Host families

• Houses
• Location
• Host parents
• Other people hosted
• Life in the house (organization, rules, etc.)
• Interviews

If you go to Malta on a study holiday, you may choose to stay with a host family. Host families are usually nice and friendly but they live in different areas of Malta.

In fact, while we were there, we were all scattered around the island and we could spend time with our classmates only during the activities planned by the school. Locations can be so different from each other; some are more modern, some simply look abandoned or less cared for, and some others are a bit rundown. 

Some of us were worried because our neighborhood didn't look safe, but fortunately nothing bad happened. Few houses weren't safe, in one of them the main door didn't lock.

Houses were cold on the inside because on the island they don't have gas pipes, so there wasn't any heating system. Our guide told us that the cold depends on the way the houses are built: the limestone of the walls keep the buildings cool in summer, but very cold in winter. 

At least the rooms were very spacious, so we could have our personal space.

Host Parents should be able to welcome the students showing them the whole house and the neighbor. They should also help them in every situation and whatever happens. In our case some host parents were more present and available than others who weren't very helpful, for example in one of the families a girl felt really sick but her host parents didn't really care about her. 

None of the family members had dinner or breakfast with us but they always gave us packed lunches and cooked for us in the evening. In any case most of them were very kind and some host parents tidied up the students' rooms everyday.

Every family had rules that all of us had to respect, other rules were imposed by our teachers:

• we couldn't go out in the evening unless we were with the teachers;

• we had to let the teachers know when we arrived home;

• we had to text or call the teachers when we wanted to go out.

In any case, everybody had to tell their host parents when they wanted to go out and where they wanted to go.

The majority of us shared their houses with other students from European countries like Belgium, France, Italy or Spain. Some of them were really friendly and some of us are still in contact with them, in other cases we tried to make friends but we couldn't because the students who lived with us weren't interested.

To complete our report, here are two interviews with our classmates.

(I=Interviewer - A=Asia)

I: What was your house like?

A: The house was pretty big and well-furnished, there was a bedroom for us with 2 beds. The rooms were clean but there was only one bathroom in the house. The rooms were comfortable but very cold and there was a cat.

I: What was your host family like?

A: Our host mother was very kind and helpful toward us, but her children were a little weird. We talked to our host family only when we came back home at the end of the day and we didn't talk a lot, sometimes we would only say "Hi! How are you?" and that was all.

I: Did you have to follow any rules?

A: They gave us a list with about 30 rules, but they weren't strict, they were fair. There were rules like " leave the room clean or take a shower once a day"

I: What was the most beautiful thing in your opinion

A: The thing that we liked the most was the fact that they respected our privacy.

I: What was the worst thing?

A: In our opinion the worst thing was the food that they cooked for us.

(I=Interviewer - C=Camilla)

I: What was your house like?

C: The house was clean but not pretty and it was furnished really badly. The bathroom didn't have a shower, there was just a bath without the shower curtain. On the left there was a hole in the wall the size of a door which led to the garden.The stairs were dangerous and there were a lot of little statues and lights on the stairs.

I: What was your host family like?

C: Our host lady was kind but she never talked to us except when she had to ask some questions. The husband was never there. The son was a bit scary!

I: Did you have to follow any rules?

C: We couldn't make any noise after 10 PM, we couldn't throw away the plastic bottles, but we had to recycle them, and we couldn't go out in the evening.

I: What was the most beautiful thing in your opinion

C: Beds were really comfortable.

I: What was the worst thing?

C: The bathroom wasn't so modern and there was a really bad smell.

Amaranta Damiano, Francesca Varone, Angelica Chitussi and Eleonora Del Torre