Posted by Jocelynn Briggs on Oct 09, 2017
Suzi Jarvis is true Ron Strickland fashion introduced our speaker this week.  Suzi started off by asking when YEX was started?  Answer...The Rotary Club of Copenhagen , Denmark iniated the first Rotary exchange in 1927, and those exchanges were during the summer holidays.  The year Rotary Youth Exchange program was created in 1958 in Lake Placid at a Rotary Governors Assembly.  Today over 9000 students participate in this wonderful program.  Madeline Gosset told us out her home and county of Belgium.
Madeline represented her country well, and her hometown is Marche-en-Famenne.  There are 12000 in her hometown with much less land mass than Huntsville has.  Here are some facts about Belgium;
Belgium was an independent country in 1830.
The federal government, based in Brussels.
The three language communities:
the Flemish Community (Dutch-speaking);
the French Community (French-speaking);
the German-speaking Community.
The three regions:
the Flemish Region, subdivided into five provinces;
the Walloon Region, subdivided into five provinces;
the Brussels-Capital Region.
Belgium is known for chocolate, french fries, waffles and beer.  Famous actor Jean Claude van Damme is from her country.  Popular sports include, soccer (football), Tennis and cycling.  The School System is different.  Children go to school from 8:20am-4pm. There is 3 years of kindergarten, 6 years of elementary and 6 years of Secondary School.  
Interesting Facts about madeline;
Her native language is French, but she also speaks, German, Spanish, English and Dutch.  Her parents are seperated and she has a 16 year old brother and 13 year old sister.  Her hobbies include running, Scouts (girl guides).  She has raised money to go to humanitarian camps through the Scout program.
The funniest thing Belgium has been known for was having a Prime Minister sing the France anthem instead of Belgiums by mistake.  Madeline has a great sense of humour.  She quizzed us about her presentation.  She paid homage to Ron Stricklands methods to make sure everyone was listening.