For Bermudians who have travelled with Up With People (UWP) and stayed with host families in countries across the world, the experience is one they will never forget.

Mia Pauwels, who grew up in Belgium, travelled with UWP from 1993 to 1994 as a public relations' representative.

"I stayed with more than 100 host families in the US and Europe. Unfortunately at the time I travelled everything was too fast paced and most of the time we only got a chance to stay with the same host family for two or three nights. Luckily this has all changed."

She still stays in touch with some of her hosts. "Some have watered down to a once-a-year Christmas card, but another still includes in-person visits about every other year," she said.

"I stayed with all kinds of people from different backgrounds. I even stayed in a nursing home and camped out in a tent in the backyard. I slept on pull-out couches, got lost in huge mansions, curled up with the cats and once a toddler!

"It's also a great way to experience some local home cooking. I've eaten ostrich, alligator, frogs' legs, snails, rabbit, pig brains, horse meat, and still to this day some unidentified foodstuff that tasted delicious."

Between 1991 and 1992, mother-of-two Robyn Eve worked with UWP and stayed with 81 families. "We learned so much more about the town, country and people in the area than we ever would have had we come as tourists and stayed in a hotel," she said.

"I am still in regular contact with former host families from the US, Switzerland, Germany and England," added Mrs. Eve. "I have gone back and visited several of them since that time and a couple of my former host sisters have been to Bermuda to visit me."

One of her last hosts lived in Northampton, England. "The lady I stayed with was named Mary Lees," said Mrs. Eve.

"She worked in Bermuda at the hospital in the 1970s and was a friend of my mom's. She literally knew me when I was born, but I don't remember her."

Tequita Shemel Dickinson went with UWP in 1991 and stayed in 90 different homes. "I loved every minute of it," she said. "All of my host families made sure I was comfortable and gave me a wonderful prospective of their culture."

She added: "Up With People is about learning about the world without having to go to college. It is showing the world that, regardless of colour, faith and gender, we can all get along."

Jerry Dee Dears, took part in Jerry-Dee Dears took part in UWP from 1993 to 1994, and said: "Yes, there are some families that you love instantly, others that you learn to love, some families that you wish you had more time with and others you just don't want to look back once you have left.

"However, either way, there is a story and a lesson learned each time. Sometimes that lesson is not learned for many years down the road."

She added: "I can remember in Rome, Italy, seven of us living in a monastery with the monks. In Cork, Ireland, I lived in a nunnery hospital with the nuns, and each family has their own set of rules, values, meals, hygiene etc. to which we had to adapt. So we had to be flexible and adaptable.

"It's all a part of the educational process. I look back on it all now and would have had it no other way."

Department of Corrections divisional officer Tanya Dyer travelled in 1981 and said it allowed her to gain insight into what she really wanted to do during her life, as well as realising everyone was the same.

She added: "I went to high schools in California that had Mexicans, Caucasians, and African-Americans who didn't speak to each other until UWP arrived the young people saw us all laughing and getting along and several asked me what colour I was.

"I told them that first of all, I was a Bermudian, that we are a mixture of colours, nationalities and heritage. I felt very confused at first because I never thought about that, as one of my grandmothers was Portuguese and the other from St. David's, a Pequot, my grandfather's ancestry is Irish and English, and the other grandfather is a black Bermudian."

Sommer Fasulo was in UWP in 2000 and travelled through the south western United States and to Scandinavia after finishing Saltus Graduate Year.

"I was blessed with incredible host families and still receive packages from a host family in Sweden filled with Swedish 'hard bread' and chocolate.

"The unique, but always incredibly welcoming host families help make Up With People the amazing learning opportunity that it is and allows you to build lifelong friendships with the families as well as the students you are hosted with.

"They allow you a real inside look at the way of life in the place you are visiting and provide a personal experience, a true family, that you would never have if you were staying in a hotel."