On December 5th, 2010 my plane landed in San Francisco. My booking involved four weeks studying in Converse International School of Languages and eight weeks Volunteer English program. Also, I am living for those three months in a home stay.

I spent Christmas and New Year’s Eve in San Francisco. I didn’t wait for white Christmas and not for summer. Here I expected mild temperatures between 35 ° and 55 ° Fahrenheit (ca. 0 ° to 15 ° Celsius) perfect for shopping and sightseeing. I also met up with my classmates and fellow students to take, for example, dinner in restaurants. To fill out the program, CISL offers variety of offerings.

I spent Christmas with my family. This was a priceless experience for me to celebrate Christmas outside of my family in another culture. I could find out differences and similarities between American and my German culture. My wonderful host family is of Filipino origin. They have four grown children and eight grandchildren aged two to eighteen years. The whole family comes together to Christmas, on 12/25. There I could share with all family members everything possible and I could enjoy Christmas in a different family.

New Years Eve I spent with my classmates, my fellow students and my new friends. You meet up with them at one of your host family, residence, apartment or in public restaurants, bars and clubs. At 11 pm you should go to the “Embarcadero” because at 00:00 clock there starts big fireworks. Perhaps I’ve never even seen so many people in one place and certainly I’ve never seen so many different cultures in one place.
Then the party was into the early morning hours.

Hey,

My name is Julia, and I am staying in San Francisco for three months. At home in Berlin, Germany, I study English in order to be a High School teacher. Obviously, my English has to be very good and I am happy that I found the homepage of Converse by browsing the Web some months ago. For years, it had been my dream to spend some time in San Francisco because I had heard that it is the most liberal city in the U.S.

So I applied for an internship at Converse San Francisco and learned that I had to take a language course as well. At first, I was a little bit reluctant because I had had some bad experiences with other language schools. However, my skepticism was soon proven wrong. I was placed in the right course level, had an excellent teacher, and never had the feeling that I wasn’t being challenged. Furthermore, this was also a good way to meet new people.

Now I am finished with my language course and working at Converse part-time as an intern. I am learning a lot about the American workplace, and the staff is very friendly and constantly helps me improve my English skills. And I still have got enough time to explore the city, to participate in the great free-time activities and to have a lot of fun.

It is the place where the students normally sleep during the travel.You have a suite with everything you need (shower, microwave, fridge…). The place is very well located in Little Italy very close to downtown, the center of the city and Converse. There are more than 300 students so it is very easy to meet people from all the countries. Most of people come from Brazil, Switzerland, Korea and Belgium but there is also French, Spanish, Italian… There are a lot of things to do for students. For example if you are European or Brazilian and you like football, you can play all the days during the week in the park opposite of Vantaggio. Mexican players use to play here. It is a good opportunity for meeting people. For the people who like to go out during the night the clubs are in downtown. Besides all the evening students stay in front of the desk where there is a room where we can play billiard, beer-pong… with people who put music or mix. There is also a yard where you can smoke.   So during all the night boys and girls can dance, share or do what they want. Thursday is the day where there is the most of people, the student who stays on house family come to Vantaggio and it is very crazy, so much people, it looks like a club or a real party. So if you live Vantaggio  you can’t be bored, everybody can find something to do like shopping, jogging, visiting, playing sport, going out during the night… There is no better place for meeting students and enjoying his time.

by Nicolas Sayo, France