one last thought on swiss school: a story

note: at the end of the semester, i saw something that made me think about the exact impact of swiss high school on my friends. hopefully it'll make you think about it too.

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one girl in my class has worked ridiculously hard to stay in school. she's studied french and english and even italian as a free subject. it meant so much to her to be in our class, and yet her grades were teetering on the edge. we'd done the math, and so as we all walked into english class and the teacher started announcing the scores, we also knew that this grade was the one that mattered. this grade was the one that would tip the balance.

it sounds funny, even a little ridiculous that so much drama should be attached to one small grade. but it wasn't just a grade-- if her grade was insufficient, she'd have to leave school. she couldn't come back in january, and she'd have to wait till summer and repeat the whole year.

there was complete silence when our teacher got to her name. a group of students gathered around her chair, waiting and hoping and dreading at the same time.

and then our teacher announced the grade, and it was enough. the girl was staying.
she'd made it.

there was a brief pause and then everyone started screaming and hugging her and screaming again and jumping up and down and shouting congratulations. it was crazy, all seventeen of us freaking out over a tiny number on a piece of paper.

so then i looked over at the girl. she was completely silent, speechless, sitting in her chair.

she had the biggest smile i've ever seen,

and tears were running down her face.

days > 100 -- belonging

piece of advice for future exchange students #16:

exchange is not for the faint of heart. if you want to feel incapable,

alone, and generally awkward 24/7 for three months straight, go on exchange.

but you know what?

it gets better.

Something has changed in the past couple weeks. I'm not sure whether it was my 100 days or if it was the fact that I've been learning Swiss German (sort of) or if it was just a sudden, random shift. But somewhere along the way, I stopped feeling like an exchange student.

That doesn't sound quite right.

What I mean is that I stopped feeling like an outsider. I no longer feel like I'm awkwardly on the edge of conversations. I no longer feel like my classmates and friends have to constantly cater to me and my less-than-perfect language skills. I no longer feel like a visitor.

I feel like a part of the class now. 

And maybe that's not quite right, because I know that my communication skills are handicapped and my grades are about average. But somehow that doesn't matter anymore. I'm not sure why. But I don't feel like "the exchange student". I feel like Hannah.

Hannah, who lives in Switzerland and goes to school and learns German.

Hannah, who is finally beginning to belong.

things that have happened in the past 10-ish days:

• I took school tests. A lot of tests. They were interesting, because I haven't successfully understood a complete test yet... and so lots of times I end up looking at the words I know and guessing at what I think I am supposed to write. It doesn't test my knowledge of the subject as much as it tests my ability to understand what the test says.
• Oh, and I got a 2 on my French test! This is approximately the equivalent of a D... BUT I'm really happy about it because a) the rest of my class averaged about a 3.5, because it was a hard test and b) my class has had 6 years of French already and I had absolutely none before I came here and c) I wasn't allowed to have my phone during class to translate the words in German or in French, so I was conjugating verbs and finishing sentences without a clear idea of what they meant. Hooray for intuitive language skills! :)
• thought: I never thought I'd be so happy about a D. Hmm. The things that change on exchange...
• I received a package from my family! And it had American... THINGS in it! :) I love Switzerland, don't get me wrong, but I do miss the USA a lot. A lot. :/

the end because I am too tired to write anything more.

hannah