First Day of School

Monday, July 24, 2018

My first day at SMAN 1 Mandastana. It is a public Muslim High School, with a student body of 300 students, grades 10-12.

Look at those faces. I have never seen so many smiling faces in my life. Bob and I were treated like rock stars. Everyone wanted our photograph, and everyone wanted to get to know us. When we toured the building, every class cheered as we walked by and yelled, in unison, "Hello Mister!" It really touched my heart.

When we first entered the building, we saw our names on a banner. The students and staff truly made us feel welcome.

The day began with a traditional flag ceremony. The children marched in unison with amazing grace and poise. They sang the country's national anthem, "Indonesia Raya."

Following the ceremony, Bob and I said a few few words to the students and staff. Nazar coached us on a few Bahasa Indonesian phrases to use in the speech:

Selamat pagi (Good morning)

Nama saya pa Eric (My name is Mr. Eric)

Saya berasal dari Amerika (I am from America).

Then, I gave a speech in my own words, expressing my gratitude to the people of Indonesia. I told them I traveled a good deal, and never in my life have knoen such love from a country. The people of Indonesia have been the friendliest, kindest, loving people I ever met. (After Nazar shared my sentiments, the kids cheered). I ended my speech with the following:

Senang berkenalan dengan kalian semua (Nice to meet you all)

We were given a tour of the school and I taught two classes.

I gave a Powerpoint presentation. The students are just learning English, so Nazar need to translate much of my lesson to them. Therefore, my presentation consisted of images, and I wrote the English words on the board. Here is a list of the slides I showed to the students, to give you a sense of what we talked about:

• My family

• Map of the U.S.

• Map of Massachusetts

• Photograph of Boston at night (They all said, OOOHHHH!)

• Fenway Park (I discussed the four major sports teams)

• Halloween (I showed Aidan and his cousins trick or treating)

• Thanksgiving

• Christmas (Along with Elf on the Shelf)

• The four seasons (I showed images of trees from the four seasons in Massachusetts).

• Snow (I shared pictures of snow storms at my house with the cars completely buried)

• Andover High School

• K12 Breakdown

• Shared Studios

• Photos of my trip to Jakarta (Visiting the mosque and other schools)

After each presentation, I opened it up to questions. They asked me about my favorite foods, hobbies, my age, what life is like in America. They wanted to know how we keep warm in the winter. They were really interested in the freedom of American teenagers. "Do teenagers date? How do they do it? Where do they go? What do they do?"

There were tough questions like:

• "Is there a lot of crime in America?"

• "How are Muslims treated in America?"

• "If Hilary Clinton had more votes, why did President Trump still win the election?"

• "Why did the United States move the American embassy of Israel to Jerusalem?"

• The most heart breaking question (which was asked repeatedly): "Why do Americans hate Muslims? Don't they know that the terrorists are only a very small few?"

They asked these questions innocently, with a good deal of poise and respect. I never detected anger. They only wanted to understand what they see on the news. I did my best to answer their questions. I promised to share our experience together with people in the U.S. and show America the love and kindness of this Muslim nation.

Every classes concluded with endless pictures and selfies.

How do you like this student lot?

The middle courtyard. A wonderful school.