Once upon a time in a foreign kingdom, there lived a princess. She loved everything pink, soft and stuffed and lived in a huge castle with her friends in peace and love.
Actually, this is far from reality. I am not a princess, I prefer green over pink and love playing with toy guns. But there has been magic in my life: I won the U.S. Government scholarship and turned out to be crazy enough to leave everything I had to go somewhere I didn't even know anything about at the age of fifteen. I never thought I would do this, but life is an interesting thing. You never know where you will be tomorrow.
As it turned out, winning this contest was pretty easy compared to living here. There are only few things I don't like about U.S. and one of them is fast-food. I mean, hamburgers and fries are good, but who really feels like watching it settling somewhere below your waist? To keep fit, for the first time in my life I had to stop eating everything I saw, avoid places that contained "sub-" and "burger" in their names and stick to fruits and vegetables. It was not that bad though.
It is weird how little control you have in an American high school. I never thought there would be an amazing day when I would get to wear my favorite jeans, converse, hoodies - all things I would never even think of wearing to school in Ukraine. Discipline in almost all Ukrainian schools is too strict; we have to wear dressy clothes of three colors - grey, black and white. If you violated those rules, you'd be welcomed to the principal's office and enjoy a conversation about your horrible behavior and think of buying a new white blouse.
Not only rules are different here but overall school courses are as well. I was very excited when I found out I could choose any class I wanted; in my home country, we had to study about twenty established courses a year with no fun classes, no art, no music, no time to go crazy. Here, the first thing I did at my counselor's office was to say: "No physics, no chemistry, no biology, no accounting, no algebra..." Those classes were just not for me, (though later I decided to take calculus despite all my principles). I am more interested in sociology studies and art - or any place, where I can express my opinion and point of view. I got to have fun in every class I chose, like journalism, web design and photography.
There was only one thing that could make my year better, and it was the people I met here. Yes, it was hard to make friends at first, perhaps I am too self-centered to make friends. Being like that, it was kind of hard to meet new people. The first week was horrible, the next week was better. Finally, beginning with my second month here, I actually started liking my new way of living. I found a lot of friends, school was amazing and my family was loving and very nice.
The biggest change in my everyday life was having a younger brother. In my home country, I had an older sister who doesn’t live in my parents’ house anymore. My parents worked all the time, and their spoiled selfish child (that would be me) was left all to herself. Throughout my life, I dreamt of an annoying little sister or a brother, but things didn’t really go well with my new brother here. That’s why in the middle of the year I decided to switch families which was the best possible decision for all of us.
New family meant more new people, a new sister, even a new school bus. Though I live with Kompasses only couple month and am not their biological family member, throughout the time I spent in their house they gave me a loving and caring environment - one that I was looking for.
America changed me a lot, and I think every exchange student would say the same. I came here not caring about anyone except myself and not caring about the future - this year was my only chance to change. As it turned out, I was right. Thousand miles away from my country, natural family and friends, trying to fit in a foreign culture and speaking foreign language for ten months, I managed to become someone I really should have been all my life.
Going back is really scary. There are people I didn't normally communicate with for all this year. They've changed a lot and so have I, and I am not sure if I can get along with them now. But there is one thing I know for sure: there will always be someone waiting for me in my home country, and there is always someone here wanting me to come back. Now I really have two homes: something not every teenager gets to experience.
