Testimonials

It is truly a wonder that when you open yourself to other cultures, you find that we are not that different. We have different customs, traditions and sometimes beliefs, but basically, we are all people. Hosting opens your world in unforgettable ways, and the friendships that are made can last a lifetime.

Calicdan Family

Thank you to the team for our recent hosting experience! What an adventure we had with our Japanese exchange student, Maika. The whole process was smooth, easy and effortless. There is a lot of support available, before, during and after the hosting period. This was our first time hosting and we would definitely be interested in doing it again. There were many tears shed on the morning of Maika's departure. It's fair to say that my daughter has made a lifelong friend in Maika and they are regularly communicating via messenger. I am also still in contact with Maika's family. If you are considering hosting - do it! You won't regret it and it will be something your family will treasure for a lifetime!

Peel family, Ocean Reef Senior High School

This is our second time hosting a Japanese student and we have had another amazing, rewarding experience. A wonderful program to be involved in, Gold Intercultural Learning are fantastic to communicate with and have made everything very smooth and stress free during Aika’s homestay with us. Our girls have made a friend for life!

Wood family

This was our first time being a host family and as would be expected, I was a little nervous but very excited before our guest’s arrival. I was surprised at how quickly Satomu became just another member of the family. we were sad to see him go!

Goldman Family

Thank you for the opportunity to host our Japanese student, Haruki. It was a last minute decision as I had to persuade my husband a little. It was a wonderful, positive experience for our whole family to learn about the differences in our cultures and to share our culture with her. She spent most of her time with my daughter and I’m sure they will be friends for a long time. She was such a pleasure to have!

Orr family, St Mark’s Anglican Community School

We cannot thank you enough for allowing our family to be involved in this program. Our exchange student (Haruka) was completely well mannered and helpful, she fitted into our family without any hiccups at all. We enjoyed learning about her culture as well as teaching her about ours. She was always willing to participate in everything and never complained about anything. We are looking forward to having another exchange student!

Rowe family

Thank you for the opportunity to host our Japanese student, Ayano. It was a wonderful experience and we had a lot of fun exchanging cultural knowledge and food. In our opinion one week stay was too short because Ayano was such a pleasure to have and we really miss her! Being host family for the first time I would really recommend this program and would love to do this again. The only thing I disliked was the sad departure as we felt Ayano was already a part of our family but it is great to have her and my daughter still keep in touch.

Lee family

Miyu, our exchange student joined us at Ocean Reef Senior High School and stayed with us for 6 nights, she is a beautiful person and we all fell in love with her. We enjoyed every minute of the experience, my daughters really embraced the experience speaking & writing Japanese and doing origami with her, teaching her some games and she was doing her best to speak English also, some of my daughters friends who joined us over the weekend seeing the Kangaroos in the area and taking her shopping. Miyu embraced all her experiences and fitted into our family well!

Artuso family, Ocean Reef Senior High School

We had the best time with our Japanese student Kaede! What a lovely experience sharing our home & our culture & showing her around where we live & learning about the Japanese culture. My daughter Abbey had the best time found to school everyday with Kaede. My son loved showing Kaede all the Japanese toys and games he loves! We are all lifelong friends now & we are also getting to know her family, sharing our stories and pictures now she is back. Our only complaint is how quick the visit was. We would have absolutely loved to have Kaede longer! Thank you for the experience, what a blessing we will all treasure for the rest of our lives! We all want to go to Japan & visit our students.

Young family, Living Waters Lutheran College

We just hosted a young boy from Gunma Kokusai Academy (GKA) year 6 group for two weeks and it was the most rewarding experience for our family!! we loved it! Reima will always be a part of our family!

Mansfield family, Hillarys Primary School

We had the most wonderful Japanese student come and stay with us! It was our first hosting experience but GIL made it a very clear and easy process. We had not a single problem throughout and were all devastated (especially my young girls who loved having a ‘big sister’ around) when our student had to return home! She became part of the family! Looking forward to working with GIL again on our next hosting journey.

Green family

Our family have hosted a few times this year (2019) and have really enjoyed the experience. Great organisation to be involved with. I've definitely felt supported and the communication is ever open.

Kanongata'a family

I just wanted to let you know what a great experience it was to have Yuri with us this last week.

Yuri is a beautiful girl, she embraced our way of life even though I’m sure it is very different from her life at home. She tried every food that was given to her and didn’t leave a thing, joined in in my daughters netball, went to my sons football and changed a lot of her routines from home to fit in with ours. We would have her back any day and I’m sure that both of our kids have made a lifelong friend.

Thank you very much.

Constantine/Lawless family, St Mark’s Anglican Community School

Tonight we say goodbye to our Japanese exchange student, Miyu after 11 days of fun! Our children Kingston and Milly have loved having her around and we shared her 16th birthday yesterday too! So many memories and a pleasurable experience with Gold Intercultural Learning. We hope to host again.

