Sorry this is a late post - but was relaxing over this past Summer, school has started for the children and things are going back to normal.
The exchange year came to a close.
The year has come to an end for our exchange student, Aya from Okinawa, Japan.
I wish I could say there were more ups than downs as it has been a fairly odd ride during her stay with our family.
As there are many personalities and traits people have we choose a Japanese student because collectively they have been known to be the most honest, had less animosity if something didn’t go their way, no known cases where stealing from host families occurred and the discipline the children have were bar none, as they were raised to honor, respect their elders.
We’ve heard some horror stories of students:
- false claims were made about sexual advances
- stolen merchandise like jewelry, money, items from the host homes
- leaving the home without permission
- skipping school to hang with friends
- complete communication breakdown from host family to student
Also we’ve heard horror stories of families;
- Hatred and lewd comments from host kids toward the student quits (presumed jealousy)
- Stealing from the host kids bankrolls
- True claims about sexual advance, which brings a whole other international consequence thing into the picture.
- Students forced to be a live in baby-sitter
- Students basically imprisoned and unable to go anywhere
Believe me we weighed the pros and cons and read through the letters from students to try and narrow them down as soon as they became available.
There were several caveats: I choose only one country because it’s part of my heritage and wanted my own children to see and live with a 100% Japanese girl to learn and get culturally enriched with some of the language, enjoy food and learn etiquette from what I thought to be an honorific society, in general.
Unbeknownst to us; there are many countries who have values and etiquette instilled in their children and taught how to behave when abroad. I guess I can say I was naïve.
Another limitation was that fact that the High School she was to attend had very strict limit to their acceptance of the SLEP score. I believe this is the Second Language English Proficiency test which was given to each student prior to coming here. Her score was the highest from the current selection of students from Japan.
It saddens me to think we turned down other student whom could have been a great match for our children and had less conflict of interests. As we viewed through we separated lower SLEP scores from the higher ones.
I learned later that other schools in the state as well as the country didn’t hold exchange students at strict as the school in our district; which is what I agree with. Its not like this is a real diploma they are getting, it’s a year to exchange ideas and see what American Schools and family are like, not based solely how well they perform on tests and homework.
European countries and some Asian countries had some real good candidates with high SLEP scores – but hind sight is 20/20 and we’ve also learned from some other families it is often best to accept a student that doesn’t come from an affluent family and they will appreciate more what your family does for them than say someone who comes from a family of physicians or high level design engineer.
Aya’s family participation has decline fairly steadily throughout the year, retreating to her space away from the family often. Checking emails, web browsing (mostly in Japanese, thus getting away from culture immersion), texting her friends from school whom seem to be pressuring her more and more to becoming a rebel (breaking curfews etc, skipping class and focusing only on the fun stuff and hanging out).
Aya spent several hundred dollars shipping things back to Japan because she didn’t want to bring extra heavy luggage on the flight to her friends’ home in Tokyo, as her plan was to spend a few days there before returning home to Okinawa.
She had been packing things over four to five days, dragging her feet most of the way. Sadly she threw a lot of things away that she didn’t or couldn’t pack, instead of offering them to my daughters or Good Will.
As my oldest had her birthday, she hadn’t purchased a card or present for her own (host sister). This I am sure hurt my daughter as she shared her life, room and friends with her.
This also made my wife even more upset and was waiting week to week to see if she would come up with one.
Her last week here she made half a dozen farewell 8 x 11 posters all decorated with magazine and photo clippings to her friends along with farewell parting gifts.
This created higher tension during the last week. She hardly ever spoke at the dinner table, even though we encouraged her to speak and tell us about her day and plans. Completely avoided eye contact most of the time. I thought maybe Japanese girls do this to be polite, but it seemed more so that she was just avoiding any interaction if possible – if they don’t see me then I am not really here.
Her last two nights were odd, as Aya’s never planned ahead or if she did she pretended to be unaware of it and have one of her friends call her and say “Oh, can I go hang out with so-n-so or go to the Mall” or “can I attend a graduation party for so-n-so”.
So the 2nd to the last night she stayed the entire day going from party to party. We thought she was done and had enough.
The last night she got up early and packed her remaining items. Then she asked my wife if she can go hangout with friends again, this time my wife told her no she could not and had to stay home. My other daughters were in school still but had a half day. My oldest came home and read a note written from her friend saying that Aya came with us to the mall several towns over and would be brought home by 9 p.m.
This obviously ticked my wife and myself off pretty bad, as my wife was planning on cooking a stir-fry meal for Aya and review the year and have the girls spend some Q-Time together on her last night here.
We made appropriate calls to the agency to notify them of the incident and is basically the final straw amongst previous interventions.
As we saw this, it was a Plan B option they knew nothing could be done about it being the last day and all. Passive defiance or passive aggression is what I think it was.
The next morning she brought out letters from her mom (written in Japanese) that were sent over the past couple months and only brought out now!!?
She also brought out a photo album, sparsely populated with pictures she took of the family and event through the year, but looked as if it was hastily put together and I believe was a request of all of the student to a similar gift for their host families along with whatever else they felt like doing. (That was all we got)
Personal letters to each of us were written expressing her gratitude for her stay with us, saying basically all the same things.
It was a long quiet ride to the airport, as my kids had their last day of school and wife had to work.
Eventually I spoke to her at the airport expressing my discontent with the whole situation.
We met a representative at the airport who had their own student from Thailand who was taking the same flight.
Aya started talking more once they were present – presumably to make the impression like nothing was wrong.
I received a parting hug and she whispered that she was sorry for the other night. She showed some emotion (wet eyes) as she and he went through security and passed through the gate.
Still I get this odd feeling that there is an empty space in my life or a missing family member in my home as I walk through it. I didn’t think I’d get that kind of feeling as living with her was difficult at times – having to try to keep a smile on all the time and keep emotions in check during the whole stay.
This concludes my experience with our first real exchange student.
We didn’t test the water we just dove in. There were 2 month options for the Summer and the whole year exchange, I’d recommend the short term to get a feel for it before anyone makes a decision.
Parting note: Cleaning up items she left behind for trash, we found some Christmas gifts, Birthday gifts and some Origami my daughter made for her to take as a keep sake - all set aside for trash pick up. Talk about the last nail in the coffin - my youngest was hurt after seeing that.
- She also didn't send a birthday card on my youngest's birthday nor the little eraser's (Cute erasers in the shape of Japanese food items) she promised to send her upon her return.
