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Saturday, May 12, 2012

In-Home Interview!

So I just had my in-home interview like not even an hour ago, and that was quite possibly the easiest, most simple thing I have ever done. I'd already had a phone interview, though, so it was really laid back, we just sat in the living room and talked about exchange, and answered some of my dad's questions. In the phone interview, there were a lot of things that you had to talk about--like if you were service oriented, if you liked group activities, yadda yadda. That was really easy to do over the phone, I didn't really worry at all when I did that.

I  did freak out for the in-home interview though! I like, scrubbed my house from top to bottom, made sure my room looked picture perfect, and I was way overdressed. I had on like...black pants, a red sleeveless turtle neck, and a long pearl/gold necklace. I looked very nice and very professional, but...they didn't look half as dressed up as I did, so I felt out of place. They should really provide you with a dress code! It would have saved me some time. One of the girls(usually it's only one person, but I had three, because my volunteer was new, so she brought along an experienced volunteer, and that volunteer brought her daughter, who has been to French Belgium) was actually wearing sweatpants, if that tells you anything. I probably could have gotten away with jeans and sneakers after all, but oh well. I know I made a good impression at the very least.

I got to have a lot of my Belgium specific questions answered, because Camille(the daughter) had exchanged there, and had visited the Flemish part a lot. A lot of the stuff they told me, I already knew, because of CS. It was really more for my dad's benefit than mine. He had been behind me and supportive a hundred percent, but he's a little more relaxed now that he got to meet Silvia(the experienced volunteer). She was from Brazil originally, exchanged to America way back when, and obviously moved here. She was really intimidating, super tall, had a super strong personality, and talked a lot. I didn't really get the chance to say a whole lot, between her, my dad, and Camille. Camille kept trying to interject and tell me stuff about Belgium, and then her mom would cut her off and give me the 'volunteer's perspective. Camille would be like "oh, some schools don't care if you pass or fail, just show up, and some don't even care if you show up~" and obviously I intend to attend the school, because that's part of the immersion, and a great way to make local friends, but her mom took that as somehow me agreeing that school wouldn't be important(all while I had said nothing, simply laughed when Camille said it.) So she talked a lot about how I was representing AFS and if I didn't attend school, then I would leave them with a bad impression and they wouldn't want to take another student in the future. I kept wanting to tell her that I know that, I've done my research, and I don't like to fail at anything. So while yes, school in Belgium will be incredibly hard, I intend to work my tail off. But I couldn't say that, because she wouldn't stop talking! Heh.

They did seem really happy about everything when they left, though, and very pleased with me, so I was glad about that. Looks like everything is more or less going well right now, just formalities being taken care of. I'll get to seem them again next Saturday for my Pre-Departure Orientation! Woot. I'm probably going to be the only kid there that doesn't know where they're going. Yay. I don't feel lame at all...

Maybe the powers that be will smile upon me and Belgium will accept me in the next seven days! Doubtful, but a girl can dream.

I can't wait to meet the other exchangers at the PDO! That's going to be fun, I'll try and take a lot of pictures!

Tot ziens!
Maggie

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