Being an exchange student seemed exciting and challenging. Not an exchange student just somewhere, but in the United States of America, ‘the land of opportunity'. My school made it very clear that every credit that I would earn in the United States wouldn't transfer, but that didn't stop me from going. After all, I decided, I am doing this for myself, for my personal experience, and it would look good on my future resumes after all. The plan was to apply for the Foreign Exchange Student program in the USA, I would ‘postpone' my senior year in the Netherlands and when I had completed the senior year in the USA I would go back to graduate ‘for real' in the Netherlands. I was all up for it. Everybody always says that your last year of High School is the best, so who wouldn't want to have two senior years? Graduate twice? Going to prom twice? Have little freshman look up to you, twice?

After filling out tons of applications and writing a bunch of essays, I was accepted to the Foreign Exchange Program. Within a few weeks a got a call that a host family in Coeur d'Alene saw my application online and wanted to host me for a year. I was the first Dutch exchange student to be picked, so I couldn't be more thrilled. But where was Coeur d'Alene, Idaho? I realized that even though I had been to the United States before, my knowledge concerning the geography of America was very limited. After looking on Google for a while, I learned all about the Gem State and the City by the Lake. It wasn't what I had in mind, and it sure would be a change to move from such a densely populated country to Idaho, but I decided to be open minded. Like my exchange organization likes to say: 'It isn't good, it isn't bad, it's different'.

August 2010. Goodbye to my parents, friends and other loved ones. Goodbye to my High School, Goodbye to my city. Goodbye to everything I had ever known, everything that I had ever experienced, and everything that I considered to be me. I decided that in order for this year to be successful, I had to start from scratch. That could be either good or bad. Nobody knew me, but what would happen if they didn't like me? They say that there is no second chance for a first impression.

Looking back on those first months here, I was definitely in a culture shock. I wanted to be open minded, but what I didn't realize was that all the new impressions could be overwhelming too and that it's important to hold on to my own values and beliefs. I felt like I was thrown into a pool with sharks.
First, I had to learn how to live in a different culture, in a different family with different rules and what not.

Second, I was suddenly surrounded by religion, something that I'd never or barely been in touch with before my stay here. My biological mom was raised a Catholic and my biological dad was raised a (very strict) Protestant, but they decided that they wouldn't want to force me and my sisters into any kind of religion. They educated me about Christianity (and about other religions), but they made it clear that we were free to believe in whatever we wanted. I knew beforehand that America was way more religious than the Netherlands, but I guess I never really thought about what impact that would have on my life and me as a person. I was completely unprepared for what was about to happen to me. Suddenly, my life was filled with church, youth group and Bible study. I think that my host family somehow saw it as their duty to take me to church, and even though my exchange organization made it clear that they couldn't make me participate in any kind of religious activities, they still expected me to go. I figured that if I was going to church, I might as well listen to the sermon, so I did. I think that even for non-Christians some sermons can be really valuable, while others made really upset me because they were filled with oxymorons and the hypocrisy was so obvious that often I wondered if I was the only sane person in the church. Or was I the only one insane? I found myself second guessing my morals and everything that I stood for.

Third, I had to adjust to all of this in a different language. Not to mention the difference in schooling systems. Lunch at school, sport teams and substitute teachers are a few examples of the many things that I didn't know before.

Because I was too scared to face my own problems with adjusting to the American way of living, I decided to focus on other things. I got cast for the fall school musical and competitive drama competition, I got involved in the music programs that my high school had to offer and I focused on what the school had to offer me academically. I started to raise my grades and it wasn't long before I got the offer to switch into AP English, which I gladly accepted.

However, everyone has a breaking point. In early November I realized that I couldn't go on like this for a year. I had to face my problems in order to function. It took me a while, but in early January I figured it out. I made up my mind and decided that it is good to be open minded, but to a certain extent. As long as I don't forget my own values, it is okay to be open towards others.

From this point on everything started to get better. Second semester I made new friends and started to focus on the things that would benefit me in the future. What would I want to accomplish, and how could this all be an advantage for me? I also started to discover that people actually valued me as a person, and that they weren't just interested in me because I was foreign. People looked up to me, even though I wasn't American and most of the time I had no idea what I was doing. When it really hit me that people cared about my opinion and about what I had to say, I realized that this was my time to step up. My time to speak up. My time to make a change.

From that point on, my fellow classmates accepted me as one of their leaders in choir and started to ask me for my advice on various topics. I truly believe that American kids have way more problems and less freedom than over in the Netherlands, so I aspired to be a good influence in these teen's lives.

Looking back on this year, I have accomplished things that I never thought I could do. First, I am fluent in another language and I graduated from Coeur d'Alene High School with a 4.0 GPA. But, more important than everything, I learned how to get along with people who have different values and beliefs than me. I learned how to hold on to my own values, morals and beliefs, even when everybody else thinks it should be different. And, I emerged as a leader, acting as a positive influence in other people's lives.

The question that people ask me often, 'will you ever come back?', is a hard one to answer. I love all the people that I met here, but even after 9 months, I'm still having a hard time with the conservativeness of Idaho. That is why I would most likely never live in Idaho again, but I most likely will live in the United States sometime or other. After all that I've accomplished this year, I really do see it as the ‘land of opportunity'. I'd love to explore different states and meet different people, because after all of this, I sincerely believe that I won't be able to grow as a person unless I see the world from somebody else's point of view.

Merel Eigenhuis
Deelneemster High School Amerika schooljaar 2010-2011