By Mai Ramirez

On March 26, DC International School (DCI) received the amazing opportunity to meet 9 Japanese exchange students who won the American Bowl to spend a day in the life of a U.S high school student. It was especially exciting because even though I had experienced exchanges with Japanese high school students, it was the first time I would show my school, class environment, and my friends to them. Once the Japanese students arrived to my school, Shunsuke became my partner and he would shadow me during my classes. Before going to class, I met with Margarita and Jennifer with their exchange student partners and gave them a tour of our school. 

They were so surprised because our school is very big and that in my school we only take four classes daily, but they last 1h 25m; meanwhile, in my partner’s school they take seven classes daily. During this tour I found out through Shunsuke that my school and his school share some similarities and differences. For example, they have geology as a science class but we don’t. Meanwhile, my school offers different language classes while they are required to take English. After the school tour, our first was French class. During this class we were reviewing how to compose a sentence with different structure. Shunsuke would ask me questions about the meaning of the French phrases and I thought how studious and cute he was when he would take notes on the lesson. Later, we regrouped with the rest of the exchange students in the library. During this time me, Margarita, Koki, Shunsuke, and Ryo talked about our school experience. Shunsuke would tell his friends that he found my math class really hard, especially a certain math problem which his friends tried to solve and then I told them that they are supposed to use the Maclaurin series to solve the problem. Their faces quickly became surprised because in Japan this type of math concept is learned during college. 

After, our short talk, the Japanese exchange students presented to us their presentation. The first presentation was about さくら (Cherry Blossoms). I learned that the Cherry blossom to people is beautiful, cute, and hope. But Cherry blossom can also means short lived and endings, such as in relationships. The next presentation was about お城 (Oshiro) which means castles which were built for military purposes. I really liked this presentation because in every slide there would be a question and we got to choose how we wanted the 城 (Oshiro) built. The last presentation was about origami. We got to see how origami is used to solve math problems and applied in real life situations which I thought was really cool. We even got to do some origami by learning to make a general hat.

This is us during lunch time

After the presentations, it was lunch time and because it was sunny outside we chose to have lunch in the field. The Japanese students got to see how DCI students spend their time during lunch time like playing soccer and frisbee. During this time we talked about what we like, such as anime, songs, and about our school life. They also gifted some snacks such as candies, cookies, and tea which had a little message in the packaging. Once lunch ended, it was time to say goodbye which made me sad because I wanted them to see more of DCI. This experience showed me that despite our homes being hundreds and thousands of miles apart we still make the same jokes, laugh at the same things, and share similar views.