Season 3 Highlights

In Season 3 of the AFS Exchange Podcast we've had the privilege of engaging with 28 guests across 12 episodes, each sharing impactful stories about how AFS has shaped their lives. To cap it off, we're excited to share a special episode which showcases some of the season's standout moments. And to mix it up, we've included amusing clips that didn't make the final edits, and some cultural deep dives from the season! You'll also hear from our podcast host Kate about the history of the show and some behind-the-scenes moments.

Season 4 will be launching soon! Until then, check out any of the previous 28 episodes of The AFS Exchange at afsusa.org/podcast or wherever you’re reading this message here :)

Study Abroad with AFS-USA: www.afsusa.org/study-abroad
Volunteer with AFS-USA: www.afsusa.org/volunteer
Host with AFS-USA: www.afsusa.org/host
Educator Resources: www.afsusa.org/educators
Contact us: podcast@afsusa.org

Transcript

Kate M.
Hello and welcome to The AFS Exchange. I’m Kate Mulvihill. The AFS Exchange is a podcast by AFS-USA where we open the door to hear from members of our AFS family. This is a place to have conversations, or exchanges, with AFS host families, students, volunteers, and educators.

Kate M.
So this episode is going to be a little different. We’ve had so many great guests this past 3rd season. Across these 12 episodes I have spoken with 28 people. Current and former host parents, current and former hosted students, U.S. students who have gone abroad, volunteers, educators. In this episode, I am going to highlight some of my favorite moments from those conversations, and also include some clips that didn’t make it into the final edit of the episode. I’ll also share some history of the podcast.

So, season 3 saw a couple of firsts for The AFS Exchange. Like… my first in-person interview. Most of the other ones had been done via Zoom in a not-very-optimal-for-recording Brooklyn apartment. The interview was with Chris Kowalski, former host brother, and took place in AFS-USA’s offices in Manhattan. Uh, to date, that has been my only in-person interview, but we will see what Season 4 will bring.

Last spring, I got to interview 3 participants from the Global Prep Spain program that I lead in Summer 2019. It was great to hear from them about what they’d been up to in the years since, and the lasting effects that this 2 week program had on their lives.

For the first time, we also featured a set of same-sex host parents, Jim Walker and Ethan Taylor. In that interview we briefly discussed what it was like for their students, being hosted by a same-sex couple. But mostly… we just talked about other stuff. Because hosting as a same-sex couple, or being hosted by a same-sex couple… really isn’t all that different from any other AFS hosting experience. Across the country, many AFS students live with kind, caring, and supportive American families who also happen to be a part of the LGBTQ community. Last year there were 50 same-sex families hosting with AFS-USA, up from 44 the previous year.

Hmm, what else. I also got to speak to a couple of high-profile guests this season. Brothers Dr. Mitch Besser and Dr. Rich Besser went to South Africa and Australia, respectively. They both have had long careers in health and have very impressive resumes. Mitch founded mothers2mothers, an NGO that supports women in sub-saharan Africa living with HIV. Rich was a former Chief Medical Correspondent for ABC News, Acting Director for the CDC, and is now the President and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

I also spoke with some high-profile TikTokers. Jocelyn and Devin Hummel gained quite a following on TikTok- currently at 180K followers- by sharing fun and heartwarming videos of their exchange students.

These all are just a couple of the folks that I have spoken with this past year. I will be sharing clips from many others in this episode.

But first, some podcast history. Maybe this is the first episode you’re listening to, or maybe you’ve been a follower since Day 1. To share some backstory…

I started working on an unnamed AFS podcast project in Summer 2020. I was working at AFS-USA full time, and believe it or not, international exchange was pretty slow going at that point. As a longtime podcast fan myself, I saw this as an opportunity to highlight the voices of folks whose lives had been affected by AFS and student exchange- even if student exchange was happening in very small numbers at the time. I started working with the Marketing team to identify the topics we should cover, and the names of some of our first guests.

