In our first day at Jac. P. Thijsse College in Castricum, The Netherlands,
we were met with nothing but kindness while biking to the school and
walking through the halls. On a normal day of school, the Dutch
students will have anywhere from 5-8 classes starting around 8 a.m.
and ending as late as 5 p.m. with two 30-minute breaks during the day.

Today we were given shorter classes involving the Dutch political
system, a debating class, a Dutch language class, and a class on the
effect that World War II had on Castricum (a village in the
Netherlands where the school is located).

Directly after school we headed to the grocery store, because later
that day we needed to cook for our host families. We grabbed
ingredients for Dutch and American foods such as spinaziepasta
(spinach pasta), shrimp scampi, Groentesoep (vegetable soup), garlic
bread, Boerenkool met worst (a sausage, and potato combination), beef
goulash, shepherd’s pie, and a lot more. Carlos Presina put in the
most work today, with it being his first time ever cooking and he was
able to help one of the Dutch teachers make an amazing pasta fruit
salad, made meatballs almost completely by himself and was helping
with the cleanup. After the big potluck, we had some time to sit and
listen to one of the Dutch students, Roseanne, play piano. Most had a
relaxing bike home in realization that it would be a full,
comfortable night of sleep.