Northport High School exchange students for 2009/2010 school-year (from left to right): Ole Holmsen, Seong Min Jeon, Rafael Brandao, and Huyen Le.  

Northport High School hosts four exchange students

BY CARI BASE
S-E Staff Reporter

Four countries and three continents convene in a rural North American high school on Washington state’s Canadian border.  
This year, Northport High School is hosting four exchange students from across the globe—to play sports for the Mustangs, take American core and elective courses, hone their English, and make lifelong friendships and memories.  
Ole (pronounced “Ollie”) Holmsen, 18, and Seong Min Jeon (“Ming”), 17, are studying through Education First and are from Norway and South Korea, respectively.  Both chose to study somewhere in the western states (Oregon, California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, or Washington) and were placed in Northport.  
Rafael Brandao, 16, hails from a city near Sao Paolo, Brazil, and is in Northport through the Eastern Travel Bureau.  Brandao wanted his location assignment to be “a surprise,” and didn’t find out his Northport placement until landing in Spokane International Airport.  17-year-old Huyen Le comes from Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, and was chosen to study in the United States through International Student Exchange.  
The four students arrived between early August and the first week of September, starting school on time with local Northport high-schoolers.  All had varying degrees of familiarity with the United States—from Holmsen, who had traveled to the US five times before coming on exchange, to Seong, who had visited once before, to Huyen and Brandao, who had never been.  
When asked if whether or not coming to Northport, a village populated by about 300 people (roughly 1,000 by postal code), shattered any pre-conceptions of the US, Brandao reflects: “My brother came [on exchange] and was placed in Dallas, so I was pretty excited.  When I got to Spokane. They told me 10,000 people live in Northport.  I thought, ‘Okay, not bad.’  Then I got here, and it was kind of a shock!”
Then he adds, “But I also wanted to come without expectations.  If I had [expectations], I’d be frustrated now.”  Brandao’s openness, he relates, has really enabled him to enjoy his experience in Northport.  
The other three agree.  Holmsen’s Norwegian hometown is comparable in size to Colville, making his shift perhaps less dramatic than those of Huyen and Seong’s unambiguously urban upbringings.  
The students are assigned to single host families for the entire year; Huyen and Holmsen share a host household.  
“I see them walking to school together every morning,” a Northport teacher smiles.  
Brandao, the only exchange student who lives outside of city limits (15 miles from Northport) acknowledges that getting rides back and forth is not always convenient, but happily labels his host situation as “the perfect family for me.”  
All four seem extremely positive and grateful for their living situations, sharing that they try to cook for their host families and help out around the house.  
For extracurricular involvement, Seong and Brandao write and take photographs for the Northport student newspaper; Holmsen, who is working on his U.S. driver’s license, is playing basketball and baseball for Northport; and all four played soccer for the school’s team and enjoy hanging out with friends.  
“We had some memorable [soccer] bus rides,” Brandao says, and the four laugh.  He and Holmsen have traveled to Canada and Seong to Leavenworth; the four hope to see Seattle at some point.  
“Just traveling around Washington, enjoying the time and sights—that’s been really nice,” Brandao continues.  He and Holmsen agree that they’d both like to travel through all fifty states at some point.  
Four-wheeling, sledding, and snowmobiling are listed as fun activities the four have tried for the first time this winter.  
What have they missed the most this year?  Friends, family, and food.  
“Definitely food,” Huyen smiles shyly.  
‘Though all four appreciate how groceries and restaurant fare are “bigger and cheaper here—really cheap,” the common consensus seems to be Holmsen’s summary: “The food here is good but I still miss my mom’s cooking.”  
Adds Brandao, “You don’t really pay much attention to things you have in you country, but when you come to another country, you just start noticing them and liking [what you’re accustomed to] more than you thought you did.
    “Brazil is just totally different.  Here it’s a sport nation—people like every kind of sport.  In Brazil, it’s just soccer.  The food is different, everything is different,” he said.
In June, Huyen and Holmsen, who are seniors, will participate in Northport’s graduation ceremony, although both still have a thirteenth year of school to complete in Vietnam and Norway before attending university.  Seong plans to spend another year on exchange in the U.S., at a high school in the Midwest, he says, before beginning university in Korea to study social welfare.  Brandao still has a couple of years of high school left in Brazil, but hopes to attend college for business management.  
Upon the school-year and exchange program’s mutual end, three of the four students will board planes for home while Holmsen will meet up with his grandparents for a roadtrip to Minnesota.  
The boys verbalize the “total acceptance” they’ve felt this year from the Northport community and at school while Huyen nods, and Brandao concludes, “I really like the U.S.  I want to come back here again.  But there is no place like home.”