Marion Dequet

2007-08 Inbound from France

Hometown: Valenceinnes, France

Sponsor: Le Quesnoy-Solesmes Rotary Club, District 1670, France

Host: DeLand Rotary Club, District 6970, Florida, USA

School: DeLand High School

Marion's Bio

Hello, I'm Marion Dequet, I'm 16 and I am from Valenceinnes, France.

But now, I live in DeLand, Florida for a year.

In France I was in 10 grade.

I play a lot of piano and am so happy because my host family has one and I can play when I want!

I can't believe I am here !!!

October 3 Journal

Departure from France 8/07/2007:

I was so excited!!! The day before I couldn't sleep. But the "goodbye" with my family was really difficult for me ... After 17 hours travel, I arrived in Orlando airport and I was welcome by my first and second host family. I was so tired but so happy to see them.

I was so surprised by the climate ... It's always hot here!!!

The first couple of days:

My host family is very nice and very patient with me because I didn't understand and I didn't speak English. The name of my host mother is Maureen and she has 2 children, Kendall (15) and Cassy (12). I love them!!! Kendall is in the same high school as me and she showed me lot of things about school. It's very different than France ... and she introduced me with her friends too .

School:

I have 3600 students in my high school, in France we were only 700 ... It's a big difference, but it's so cool because I meet nice people every day ... I take the bus at 6:20 of the morning and I have to get up at 5:00!!! But I love school here!!! In France, it's so boring but here you have a lot of activities and I finish at 2:30 of the afternoon! I have chorus, culinary, English and TV-production classes, it's so much fun ...

Food:

American food is so bad for your body!!!!!!!! I think I will be fat before the end of the year ... But it's so delicious!!! Pizza, peanut butter, chicken, hamburger ... I can eat that every-day for the rest of my life!!!

New York:

This week, I was in NEW YORK CITY!!!! It was incredible... I was in the last floor of the Empire State Building and I could see all the city!! I visited a museum and saw a picture of Modigliani, he is my favorite artist. Of course I saw the Statue of Liberty!!! I did shopping in Times Square and saw an amazing show on Broadway!!!

The dream during 4 days ... I saw my mother too because she get married 3 months ago and she was in New York with my step father ... I was so happy to see her!!!

December 9 Journal

It was Thanksgiving, like 2 weeks ago, and my family and I went to Washington DC. It was great!!! I was so impressed by the architecture and the museums ... everything is big and like roman style. My favorite was the modern art museum but my family didn't really like it ...

After we went to Pennsylvania to visit my host parents' families and we eat turkey and the day after we went shopping ... we went to Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia ... fantastic ... but really cold compare to Florida and I realized I don't miss the cold like in France ... All the trees were yellow, orange and red , it was wonderful ...

I'm in chorus at school and the last week we had a concert in Disney World, 277 people were singing ... so cool!! This weekend we were in Disney World with the other exchange students!!! I love be with them ... I don't know, we are like brothers and sisters ... It's crazy when you think about that: everybody comes from a different country all over the world and we really live something crazy together ...

But I have to tell you, it's not always easy to be an exchange student ... I mean it's probably the best experience in my life but you have to know you will be disappointed ... like in US if you are under 18 you are really a kid for them and you can't do what you want, you have to respect a lot of rules and sometimes it's hard ... but when I travel, when I see the others exchange students, when I realize I can speak English or when I do things with my friends at school, I think it's really the best thing I ever do in my life ...

March 23 Journal

Hello! I just realized the time spent so fast! I just have 2.5 month left for school. I learn English, I spend charismas and Easter here, it's almost my birthday, and I learn to speak English! I feel like I came here 2 month ago!

School is not a big deal anymore, I go there every day, I don't have any language problems, I learn a lot in my American history class, my teacher cracks me up when he talk about the 'bad' French people and I really enjoy his class.

I changed my host family last month, I had two younger brothers, Dekota (14) and Hunter (12), I really loved them, and an older sister, Stormy (18). At the beginning everything was perfect, my brothers took me to some dirt bike race and my sister introduced me to some 'red neck', yes it's DeLand, we have a lot of them but the ones I meet were really nice, they took me in the forest with their big truck and took me to the bike week in Daytona. But I had to change my family again after a month. Now I'm at Bob Booth's house, they are so nice to me! Their son is in Boston College but he came home for Easter and took me to Universal Studio this afternoon! Awesome!!! They have some REALLY nice roller coaster and I loved it! We spend all day long, I was so tired. And I catch my first fish in my life this evening with my host dad! It was so funny, I was so excited after that!

Well, even if it's hard sometimes to be away from my family, I can say I had some really great time here, and I really think this is the best experience of my life! The trip for the west coast is coming soon!!! I'm so excited!