In June we were contacted by a family from Málaga, looking for a nice family in England in search of a friend for her daughter and practise their mutual mother languages. On Spain reached out to the Schools within her network and no less than 11 teachers replied. After finetuning the profiles for the exchange in the end 6 possible new friends for the Spanish girl indicated their interest in coming over to Málaga in the summer. In the end a succesful exchange was set up with the kind help of the Spanish teacher at Yately School.

On Spain spoke to the Spanish mother, as ofcourse we were very curious how it all went!: “It was a wonderful experience”, Ms Morales indicated. “It was very good to see that the girls got along so quickly, enjoying eachother´s company, the beach, the cinema. They were also able to enjoy the local feria here in our part of town.” When we asked her if she had learned something herself, Ms. Morales commented that she had the preconception about large English breakfasts, but was surprised that the English girl preferred breakfast cereals just like her own daughter. “I guess it is just her new generation thing”.
How about culture shock, was there anything that was a big surprise for either you or the guest?. ” Yes, I think what most shocked or better said surprised our guest was the food and the schedule of the meal times. She liked the food very much venthough it was so different from her own, but I am not sure whether she like liked the time we started eating, so late!” (laughs)

It was a truly positive experience, as we learned from Ms. Morales. “I would recommend it to anybody who is interested in learning and it really triggers my daughters interest in learning English and being open to a different culture. And they obviously thoroughly enjoyed themselves as they could not stop lauging and talking!”

Want to find out about part II in England of this story? Keep tuned on the On Spain Blog!

More later this month.