Camille Homassel, a 16-year-old French girl, visited the United States for the first time this summer. Camille, who lives in a small town outside of Paris, experienced what many Maine tourists, both foreign and domestic, do the first time they come to Vacationand: Eat lobster.

As she explains the pleasure of eating  lobster, Camille stumbles, finding the right words in English to explain her joyous odyssey. She makes a breaking motion with her hands to explain how one extracts the meat from lobster.

“Yes! Yes! You crack the shell to eat the meat,” she explains.

Camille spent three weeks in Edgecomb this summer. She stayed with her host parent, Jarryl Larson, as part of an English immersion and cultural exchange program. She was joined by another French teenage girl, Sixtine Jadaud, a 14-year-old who also lives in a small, central France village.

While visiting Maine, the teens witnessed the state’s rockbound coastline, hiked its pine tree filled forests, and caught and cooked a live lobster. These are all new experience for the French teens. But hosting international teens is not new for host parent Larson, who lives in Edgecomb.

Larson has opened her home to international children for nearly 30 years. She began as a foster parent in 1984; and she has continued in that capacity ever year except for a couple when she first moved to Maine in 2004.

Larson initially accepted children from Vietnam and Cuba who fled their homelands by boat. As a foster parent, she raised 10 immigrant children. Besides Vietnam and Cuba, her foster family includes children from Sudan and Somalia. Her children also includes a biological son.

As a host parent, Larson typically cares for one or two international teenagers each year. These teens come to the U.S. to improve their English, and to experience American culture. For years, she has advocated a welcoming U.S. immigration policy. She compared the current situation at the U.S.-Mexican border to the one faced by her foster children decades ago fleeing other troubled regions.

“I love children, that’s why I welcome them into my home,” Larson. “I’ve raised 10 immigrants just like the ones coming through Texas. They’re all running from fear. They go from camp to camp until they make it to the border. The country has taken in thousands, thousands and thousands. I happened to get 10.”

According to Larson, she has hosted more than 40 more international teens at her homes in California, Massachusetts and Maine. Besides the two French teenage girls, Larson hosted two French teenage boys this summer. The boys enjoyed playing basketball at the Boothbay Region YMCA and going to the Yarmouth Clam Festival. Larson also took the boys to visit her Vietnamese foster daughter in Boston.

“We did some sightseeing and my daughter’s husband also got tickets to the Boston Red Sox,” Larson said. “And the boys really enjoyed it. They are both really into sports so sitting in the box seats was quite exciting for them.”

The girls experienced a different sporting event. A friend of Larson’s took the girls lobstering. The girls also went to the Union Fair and attended an Edgecomb Planning Board and Maine People’s Alliance meeting with Larson.

For both French teenage girls, the best part of American culture is definitely the food. Especially the kind that comes from the sea.

“In France, we eat a lot red meat, potatoes and cheese,” Camille said. “There is nothing like the seafood we ate here. It was wonderful.”

Sixtine agreed that tasting American food was an amazing experience. As she began explaining her enjoyment of American food her eyes lit up and a big smile formed.

“The food is delicious,” said Sixtine, who got her name from an American grandfather.

The French teens learn English as part of France’s education curriculum. French students begin learning English at age six. Camille, who wants to be a lawyer, and Sixtine, who wants to be a doctor, said they enjoyed their American visit and definitely want to return.