Elise was one of five South Australian Year 10 students who won a competition, and the only country one in the group. She encouraged all Year 10s to think about entering each year because “You never know!”

She researched seven different soldiers before leaving on her trip, and took lots of photos of their graves for their families while over there, and visited the families when she came home.

Elise’s power-point presentation was excellent and helped show her audience what really happened during World War 1. Although Gallipoli and Anzac Cove, with 8,000 soldiers dying there, was extremely moving, she felt the Western Front had been somewhat forgotten as 46,000 men were killed on The Somme. She was also impressed with the stories of how the stretcher bearers saved so many lives while being under constant fire themselves.

Elise’s group visited a lot of beautifully kept cemeteries, from very large to quite small, and discovered just how much the French and Belgium people still really appreciate what the Australians and their allies did for them.

After visiting Tyne Cot, the biggest allied cemetery in the world, Villers-Bretonneux, the Menin Gate and other memorials with hundreds of thousands of names, Elise said it was overwhelming to comprehend just how many young men had given their lives for their countries. She especially mentioned the Menin Gate with 55,000 names of those missing. A local man, known as Shrapnel Charlie, was making lead soldier figures from shrapnel collected on the fields to commemorate Australian sacrifices. So far he had made 27,000 “Aussie Diggers” to send home to their families. Elise is very proud to have been given one as a memento of her visit.

Although it was very traumatic to learn first hand of the horrific conditions in the Flanders mud and actually see the trenches and imagine the horror of war, she felt privileged to have had the experience.

Elise said she believed the Anzac spirit still relates to Australians and her trip helped her to understand that spirit of loyalty, of never giving up, dedication to their country and their mates without hesitation has been handed down today. She spoke of the young men all those years ago who went off expecting adventure and found the reality so very different.