QC, THAT'S WHERE!
QC, THAT'S WHERE!
World, meet the QC. QC, meet the World.
We're diving deep into the transformative power of cultural exchange, as our guest, Emerald Johnson from the Iowa Resource for International Service, shares her insights on what it means to welcome someone from across the globe into your home.
Discover how hosting fosters unforgettable connections, bringing families together through shared experiences. You'll hear heartwarming stories about students experiencing their first snowfall or traditional Midwest community events, showcasing the bond formed between locals and exchange students. These interactions do more than illuminate cultural differences; they create lasting friendships that transcend borders.
Emerald discusses the incredible impact these programs have on both the students and the communities they visit, opening minds to new possibilities and fostering understanding in an increasingly connected world. If you've ever considered becoming a host family or simply want to learn more about cultural diplomacy, this episode is packed with insights and inspiration.
Ready to broaden your worldview and create lasting memories? Tune in and embrace the enriching adventure of hosting an international student! Don’t forget to subscribe, share your thoughts, and consider joining the vibrant community of host families.
IRIS: https://www.iris-center.org/
QC, That's Where is a podcast powered by Visit Quad Cities. Through the people, partnerships, and personalities woven throughout the Quad Cities region, you'll meet real Quad Citizens and hear the untold stories of the region.
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It makes me much more engaged in the community as a single person. If I have a kid who's never seen cold weather or snow, I even take them sledding. I haven't. I would not personally. I'm old enough to be done with sledding. But when I have teenagers I go sledding, you know, because they've never done it in their life. And if you ever see a toddler with snow for the first time, how fun and cute that is. Imagine a 17-year-old who's never seen snow. It is a whole nother level.
Intro:Where do you find a family of communities connected by the storied Mississippi River, where young explorers and dreamers, investors and entrepreneurs thrive? Where can you connect with real people living and creating in a place that's as genuine as it is quirky QC? That's where.
Katrina Keuning:Welcome to QC. That's where I am, Katrina, your host, and I'm so excited to be talking with Emerald Johnson today. She is the Programs Manager and Lead Coordinator with IRIS. So, Emerald, would you please first of all just tell us what is IRIS and what does that feed into how your life plays out day to day?
Emerald Johnson:IRIS is Iowa Resource for International Service. We are a non-religious nonprofit and we are based in Iowa. We facilitate international exchanges and some of them are students and some of them are adults, like professional groups, entrepreneurs, things like that, sometimes journalists from across the world who come into Des Moines and do short-term programs. I'm in charge of youth programs. We work with high school students. They are from the YES program of the State Department and they come in every August and they're here until June. We are busy.
Emerald Johnson:If I'm hosting, I have them in my home and I'm doing all the parenting. But if I'm not hosting, like this year, I'm still a coordinator and I do check-ins, mentoring of the families and the kids to make sure if they need a little help adjusting to each other, I'm here to help that and keep up with what they're doing in school, cheering them on at the accomplishments they have or the things they're trying, and help them overcome their small disappointments when things don't go the way they thought it would Maybe. Friendships are hard to, you know, establish. And then we do orientations three times a year for goal setting, growth topics, processing where you are in the year and just you know, generally growing as humans, because this is. It's such a formative time of life and when you change your environment, you just you grow in surprising ways. So that's sort of what I build my year around.
Katrina Keuning:There's, there's a lot, yeah, and those formative years is a lot of changing. So it's almost like a high risk, high reward, like you might have, you might have a bad day or whatever, but like what you're getting out of it long-term is so worth it and you've got a lot of experience because you've been hosting since what? 2012?.
Emerald Johnson:Yeah, I've hosted 17 exchange daughters since 2012.
Katrina Keuning:Okay, so, okay. So 17 exchange daughters since 2012 and they're coming from all over the world. Like can you spout out a few places they're from?
Emerald Johnson:Yeah, through the YES program I've hosted from Saudi Arabia, pakistan, egypt, thailand, ghana, philippines, tunisia, israel, and then Bangladesh, albania, and then I'd hosted again from Philippines and Pakistan, and then I'd host it again from Philippines and Pakistan.
Katrina Keuning:So like we were talking a little bit before the podcast and you had a really cool sentiment that kind of clicked with me. So like it was a little bit like people are coming here that have never heard of the Quad Cities and in return, people here are meeting folks from countries they've never heard of. So it's like you know, QC meet world and world meet QC.
