pleasure to get some very often.
The best of all were the weekends, of course. We went to London twice where we visited all the sights a tourist has to see. And of course shopping was a must, too. Or we traveled a bit along the coast.
Another great thing was the circumstance that we could see the solar eclipse at the beach of Brighton, this was very impressing to me.
In summary I think England is a wonderful country and I hope to go there again some day to see a bit more of the north, maybe Scotland too, but I would never stay at a guest family again and try to avoid eating typical English food.

[Flauta]

Is South-Africa counting, too?

We were there 2 years ago, as you guess, also with an orchestra (youth wind band).
We stayed in a Lodge in Cape TOwn and than moved to guest families. We had a concert in the Opera House in Cape Town. Unfortunately we saw how it all was going to be older because there is no money for culture left.
In Cape Twon I was loged in a family that lives in a "coloureds Township". This family was very friendly, it was a very impressing stay where we had a lot of fun, made friends but we saw how difficult the past and present is still for a not white family and that there is still hostility between whites, colored and black people.
We passed form Cape Town to Kneesna on the garden route. Than from there to Kimberley and from there to Bloemfontain. In K. I stayed in a family where the mother is a secondary school teacher and the father a doctor for paediatrics. It wasvery interessting to know the facts of these professions in SA. In B. I stayed in a family of a biochemestry professor and I learnt a lot about university life in SA.
We moved than to an other University Town and than to a former Farm near Pretoria. The Farm is now used for pleasur and tourists. We can see here how farmer life was and make some hiking tours in the nature that looked very african. The owener's son is a pilot at British Airways and he told us a lot about his profession. In the evenings we sit around the (BBQ) fire and listened to the sound of the African nature: you must try this once, wow!!
Than we moved to a safari-park and did a tour in the evening. That was so fantasic to discover the big five by night. Our rangers were very big nature fans and showed as very typical staff, that is normally hidden to tourists. And in ther very early morning we had the possibilty to do again a tour by our bus to the safari park. As we were driving in the bus, the sunb was rising and we had a beautiful vieuw to a lake like it was in "lion king". It was soooooo beautiful!!!
we did all the ways by bus so that we saw a lot of this country and the contact to the guets families we had impressions of the culture of SA that no Tourist can have.

This stay was very special: interesting and shocking.
But we enjoyed it.

[Iloenchen]

I've been to England a few times when I was younger. My grandmother's cousin moved there many years ago, got married and got children and that's why I've got many relatives in England. I was thinking about making a 'Famulatur' in England, and I hope that I could live with them during my stay.
As to the USA: I've been to New York in 2004. It was great, but it was also very expensive, and I have to admit that I was quite disappointed when I saw the Statue of Liberty. I always expected it to be really huge, but it was much smaller than in my imagination.