Planning An Exchange Year, 3 Tips

Hi people on the Internet,
today I thought I would make something a little bit different. Since I have already experienced quite a bit on the journey of planning an exchange year, and sometimes I wished I would have known these things in advance, I wanted to share my knowledge. So, here are my three tips:

1. First tip is, talk to someone. If you don't know where the destination you belong to is, it can help to talk. I've experienced that myself. If I wouldn't have talked with my teacher about my plans,  I would have never even started getting concrete. It was thanks to her that I have decided to go to Australia and it was her that encouraged me to discuss it with my parents.
2. Second tip: Make a folder where you put in everything that seems important to you. In my particular case, I've put in a calendar to plan everything, the letter I wrote to the exchange agency and the paperwork I got when I applied for my passport. If that doesn't sound much, you're right, but I'm still only at the beginning and there will be more stuff to put in.
3. The third tip, and probably the most important, is that you should inform yourself. There is lots of information on the Internet, from the size of the country to a description of the coffee bar near 2nd street of some random city. Some things that might be important are eating habits (not only the typical foods, but what the people there actually eat every day), the school system, how big the cities are and much, much more. Also, there are lots of fairs where you can meet people and find exchange agencies. There you can ask all the things you want to know and the Internet didn't answer.

There you had it, three tips on how you can plan an exchange year.