Emerald Johnson:Yeah, yeah, it's especially well. Adults, yes, but even our kids. Our kids see the world through Instagram. They see the world through all these social media apps and they have snippets of it. But meeting an actual person that they can sit in their classroom and talk to about what their world is like while they're here, those connections are amazing.
Emerald Johnson:I have had kids like my Albanian exchange daughter. She came here and she was so social. She actually just grabbed people at school and made a friends group. She built a friend group and she didn't take no for an answer. And half of those kids are so excited to go visit Albania and they never would have done that if they hadn't met her Like they never would have. These kids never would have thought let's go to Albania. Like maybe they wouldn't have even thought to leave the country. This country is so big, so many of us never leave this country, but this program brings kids from places and they, they form these friendships. And then people like I want to go to Pakistan, like that was not a place on my bucket list when I was little. You know these really. It really opens our mind to what is possible as far as travel.
Katrina Keuning:And then like in on the other side of the coin, like you know, your Albanian daughter like did she know she was coming to the Quad Cities when she got into this program?
Emerald Johnson:No, they don't get to choose their location. Okay, so they get assigned. When they get a family, they're told your family lives in this city, in this state, and so then they google it. And when they google Iowa it's all corn fields and pigs and you know maybe a little bit about Des Moines, maybe a little bit about the Mississippi River, if it's finding quad city stuff, but they they definitely don't know. But once they get here they do love it. We had a kid at the end of the year announced that he was going to bring his if he got married. When he gets married he was going to honeymoon in Iowa because this is where his family is and this is his home and he would want his future wife to really know him and know his family and a place that is so dear to his heart. So those are the type of impacts that these exchange programs have. People from the other side of the world who have never heard of Iowa go home and they have such an affinity for Iowa after these programs.
Katrina Keuning:So they, like you know, they come in pretty much, just, you know, blindly assigned, they don't know what they're coming into and it sounds like they have. You know they come in pretty much, just, you know, blindly assigned, they don't know what they're, what they're coming into, and it sounds like they have. Once they're here, they're able to get like a warm welcome and really, like you know, jive with the area, thanks to you know, host moms like you and host families across the state. So you know what is that walk through, like, what is that first week? Like, you know, how do you help somebody who had, who had no idea what they're in for, get like, get comfortable?
Emerald Johnson:It's different based on where you live, but, like I'm in the Quad Cities, so I usually give them a Quad City visitor's guide so they can have an idea about what kinds of things even are available around here. So it'll have things like the farmer's market. We love going to the farmer's market actually, because it's just such a vibrant, vibrant vibe and the kids love it, plus the river and it's outside. So we do the farmer's market. We usually take some walks along the river. So we do the farmer's market. We usually take some walks along the river.
Emerald Johnson:We might go to Wildcat Den to do some hiking down. Just it's just 20 minutes away in Muscatine. But that visitor's guide they can look through at night that way, because a lot of times kids don't know what to ask for, because they don't know anything about what's available here. Yes, so I give them the visitor's guide just to give them ideas and tell them to ask me about it. But we'll go to live at five downtown, sometimes alternating currents, because I think that's usually in August. So we, you know, we try to find local events and local things to do.
Katrina Keuning:So is it kind of a mix of, like, you know, you kind of throwing offerings at the wall hey, let's see what you're into, and then hope, hoping that they're comfortable enough or open enough to say, hey, I like sports, or, you know, just kind of giving you a little bit of idea to go off?
Emerald Johnson:of yeah, a lot of times I'll make, because I've done this a few times. So I'll have a whole list of what's available in our area on a paper and I'll give it to them and I'll say, just check off the things that sound interesting. You know, we try it once. You don't like it, we don't do it again, Like you know, and so that at least gives them an idea of what they can ask me about. So yeah, and then the first weeks are obviously going to be adjusting to the house, adjusting to where food is, getting them ready for school, meeting their counselors you know that kind of stuff too. But we try to have some fun and our practical necessities.
Katrina Keuning:Totally so. They so they come here and they start kind of getting used to the home and you and the things that like what is the Quad Cities about, you know? And then they've got their classroom experience. So like how, how does that fold into the program for them?
Emerald Johnson:So their school here is entirely different than school in the rest of the world. Electives don't really happen in most places in the world. You are set on a set core schedule and you don't have things like art classes, music classes, psychology. It's mostly language, science, math, maybe business, maybe computers, but you don't get a say in it, you just are assigned classes and you go.
Emerald Johnson:So coming here and getting to explore things like auto shop or welding, I had a daughter who did welding and she just did it as a random thing and she loved it. She was just. I still have her welds up in my, my guest rooms because she would come home and she'd be so excited and I'm like what does your family think about you being a welder? And they're they think you know she's like. They think I'm crazy, why is a girl welding? Um.