Moses family

Thank you to Gold Intercultural Learning for giving us the opportunity to host our 7th Japanese student, Rin. He was a pleasure to have in our home. His english was excellent and he fitted in well with our family. Despite the winter weather we managed to show him some of our beautiful city. He enjoyed seeing the kangaroos at Pinnaroo. And we finished the week with a bike ride along our Swan River and had a picnic at Matilda Bay shoreline, and back up onto the Narrows Bridge for a view of the city. Our boys enjoyed including him in our daily activities and family meals. Rin presented us with a special booklet he had made about his family and was very proud to tell us about them. I was very impressed with his behaviour and his interaction with our sons. Our boys always enjoy hosting students and each time it leaves us with a memorable experience. I was very impressed with their presentation at the farewell party and their performance of Waltzing Matilda literally bought a tear to my eye. My husband and I have travelled a lot in our younger days and experienced different cultures, and we feel this is an opportunity for our sons to also meet people from different countries without leaving home.

Fraser family, North Woodvale Primary School

Our family have now had two Japanese exchange students and been an amazing experience for all of us the hardest part is saying goodbye we are now inspired to travel to Japan next year.

Spells family

Emily, my husband Paul and I had an awesome time with Manami during her stay us. We were able to have many fun times and outings. Manami got to be part of Emily’s friends birthday party at adventure world and the following sleepover at our house, to visit Penguin Island, hold a baby Koala at Cohunu Koala Park, go shopping at the mall and in Fremantle, go to Bounce Inc and bounce on the large selection of trampolines and I even got her started scrap-booking the photos from her trip with us. Manami cooked us a Japanese dish which was yummy! Emily loves having the exchange students to stay as well and we all learn new things. Manami is our third student to stay and we hope to be able to host more students over the next couple of years! All around it is a very rewarding experience!

Christensen family, Kent Street Senior High School

I would suggest to all sharing the experience of hosting an exchange student. The fun both family and exchange student have is rewarding. Love seeing the smiles on children’s faces as they learn more and more from both cultures. The hard part is saying goodbye for now. We have tears but memories forever. We have had one of our students return for a visit, and the experience we have had has made the decision for us to host for a whole year with GIL. We look forward to the experience, fun and laughter we are going to have.

Cifelli family

There are no cultural barriers when kids just play. Happiness, laughter, friendship and fun is a universal language. Our family had a wonderful time with Ran and I would love to surprise her with a visit.

Hosking family

Living with our Japanese students has been a great cultural exchange experience for both parties. Us the Davies family are African/Australian. Finishing off our week by making African attire for the girls to match. We loved every moment of our time together.

Davies family

We had the most wonderful Japanese student come and stay with us! It was our first hosting experience but GIL made it a very clear and easy process! We had not a single problem throughout and were all devastated (especially my young girls who loved having a ‘big sister’ around) when our student had to return home! She became part of the family! Looking forward to working with GIL again on our next hosting journey.

Budding family

Again we had a great time being involved with Japanese host program, Kousuke was a wonderful child and it was a pleasure to have him in our home. The Japanese children are wonderful and I have to say that this year’s program of arrival and departure routines worked extremely well.

We have truly enjoyed the experience and want to say thank you.

Adamson family, Ardross Primary School

We are all already missing Nichika. She was such a lovely girl that fitted in perfectly with our kids. Friendships have definitely been made and tears were shed at the goodbye. Once again, thank you for this lovely opportunity to host a student. The whole tour was very well organised and as a host family we felt well looked after. The information booklet was a great help and the knowledge that there was always someone available to speak to (for both the student as well as ourselves was great). Thank you again for helping establish this great new friendship.

Atkinson family, Falls Road Primary School

We had a great time with Tsune and we have already had contact with his family and will continue the friendship, already they have invited us to stay with them in Japan! Max and Tsune, although both quiet boys in nature got along very well and albeit conversation was limited they both had an awesome time together.

This was our first experience hosting a student and it was very successful for our family.

Thank you!

Kingsbury family, Ardross Primary School

I wanted to share with you my family’s journey in discovering more about another culture. Our family started hosting Japanese exchange students through Gold Intercultural Learning a few years ago, when our kids’ Primary School joined an exchange program. At first, we were a little apprehensive about the extra strain this might cause.

We soon realised that hosting exchange students was very easy and enjoyable. Before our first exchange student arrived, we attended a well-prepared kick-off meeting. We learnt that the Japanese kids were meant to experience ‘normal everyday life’, and were encouraged to not make too many special arrangements.

So we let our young visitor share our son’s bedroom, which was hugely popular with the kids – it was like having a new best friend sleeping over for a whole week! We then went about our normal week, which included swimming and tennis lessons, a trip to the beach and a birthday party. Our first exchange student enjoyed himself at all these outings, as did our kids.

Our children learned just a few new Japanese words, but certainly became more interested in our visitor’s culture, and were much more focussed on their language lessons for months to come.

After this first experience, our kids were keen to invite other visitors into our home. I have to say that the great support we received from Gold Intercultural Learning over the years helped us in making the decision to host again and again. Every time there was a potential small glitch, there was re-assurance at the end of the mobile phone, no matter what time of the day. For example, knowing that we could call and get an instant accurate translation into Japanese of “you must swim between the flags” meant that we were very relaxed in planning outings even when our visitor didn’t necessarily understand every single English word we used.

By now, we have hosted exchange students twice a year for the last three years, and hope to continue this wonderful this family tradition for many years.

Major family, Ardross Primary School