Dear Friends of the AIB,
It is hard to imagine that our Academy is now turning 20 years old. I have been with the AIB from the very beginning and I tend to look back at the past with nostalgia and see how the times have changed. But let's look at it seriously: did things change over all the years? Or are they the same today as they were before?
Let's take Bonn, for instance. When the AIB started in 1993, we still had the German Parliament here. Filled with pride for our city, we led our students through the Plenary Chamber. Today, the Parliament is in Berlin and the old Plenary Chamber in Bonn is a working place, getting ready to perform as a Congress center. Did Bonn change? Yes, on the surface, but the heart and soul of the city did not. For our students, Bonn is still the place where nice people live, where people open their homes to become host parents, where a kind of Rhenish friendliness and amiability makes life here easy and enjoyable.
In the larger scope of history, 20 years is not a lot, even by American standards. The difference between Americans and Germans is that Americans consider 100 years a long time and Germans think that 100 miles is a long distance! So, is there a reason to celebrate? Indeed, some of our young guests suggested to party harder when we turn 21!
However, all this time, all these 20 years, young American students came into the city and change took place in them, change took place in the host families, and change took place in us. Each student, when they return home, leaves a small part of themselves here in Bonn. They take home the memories of their times abroad, of the families who helped them grow and deal with the world abroad. They take home a new perspective to share with their friends and families at home.
I tried to calculate how many students have come through our doors since our first program. The number is around 7,000.
7,000 times young students got on their way, full of expectation, full of excitement and nervousness, full of pleasant anticipation and advice from their parents and relatives. 7,000 times they arrived in a foreign country which appeared very strange at first glance, where instead of donuts, they found 'Brötchen' and 'Teilchen', where they have 'leckere Döner' instead of hamburgers, and where you can order a beer without showing your ID.
All these students were confronted with differences, some good, some bad. But these differences made them change their perceptions of the world. Each incident--whether it was the small obstacles in their daily lives, like not understanding the waiter in the restaurant, or whether it was the big challenges, like getting sick and visiting the hospital--helped the students develop a mix of personal growth and development. The changes in the students are often small or subtle; the loud students become a little more quiet, the quiet ones become a little more outspoken; the shy become more confident and the self-confident become a little more reluctant. But nevertheless, change and growth had occurred.
At this point, I would like to thank god in all seriousness, that over 20 years--besides having smaller health problems and minor accidents--we never had any serious incident. This is a true reason to be thankful!
Together with some 7,000 American students, and the same number of host families in Bonn, who listened with patience to 1 million questions, who explained 100,000 times how the German garbage separation works, who waited 100,000 times on their students because they were late for dinner, and who had an overabundance of patience and a lot of fun when they laughed with their guests about the newest blunder. It is still exciting to us, even after 20 years, when new students arrive at the AIB. They hang around, shifting from side to side, nervously expecting the arrival of their host family, which as it turns out, usually feels just as nervous for getting to know a 'crazy American'. And it is still touching at the end, when saying good bye, the students twiddle with their luggage trying to delay the moment of departure, they hug their host mom as she fights back her tears, while the 7 year old daughter cries loudly because she loses her elder sister!
7,000 times students flew back to Texas, to sunny California, to Pennsylvania or wherever they came from – back to their families – but they never arrived home. They never got back to the land of hamburgers and Starbucks, of baseball and College football, to the home as they knew it before they left; they had become global citizens. Time and time again, parents went to pick up their son or daughter from the airport and realized that they had lost their small child and had gained a new partner in life.
The great Greek philosopher Heraclitus said, “There is nothing as constant as change”. You have to be open for new experiences and not only be alerted, but expose yourself to them. My grandfather Martin used to say the same thing, but in his own words: “Taking a bath is not enough. You need to change the water from time to time.”
I want to thank all the students who still keep Bonn and the AIB in good memory! It was a good time with you! I want to thank the host families who opened their homes and became our friends. I want to thank my colleagues over all the years for going above and beyond and being the fearless leaders and human beings that you are (see underneath). I am proud and thankful to have shared these years with all of you! We had a gorgeous time together!
Your Rainer Zäck
