Some Belgian friends and I went to the Belgian coast for New Year’s Eve. The guy with the curly fro, Martin Gilson, was an AFSer at my high school in Little Rock the year before I went.

As an unforgettable experience, my year abroad with AFS ranks number 1 in my life. Going from a city girl to living in the Belgian countryside made a huge impact on who I am today. The day after I arrived I remember calling my mother to say I had arrived safely but instead I could not stop talking about the beautiful landscape and the fact that there were horses down the street and cows right next door. I went overseas having almost no language experience and the first month or so my host parents tried desperately to talk to me in English until my French improved. There were several times when either my host parents or I tried to pronounce things in French or English and instead we wound up laughing for several minutes when we learned what we had actually said.

In Belgium I lived in the town of Bastogne which is 5 minutes from the border of Luxembourg. The most interesting thing about my town was the fact that it was the site of the Battle of the Bulge in WWII. In the town square there was an old American army tank and a bust of General Patton. Also located there is the Mardasson which is the huge Memorial to the American soldiers who helped save the town. Thanks to that, in the springtime many American veterans come through visiting the battlefields and during lunch one day a group of them walked into the café I was eating at. The coolest part was helping them translate what they wanted to order.

In my town I was the only American and one of two exchange students living there so that and being a six-foot tall woman I stood out like a sore thumb but by the end of the year I became just another person living in town. I replaced activities like dancing and swimming that I did back home with ballroom dancing, volleyball, and cooking in Belgium that I had never really done before. I also changed from being a drama student at Parkview Arts/Science Magnet to being a visual art student in Belgium and it was really interesting to see how Europeans view art in a completely different way. With my school I got to do an internship at the Cultural Center of Bastogne and I had the opportunity to see different traveling performance groups and art tours, the likes of which I have never seen in the states.

Thanks to the transportation systems in Europe I got to visit France (three times), The Netherlands, Italy, Luxembourg (more than I can count), and Poland with either my school, my host family, or just with friends. Some of my favorite memories of living abroad with AFS were with the people that I met. I met people from all around the world. Not only did I become really good friends with Belgians and exchange students from other countries but I also met many Americans that went abroad too. There were some that I met at our departure orientation in New York City that I got to visit in Holland or in Flanders later in the year.

Being now in my second year in college and reflecting on my year abroad I know that I would do it again in a heartbeat. I walked off the plane in Brussels as one person and walked off the plane in Little Rock as a very different person. I now have friendships and family ties spanning almost every continent, new hobbies, a broadened palette, and a different spin on living than others that I go to college with. I thank AFS a million times over for one of the best and life changing experiences I will ever have!

Other AFS exchange students and myself at our Midyear Orientation in Liege. The other students in the photo are from New Zealand, Italy, USA, Finland, Paraguay, Iceland, and Indonesia.