Sanja Janevska was born and raised in Macedonia, part of former Yugoslavia. Now she spends a year abroad in Minnesota, USA.

A big smile, thick brown hair and a east-european-sounding accent. These are the first things you notice when you talk to Sanja. She’s an exchange student from Macedonia and a student at Blaine High School.

She lives in Minnesota since the end of August and will go back to Macedonia by the end of June next year. Her placement organization is ‘AFS Intercultural Programs’. Through this organization, she found her host family here in the USA: It’s a couple who’s also hosting a girl from Germany. This way, Sanja doesn’t just have a new family, but also a new sister.

Actually, there are many more new things: The language, the school, the city, the cars, the grocery-stores, the pets and the people – everything is different and exciting. But sometimes it’s also hard and tiring to get used to all these changes. So there will be good times and less good times during this year for her, and it’s all part of it. She knows that it won’t always be easy, but it all belongs to the experience.