In POLISH! – Dzien dobry wszystkim, niezmiernie sie ciesze ze moge opowiedziec wam o mojej niesamowitej przygodzie.

Oh sorry that was in Polish.

Some of you may not know who I am but for the past year I’ve been attending this school as a Exchange Student. Okay let me introduce myself to all of you. My name is Maciej Wolanski and I come from Poland which is a small country in the middle of Europe – right next to Germany if you want to find it on the map.

Standing here in front all of you is not simple, I got to say I’m a bit stress, trying to read sentences that I wrote two days ago, because I obviously leave everything to a last minute, is not easy - and if that’s not enough, English is not my first language – if you haven’t noticed. But Here I am at the end of the best year of my life doing a speech in the best school I’ve ever had.

333 days, 333 days that is exact time I have spend in Australia. 333 days of meeting new people and friends for the rest of my life, traveling to beautiful places AND learning new language but also 333 days of uncomfortable situations 333 days without my Mom my Dad my two sisters an my brother and 333 days living with people who I now call family who were strangers when I first met them. Throughout this whole year I have gotten to experience plenty of new things but I also get to learn, learn a lot, and I would like to share with you a couple of important lessons that I’ve learned during this year.

Lesson number one: every thing happens for a reason.

As you now all know Poland is not a very big country but we do have a couple of BIG cities, and I come from one of them.

Wroclaw – this is how my home city is called. 1 million people, not many but a few Skyscrapers, and a lot of traffic. So now you can imagine my face when I first landed in Tamworth, I was terrified – no traffic, no skyscrapers only cows I wanted to go home. The only thing I sow from the plane were a lot of properties and cows a lot of cows - a lot for me. However after spending first couple of months in Tamworth and settling into country coulter I started feeling much better I even got a job on a turf farm during school holidays, where I could very deeply experience country lifestyle. And finally country Music festival, this is the time I realised why I’m here. As a person who loves music and a person who plays guitar being able to go to a local pub sit and listen to a totally free concert was just stupendous. Walking down the street and watching buskers playing whole day long was my favourite thing to do. And belief me during Country Music I was the happiest man alive. And again everything happens for a reason, If my exchange wasn’t happening in Tamworth I wouldn’t have experience all this music, I wouldn’t have improved my guitar skills, and I wouldn’t have met so many amazing musicians.

Lesson Number two: Not everything that flys is delicious?

At the end on of school holidays Rotary – the organisation that I’m on the exchange with, organised a big trip for all the exchange students. There was 70 of us so we got split to two groups one big – 50 students and one small group – 20 students. My trip started on kangaroo Island, this part of our trip was the chill part. Sleeping in, swimming on the beach and just resting was amazing. But I was in the small group – all my friends all the people that I knew where in the big group, so I was devastated that I was left alone. After having a Fabolous 7 days on kangaroo island we moved on to the next part of the trip – Uluru and Alice Spring. After landing in Alice Springs we bussed to our accommodation – and this bus drive was unforgettable. 20 people in the bus singing Taylor Swifts biggest hits and having a time of our lives. That’s when I realised those people are amazing and I’m extremely lucky I have met them. Hmmmm every thing happens for a reason doesn’t it?

This part of the trip definitely didn’t have anything to do with a word “chill” 6am leaving Alice Springs in the morning driving 6 hours to Uluru, doing 14 km walk and after that the only thing we dreamed of was a good sleep. Well when we got to our accommodation we had to find our own spot to sleep on the ground, because we slept in swags, out in the open. No roof, no walls…just the stars.

As a person who came from Poland the only thing I knew about Australia was SNAKES, SPIDERS, SHAKRS AND EVERY THING THAT CAN KILL YOU so now you can imagine my face when they told me we are sleeping on the ground in open swags. After three days of waking up at 4am in the morning and hiking kings Canon and a lot of different places time has come for a rest. A beautiful sunset with dinner at Uluru. Our guide was also our cook and he cooked delicious tacos, but I think you especially as Australians know how many flies there are during summer. So again not everything that flys is delicious, beautiful sunset and delicious tacos and I am pretty sure I ate more that a hundred flies.

Lesson number three: Unknown doesn’t mean scary

A day before starting my journey at calrossy I moved in to my first host family and believe me that was scary. Trying to make a first impression with people that I’ll be staying with for 3 months and at the same time trying to understand which bus I should catch home after school is not easy.

And finally my first day at calrossy has come, I don’t remember much I think I was that stressed that my brain decided not remember - it was crazy. I am not very good at remembering names at the best of times… so when everyone started throwing their names at me I was completely lost …. Yeah about being lost I think at my first day I got lost at this campus at a least 10 times most of the time I didn’t know what I was doing. Each day I could see all the differences between Calrossy and my school. Polish schools are totally different, we don’t wear uniforms and we can’t take laptops to school – so now you can imagine how surprised I was when I was told I will be given a MacBook to use during classes. My school does not commit to sports as you do, we don’t even have a team representing our school at any kind of sport.

I have been talking about learning new things, calrossy allowed me to learn new sport, I mean I should say I was trying to learn how to play rugby. Beginning was literally terrifying - after watching someone getting tackled at the first training I thought to my self Oh NO NO NO NO PLEASE. On my first training their was also a lot of Suprises, after passing the ball to Someone that was in front of me every one started laughing at me - that was surprising to mean. Every sport In Europe is about passing the ball forward. But after making so many mistakes in my first training session what made it special was that all the boys encouraged me and helped me to learn the rules and how to actually play Rugby – I still don’t get it but thanks guys.

Now standing here in front all of you I realise how big a privilege it was to be part of this school, I realise how amazing this school is. And you know why this school is amazing?

because of you, you are amazing and you have been amazing to me, I can’t describe how much support I got from all of you. And again Unknown doesn’t mean scary. Calrossy and all of you at the beginning were terrifying but now you are part of my best memories.

I would like to thank Mr Smith, Miss Boland, all of my teachers and all of you the students who have made my time here in Australia so amazing. You have accepted me as a Rotary exchange student, allowed me to experience a new and different country and culture. Exchange has always been my dream and you not only made it possible, but you have been an integral part of it. If this is something you would like to experience, get in contact with Rotary. You can become an exchange student or you could be like Harry and Lilly Russ and host one of us. Being an exchange student or hosting one is an amazing thing and you will not regret it.

And remember everything happens for a reason, I’m leaving Calrossy on Friday some of you will be leaving this school very soon and Charlie is leaving today. Leaving school opens a new pathway of unknown things and they make your life better.

Thank you

Maciej Wolański