Jacob Grandstaff – Germany

“I never tasted any food that I didn’t like, but German food is not exquisite or exciting. Their lifestyle includes a lot more down time than Americans. It is very much a beer culture. The drinking age is 16-years-old, and they look at beer the way we would look at a Coke. In fact, the reason why they eat so little is probably because if anyone ate like a Southerner and drank like a German, they would never make it to 40.”

Erica Oman – Denmark

“It was beautiful there with cold weather in the 40s. It snowed the first day I arrived. We got to jump on the public trampoline and do a lot of sailing for really cheap. It was inexpensive to travel through Denmark. Buy a bike — that is the key while there. The Danish people did not encourage us to learn the Danish language. That was appalling.”

Becca Stackhouse – China

“I learned to enjoy the culture and history you can indulge in and absorb firsthand. You can also understand more as stories and pictures from history books come to life. The culture and lifestyle did not overwhelm me at all because in all my travels growing up, communicating was a challenge. I quickly learned to adapt. It takes patience to communicate your wants and needs.”

Andy Page – Peru

“The real challenge was the language. The host family had about as much knowledge of English as I did about Spanish. I knew the least Spanish among my roommates, and our host family knew less about my language than I did about theirs. What excited me most was the anticipation of knowing how much my Spanish would improve while I was there, and it improved a lot.”

Robby Thompson – Tanzania

“Our group didn’t go to Tanzania to bring our culture or way of life to its people. Quite contrarily, we were the ones changed by our time spent there. Tanzania may not boast a tremendous or outstanding national economy, but that does not mean this country is not rich. Tanzania is rich in its physically diverse environment, landscape, natural history and resources. It’s people are some of the happiest and content peoples with whom I have interacted.”