The Study Abroad Experience

After coming back from Sydney, Pam Seltzer, 21, a student at Barnard College, can’t help but miss it. If it were up to her she would go back. The Australian lifestyle to her was much more relaxed. She says that her experience there was, “incredible.”

“It’s one of the most important things as a student, everyone should study abroad,” she says.

American students like Pam, as well as students from all over the world, are studying abroad. According to the Institute of International Education, about 300,000 American students go away to foreign countries each year. Meanwhile, almost 700,000 students come from abroad to study in the United States, according to the website internationalstudent.com.

But difficulties come with new experiences.

Christine Hsu, 21, also a student from Barnard College, studied abroad during her junior year. She was part of the International Honors Program, and studied in South Africa, Brazil, and Vietnam. She was treated differently, she says, depending on where she was.

Wherever she went, she was often judged by her Asian appearance, and was mistaken for Chinese or Japanese, when in fact she is Taiwanese-American.

While she was in Cape Town, South Africa, “Everyone thought I was Chinese, people asked if my uncle was Jackie Chan,” she says.

 However, in Sao Paulo she wouldn’t get the attention she got in Cape Town.

“Brazil had a large Japanese population. Everyone thought I was Japanese, people didn’t try to sell me things,”Hsu said.

Students from other countries who come to America say they get stereotyped as well.

“I didn’t speak English and couldn’t communicate with others,”  said Mehnaz Sultane, 16, who came here from Bangladesh. “People judged you a lot like you should be a certain way.”

However, she says that the way of life in America is much more fun and loose.

 Her friend, Eilyn Gutierret, 16, points to a half-naked man in Union Square. 

“You wouldn’t see that there,”she said.

Jessie Zhao, 21, who’s studying in America from China, says the culture here is much more, well-mannered, and that the food is different.

“I never knew you didn’t have to microwave cheese until I got here,” she says.