Emerald Johnson:But these kids get to try things that they would never culturally try, um, and usually the safe things like well, you know they're not irresponsible, they're just getting out on a limb. So schools, the classes they take here, are just mind opening in those kind of ways. In history class or even in foods class sometimes the teachers have said they'd call on them specifically because it would be interesting to hear from someone from that part of the world. And so, yeah, teachers have given my kids feedback that they're really glad that they're in their class this year, because having them in a classroom discussing their culture or their religion or their foods is something that isn't possible every day.
Katrina Keuning:Yeah, how okay. So like they're learning a lot and they're getting new experiences. But then, like you know, like we were saying earlier, on the other side, like you know, quad Cities kids are are like also learning from them. Like how enriching would it be to have somebody who can speak from that firsthand experience in your classroom, in your history class or whatever? How amazing.
Emerald Johnson:Yeah, and our kids also part of their program, because they're here to be ambassadors, like person to person diplomacy. That's what these programs are about and our yes, students especially. They give presentations about their country and culture to their, to their school classrooms, and especially during international education week, but they do it all year and then sometimes some of the local elementary schools will have cultural um cultural days, world cultures days, and the kids will go and talk there too. So that brings that firsthand knowledge and the opportunity to ask questions.
Katrina Keuning:So our kids here get to ask questions about what life is like in Morocco or in Egypt or Ghana, nigeria, tanzania, south Africa, you, you know all these places yeah, as the, as your students you know, living in your house and like going through the years, like do you find that they, you know that they're making friends and they're bringing friends home and they're like kind of branching out and doing their, doing their thing yeah, um, my kids bring friends home sometimes but they mostly go out um and do coffee with their friends or fast food.
Emerald Johnson:They like to go to Buffalo, Wild Wings and actually the coffee houses. I live near St Ambrose and my kids love coffee. What is it over there by the Aldi? And they love the brood book. They love to go to the brood book on Harrison and cause they have all those games and so they'll just meet up and they'll hang out and they'll they'll play games and have coffee or tea and they love that kind of stuff. So all these little local coffee houses, it's it's. There's not a lot of places for teens to just hang out, but those are great places for them.
Katrina Keuning:Yeah, I know what you're saying and that's that's something that, like, I think as a as, like a region, a community and like, even broader, like a destination, that's something that I think we all, just as people who live here, need to start helping project that. Like you know, the Quad Cities might have this reputation from the outside, looking in, like people haven't heard of it, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but, like you, you and your kids have found so many things to do alternating currents, farmer's market, coffee shops Like it's so cool that you've been able to kind of take the bull by the horns and be like you're in the Quad Cities and it's actually like a super cool place to be. You know, we're happy to have you and you're going to have a great time.
Emerald Johnson:Quad Cities has so many things to do. We have so many local theaters. Like, we go to shows all the time. We go to dinner theater at Circa. Sometimes We'll go to improv shows. Comedy sports is great. Actually, bob's one of our hosts this year, so he got a kid so he brings her to do activities with the improv. He does a lot of outreach for teens too, so you can do teen improv lessons and workshops there. Yeah so, yeah, there's just there's so many things. Um, I live near Ambrose so my kids walk to Vanderveer and hang out. They have picnics in the park and they, you know, sometimes have misadventures trying to walk on that stupid pond. I had to go get them.
Katrina Keuning:Oh no, no kidding, yeah, I had kids fall in that pond once.
Emerald Johnson:Oh my gosh. I was just like what are you doing? Good try yeah.
Katrina Keuning:Yeah, I don't know if you know about this, but, like something we do at the at VisiQuad Cities, we have a QC coffee trail, so it's like a free mobile pass basically that guides you through all the coffee shops in the area. So, as you like, go, you check in it's. You know, like I said, it's all free and some coffee shops offer, like you know, little discounts or incentives to come, and then, as you complete the trail, you get prizes along the way and then just, I mean, I think it's a bragging point if, like, you can say, yeah, I've been to all you know 35 plus coffee shops in the area and it's, it's something that someone who's coming for an extended period of time that you know they actually would be able to achieve it. It's really easy for like locals to do, because you've basically got forever.
Emerald Johnson:Does it have like a card where you punch off the ones you've been to, or it's all?
