For Mara Speck living in Assiniboia is an adventure. Speck is from Zug, Switzerland and she in on a year-long Rotary international student exchange. She is attending school at the Assiniboia Composite High School and ex颅periencing school life. While on the exchange, Rotary students like Speck are billeted at a host family鈥檚 home, allowing them to also experience family life.
Life is almost completely opposite for Speck. She comes from a compact town of almost 30,000 located on the banks of Lake Zug in the German-speaking moun颅tainous region of Switzerland. She has a view of a huge blue lake set against the backdrop of the Swiss mountains, some of the tallest in the world. Her parents own a choco颅late factory. She lives with her family in an apartment in the building that houses the family鈥檚 restaurant.
Here in Assiniboia, Speck is living with Lana Wilson in a house with a yard. One of the adjustments Speck has had to make it to the vast spaces in Saskatchewan. She has been making some family trips to places such as Saska颅toon and Regina and it was difficult to adjust to the long driving times.
Another difference was getting used to her peers in school having their driving licenses at age 16. She ex颅plained that in Switzerland they can receive their license at age 18, but there is really no hurry. Speck gets around her hometown easily and to other places in Switzerland by public transport. The European train system, bus, trol颅leys and subways stretch around the city and country.
With the family鈥檚 food business such a big part of her life, Speck takes notice of the differences with Saskatch颅ewan food habits. The long rows of salad dressing at the Co-op store was surprising for her. She was amazed at the prepared sauces like alfredo sauce and pasta sauces. In Zug as elsewhere in Europe, sauces and dressings would commonly be prepared from scratch as they are needed daily. European apartments are more compact and don鈥檛 have the storage space for too many canned goods. She is used to buying fresh foods like breads and vegetables daily at the market. However, in Assiniboia she is experi颅encing how families buy and preserve foods in advance and store them in large freezers 鈥� a first for her. Swiss households do not have the need for large freezers and fridges seen in Canadian homes.
Speck is also experiencing a different school system. Common to the European system, in Zug students must take at least nine years of school before they are streamed into university preparation studies, work placements or training for trades. Back home, classes start at 7:30 a.m. and they are more academically-oriented. There are double classes of 45 minutes each. Sports are taken at after school clubs. Speck enjoys sports and here in Assini颅boia, she is playing with the girls volleyball team.
What is common for Switzerland and Canada is be颅ing multilingual. Switzerland has four official languages. Speck lives in the Swiss German-speaking region and has studied English. Here in Assiniboia, she plans to join the French class next semester.
Speck has had a chance to take part in some uniquely Canadian experiences. She visited a farm and witnessed the Prairie harvest in full swing. She has gone to a Sas颅katchewan Roughrider game and has see the famed Can颅adian snow. One unforgettable experience was travelling to northern Saskatchewan and then across to Churchill, Manitoba, to see the polar bears. But her best memories of her exchange come from Assiniboia. When asked where she would recommend other Swiss students go on their Rotary exchanges, she quickly replied, 鈥淗ere.鈥�
Speck will be moving to join a new family soon for the next three months to gain more new experiences.
The Rotary International student exchange is a pro颅gram for students in secondary school. Rotary Inter颅national has been sending students to different countries around the world since 1929 with the goal of experiencing new cultures. Currently, about 9,000 students are spon颅sored by Rotary clubs every year.
