Dryden Exchange Student Recounts Her Experience in Are, Sweden
Posted by John Borst
on Aug 27, 2014
Imagine being 16 and getting a change to spend a year of your life in a Swedish town famous for its ski hills, the Whistler or Vale of that country. That is the opportunity Jessica Stuart had as a Rotary Exchange student.
Each year that the Dryden Rotary Club agrees to host a Rotary “long term” youth exchange student from another country, the they get to send a local Dryden student to a foreign destination.
In reporting her experiences to the club Jesse took those in attendance on a picture tour of her time in Sweden.
 Location of Are
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 (Top) Jessica & John Carlucci
(Bottom) Ski Runs at Are
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Stuart lived in the town of Åre, the leading Scandinavian ski resort in Sweden with 1,417 inhabitants
Her host, the Åre Rotary Club bought her a ski pass and she learned to ski and often skied 4 days a week from November to May.
ICEHOTEL is the world’s first and largest hotel built of snow and ice and it is situated in Jukkasjärvi, a small village in Northern Sweden with 1,100 residents and 1,000 dogs. |
Jessica also showed pictures of her visit to the “Ice Hotel”, her trip to Lapland in the north and of her host families.
She also went on a Eurotour with other exchange students and visited 12 countries in 20 days.
Although she is now fluent in Swedish, it took a while to learn because most young Swedes can speak English so that made it a little more difficult to learn the language.
Jessica thanked Rotary for the opportunity to go on this exchange and is already looking at going back and possibly doing university there.