Katrina Keuning:mobile actually. So you just open your phone and it's a it's link-based. There's nothing to download, which is something that you know we've heard people like, cause I don't have space on my phone for anything else. So it's just the link and it's just a virtual check-in. You know, you show the barista and they punch in a code and then you can, it tracks your progress for you. So you don't have to remember and you don't have to carry anything extra around with you other than your phone.
Emerald Johnson:So yeah, I bet the kids would love doing that. Actually, we have a kid this year who is all about trying every fast food, so she's got a little list of every fast, like this week they're going to go Arby's, oh yes, arby's before. So I mean her host mom is like I have never gone to so much fast food in my life.
Katrina Keuning:So that's, that's one thing I wanted to ask you. So I mean you get so comfortable with these kids and that you bring them into your life, they end up calling you mom.
Emerald Johnson:Yeah, yeah, I mean you get so comfortable with these kids and that you bring them into your life, they end up calling you mom. Yeah, yeah, I mean not everybody. I mean it depends on the dynamic. I'd say about half of my kids call me mom, maybe 60%, and other ones would maybe call me M or Emerald or whatever.
Emerald Johnson:One of them started off feeling like it was weird to call me mom. So she's like can I call you M? And I said yeah, that's fine, Like I don't care what you call me, it's just whatever you want. But you, you can't call me. Ma'am is my only rule, because to me it feels like ma'am means you don't even care enough to learn who I am. Like that's the way I hear, ma'am. So if you're living in my house and I'm taking care of you and I'm feeding you and I'm driving you around, the least you can do is know my name. But this girl called me M and all the kids in the area called me M. And then she said, well, they all call you M too, and I think I want something special. And she said could I call you Ma M? And I said yeah, but it might take me a while to learn how to answer to that. That's me. So she's still, she'll still message me. She's like Ma M, how are you doing? I love that.
Katrina Keuning:Yeah, it's just yeah, that's awesome. And so now, with your role at Iris, so you're do you find that you are kind of trying to vocalize what the program is and like encouraging people to become a host family?
Emerald Johnson:Definitely. That's a huge problem, especially since COVID. You know, increased cost of living it is not nothing to support an extra mouth in your home. So, yeah, we are definitely always looking for new families. We need new families. We cannot do this without families willing to welcome a student into their heart and into their home and really treat them like family. They're not here as a guest, they're not. You're not waiting on them, taking care of them all the time. Like you teach them how to do their own laundry, you teach them how to, you know, make their own snacks and breakfast. You know you're not their chef, you're not their maid. You know just as much as any kid. You know you're going to do some cleaning up. But yeah, we need families all the time and half of my job is when I drag all these kids around town and I'm going to events.
Emerald Johnson:I, my job is when I drag all these kids around town and I'm going to events. I usually it's they're just they're joining things I'd be doing anyways. If I'm going to the farmer's market, I may as well bring a kid along. If I'm going to go hiking, I may as well bring a kid around. You know, sometimes there's library lectures If I have a kid that's really interested in learning, I will go to library lectures Certain years. I'll do a lot of those. But yeah, if I'm going to live at five, that's family friendly. Bring some kids along.
Katrina Keuning:Yeah, and so, like you know, bringing the variety of, like a student from a different country, you know, year after year into your home, you were kind of saying earlier, it just adds a lot of vibrancy to your own, your own life bubble.
Emerald Johnson:It makes me get out too, because this year I don't have kids. If it's really cold I might not go down to Ice Stravaganza, but you know, if I have kids in my house I will definitely go to Ice Stravaganza, even just to take a quick walk and see the see this ice sculptures and buy a snack. You know, it makes me much more engaged in the community as a single person. If I have a kid who's never seen cold weather or snow, I even take them sledding. I haven't. I would not personally. I'm old enough to be done with sledding. But when I have teenagers I go sledding, you know, because they've never done it in their life.
Emerald Johnson:And if you ever see a toddler with snow for the first time, how funny, cute that is. Imagine a 17 year old who's never seen snow. It is a whole nother level Like. These kids are out, they're jumping around, they're in their pajamas outside making videos of the snowflakes falling. It just makes life a lot. It makes you appreciate things. As an adult you don't appreciate snow, it's just shoveling, it's just cleaning your car off. But when you bring these kids in who's never seen it and they're building snowmen and they've never touched snow or they're on, you know, the really dry snow.
