By Leen El Harake (YES 2014-2015, Lebanon, hosted by FLAG in Loris, SC)

It’s just past lunch time, and my fellow YES Alumni, American Councils’ staffers, and I are at the airport. We organize ourselves into a human chain leading from arrivals to our designated waiting area. We’re holding up our YES signs, American flags, and, most importantly, our welcoming smiles. I have a camera in hand to capture this long-awaited moment. As soon as I spot the first blue t-shirts making their way out of the international arrivals door, I can already feel their excitement. It is a brimming curiosity that will continue to build throughout the coming year.

I know they can’t help but think of what’s coming next – their first meeting with their host family, what their neighborhood or school will be like, who they are going to be friends with. I know that although they are tired from their travels, they have much be cheerful for as they sit in groups, making new friends, and waiting for more students to arrive. I know that they struggle to stuff their overloaded luggage into the bus because they tried, ever so tirelessly, to fill their suitcases with as many items that represent their culture and traditions as they could, ready to share with everyone they meet. I know all of this because a couple of years ago, I arrived to Dulles with my blue t-shirt on, my bags weighing exactly 23kg, surrounded by my new YES family as we made our way onto the bus heading for our arrival orientation at the 4H center.

If you were to ask me two years ago when I have felt the happiest in this journey called life, my answer would have been completing my YES year with a lot of special memories and the lifelong bonds I made with my host family, friends, and the little town of Loris, South Carolina. But coming in as a close second was having the privilege of being an Alumni Instructor at the 2017 DC Orientations. As an instructor, I got to relive those memories and revisit the people and places closest to my heart in the States. 

Being an exchange student is a mentality - one that encourages growth and flexibility, takes you out of your comfort zone, and teaches you to be accepting of everyone’s individual identity, no matter how different it is from your own. In the DCO classrooms, these are the qualities we tried to nurture and instill in the newest generation of YES students. It filled my heart with hope to watch the students teach one other about their backgrounds, become friends in a matter of hours, and discuss the things they were nervous about in the comfortable classroom environment we created together. From things such as walking a dog and ordering lunch at an “American-style” cafeteria, to group sessions on communication, religion, and safety, the DCO instructor team worked hard to make sure every student was prepared and ready to move on to their host community. As I waited with students at their airport gates, I tried to reassure myself that they will have a great year ahead and hoped that we did the best we could to prepare them.

From the first arrival to the very last departure, the alumni instructor team was not only the new exchange students’ support system; we also created a support system of our own. Vullnet, Blessing, Walid, Shuda, Arhum, Zain, and myself (left to right in the picture) were incredible partners during the orientations. Along with American Councils’ staff and teachers, we managed to laugh until it hurt and lift each other up to get our tasks done.  At the end of the day, I wonder if this is what it truly means to be an exchange student: being able to find family in every kind-hearted person you come across, learning from them as they learn from you, and appreciating everything they do. If so, I truly believe every person can be an exchange student, even if it means their journey takes them no farther than their own neighborhood.