The feeling after coming back from an exchange semester abroad, which lasted a brief four months, is not the easiest thing to describe. My mom’s guess is that it feels surreal. Waking up in my soft familiar bed and feeling the heat through my window, just after spending the past night in a harder bed freezing in the 15-degree Celsius weather, does make it surreal; however, coming back and seeing everything exactly where I left them and seeing people doing exactly what they did before but not seeing them in the same way, is an entirely new feeling altogether.
Part of it makes me feel like the famous Crisostomo Ibarra, eager to share the knowledge he had acquired abroad with his friends and family. But precisely what knowledge did I gain from my semester abroad that is possibly worth sharing?
Maybe not the fact that, for example, divorce is not legal in the Philippines. Of course, everybody knows this already. But what is worth sharing is how my French friend reacted when I mentioned this in a casual conversation we were having over dessert. I would be making an understatement if I told you she was shocked. The expression on her face was a combination of confusion, disbelief and amazement. I remember her saying after a brief pause: “I’m sorry but I don’t understand. For me, it’s a basic right.” And there I was, confused at her reaction and trying to figure out why it was such, especially since she knew I’m from a predominantly Catholic country.
The absence of divorce in the Philippines made perfect sense to me. It felt “natural.” This is just one of those “natural” things that, I eventually learned, shocked international students. Another example is subdivisions. My German friend who had visited the Philippines for a vacation asked me what those big walled complexes were. It took me a long time to figure out that he was talking about subdivisions—again, simply because it was so natural and was probably the most uninteresting thing to see on a vacation in the Philippines. He said it was so weird to see a big gate with houses behind it, but weirder to have guards with shotguns protecting it. He asked me if I didn’t feel threatened by these gun-wielding guards, and I replied: “I actually feel safer because of them.” Apparently, even the presence of security guards in our dormitory was strange for them, whereas for me it was just as it should be.
I’ve had my share of shocks as well. I heard from a girl from Finland that Finns do not bother locking their houses when they leave. That is completely absurd to me, while it’s normal to them. The fact that you can drive from one country to another in Europe under two hours is also quite hard for me to grasp, especially because it takes me that long to get to school with traffic. Learning finance or international business in my native language seems very difficult for me, whereas learning it in English is a struggle for some international students.
Realizing that these seemingly normal (or abnormal) things are the exact opposite for my international friends is probably the most valuable thing I learned while abroad. It’s ironic that the new things I learned are not the things per se, but the perspectives in which one can choose to view them. This, in my opinion, can only be learned through direct exposure to the people who hold such different perspectives from ours—which is exactly what my exchange semester has given me.
In philosophy, it is said that it is difficult to see something when you are immersed in it. The best way to see something clearly is to take a step back. Living in another country and interacting with people of at least 20 different nationalities proved to be an effective way to take a step back.
A step back from what I’ve been used to, from what my society has taught me to believe in, from my daily routines and habits—this is what enabled me to see things from a different perspective.
Studying abroad and learning about varying cultures is not overrated, as some people would say. It does not only teach you how to be independent, which you can actually learn without leaving the country. Being on your own in another country requires you to understand the people around you—people you would never have encountered if not for this rare opportunity. It is learning about different lifestyles (which also include politics, educational systems, etc.) straight from the source, or, even better, from a friend who you have learned to live with and understand despite the striking differences.
I can even say that studying abroad is underrated, precisely because what I’ve learned is quite difficult to share. It is not merely acquiring new knowledge but, more importantly, it is acquiring a new pair of eyes with which to view this knowledge. A pair of eyes which no course in the country can give, because its basic requirement is to put aside all the things you have been used to, leaving you no choice but to see things differently.
And so today, I am back doing my old routines with the subtle difference of seeing them differently. Closing our gate when I leave and seeing our subdivision guards make me think about our concept of safety. Looking for an FX that says “Quiapo” instead of a number that corresponds to a specific route in a bus stop make me think about our public transportation system. Taking more than an hour to get to school now makes me think I could be in another country already if I were in Europe. Even seeing the warm smiles of Filipinos means a lot more to me now after realizing that this trait is indeed quite unique to us.
Those four months left me with a lot to wonder about—things I would never have noticed had I not left. It taught me not to judge people or things quickly as everything can be viewed in different ways. The cliché “my exchange semester has opened my eyes” proved to be false for me. Instead, I can bravely say that my exchange semester has given me a brand-new pair of eyes. And as I see everyday things differently, I’m even more curious about what other things I might be overlooking.
Timmy C. Caparros, 19, is a junior management engineering student at Ateneo de Manila University. She attended a semester at Hong Kong Baptist University under Ateneo’s Junior Term Abroad program.