Emerald Johnson:I told my two kids. I said, go outside, I'll come out. And I got to. I'm going to put some snow pants on because I'm not crazy like you guys. And when I came out they couldn't build a snowman. And I was just like why? Why are you not able to do this? And then I paid attention. I'm like, oh, the snow's too dry and they're like that's a thing. That's a thing, there's different types of snow. So it just it just sort of points out the things that we we take for granted that people would know because we grew up with it. So, yeah, I think having kids here experiencing things like snow One kid had never even had a rainstorm before. She's from Aswan, egypt, and it's like the sixth driest city in the world. She'd never seen anything but like a sprinkle. And the first time we had a thunderstorm she ran to the window and she was making a video and she said it's like a scary movie, because that would always be in a scary movie a thunderstorm.
Katrina Keuning:So oh my God, and she's the one that you took to see a waterfall for the first time.
Emerald Johnson:Yeah, yeah, we went to Starved Rock. We don't take big trips. I don't take them on big trips. I take them on, you know, day trips or maybe a weekend to Chicago or St Louis, but there's so much to do in and around the Quad Cities that. But yeah, we went up to Starved Rock and she was fascinated and she was a photographer, that was her passion.
Intro:So perfect.
Emerald Johnson:Yeah, she took a little. I still have it. It's sitting up on my shelf. But she took a little glass globe and took pictures of the waterfall through it and so it was like the outside was the right side up and then inside was the inverted waterfall. She took great pictures. I have them on my walls. You know I keep a lot of her things that she did. I have like little displays of her photography on my walls.
Katrina Keuning:So like it's cool that they have little leave behinds for you and I know that you were saying that they stay connected to like the QC once they leave.
Emerald Johnson:Yeah, she's actually the same one. We saw a musician when she first got here. We went to Live at Five, I think, or something. Yeah, I think it was Live at Five and somebody was playing. And then we went out two or three other times and her last weekend in town we walked into a place and she said it's my favorite guitarist, like it's my favorite QC artist, and I can't think of who he is right now, but she still follows him on Instagram and then every once in a while she'll send me like a live video that he had posted and she'll be like I remember being at that place that he had posted and she'll be like I remember being at that place. And yeah, they follow the Quad City downtown, the downtown downtown Insta and they share me events. They're like you should go to this mom, you should go to this, it's like fun.
Katrina Keuning:I wish I could go, oh just you know, facetime them or something yeah yeah, I do.
Emerald Johnson:Sometimes I send them. If I see that artist out and about, I usually make a video and send it to them.
Katrina Keuning:That's awesome. I bet they appreciate that. Oh, that's so cool. I love that they create favorites while they're here, you know, and the fact that, like it just opens, it opens the door for them to come back, like the student that was going to come back on his honeymoon, student that was going to come back on his honeymoon I love that. I hope that he does come back and brings more people and you know it, just everything that, like these kids experience totally speak to, like the mission of Visit Quad Cities, which is to make this destination a world-renowned must experience place. And it's cool to hear that, like when they come here, when those students come here and they get placed with a family and they didn't know where Iowa that they walk away with really amazing memories.
Emerald Johnson:They do and they start realizing too that some of my kids, like my daughter, from Saudi Arabia you can't really get a much more different culture and lifestyle than Saudi Arabia to the US culture and lifestyle than Saudi Arabia to the US. But when she was here she told me I thought life would be really different. But it's just normal life and normal people. It's really nice, it's quiet. She loved hiking, so we did tons of hiking. She liked the lectures, so we went to the libraries and stuff. She liked things that were quieter and not really intense.
Emerald Johnson:We've had kids from Bangladesh who are from Dhaka, which is a huge, overcrowded, huge city, and they were. I had a two week program and they were here and they loved the Quad Cities. They loved it. There was plenty to do as far as like thrifting or going to bookstores, because that's what a lot of them wanted to take home thrifted stuff and because that's such a trend, yeah, but they also just loved taking a walk and hearing the birds and seeing, like, what neighborhoods are like and we have a lot of really good quality experiences like that that are just simple everyday life and these kids really appreciate it.
Katrina Keuning:The fact that they have the opportunity to get placed here, I think, is such a positive because, like the Midwest does offer all four seasons, you know of what you know, coming from maybe a place that has more extreme temps one way or the other, and then to you know, to be able to, like, try and experience it all.
Emerald Johnson:It's really cool that they get that chance to do so and, yeah, yeah, this year we didn't have very much snow and so our kids were so bummed they didn't, and but then we got that snow last week Was it last week or the week before and they finally got out and I I said, get out there and make your snowmen, get out there and do your stuff. And so I got lots of pictures of snowmen last week.