To share a little bit of the behind the scenes… the main struggle when I started working on this show was… trying to define who the audience is. Is it… AFS volunteers? Potential host families? U.S. teenagers who may want to study abroad? Educators? Who should we be catering these episodes to? Is there a way for me to… spin, tweak… each interview to make it apply to X audience? Should I not really talk to guests who have such-and-such affiliation with AFS, because their stories wouldn’t appeal to the audience of The AFS Exchange?

I mean… no. That’s the answer I’ve come to. Yeah, not every episode is going to interest each listener.

Maybe you want to hear about host family experiences, but not about what U.S. students take away from their programs abroad. 

Maybe you work in education and want to hear about how AFS helps educators teach global competence in the classroom, but you aren’t really interested in what AFS volunteers are up to.

That’s… fine! We would much rather share the stories of all the different types of folks that AFS has impacted, instead of focusing in on a specific subset. Will this podcast ever hit the Spotify charts? Uh, no. But that’s really not the goal here.

Anyway. Between the time I started working on the show and the release of the first episodes- late May, 2021- it was about 9 months. We’ve picked up the pace since then.

And I actually left my full-time position at AFS-USA a few months after that May 2021 release, but I have continued to work on the podcast on a freelance basis for the past 2 ½ years. And… I have you listeners to thank for that! As the seasons go on, and more AFS stories are told, we see more and more downloads and subscribers. I love reading the messages I get into the podcast@afsusa.org inbox, and hearing your suggestions for future episodes. Keep em coming!

Also… yes, if you could rate, leave a review, and/or subscribe on Spotify or Apple Podcasts… that would be great. If you subscribe you will also be the first to hear once the show comes back for its 4th season!

Kate M.
Okay, so we’re going to start with a couple silly little clips that didn’t make it into the final episodes. Like this exchange with Jocelyn and Devin Hummel, where they discuss a tradition from Switzerland that is similar, ish, to Groundhog Day in the U.S.

Jocelyn H.     
I've learned our Groundhog Day celebration is nothing compared to Switzerland. I was absolutely shocked. Alright, we need to just adopt that.

Devin H.     
They've got this huge wooden snowman that they put fireworks in the head. And they light it on fire. And depending on how long it takes to explode the head is how quickly or how slowly summers coming. And her mom sent us a video where one of their friends were there. And I'm looking at it going well, maybe we're not that crazy. Maybe Groundhog Day isn’t that nuts. But yeah, it was crazy. It’s huge snowman and it explodes  the head. So they have bands and everything. So it was crazy.

Kate M.     
Okay, and I just thought that the U.S. was so I'm learning something. I thought the U.S. was the only country that did something like that. And, you know, people will make a pilgrimage to, what, Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania and that's kind of the end of it. No, very interesting.

Kate M.
We’ve got Erika from Norway and her host sister Jessica from Ohio, discussing food in the U.S. Oh, and Erika’s Norwegian accent? Virtually undetectable. The two of them pretty much sound the same. She’s the one talking first.

Erika R.     
There's so much chicken here?

Kate M.
Chicken?

Erika R.
It's insane. I thought about it recently because back at home, I would constantly ask because chicken is so easy to prepare back at home and usually my mom makes dinner. And I'm like, can we make something with chicken this time? She always makes beef, pork, lamb, rabbit. And it's rarely chicken. And after I came here I'm like, Oh, look, it's a chicken sandwich. Look, it's KFC. We've got Chick-fil-A. And I'm so excited. Now, it's a lot.

Jessica D.     
If you could rate though, if you could rate… or which is your favorite fast food restaurant to get chicken?

Erika R.     
Oh, I feel so bad for saying this. But I like KFC more than Chick-fil-A.

Jessica D.     
No way. No way. I'm definitely a Canes type of gal.

Kate M.     
Raising Canes. Okay. Yeah. chicken sandwiches. I don't remember chicken sandwiches being this popular ten years ago. I think it's really like the rebirth of the chicken sandwich. I'm a fan. I'm a fan.

Erika R.     
Surprisingly,  I am not a huge fan of mac and cheese. It's just it's lacking. I just it's too much of the same flavor. It is too much cheese. It kind of makes me nauseous. I can have a couple of bites just for just as a tiny snack.

