LAUREN WAUGH & DANIEL HOUGEY
Heidelberg Columnists
One of the perks of being a student in an international program is getting to hang out on campus for a week before the flight leaves. We had a chance to see all of our old friends and meet a few freshmen (even though they’re all going to forget us). We got to go to the beach whenever we wanted and play table tennis in the HAWC.
We had fun because there were no classes to attend, which isn’t reflective of a typical Pepperdine experience. But alas, we had a plane to catch.
We got to Germany and moved into Moore Haus, our Heidelberg home. It’s even better than Malibu, and though we felt overwhelmed by the experience of being in another country, we realized that it was so much fun because we didn’t have any classes to attend.
Classes began last Monday. Some of us are already brainstorming excuses for being late or missing homework, which can’t be good.
And then the truth slowly dawns on us: We are not on vacation.
“It seems that some students in the past have believed that they came to Europe to travel, not to study,” Frau Drehsel, our German instructor, said on our first visit to the classrooms.
“You can take a lower course load and experience more of Europe through travel. That’s up to you. If you are satisfied with a slightly lower grade in a class than you would have regularly made, it is your decision. This year will be whatever you choose to make of it.”
We’re clearly here as a students, and traveling is a privilege. Yet schoolwork seems to be the last thing on our minds.
“There is so much to do and see, and I feel like there is so little time to do it,” junior Pilar Mitchel, one of the few students leaving mid-year, said.
Yet, many of the students staying until April share this feeling.
“We may have other opportunities to return to Europe,” said junior Jessi Martin. “But we will never have an opportunity quite like this one again, and I want to be able to make the most of it.”
When we initially arrived in Heidelberg, every new aspect of German culture became a point of excitement.
We called the main street “charming,” the medieval castle towering overlooking the city “enchanting” and the famed Moore Haus “quaint.”
It took less than a week for us to realize that although our head-on collision with German culture was indeed new and exciting, the lifestyles of these Heidelberg natives provides much more endearing amusement.
“It’s my hope that we will help get rid of the stereotype of ‘loud Americans,’” said junior Chelsea McCollum, our service project coordinator. “I hope we can really become involved here.”
We’re beginning to see Heidelberg as a functional and real society that we want to become a part of, rather than just observe with amusement.
Perhaps that’s the main point of going to an international program: to realize that other countries aren’t strange or weird but just different.
After all, learning that the American way of life isn’t the only way of life is the best way to outgrow our embedded ethnocentrism.
09-22-2005