Katrina Keuning:I love that. I love that. So, as you're, you know we kind of touched on it a little bit ago, but you know, as you are kind of pitching to people what in your mind describes like an ideal host family, what kind of bones does your house need to have to have somebody in?
Emerald Johnson:Realistically, as long as you have room in your heart and your home and you're willing to welcome someone as family, sort of train them a little bit on how to actually navigate the world, like how to use your stove you have to do that from day one. You can't treat them like a guest, you can't. You know they need to feel like family. But I'm single, single. People host all the time and it we have had multi-generational families host. Maybe they have great grandma living in the house or four kids. You know, as long as you have room in your car, that might be a mitigating factor, but it really can be anybody If you're interested in mentoring a teenager and helping them grow and having your kids learn about the world from a really close up view or just yourself learning.
Emerald Johnson:I have learned so many funny little things about life in different places just from having a kid in my home and we'll be talking and having a chat and then all of a sudden we'll get onto a topic I never would have thought to talk about with a random person that I just met and I'm just like, wow, I had no idea. So I mean, anybody can host. We do background checks, obviously, reference checks, obviously. And then we have a coordinator who just is your go-to mentor for the family and the kid to help you through the year and.
Emerald Johnson:I did. I've called my coordinator in and I've said I need help understanding each other because I'm living with a stranger not everybody. When you first start hosting and have a person who you don't know living in your space, just like with a roommate, really at first you're not going to understand each other and there might be misunderstandings, there might be some, some friction. So I would call my, I'd call my coordinator and I say, hey, we need to sit down and talk and you help us listen to each other, and then communication almost always solves the problem. Once you give people the benefit of the doubt and you communicate literally and understand each other, almost everything works itself out.
Katrina Keuning:If someone listening has perked up and this sounds interesting, what's step number one to considering becoming a host family?
Emerald Johnson:You can check out our website. You can message me. I think my link, my info, will be probably on the podcast.
Katrina Keuning:Yes, I will. I will commit in the description here whatever links you throw out or websites you're mentioning now. I will make sure that it's listed there. So find the description and you will find it.
Emerald Johnson:Yeah, you do it. Just reach out, ask your questions. I can talk about what hosting is. I would ask you know I could talk to a person about what their lifestyle is. A lot of people think you're too busy, but most of our kids want to go and do stuff. So as long as the things you are busy with more often than not you can bring a person with, it, can really work Some kids. If you're a homebody, we could find you a homebody kid who likes puzzles and board nights and movie nights and you know, whatever there's. Every. Just every person wants different things and we are really good at matchmaking.
Emerald Johnson:Usually I try to match people based on like if you pick a country, that's not always the best way to go, but if you match by hobbies and interest, you have things to bond over. So, like, I like to cook. So if I have a kid who enjoys food, blogs and likes to cook or is curious to cook, that gives us a space to get to know each other. That sort of gets rid of the awkwardness. So I would definitely talk to a family, find out what their interests are. Find out what their interests are. Find out what their hobbies are. Their general schedules? Are their work schedules even? And then troubleshoot like how far do you live from the school? What kind of options are there for getting to and from school? I send my kids on the city bus because in Davenport, which is really nice the city bus if you're in school is free, so that solves the problem of getting kids to school.
Katrina Keuning:Yeah, and it's just another like cultural experience that they get to have. Yeah.
Emerald Johnson:It teaches them independent life skills and that's a big part of what an exchange year is all about Like. It teaches them how to step up and take on chores, contribute to a household and show appreciation to their family contribute to a household and show appreciation to their family.
Katrina Keuning:This is so awesome. So, per tradition on this podcast, I'm going to have you fill in the blank QC. That's where the world comes together. I love that so much and I think everything that you spoke to just absolutely resonates with that statement. So I'm so excited for people to hear this and, like I said, I'll link all of the tools in this description of this podcast and Emerald. Thank you so much. This was super enlightening and really fun.
Emerald Johnson:Yeah, I enjoyed it too. Thanks for having me, and I hope maybe one day you'll host an exchange student.
Katrina Keuning:Ooh, maybe I will. That's a great idea, it's a lot of fun. Yeah, it sounds like fun. I love how I love the memories and how you said like you come away with just like moments of laughter and experiences that you, like, wouldn't have normally had otherwise.
Emerald Johnson:Yeah, and even when I go to places in the Quad Cities it triggers memories of having a certain kid in that spot. So there's like little hidden triggers all over the Quad Cities that remind me of my kids.
Katrina Keuning:Yeah, I love that Well, thank you so much again. I really appreciate it.
Emerald Johnson:All right, thank you, have a great day.
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