13 Feb 2013 | Comunicacion BDS
13 Feb 2013 | Comentar

More News from San Francisco

Martina Díaz Fernández (S6H), currently enjoying an exchange experience in The Athenian School, San Francisco, reports on the last few days and shares some more photos.

Friday, 8 February (2nd report)

My first week at The Athenian School is over and I'm starting to get used to the school and the people. It has been a hard school week for Kelsey, who had lots to do after class! I'm really looking forward to visiting San Francisco City over the weekend.

It may be worth sharing that during a Spanish class, as an assignment the teacher asked the students to think of three questions to ask me about Argentina. It was very fun! We talked about sports -both in the country and in BDS- about our popular "asado" and about the differences between both schools and countries.

On Fridays, there is an "Advisory" period, something like our "tutorías" but joining students from different courses. I was happy to hear two students of Athenian may be  coming to BDS in August and I'm anxious to meet them next week!

About the last weekend (third report)

I got to know new places such as Golden Gate Bridge, Mount Diablo, Chinatown and Ghirardelli Square!

On Friday night, Kelsey, her brother Eric and me went to the theater to see the movie Identity Thief and did some shopping at the downtown of Walnut Creek. The next day Kelsey had to do her volunteering in a local hospital, so I went with Kelsey’s family to have a car ride all to the top of Mount Diablo. We were able to breath some fresh air, admire the beautiful view and visit a museum right there, in the midst of the flora and fauna of Mount Diablo State Park. That night we had dinner at a Mexican food restaurant and had some spicy and delicious food that’s very popular in California.

On Sunday, we went to the city of San Francisco. Hannah, another student on exchange came with us, too (by the way, in my first reports I wrote she was Australian, but in fact she is from Scotland). We were lucky because it was a lovely sunny day and the city was not that busy as we had expected. The first stop was at the Golden Gate Bridge. We walked across and took some pictures with a beautiful view of Alcatraz Island, the city, and the Pacific Ocean. After that, we went to Chinatown. San Francisco’s Chinatown is the largest outside Asia and that day happened to be the Chinese New Year's Day (the Water Snake year started). We had some green tea with tapioca. We next went to Ghirardelli Square. We visited the beach, had dinner watching a marvelous sunset... and dessert at the famous chocolate factory, Ghirardelli. It was, indeed an interesting intercultural experience: US, Scotland, Argentina... and China!

To read Martina's first report, clic here.

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8 Feb 2013 | Comunicacion BDS
8 Feb 2013 | Comentar

Exchanges: Californian News

After hosting The Athenian School's student Kelsey Strand in July 2012, Martina Díaz Fernández (S6H) now reports on her own current experience in the US:

"I arrived in San Francisco on Sunday, which was a very important day for them as the San Francisco 49ners were playing the Super Bowl that night.

Kelsey and her family live in the outskirts of San Francisco, in a city called Walnut Creek, where the houses are surrounded by mountains and lots of trees. That same day we went to the downtown of Walnut Creek and visited shops and places to eat. The next day was my first day at  Athenian. Kelsey introduced me to her friends and Kathleen, the head of Round Square Association, showed me the school and introduced me to the principal, teachers, nurse and other people. The Athenian is very different to BDS! It consists of a 57- hectare campus located in a valley of mount Diablo. The classrooms are like small houses all around the place. It really called my attention  to walk my way to the next class just beside a mountain side! This, and the fact that there the groups are small in number, makes the school particularly  peaceful place in my opinion. And I now understand why Kelsey was so surprised with BDS and our big city. One day, at lunch time, we went to a Round Square meeting, where students who had gone (or want to go) on exchanges get together.

Here, classes change each semester and I have been given my own schedule with the following subjects: Maths, Spanish, Global economics and 3D Art!"

About the photo: Here's a view of the school campus. The building behind us is the Science Department, and following the path there are more classes. In the picture I'm with Hannah (another Round Square exchange student, form Australia), Kelsey and Paige.