Pre- Travel Updates

On January 7th we attended our first orientation meeting. It was exciting to meet the other members of our delegation and our leaders. We exchanged emails and will get to know each other more as we talk and attend the monthly meetings. Our first assignment is to write a one page report on a famous person, a monument, the food or the climate/geography of France before our February 4th meeting. Mike chose to write about the climate/geography and Will chose to write about a monument.

On February 4th we attended our second meeting. We reviewed packing including what to bring and what not to bring and how big our suitcase can be. Our Mom joined the parents to review the uniforms we are required to wear and details about phone cards for travelling. We worked in small groups to read and share our reports about France. Our next assignment due at our March 4th meeting is a one page essay about Italy. Mike chose to write about monuments and Will chose to write about Italian cuisine.

On March 4th we attended our third meeting. We talked about hotel etiquette and how we should behave while representing our country. We also discussed our home stays, which People to People has changed this year. We will be staying at a guest house instead of at someone's home. Our whole delegation will stay together at the guest house. We received our Travel Journals. Our Dad learned about what we should bring for money and debit cards. Our next assignment due at our April 1st meeting is to write a report about an architectural feature from the city in Italy we were assigned. Will is writing about the Florence Cathedral and Mike is writing about Rome. We also have to read The Dog of Pompeii by Louis Untermeyer and write in our journal what we thought of the story.

On April 1st we attended our fourth meeting. We worked in groups sharing our essays and reports. We planned our May meeting, that will be a Food Festival. We each drew a country from a bag. Mike got Greece and Will got France. We talked about our group's plans to participate in a BowlAThon in June. This is an opportunity for us to raise some spending money while having fun and learning more about each other. Our next assignment is to select a theme from Greece and write an essay. Mike is writing about the Olympics and Will is writing about Aristotle.

On May 12th we attended our fifth meeting, the Food Festival. Mike brought spinach pie from the Olympos Bakery in Lowell and Will brought Cucumber Sandwiches on Pumpernickel, made by Grandma. Gelato, Italian ice cream, was a favorite of all. Will's favorite was the pasta salads. Mike even tried some new things. Our Dad enjoyed watching our attempts at Greek line dancing. We will visit a Greek dance studio during our travels. We also got details on our going away celebration in July. Our assignment is to continue writing entries in our journals as we prepare to leave.

Our June meeting was a Bowl A Thon held on June 3rd at the Acton BowlADrome. Mike thought Will would have an advantage because of his bowling league but it was duck pin bowling, a new experience for both of us. It was fun to spend time with our friends and get to know them more before our adventure. Thank you to everyone that sponsored us in the Bowl A Thon, we raised $145.00 that we will use for some spending money.

Our July meeting was a going away cookout held at the Dys Family home in Dracut. While we were there we had time to talk with other delegates and meet their families. We had a pinning ceremony and our parents put a pin on our lanyard. We gave our passports to our leaders and had our suitcases weighed. Now we are ready to begin our trip.