The Foreign Service Journal, December 2004

76 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / D E C E M B E R 2 0 0 4 S CHOOLS S UPPLEMENT field trips (like to Paris and Florence), and the closely walled villa; the prom on a boat in Venice; the amphitheater in the dell; the shepherds who walked through playing their pipes when they herded their flock; and, of course, making close friends. According to one student, “I would say that the friendship bond was at its highest dur- ing those later years in high school.” Although many international stu- dents were in overseas schools due to the politics of their parents’ coun- tries, usually all politics was left out- side the school gates. I remember a phenomenal friendship between two boys, whose parents’ countries were enemies. One of them had a body- guard and was driven to school in a different car every day. Maybe they weren’t really different. Yes, they had different religions, languages and destinies, but both were from well- off, cosmopolitan families. Many schools also had children of royalty, or from deposed regimes, from rich families, from industry, from govern- ment, jet-setters, movie-star kids and fun-seekers. As one former student who attended high school in the 1970s in Rome said, “Our mates were kidnapped, and their homes in the Middle East were attacked.” One student who attended school in Manila said she doesn’t remember anything about politics: “Even though there were tanks in the city, we were just happy to have a few days off school!” Although politics was important to us, another said, “we did not factionalize.” If the good experiences were var- ied and often exotic, so were the bad ones. The worst parts of these schools, reported one respondent, included drinking gin at a dance and feeling sick; listening to Doron and Ali say goodbye at graduation with a “see you at the front;” and the Getty boy getting kidnapped and having his ear cut off. For some, the one disad- vantage to attending an international high school was logistics — the two hours it took to get there by bus or, as in Hong Kong, needing parents to drive one places. Anna, a Swedish diplomatic national who used to wander the streets of Kabul and Delhi by herself, echoed the kind of freedom and inde- pendence I experienced in Copen- hagen. “Since my parents lived in Kabul and I in New Delhi during high school, I spent all the long weekends and holidays going back to Kabul to be with them. Hence, I was in Kabul during the days between Christmas and New Year in 1980 when the Soviet army invaded,” she said. “But what I remember was my indepen- dence and gumption. Each time I Continued from page 74 Continued on page 79