Year 9 Boys Edward Henderson (9/LE) and Fin McAvoy (9/LE) recently returned from a six week exchange to The Woodbridge School in England. Featured below is a short summary of their experiences.

For the past 6 weeks we have been over in England on exchange, an amazing experience and one we won’t forget. We were dropped off at the airport by our families and said our last goodbyes to all of them. From that point onwards we were independent young men and we had a lot more responsibility to carry on our shoulders.

We were anxious as we boarded the flight to Hong Kong as this was going to be the longest flight that we had ever embarked upon. However, we were both really excited on meeting back up with our exchanges and their friends. Before this Sam and Jack (our exchanges from England) had arrived in Australia and we had an excellent time. They both really loved coming over to Australia and meeting all of our friends, family and seeing our beautiful country. It was really sad to see them go but we knew that we would get to see them again in 3 weeks.

We were not disappointed, the people were extremely nice, helpful and took great care of us from day one. Once we had arrived at Heathrow we were picked up by both Sam and Jack and it was so good and fulfilling to see them again. We had a long drive to get back to both of their houses and we had a great opportunity to catch up on memories and the times that we had shared together. Arriving at the house for the first time and meeting our exchange family was full of mixed emotions.

School was very different to Newington, mainly the fact that it was co-educational which was completely different to what we were used to. They also had school lunches provided to them everyday and they were actually very tasty. The only disadvantage was that this meant we had to queue up for a while. All of the people that we met over in England were extremely nice and always there for us if we needed any help around school. This also included the other Australian exchanges from Melbourne and Tasmania that we met whilst over there. We all became really close friends.

Whilst we were there, England was experiencing the wettest April on record and we were both really surprised by how cold, wet and miserable the weather was. Another big thing that we noticed was the greenness of the countryside. Everywhere we went we were surrounded by endless fields of green grass. Despite the weather we still had an amazing time.

Most of our stay consisted of going to school each day of the working week and although it might sound boring it was actually really fun. It was good getting really into the culture of England and how everything works. On the weekends we had a lot of planned activities that our exchange families wanted us to see, such as going to the motorcycle racing, learning pieces of history in the local area such as nearby castles as well as visiting London.

Personal observations

On the last weekend before the last week of school, Jack’s family booked us a hotel that was right in the heart of London. In fact we had a room that looked out on Tower Bridge, which is one of the famous landmarks in London. The weekend was one of the biggest highlights of my trip. It is so good to finally see in real life the things that you’ve heard or learnt about in London, such as Piccadilly Circus, Hyde Park, Nelsons Column, Pall Mall, Buckingham Palace, Tower of London, London Wall, The Underground, The London Eye, The River Thames and lots of other famous sights. I was fortunate enough to go in an open topped bus tour around all of London seeing all of these sights and it was amazing, something that I will never ever forget.

Edward Henderson (9/LE)

My trip to Le Touquet France was amazing. This was a perfect time to practise my French, as I do it as an elective. To get there we drove to Dover where we parked our car on the train and waited twenty minutes and we had arrived in France. The first thing we did was head straight to the beach. The French beaches were a lot different to Australian beaches and there were no red and yellow flags and no surfers. After a weekend of beautiful food, scenery and awesome beaches it was time to head home.

Fin McAvoy (9/LE)

Fin McAvoy and Edward Henderson