If she were still in England, 11-year-old Kimberly Neighbor would be in "Year 7" at a secondary "High School" this year. Instead, she's in seventh grade at a California middle school. The following excerpts are taken from the diary, or journal, Kimberly began in England this July. The excerpts end in Washington, DC, where Kimberly and her family completed their orientation for the Fulbright Teacher Exchange.

From Kimberly's Diary (July 25 - August 3, 2000)

25 July 2000
My name is Kimberly, and I am aged eleven. My mum and dad are doing an exchange with some American people. We will live in their house and have their cars and pets, and they will have our house, cars, and pets for a year. We have to do lots of packing, which isn't much fun. I am going to throw lots of the stuff I have outgrown away. My mum keeps getting annoyed with me because it is a bit stressful and we have to make decisions about what to keep and what not to keep.

27 July 2000
I don't like saying goodbye to all my friends. I'm very sad, and I keep wanting to cry. One of my friends has a dad who works for an airline company, and she has promised to come and visit me because they get lots of free airline tickets. So I am very happy that I may see her soon. I will miss my grandma and grandad because we are always at their house and I love them very much, but they are also coming to visit us. So it won't be so bad.

31 July 2000
We arrived in Washington in the middle of the afternoon for an orientation conference. Our flight from London took us eight hours, and we were all jet lagged and felt tired. My mum went to bed straight away. My dad, brother (Martin), and I ate a buffet of lettuce, ham, cheese, and grapes. My first impression of American food was that it was good!

1 August 2000
This was the first real day of the exchange. This morning at breakfast, we met two German girls from Berlin and my mum talked to a German teacher who was going to Florida. Then my mum met a lady from Brighton on the south coast of England, and she had three children who were also going to the child care center.

After breakfast, Martin and I had to go to a special child care center where we could do arts and crafts, board games, play on the PlayStation, and do talent shows. We made more friends. Before we got to the child care center we met the girls (Mimi and Beth) and mom of our exchange family. Their dad was still in bed.

In the afternoon, we went on a tour of Washington, DC, and I spent much of my time looking after the three other English children, and we also went with a family from Israel. The two English girls wanted to be with me all the time, and I gave them lots of cuddles and piggy backs.

I thought that the USA would be the same as England, but it isn't. Here everything is bigger. The shops are bigger, the streets are wider, houses have more space and land to them. Here everything is spaced out. Cars are often larger, too! Even the clothes people wear are different. More people wear tennis shoes, or trainers as they are called in England, than in the U.K.

In Washington it is very hot and humid. As we got the subway back to the university where we are staying, there was a thunderstorm. It was warm and like a nice shower. At home, we are used to it getting cold when it rains. We enjoyed splashing through the puddles as we walked back from the subway station this afternoon. We didn't know that Washington had once been a swamp, and we had not anticipated all the nasty bugs which bite you, although we get lots of those horrible things at home, too!

2 August 2000
All day we were at the child care center, and I made a cupholder made from Popsicle sticks. We don't really call them Popsicles, by the way. In Britain they are called ice-lollies. I spent most of the time playing with the English girls, Martha and Hope, and a girl from Massachusetts called Rachel, whose mum is going to spend her year teaching English in France.

3 August 2000
Tonight is the last evening when all the children from child care are together. We will all be giving a special performance. The ladies who work in the center have been coaching us. During the ceremony I will hold the English flag of St. George and read out this poem:

A friend is someone who listens.
He listens with his eyes
And searches out to find the timid
That lies behind your smile.

I've really liked meeting all the other children from all over the world and hope to visit them either in the USA or when they are back in their home countries. I think I will try to stay in contact with the German girls so that we can become pen friends when I start to learn German. I think Washington is very nice but hot and would like to visit it again. In particular, I would really like to see inside the White House, and I would especially love to meet the President!