Granville woman hosts exchange student from Germany

GRANVILLE — Beth Acunicus has learned people are the same “no matter where you go.”

Acunicus hosted 17-year-old Lili Klos of Germany this past year in her Granville home.

“In 1989-1990, my parents hosted a student from Chile named Rodrigo Eyzaguirre,” she said. “He was sponsored by the Granville Rotary Club, and he attended Putnam County High School. We became very close and have stayed in contact with each other since then. I also hosted a woman from Russia for one week while I was a patrol officer in Normal and she worked at a police academy in her country.

While she was not actively looking for a student, concerned a teenager might not be happy with no other children in the house, she liked the idea of getting to learn a new culture.

“I liked the (International Cultural Exchange Students) program because I was able to pick the country the student came from and read letters from the student, a parent, and a teacher before committing to hosting,” Acunicus said. “I wanted to host someone from Germany. I’m very interested in genealogy and many of my ancestors came to the U.S. from there. I also want to travel to Germany and felt we would be able to have a true exchange when I’m able to travel there.”

One of the program’s coordinators Andrea Crew found a couple profiles for girls from Germany, and one of them was Klos.

“I learned that her parents, Natalia and Szymon, are Polish and she and her younger brother were born in Poland,” Crew said. “Natalia owns her own esthetician business in Hamburg and Szymon owns a factory that makes pallets. Lili lives in Hohnstorf, approximately an hour southwest of Hamburg. Her town is slightly larger than Granville and she lives with her mom and her brother, Fabian (age 14). Her dad, lives in nearby Vastorf, Germany.”

Klos ended up spending nearly a year in Putnam County with Acunicus until flying home this July.

“I love to travel, and I wanted to improve my English,” Klos said. “My parents weren’t sure about an exchange year, so they send me on a two-week language trip to England when I was 14. It was fun, but I didn’t really improve my English. My dream was to travel to the US, so we sat down and talked about an exchange year in the USA.”

The teen, who likes to spend time with friends, family and her dog along with taking take horseback riding lessons, said there were some initial culture shocks coming to America.

“I was surprised about the school system here, it’s way easier than the school system in Germany,” she said.

In Germany, she is going to a college prep school.

While here, she played volleyball, a new sport for her.

“It was actually my first time playing volleyball, because we don’t have school sports in Germany,” Klos said.

“Lili’s interests and personality were very similar to mine and she had very high praises in the letters from her mom and teacher,” Acunicus said. “We met using email and social media in early March, a few weeks before the COVID-19 lockdowns. We had to wait until the end of the summer to confirm that she would be able to travel and that the school would actually be open, and they would accept her.”

Klos attended Putnam County High School while staying in Granville.

“She was very, very quiet at first, which I expected,” Acunicus said. “She seemed to understand most of what was being said, but she lacked confidence in her speaking ability. When words came up that she didn’t understand, we were able to use Google translate to help. Approximately three or four weeks later, I noticed she was talking a lot more and had gained a lot of confidence. It wasn’t long before she was also using slang.”

Acunicus said they were limited in the things they were able to do because of COVID, and it was hard for Lili to make friends because of quarantines, social distancing and the number of students who were remote learning. She definitely didn’t like having an exchange year during COVID and she did not like our extreme weather conditions, Acunicus said.

“We ended up spending a lot of time going for drives and doing things outdoors as much as possible,” Acunicus said. “She didn’t answer what she liked the most, but she normally said hanging out with her friends from school and traveling were her favorite things to do.”

One of the highlights of her exchange year was visiting one of her best friends from Germany, Acunicus said.

“He is also an exchange student attending school in Colorado,” she said. “We were in Colorado during spring break, and she was able to spend a few socially distanced hours with him. We also spent time in Chicago, which she loved, and we went to New York City for four days in June. She said it was one of her dreams to travel to NYC and she was very excited to go to many of the places she’s seen in TV shows and movies.”

Klos plans to go to a school for event management in the future, but she said she will definitely come back to the U.S. to visit her host mom, friends and to travel.

Klos’ takeaway from her year abroad?

“I learned that it doesn’t matter where you are, it matters who you are with,” she said.