We are happy to announce the results of the CIEE story contest. We asked all Fall 2008 CIEE Study Center participants to submit their story – a reflection of their international experience. We asked: what did you learn about the local culture, people, yourself? How has it changed your outlook? What would you tell other students thinking of going abroad?
We received many wonderful and inventive entries. It was hard to pick the winners! For those who participated, thank you. We greatly enjoyed reading all about your experiences on a CIEE Study Center program.
Congratulations to all!
Overall Winner
Allison Horowitz
CIEE Study Center in Budapest, Hungary
From the Corner of Raday and Kinizsi
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” (Mark Twain)
When I entered the study abroad office at Tulane for the first time, I had my heart set on going to Paris, France. I had been taking French since the 6th grade and I felt that Paris was the logical place to spend the fall semester of my junior year. Now, over a year later, I am forever grateful that I decided to do something different, take a chance, and spend a semester in Budapest, Hungary. The four months I spent in Budapest will remain one of the best experiences of my life. Not only did I learn a tremendous amount about myself, but I learned so much about a country and a region very different from my own. By the end, I was also able to see the similarities, the most important realization...
To read the rest of Allison's story, click here.
Honorable Mention
Alison Medina
CIEE Study Center in Santiago, Chile
A Tragic End
October rolls around, and my friends Liz, Callie, and I began to feel homesick. Our favorite season is Fall, and while it is not Fall here in Santiago, Chile where we are studying abroad, we see pictures from friends back home, walking through beautifully colored trees and playing in the falling leaves. In order to cure ourselves of the longing to sip spicy cider and pumpkin carving, we decide to treat ourselves to a night dedicated to Fall activities.
We meet up at the Principe de Gales metro station and walk to the market. It is warm outside and nothing at all like the pictures we see from back home. We set out with the purpose of finding huge orange pumpkins to carve. When we get to the fruit and vegetable section of the store, we are hugely disappointed. They don’t carry anything that looks anything like a pumpkin and when we ask, we are taken to the Halloween candy aisle and handed a hollow neon orange plastic pumpkin, used for collecting goodies...
To read the rest of Alison's story, click here.
Honorable Mention
Bryan Turnbough
CIEE Study Center in Taipei, Taiwan
Taiwan
Taiwan is a place of great beauty,
A small island off the coast of mainland,
Peaks upon its spine stretching into the heavens,
And waves of blue and green caressing her shores...
To read the rest of Bryan's poem, click here.