Our trip to Asia in 2011 was our first trip with Friendship Force International. There are some 370 clubs around the world, including the one we belong to in Salem-Albany area. In 2011 our club arranged exchanges with clubs in Tokyo, Taiwan, and Thailand. Up through 2014, when this was written, the club had had a number of domestic and foreign trips, including China and Iceland, and has hosted clubs from Australia and Japan, among other cities.
Trips work like this: each visiting member or couple stays at the home of one of the host club members, and this, to our surprise, turned out the highlight of the trip. The people we stayed with in all three countries, were wonderful, warm, intelligent, and friendly. We had been a bit apprehensive about staying in the homes of strangers, especially those of different cultures, but we quickly found that the hospitality and friendliness made us more than welcome. And it’s a big advantage in an unfamiliar country to be with people who are at home there.
The host clubs had arranged tours and visits for us, but we also had plenty of time to go walking or riding with our hosts, getting an insider’s view that we would never have gotten on our own.
We have become enthusiastic boosters of FFI. Check out the national website, and the site of our club, the Mid-Willamette Valley FF Club. FF clubs are always looking for new members, so come to a meeting. And take a glance at what we saw at each of our three spots.