As the end draweth nigh and thoughts of flash cards, sweaters and curiously compact milk cartons nip at the heels of the season, many students-in-waiting have taken a moment to reflect on just how they spent the last two months.
Some swam so much they sprouted scales; some are still peeling from the sunburns. Others have memorized every single book on their shelves--even their mothers' back issues of Better Homes and Gardens.
Two Lewisburg students, however, will look back with no regrets after a summer of globe trotting. Shaunna Head's first day of school won't seem so bad with a tale of two cities to tell, and since Ethan Wilson headed "down under," he'll have a lot of catching up to do when he sees his friends again...
All the world is a stage for show-tune loving Shaunna Head. Crossing the Atlantic was quite an accomplishment for someone who doesn't even have her driver's license and has only been as far as Washington, D.C. without her family.
The seventh grader heard "London calling" and Paris, well, speaking lots of pretty French words when she signed up for a People to People Student Ambassador Tour, a program that encourages a global village of children but was designed by a decidedly all-American fellow -- Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Head might not have stormed the beaches of Normandy, but she's still reeling from her exhilarating sojourn. She's not alone; the People to People Student Ambassador organization sends hundreds of kids around the world each year--in less than 80 days.
Not only have the (fully-chaperoned) treks taught many kids to think maturely about cultural differences, they've inspired a different type of tour that makes everyone feel like a kid again.
It's a bit quicker than the fortnight-long journeys student ambassadors enjoy, but the "It's A Small World" ride at Walt Disney World is an adventure all the same. Disney himself commissioned the 'tour' after getting involved with People to People.
Spots on such excursions are secured through teacher nominations, and Head was incredibly grateful for her recommendation. Not only did she catch a live production of My Fair Lady in London, but she got to see her favorite landmark, the Moulin Rouge dance hall, first hand while in Paris.
No sign of Nicole Kidman, but that didn't dampen the trip for Head, who marvels, "I was singing songs from CATS, my favorite musical, and from Moulin Rouge, when the coach driver turned on, oddly, all-American pop!"
It seems you just can't escape your roots (or Jennifer Lopez), not that Head would ever want to. "I was glad to be home for the 4th of July. I think the trip made me proud to be an American. I loved it, but I couldn't wait to get home."
Head notes that a few Parisians couldn't wait for the students and chaperones to, shall we say, bid their town au revoir, either. "These French people swarmed us, trying to sell us stuff at the Eiffel Tower," she recalls. "When we didn't buy anything, they started screaming, 'No Good Americans!' But in most places we went in France, they weren't exactly rude... English people are very nice, though."
Naturally, it was hard to choose, but Head's favorite part of the trip was the night they spent in Oxford, home of the famous university. Appropriately, since she's so musically-inclined, she won a talent competition involving all of the student ambassadors, a group that was headquartered in Nashville, Tenn. before the European outing began.
As if that wasn't cool enough, the kids even had a brush with royalty when they passed the Queen of England in her carriage on the way to the theatre (talk about a traffic stopper). Of course, a girl Head's age would probably be more interested in a Prince William sighting!
London was only a "hard day's night" for Head and the kids she traveled with when her friend mistakenly used the word 'bloody' over and over, not knowing that it is, in Head's terms, a "cuss word over there"!
Maybe it's simply the language barrier in France as well, n'est pas? "In Paris, we were in this horrible restaurant, and they told us to sit down anywhere there was a spot. It was like walking into Ponderosa and sitting down with someone else's family. They laughed at us," Head remembers, though she concedes that the incident would've made anyone cry "Excusez-moi!"
If it sounds like this girl hated Paris, she didn't. She and the famed metropolis of romance had their lovey-dovey moments. After all, standing atop the L'Arc de Triomphe (Arch de Triumph) and gazing at the stately skyline of the City of Lights isn't such a bad way for a seventh-grader to spend her summer break.
Think her classmates will be jealous?
Guaranteed, at least one won't be.
After all, seventh grader Ethan Wilson, who is in Head's class, took a trip to Australia via People to People and survived the land of crocs, that Steve Erwin guy, kangaroos and, of course, Survivor: Outback.
It's a good thing this guy's a fan of the show. When the opportunity arose for Wilson, who was originally in Head's Nashville group, to chose between the European trip and the Australian voyage, he was drawn to the world's smallest continent like a boomerang (meaning his student ambassador group's pre-tour meetings and information sessions were moved to Louisville).
Most people file no complaints about a vacation in the Land Down Under -- except the seemingly endless flight. Luckily, Ethan's father, Steve Wilson, manages the Logan County Airport, so he's quite at home at 20,000 feet above sea level.
After his stint spent snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef -- one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World and the only one visible from space -- Wilson is pretty comfy "20,000 leagues" under the sea, too.
"It wasn't as colorful as I expected, but I saw all kinds of fish, a turtle, coral... no sharks, though," he says, adding that the world's smallest continent isn't full of unspeakable dangers like the Crocodile Dundee movies would have you to believe.
"Sydney's just another city. I didn't see any crocodiles in the wild. We ate at the Hard Rock Cafe the first night there," were among Wilson's statements debunking Australia's "croc-eat-croc" stereotype.
However, the "people-eat-croc" mantra is right on target (thank goodness, it's not vice-versa). "We had kangaroo -- that tasted like chicken -- and emu and crocodile," Wilson enthuses, but after eating such down-under delicacies, his tone turns remorseful when he recalls all the vegetables Australians eat.
"They eat this Vegimite stuff (by Kraft) like it's peanut butter. It tastes like pure salt," Wilson blanches. Oh, well, you can't have it all.
Besides, there were plenty of things to take his mind of his tastebuds. The students and chaperones, Wilson reports, were always "on the move." They visited an opal store (an opal is the country's national gem), the Aborigine Cultural Center (dedicated to the first people to inhabit the continent), the famed Sydney Opera House, a koala sanctuary and two schools, which were rather eye-opening.
Believe it or not, schools are in session in Australia now, because in the Southern Hemisphere, it's winter, though Wilson reports that he wore shorts every day anyway and the temperatures were rather spring-like.
He also discovered that because the country has the world's highest rate of skin cancer, all students in Australia are required to wear hats, unlike our no-caps-in-the-classroom rule here.
As far as American school, Wilson isn't looking forward to the first day. In fact, he says that although he became a little homesick, he would have rather stayed in Australia, "because it's different."
Unfortunately for Wilson, though, all boomerangs eventually return home.
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