Jessica D.     
When we first tried mac and cheese I suggested that she should put ketchup on her mac and cheese but supposedly Erika does not like ketchup at all. No. Wow. Isn't that insane? I feel like that is like, you’re an American, you get a burger and fries and ketchup. You know?

Kate M.
How about ranch?

Erika R.     
Ranch is pretty good. Usually I don't eat a lot of dressing but I don't eat a lot of stuff that needs sauces. But ranch is really good.

Kate M.     
People dip their pizza into ranch. That's like a thing here. Yeah, and I don't know. Jessica, have you heard about that dipping?

Jessica D.     
I'm guilty. I take the little pizza pockets though. You know pizza pockets.

Kate M.     
Oh the Tostinos?

Jessica D.     
Yeah

Kate M.     
That's, that is good. And that would solve the problem of like the pizza slice like, it can be kind of messy but like the Tostino is like that's wrapped up in an envelope for ya. Smart. That's a good one to about. Okay. Yeah, I'll think about that next time. I need to, like bring an appetizer somewhere. Okay.

Erika R     
I still have yet to try corndog.

Jessica D.
You haven't tried a corndog?

Erika R.
No!

Jessica D.
I've failed as a host sister.

Kate M.    
You guys have got a few months, you got like three months?

Erika R.     
That's like the finale?

Jessica D.
Your last day in America? You must try. Here is that corndog.

Kate M.
Okay, you guys, you got a plan.

Kate M.
Okay also, after that whole exchange… and actually only while scripting the words that I am writing right now, did I check and realize that they are called Totino’s Pizza Rolls, not Tostinos. Anyway.

For the episode that came out during International Education Week, I spoke to educator Hannah Arrington from Bellaire High School in Houston, Texas. When I am conducting interviews with educators, I like to ask questions about the school community, so that I get a better image of what the place is like for students. When asking about extracurricular activities at Bellaire, I got a unique answer… and honestly, I am kind of jealous because I so would have been a part of this had it been an option at my high school.

Hannah A.     
I sponsor a club that is called the McGonagall Film Society for Bad Poets. And I have a group of girls who come in once a week to discuss bad films with me, and then write angsty poems about sad films. Bellaire is incredible in that it offers students the opportunity to do anything and everything that sparks joy.

Kate M.
And yes, Hannah is the McGonagall in question. If you’re confused, I’ll just let you know that this is a Harry Potter reference.

Kate M.
When I am talking about a specific country for an episode, I like to do a little intro. Sometimes it’s pretty brief, or… it could be something like me spending 7-10 minutes summarizing the last 200 years of history in Cyprus… or attempting to describe Apartheid, the system of racial segregation and discrimination in South Africa in the 20th century.

One of the things I enjoy about working on this show is that I get to do some research about parts of the world that I have never been to… and then I try to figure out how much of it I should share with all of you listeners. It honestly takes a lot longer than you- or I-would think. I’m not just pulling from Wikipedia, folks.

I don’t want to assume you know nothing about, say, Australia. Cyprus. Moldova. Norway. But it is also possible that you, like me, haven't really taken a world history class since the 10th grade… and that even if you are well traveled, well read, that there are probably some gaps in your knowledge of world cultures, world history, and just…geography.

I am not going to share my summaries on Cyprus and South Africa in this episode… but you are more than welcome to go back to episodes 10 and 5, respectively, to hear those.

I will say that one of my favorite things to do when introducing a country for this show is to compare it to a U.S. State. I could instead, you know, say how many square miles it is… but that doesn’t mean a lot to some people. I’d like to think that this type of comparison is more helpful.

Kate M.
So Italy, we think of it as like a long boot, right? It’s about the size of Arizona, but all stretched out.

Kate M.
So South Africa… is at the southernmost point of Africa. For perspective, it is the size of California, Nevada, Arizona, and Utah all put together.

Kate M.
So yes, Australia is about the same size as the contiguous United States- that is, the U.S. minus Alaska and Hawaii. However, Australia has about a tenth of the population as we do here. And twice as many kangaroos as humans.

