The First Moments in Your Private Teacher’s Home Might Be Like This

When you first step into the home of your host family, what could be better than a friendly chalkboard message to make you feel good?

One of our Japanese guests is right now spending a wonderful home-stay week in Finland, studying Finnish! She was warmly welcomed at the airport of Helsinki by her host parents and their dog. The long drive to the family’s house was spent getting to know each other and admiring the Finnish winter that is extra cold and white this year.

Upon arrival, our guest found a lovely greeting in English and Finnish on a chalkboard at the entrance of her home for the week. This is how she learnt her first Finnish word, tervetuloa, which of course means welcome. A couple of mornings later the host found a reply from her guest saying “Kiitos!! Minä olen onnellinen.” which translates as “Thank you!! I am happy.” 

The emoji at the end of her message, of course, needs no translation. 🙂

Enjoy your time in your Private Teacher’s home, Maiko!