Mia abroad in the US 2018/19

In only six weeks I´ll fly to New York City for the Orientation Days. The time has run since last year. One year ago I had my interview with AIFS and now my year will start. I´m not sure about how to feel. A part of me is extremely excited and can´t wait to start and the other part realizes that I won´t see my family and my friends for one year 😭 However I´m still happy with my decision to go to the US. I´m sure that it will be a wonderful time. Obviously I´m scared of a few things e.g. the first day of school or (I know it sounds silly) that my suitcase get lost at the airport.😂 Nevertheless I´m excited and hope to make some great experience.

After filling out my host family application AIFS send ist to AYA. In my case AIFS hat to wait until I get the cancelation of the PPP. The host families also need to fill out an application. Employers of AYA give, with help of both applications, a selection of exchange students to theri host families. It´s possible, that your application was already given to a few host familys before it reachs your final family. Sometimes it happens, that a family choose a student, but the high school can´t give a comitment wether you can attend to this high school or not. A late placement never ever means that no one wants you. often it takes a long time to check the criminal backgroung of the family or to get the commitment of the high school.💙

I already had my preparation seminar  at  22.April.18 at the AIFS office in Bonn. Embarrassingly I was a bit too late, ´cause my mum and me get lost on the way through the downtown. However they welcome us calmly and very friendly. I directly get a hoodie, a t-shirt, a little notebook, a pen, a nameplate and a textile bracelet (you can see everything in the photo) by AIFS. During the morning the parents and we (the students) had separated presentations about the exchange program. The presentation last almost three hours that´s why we had a break of twenty minutes. After the presentations the parents went away and we ate some bagels. Then  we came together in a circle of chairs and present ourselves. At the beginning of the afternoon we talked about differences in the culture. Therefore we builded groups with the returnees (exchange students that are backf from their exchanges), which already answered questions during the presentations. My group talked about family living...

My host family lives in Missouri City, Tx, a suburb of Houston. (I won´t tell you that much about them, because I don´t know if they want that). In the US I´ll have three little host siblings. A situation, which is totally new for me, because I´m an only child. I get my host family extremely early (29.January.18). The most students get their families in May or June ( How do they select the host family? ). To keep the contact we decided to skype every two or three weeks. I know that other students don´t know what to say in Skype talks, especially at the first talk. I confess that I didn´t talk that much at our first talk, I smiled the whole time. Cause of this I decided to Skype with them without my parents and since that I talk really much when we´re skyping. I can recommend you to ask everything you want to know about your family at the first talks. Have a lot of fun with your family 💙

The most difficult thing after the host family application is to apply for the J1-Visa. It takes a lot of time. I´m really glad that AIFS helped us again. They did the first step and applied for the form DS-2019. They send it to me with an guidance how to complete the online application for the visa. My first step was to create an account at the website of the US-embassy and answering all the questions in the online form. There are questions (more than one side) which are only for male applicants. At the end of this  I needed to print a confirmation of the questionnaire. Before you can arrange an appointment in the embassy you need to pay 136€ for the processing. Also you can´t go to the appointment at the embassy until you pay 180$ SEVIS-Dues. Attention!!!! The SEVIS-Dues can only be payed with a credit card or with Western Union. After I filled out and payed everything I went to my appointment at the US-Embassy in Frankfurt am Main. Your parents are allowed to co...