By Muhammad Ibrahim (YES 2019-2020, Pakistan, hosted by States 4-H in Prairie du Sac, WI)

I happen to be living the best moments of my exchange year right now. My hopes are soaring and my spirits are absolutely galvanized. The time, no doubt, is significantly short and over the course of merely three months, I will be departing for my home country but I feel exquisite pleasure and satisfaction over the accomplishments I have made so far.

I travelled a remarkably long distance to make my dreams and overly-ambitious goals come true, something that I must divulge, was relatively nerve-wracking in the beginning than I expected it to be. I went through times when I was experiencing intense incompetence and challenges over my goals taking too much time to be accomplished. But, it so happens that my consistency, flexibility and hardwork has paid off.

One of my most desirable goals was to continue public speaking. I had been involved in debating before coming to the States but after I arrived here, I began to learn some amazing tactics of interacting and bridging my ideas with audiences on a whole new level.

I joined the Forensics Club in my high school during November and I discovered that public speaking here offers a wide range of categories, something that fascinated me a lot. I went on to choose Farrago, a category in public speaking that comprises all the branches of literature and is regarded as one of the hardest categories. I kept practicing for weeks and finally in our first tournament of the season on January 25, I secured overall second  place amongst incredibly experienced speakers. I was exhilarated to hear about my accomplishment in the first ever U.S. Forensics Tournament. But I did not overwhelm myself from this distinction. I continued to work harder and spent more hours on practicing than I did before. Then, came our second tournament on February 1st at Sun Prairie High School where guest schools were more than 36 in number who came all the way from the biggest cities like Milwaukee. Even in that, I secured the medal of Top Novice. It was a remarkable feeling as if all the blessings of heaven were bestowed down upon me. I was consistently succeeding. But, now my goal was to attain the first place and get declared as the Tournament Champion. On February 21st and 22nd at two different tournaments, I was named as the Tournament Champion twice in a row securing first place in both of the competitions, one at Milton High School and the other at Lodi High School, again amongst students who were profoundly strong speakers. Out of all the four tournaments of the season so far, I have managed to claim outstanding awards in all of them.

On February 29th, the marvel of the marvels came to pass. My most treasured and anticipated goal in public speaking came true. I was selected as a TEDx Speaker for the University of Wisconsin-Madison´s Annual TEDx Event. Doing a TEDx Talk has always been my topmost objective in life and this exchange year provided me with the opportunity of making it happen at last. There were around a total of eight speakers for the event who were significantly well-known and experienced in their fields. This was the time I became completely overwhelmed and gratified with the opportunities this exchange year provided me. The topic of my TEDx Talk was ¨Why Host an Exchange Student¨? I spoke for 16 whole minutes about the significance of doing an exchange and on what enormous levels it changes the world. At the end of my talk, I received an incredibly warm standing ovation from everyone in the audience with quite a few commending me on individual basis.

I have also done more than 145 hours of community service by now. I volunteer on a weekly basis at the Ruth Culver Community Library, Sauk Prairie Food Pantry and concessions at my high school. With the help of volunteering, I not only have done service to the community but also have made amazing friendships that will last forever.

It feels great to know that not only my natural family is proud of my accomplishments but my host family too. I now can comfortably say that my host family is now not just my host family but my real family. My American friends and all those beautiful Americans who taught and helped me so much will stay in my heart forever. They all have left a mark which is going to live in my very soul for eternity. A mark of love, compassion and humanity!