The Laws of the Exchange Student

The Laws of the Exchange Student

This list is a compilation of many ideas, events, challenges and eventually laws that may happen during your year as an exchange student. They have originated from jokes, from other lists in the internet or from friends.

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What are the Laws of the Exchange Student?

Yourself

Lonely woman sitting on the waterfront raft.

The first actor in among the laws of the exchange student, is yourself.

  1. You don’t have any preferences anymore, for anything.
  2. Saying: “Hello, I come from [your country] but you can call me [your country]” is now a habit. You do it so because the people from your host country can't pronounce your name easily.
  3. You ear animals that you considered once pets.
  4. You no longer know where or which is home.
  5. In the middle or in the end of your exchange year, you are so used to your host country that your home looks like a distant memory.
  6. You find some stuff that initially seemed odd when you first arrived to your host country but now they are normal. You also think that you are de-used to your homeland with this new experience.
  7. You have friends in more than 2 continents.
  8. Everyday is a new adventure and you don't consider it a valuable day unless a remarkable event occurs to tell it later.
  9. Beyond all the reasons you had to choose your exchange host country, one of the most important was “the girls or boys are hot” or “the food is spectacular“. Odds are that you didn't had a reason in the first place.
  10. You want to stand out brave when you say you don't miss mom.
  11. You make reference to your exchange year often when you come back to your homeland. You expect that someone will show some interest, eventually.
  12. At the beginning of your exchange, you spend some time smiling, nodding, and pretending what is going on around you.

Things and Clothes

There are some laws of the exchange student associated with things.

  1. You like pins in your clothes because they are cute decoration although some people may laugh about them.
  2. You collect bus or train cards, beer caps, beer mats or any material object that brings you memories.
  3. You have tried to put all your mundane material possessions in 2 suitcases to go onboard and you have succeeded more than once.
  4. You stay watching TV shows that you don't like that much late in night just because you can understand them.
  5. You read books that you never thought you would read them when you were in your host country.
  6. When you return to your homeland, you watch documentaries or news from your host country just with the intention to hear the language or watch again the cities of that country.
  7. When you see stuff with the name of your host country, you want to keep them as memories into your room.

Foods and Drinks

Pide turkish flat bread with ground meat and vegetables filling

Among the laws of the exchange student, the most enjoyable!

  1. You're ready to drink in any time of the day.
  2. You take with you a dictionary and a photo camera in your backpack, pursue or bag, always.
  3. You have drunk alcohol, and maybe got drunk, with your host family at least once.
  4. Now you enjoy foods that you once considered to be repulsive at home.
  5. The best gift you can receive is a bottle of your favorite alcohol drink from your host country (or from your homeland if you are still in the exchange year). If there are two bottles, you drink one the same day.
  6. You have a craving for food that other people find disgusting.

Family and Homeland

Your bond with your homeland in the first laws of the exchange student.

  1. You have 20 siblings and 8 parents.
  2. You talk to your pet when you call your family.
  3. You have at least 5 stories that you cannot tell your parents.
  4. You have trouble explaining or can't find the right words to your host family how certain holidays or festivals are celebrated in your home country.
  5. When a relative asks you what you are learning on the phone, you answer something general and don't tell that you have learned to open beer bottles with a coin.
  6. If your family comes to visit you or if they send you a package, you insistently ask them that they could send your favorite food, snack or drink.

Friends and People

With those who share everything! The social piece of the laws of the exchange students.

  1. The train station or bus terminal is now your meeting point with friends.
  2. If you went to the disco, club or bar, you presented your ID, false or authentic, in order to pass. Some got confused and they made you pass. Others, just because you were foreigner or from another continent, they made you pass in.
  3. You live in a city or country that many people can't spot it in a map.
  4. You are never completely sure if someone is being your friend, flirting, seducing or stalking.
  5. You considered anyone from your host country who said ‘Hello' to you as a ‘friend’, because sadly you still don’t have friends there.
  6. At school you don't raise your hands to answer a question because you don't want people to expect a lot from you.
  7. If you get punished at your school, you free yourself more easily if you say you didn't understand the rules that are in a foreign language, even though maybe you were just pretending.
  8. You became the exchange year agency mascot.
  9. Before waiting to see if people understood what you meant, you start acting or mimicking.
  10. You get a high-five when you finally understand what someone is saying to you.
  11. If you do something wrong or make a mistake by saying something and everyone around you looks strange, you answer “That is how we do in my homeland” even if it is not true and you are automatically forgiven.
  12. Sometimes you use excuses like “I'm sorry, I don't understand” to avoid having a conversation with certain people or answering uncomfortable questions, even if you understood.

Tradition, Language and Culture

Floating market in Thailand in a summer day

The base of the laws of the exchange student. The reason why all these started!

  1. When you speak your mother tongue, you do it with a strange accent.
  2. You are not sure if a children's book from your host country is appropriate for children in your homeland.
  3. You have dreams in the language of your host country.
  4. You receive messages, letters or emails in a language that no one else at home can read.
  5. You can swear in 20 different languages ​​but you can only speak 2 or 3 languages ​​fluently.
  6. The first words you wanted to learn in your host language were usually bad words or those related to alcoholic drinks.
  7. You want to congratulate or hug people who try to speak your mother tongue.
  8. After weeks of not being in contact with your mother tongue, you want to read anything you can get in this language, even if it is product labels.
  9. You can understand things in certain languages ​​that you never studied.
  10. You have a conversation with a person from the host country and everything is fine until you forget a word or phrase. When you see the dictionary, you remember how to say it or they explain it to you how to say what you wanted to say but, you already forgot what you were talking about.
  11. It frustrates you when your peers from your homeland to try to speak the language of your host country because they are not as good as you. Still, you wish that it remains this way.
  12. You consider yourself to be 1 year old again, because you don't get along with people in your host language due the language barriers.
  13. You classify “doing homework” and “translating it” 2 separate things but it takes more time than doing the homework itself.
  14. When you talk to other exchange partners, you start to enter words from your host language because you can't translate them or because they fit perfectly in the context.
  15. You can sing all 20 songs that remind you of your exchange year or that you sang with your exchange friends even years later.
  16. You know bad words in the present tense. You are not interested in learning how to conjugate them in the past or future tense.

IMPORTANT!

Beyond the Laws of the Exchange Student

The last but not least of the laws of the Exchange Student.

  1. You read this list and it seems as funny as it is entertaining, but other people around you just say: “I don't understand.”
  2. You can't imagine what your life would be like without all the wonderful (and disappointing) experiences you've had with your new friends in your host country.

Don't forget to visit the voyageLlama blog and read my story about my exchange year in Germany from 2008 to 2009.

https://www.voyagellama.com/blog/exchange-about-germany/

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