I must admit that I'm absolutely amazed that I've been nominated as host family of the month after only joining Global Experience for four months.  We have had some wonderful students staying with us, which has made it easy and enjoyable to be a host family.

I am from Denmark and have always worked in tourism and travel.  I have great passion for showing tourists around our city and country,  I have been a stranger in many different countries myself, which helps to understand the problems people face when in a foreign place.  John is Australian and he has always lived and worked here.  He is working as a network engineer, which is handy when our students have questions regarding internet and phone connections.  We have two children, Ian, aged 11 and Martin, aged 7, both are in school.  They also play hockey and soccer and love going to the beach and surf.  My boys also have travelled a lot already and understand how it is to be in another culture.

We have been a homestay family for many years.  Before we started hosting students, we always had people from around the world staying in our house.  I had a backpacker hostel for a few years when first arrived in Australia, 20 years ago.  We still know many of the travellers who stayed in the hostel.

We find it inspirational to host people from other backgrounds.  Often we learn about their culture and traditions.  As we like to travel, it is great to find out about other places from people living there.  We try to treat our students as part of our family and involve them in our life.  We take them with us to the pool, to see friends, sightseeing trips and weekends away.  We try to help them to solve their problems and always make time to talk with them every day.  We try to involve our boys and often ask the students to read book with the boys.

The best way to understand other cultures is to have been a stranger yourself in another country,  If this is not possible, be interested in learning about other cultures.  Having a foreign student in your house gives you the best opportunity to find out about other cultures.  Once we had a Japanese family visiting us.  They had a boy, who was the same age as our boys,  He did not speak any English and our boys did not speak Japanese but they played and laughed all the time they were together.  Smiling and making people laugh with you is the best way to communicate.

The tips to become a successful host family is to be interested and show excitment about your guest and their culture.  Ask questions about them and their life.  This can help to gain understanding and create trust.  Make sure they understand practical things i.e. the bus route to their college.

At Christmas, everybody joined the boys playing with their Christmas presents - the Wii Guitar Hero, and had a real great laugh.  One of our students played alot with our boys and they love her as their sister.  Taking a student to Merry Beach for the weekend and seeing lots and lots of wild Kangaroos was one of the best experiences we have had with our students.

It is not just when you travel that you can learn about other countries and cultures.  Being a homestay host gives you a great opportunity to meet people from a different backgrounds and find out about their lifestyles and countries.  When you are in a foreign country and don't know the language, it is very difficult, starting with a friendly smile helps a lot and makes a big difference to everyone.