When a lady wandered into my French class last year to talk about hosting a student from Argentina for a month, I was confused. My Spanish education consists of one year in third grade, halfway through which the teacher vanished.

She talked about how all of the students were so excited to come, and they needed a lot of hosts to handle the number of Argentines that wanted to come. This year, there were two trips of Argentines to accommodate the number.

Being told that someone was willing to travel 5,000 miles from the comfort of their own home to observe my life and daily routine as a high school student in Pfafftown, N.C., was hard to grasp. It’s just so boring here.

Nevertheless, it was something I thought would be an insightful experience, so I signed up. I never knew how much fun and friendship this experience would bring.

The Argentine students are only here for a month (which is way too short, in my opinion), but within just two weeks I have seen and made great friendships among them and their hosts.

“Hosting [my Argentine] Juani was a ton of fun, and after a month he was basically my brother,” said senior Stevie Thompson, who hosted during the first month. “I loved getting to grow super-tight with him and learning about Argentina. 10/10 experience.”

Bringing a stranger into your home is a unique and sort of a risky experience. It’s even more scary for the person entering the unfamiliar environment.

“I thought that it was going to be difficult to get used to living with another family in another house, but I realized that even though both of our families are from completely different places in the world, they’re really similar,” said Candela Jano, my Argentine. “ I’ve only been here two weeks and I already feel like they’ve accepted me as family.”

Hosting someone from a different country has really opened my eyes about the U.S. and the rest of the world. I never knew how much of an influence we have on other countries, and how little we pay attention to other cultures; the U.S. is a very egocentric country.

It has also taught me how to manage my time, considering there is so much to see and so little time to see it all. I am now doing homework every chance I can get between class periods so that we can go out to eat, watch a sports game, or just hang out with friends almost every day after school.

Now, North Carolina has become an exciting place to me. It was a necessity to introduce downtown adventures and Chick-fil-A to them.

The Argentines have such a curiosity about our lives and how we do things. They’ve seen the movies about American towns and high schools, and now they get to experience it all.

“When I came to America I thought that it was going to be hard to make friends, but now I realized everybody is more accepting than I thought,” Jano said.

I am constantly busy exploring and eating, and most of all having the time of my life. If you ever have the chance to sign up to host an exchange student, take it. I am dreading the day we have to drop everyone off at the airport.

“Hosting an exchange student was such a rewarding experience and I am so grateful to have had the opportunity,” senior Madison Schuller said.