Matthew McConaughey has recalled the “year of hell” he spent in Australia after he finished high school.
During an appearance on the Diary of a CEO podcast, the Hollywood actor said he decided to take a year off after school, and be a rotary exchange student, and he had to choose between Australia and Sweden.
He chose Australia because he thought “they speak English and Elle MacPherson’s there… 18-year-old thinking,” he said with a laugh.
The How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days star thought he would be living in Sydney but once he touched down in Australia, he was sent to live with a family in Warnervale, on the NSW central coast.
“I remember pulling up that gravel driveway with that host family. They were like: ‘Welcome to Australia, mate’. I was like, ‘All right. Not what I thought. But I can make this work’,” he explained.
He said he quickly missed the freedom of being back home and hated being stuck out in the country.
“I feel like I’m going backwards socially. No one’s got a car. Their interests seem to be different. The teachers … I’m failing. They’re giving me F’s in everything!” he said.
The 55-year-old told host Steven Bartlett that he also had a strange relationship with his host parents, who insisted he call them “mum and pop”.
“That was a seminal moment because many things had happened up until that point that were odd that I was going, ‘okay, that’s just a cultural difference,” he recalled.
“[I’d think] Hey, stay open here. That’s a cultural difference. But I remember the night they said that, and it was the first time I went no, no, no, I’m not doing that.”
He later dropped out of school and was given a work placement, where he worked for places like ANZ Bank for free.
“I’m taking these odd jobs as a carpenter and all these different things,” he said.
When he would get home from work, dinner would be on the table by 5pm, and then he would sit in his room at night and write long letters to himself filled with “existential questions”.
He also adopted a vegetarian diet, ran 10 kilometres every day and weighed just 60 kilos.
While speaking to Stellar magazine earlier this year, the Green Lights author said his time in Australia made him the man he is today.
“I learnt a lot about myself and who I wanted to be. Those are priceless memories and lessons I needed at that time in my life,” he said.
“I wouldn’t change anything because living there made me who I am today, all those years later.”
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