Kate M.
Cyprus is an island kind of tucked into the corner of the eastern Mediterranean Sea. In terms of land mass, it’s about half the size of New Jersey.

Kate M.
A favorite cultural deep dive I did this season was about the Law of Jante, which was totally new to me. I’m including a clip from the episode featuring Erika from Norway. Norway being, uh, also about the same size as Arizona, all stretched out.

Erika R.   
I don't know if this is very like out there. But I've noticed that Norwegians are very, we read the room, we adjust to every person that we meet. It's kind of like, if they're comfortable, you're comfortable. But it's mostly in a quiet way.

There's a certain vibe all the time. And in Norway, we're all very similar when it comes to behavior. Of course, people are different. But the thing is, if you can feel that a person is different, you're most likely to just not really want to hang out with them. Either that or you're commenting on the habits that you don't like, and they will definitely take that in. It's very unique here.

Kate M.
Erika said that in talking to other Norwegian students in the U.S., they expressed similar feelings. After our interview I did some research on Norwegian social norms, and came across something called the Law of Jante. Jante is spelled J-A-N-T-E.

The Law of Jante is a set of social codes in Norway, not a legal law, that explains why Norwegians act the way they do. This also applies to the rest of Scandinavia, including Denmark and Sweden.

And what do these social codes say? Well, that it is imperative to put society ahead of the individual. The law discourages drawing attention to individual success and instead encourages striving for collective accomplishments and the well-being of the community. 

I can see how this could be a real difference for a student coming to the U.S. from Norway. When thinking about common values in the U.S… I think about independence, individualism, and personal achievement. It is normal to hear someone talk about their individual successes here- or to openly congratulate others. Many Americans pride themselves on being independent, self-starters, and forging new paths… which is pretty different from what is valued by many Norwegians.

Kate M.
As I mentioned in the intro, in this season I spoke with brothers Dr. Mitch Besser and Dr. Rich Besser, who have both had long careers in health. They went to South Africa and Australia, respectively. 23 years ago, Mitch founded mothers2mothers, an NGO that supports women in sub-saharan Africa living with HIV. I’m including a clip here where he talks about this organization and the reality of HIV/AIDS in Africa.

Mitch B.
So mothers2mothers is an organization designed to meet the needs of women who are pregnant, who are living with HIV. mothers2mothers evolved from my experience as a clinician where I recognize that as a male, as an American, as someone who was not fortunately living with HIV, I could fully or even maybe even partially understand the experience of a mother, who was HIV positive, and coming from a culture and a community that I was foreign to me.

And so what we did was we embraced the patients who I had seen, who had had babies and, and brought them back into the clinic to provide mentorship for women who were still pregnant and mothers2mothers was that notion of a mother who had had a baby who was living with HIV who had had a positive successful experience could change, change the world have a mother who was pregnant and fearful about her well being and her baby's well being and, and just that, you know how to live with the stigma. And at that point, there's an enormous stigma of being HIV positive in, in South Africa.

Kate M.
What is something that you wish people knew about the reality of HIV/AIDS in Africa? What are some common misconceptions that we have over here in the States?

Mitch B.
So here's a common misconception about HIV, that mothers who are pregnant and having babies are going to have HIV positive, HIV infected babies. Truly 99% of mothers living with HIV, give birth to HIV negative babies. mothers2mothers year on year for the last seven years is at a mother to child transmission of HIV of under 1%.

And so that this is possible in Africa, but also in the world in which we live in the United States and Europe. The transmission rates are minuscule, and if people get care, they essentially dial down to zero. So I think there is a misconception that people who are living with HIV and pregnant will transmit it to their babies. And that's false.

I think what we're also coming to understand is that people living with HIV can live normal, long, productive lives. With the medicine and healthcare currently available, people have normal lifespans with HIV. And I think that there's a misunderstanding that HIV is a death sentence, it's not any longer.

Kate M.
Then in my episode with Dr. Rich Besser… episode 8 of this season, by the way… we discussed a lot about his experience as an AFS student in Australia, and his professional path since. I spoke with him about the takeaways from his program, and how they have impacted this career.

