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CLEARMONT, Wyo. (AP) — Ida Stub Clausen, of Denmark, and Flàvia Ferrùs Marimòn, of Spain, are two of the newest members on the Arvada-Clearmont High School volleyball squad. The exchange students landed in Wyoming in August and after two months, they seem right at home.
"I'm getting more into country," Stub Clausen said, sitting on the waxed gym floor one night after practice. "I listen to George Strait."
Deb Klaahsen, Stub Clausen's host mother, laughed.
"We're going to get to her," she said.
Klaahsen had a host sister from Mexico when she was growing up and the two are still close friends. Now Stub Clausen is as much a part of the family as Klaahsen's exchange sister was years ago.
"She's pretty happy, sings all the time," Klaahsen said.
Stub Clausen and Ferrùs Marimòn take a majority of their classes together — which isn't so crazy, considering there are only 93 students in the school district. The high school juniors also plan to play basketball when the volleyball season is over, followed by either soccer or track in the spring. "It's a tug-of-war," Klaahsen explained: both coaches want the players on their team.
Katie Fennema, who is Ferrùs Marimòn's host mother, said that in the letter Ferrùs Marimòn wrote introducing herself before arriving, she said that she couldn't cook, but she could clean.
"She's just very respectful," Fennema said, describing her "new" daughter. "She has a very good sense of humor."
"She is smart," Stub Clausen added, speaking about her friend.
"That's what I gather from all the kids," Klaahsen said. "Flàvia's really smart."
When Stub Clausen found out that she would be spending her exchange year in rural Wyoming, she wasn't quite sure what to think.
"I looked it up and saw the town and was like, 'OK, it has one highway going through it,'" Stub Clausen said. "Where am I going?"
But since arriving, Stub Clausen said she likes it here, especially because of the mountains. Her hometown in Denmark is flat.
So far, Stub Clausen has spent time in the Bighorns and Ferrùs Marimòn has gone to Yellowstone National Park. Both have helped out on their host families' ranches, borrowing jeans to move cows on Sunday morning.
After two months, the students have a few impressions about life in eastern Wyoming.
"To go to town you have to drive one hour," Ferrùs Marimòn said. Her extended family in Spain lives an hour away from her parents' house, and they consider it too long to drive. But here, one hour in the car "is like nothing."
"I think it's curious that you, every morning, do the Pledge of Allegiance," Ferrùs Marimòn said. "And you have flags everywhere. We don't."
Stub Clausen said that in Denmark, students call teachers by their first names, not "Mr." or "Mrs." It's the same in Spain, Ferrùs Marimòn said.
"Ohhhhh," both girls said in unison, when asked about the food here.
"You got a lot of different kinds of food," Stub Clausen said.
The two agreed that some American snacks are strange.
"Example: peanut butter and jelly," Stub Clausen said. "Who would ever have thought of putting peanut butter and jam together?"
"Oh, taco in a bag!" Ferrùs Marimòn said. Stub Clausen chimed in, calling this "the greatest invention ever."
The two said they sit together at lunch because everyone else eats too fast. Stub Clausen said she is thankful to have Ferrùs Marimòn.
"The thing about being the only exchange student and having somebody who's in the same boat, that's — I love it," she said.
While both students occasionally text their family members or talk on the phone to a sister, they said it's important to focus on the experience in Wyoming.
"Yeah, you miss them, but it's like, you're here," Ferrùs Marimòn said.
"It's kind of really close," she said, of her new community.
"It's like a little family here in Clearmont," Stub Clausen added.
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Information from: The Sheridan (Wyo.) Press, http://www.thesheridanpress.com/
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