Rich B.    
I think my AFS experience provided the skills that I've used in every job that I've that I've ever had. And you know, in every job that I've had there's been a focus on trying to make the world a better place. And that's a core value of AFS. The whole philosophy of people meeting people and connecting and building relationships and, and seeing those common threads of humanity are, are one of the most beautiful things about the program. And I think it probably is what steered me towards a career in public health. So, in each of these jobs, they've been different approaches to trying to improve the health of people and creating opportunities for health. But that's the common thread in all of the jobs I've had, and also curiosity. It's pretty hard to be an AFS student, or a successful one, if you're not curious. The whole idea of going somewhere and experiencing something new is about curiosity and wanting to learn more and explore and I brought that curiosity to each of the jobs that I've had, whether it's, yeah, my jobs at CDC as a Disease Detective or at ABC News, as a reporter, or here at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. I bring curiosity and wanting to learn and continually learn and grow. And that's kind of what drives me.

Kate M.
A question that I ask to pretty much everyone is… why is intercultural exchange important? Here are a couple of their answers. First, a story from volunteer and staff member Sarah Radermacher. This story continues to stand out to me among all the interviews I’ve done.

Sarah R.
I shared this with someone during a job interview lately and brought that person to tears. And that was a little unusual. I don't like to make people cry when I'm interviewing them for a job. I'm an AFS staff person now, too, and I have worked a lot with the state of Wisconsin. In Milwaukee, there's a synagogue that very regularly has an AFS event that they invite all the AFS students to in the Milwaukee area. And I happened to be there during the event at the synagogue and I was traveling there with a volunteer and we had some exchange students with us, including a young Muslim man who was very upset about needing to go to the synagogue because where he was from, he came from a family where they did not trust Jewish people. And he didn't think his parents would approve of him going to the synagogue where there would be Jewish people and learning about Judaism and that he was going to be in so much trouble. This just wasn't okay. Like, he really felt that Jews were bad.

And the volunteer and I were like, it's going to be okay, we're all just going to be there to learn. You know, nobody's going to ask you to change your religion or things like that. We will help make sure you're safe and this is part of the program you signed up for. And we're gonna go.

Well, the rabbi of the synagogue was very open to people asking all sorts of questions and learning more about Judaism. He was very welcoming. And so we had this program and the rabbi took lots and lots of questions. And this particular student just had a ton of questions. And so after it ended, the rabbi invited people who had more questions to come up and the student did as well. And through the course of this experience, came to realize how much he as a Muslim had in common with Jews, and the whole ride home was very different. Like, I had no idea that being kosher is a lot like being halal. And we have all this shared history, and we have a lot of discrimination against both of us. And just all of these things that he realized in the volunteer and I are just in tears on the drive home saying, This is why we have AFS. In his home country, he never would have had an opportunity to truly sit down with someone who was Jewish, and to realize what they have in common. And that maybe, maybe not everything about a certain group of people is horrible, right? Maybe in some ways, there's things that are okay to or things that are just like us. And that student had that moment, on his exchange, you know, that's really why we do what we do. It's pretty powerful. Wow, I hope he was able to bring that home to his family. Not all Jews are bad. For you know, whatever he needed to say to his parents to help them realize how much he had learned during his exchange here.

Kate M.
Next, volunteer and host father Jim Walker, former hosted student from Italy, Tommaso Casavecchi, and former hosted student from Russia, Tatyana Sergeyeva.

Jim W.
I feel like there's a lot of misunderstandings, miscommunications in the world. And if you know somebody personally, you will try to work out those misunderstandings. If you know somebody personally, you're not gonna jump to be angry at them for whatever reason, you're going to hopefully talk it through. I feel like if more leaders in the world would have personal experiences with Americans, maybe some of the issues we have in the world would be resolved or wouldn't be as extreme.

Tommaso C.     
Each exchange student is an ambassador for his or her own country. And so, when you go abroad and come back home, you're really keeping this network of relations with people from all over the world. And I think that's extremely important. As also one of AFS’s core values is to maintain peace, avoid conflicts. So I think each exchange student may be an ambassador, a sort of an unofficial diplomat, is really attaining this goal of peace, of keeping connections with people from all over the world from different countries.

Tatyana S.   
If everyone had the opportunity to participate in a cultural exchange, we wouldn't have wars, I firmly believe that. Again, the sense of empathy that you develop, once you meet all of these amazing people from all over the world, you know, it will really help you understand that we're all part of this wonderful world, and our differences is what makes it special.

And again, intercultural exchange is an absolutely transformational experience for anybody's life. You come out of it as a different person, and you come out of it as a better person. Whether you may be, of course, facing some challenges as part of intercultural exchanges, but it gives you the opportunity to use those problem solving skills, to teach your resiliency, to teach you creativity, to teach you innovation. And all of these, again, make you a better person, make you a better employee, make you a better global citizen.

Kate M.
And if you’re not convinced yet, here are two clips from Mitch and Rich Besser…

Mitch B.   
I think intercultural exchange is important because we view the world, I view the world, through the lens that presents in front of me. It's the only lens I have, without stepping out from, from where I am.

Through intercultural exchange I begin to get a better view of the world through other people's lenses. I’d be able to understand the world through a perspective that is foreign to mine. We view the world, we have two eyes. And so there's that vision, but it's still incomplete. And if a pane of glass can be viewed in one direction, out, there's also that view, back in again. And if you don't leave your chair and go outside and look back in, you don't get the full picture. So to me intercultural change is like leaving your chair, going to the other side of the pane of glass and looking in.

And I think that we, in a global community, need to do that more, because I think that we become frozen in the perspectives we have. We are, frankly, ignorant of other people's perspectives. And I think that's polarizing, I think, to live in other people's worlds to share that experience gives us a better view of social justice, of humanity, of empathy.

Rich B.    
I don't think it's ever been more important. And when you see the divides in our country, which is incredibly polarized, but divides around the world. I think one of the things about AFS is that it allows you to see the humanity in everybody. And by doing that, you can see past differences in religion and political affiliation and, and things that can be very divided. And when you look at the state of the world, and the divisions that are there, and in many countries, the rise of totalitarian regimes… AFS is, you know, an antidote to that. It pushes back on this idea of “other” that people from different countries, or different cultures are “other.” It lets you see people as people and allows you to celebrate the diversity of cultures and the richness of that and what it means for the world.

Kate M.
And to finish it up, this very logical, practical answer from Juliette Cosh. I spoke to Juliette and her friend Deb Moon for episode 10, which came out in December. Deb and Juliette, along with 5 other AFS students, were participating in a program in Cyprus when there was a coup to overthrow the country’s president. A few days later, the northern part of the country was invaded by the Turkish. Deb and Juliette were then evacuated to Lebanon. This episode was one of my favorite episodes to work on… go check it out. Once you’re done with this one.

Juliette C.
Yeah, I would just say that the more connections you have, the less prejudice you have. That I think that they're inversely proportional. That’s the math geek coming out in me. That you know, as you have more connections amongst people there, they’re creating that understanding and once people have understanding and they've been exposed to other cultures, they don't prejudge because they know that different is okay, different doesn't mean bad. And I think it makes a person more open minded.

Kate M.
Yep. To sum that all up? Intercultural exchange leads to… open mindedness. The ability to see the world through someone else’s lens. It leads to empathy, resiliency. More peace, less conflicts. Less prejudice. Less of “us vs. them.” All things that… I really think we could use more of today. 

Whew. Well, thanks for listening to this Season 3 highlights episode. Thank you thank you thank you to all of our guests this season. And… Season 4 is coming soon. In the meantime, I would certainly recommend checking out any of our previous 28 episodes. Ya got a long car ride coming up? How about some early spring cleaning? Background noise while you’re doing your taxes? Okay maybe not that one.

As always, this podcast was created by Kate Mulvihill. And as always, social media by Julie Ball and Nina Gaulin.