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Though this is my last report from Anatolia College in Greece, my job and the students' school work is not yet over. Classes are just about wrapping up, but the junior high and high school students still have to prepare for their year-end exams. The stress of studying has afflicted some of them already, but thankfully they have a buffer period of up to 11 days before exams, unlike Grinnell. Unlike most American high schools, though, their battery of exams plays a critical role in their future. Younger students may lose their scholarships, and high school seniors' exam scores will determine if and where they will attend Greek university. Greek law prohibits accrediting private universities, so the number of students graduating from high school overwhelms the amount of space at the public universities. The seniors that I have talked to are currently more concerned with their tests than with their future, and with good reason: Anatolia is a top-notch school that sufficiently prepares students for their
exams.
Anatolia's excellence raises a question that I have spent all year trying to answer: why am I here? Specifically, I have questioned why Grinnell Corps, which has programs at schools in much less developed countries such as Lesotho, Namibia, China, and previously Nepal, also operates in Greece, a member state in the European Union. Even more specifically, why place two Grinnell alums at a school as stellar as Anatolia?
The two colleges, Grinnell and Anatolia, have a history much older than the Grinnell Corps program. In April, I substitute taught a ninth grade class that learned about this history. Both schools were founded in the 19th century, largely by Congregationalists, and a Grinnell alumnus, Dr. George E. White, was the president of Anatolia who shepherded the school during its relocation from Turkey to Thessaloniki in the 1920s. Another Grinnell graduate, Esther Jamison, described Thessaloniki during that time as a city full of "places of horror," filled with war refugees and diseases, and lacking food and water. White, who traveled constantly in fundraising efforts, helped Anatolia build its current campus away from the squalor of downtown. Carl Compton, another Grinnell alumna and Anatolia president, was the one of the first Americans to return to Greece and the school campus after the Germans occupation during World War II. The Germans used Anatolia's campus as their headquarters for northern Greece, and
while they left behind a bomb shelter that I took the ninth graders to, they also left the rest of the school in shambles. But, the school was rebuilt, and today both White and Compton, who I tenuously call "my fellow Grinnellians," have buildings named after them.
Thankfully, Emily and I have not had to harbor as large a burden as White, Jamison, or Compton. Nevertheless, we are employed by Anatolia, and must follow their mission statement, which is both brief and buoyant: to blend the best that American and Greek educational systems have to offer. I think that freshly graduated Grinnellians provide distinct resources from the American system that a place like Anatolia otherwise lacks. I have used my rather feeble $lum Wiffleball skills to lead the baseball club, and tried to logically explain tagging up on fly balls. While last year I harnessed my enthusiasm for comic books to edit The Sequence, this year, I organized a comic strip club. Unfortunately, we weren't able to assemble a compilation of their completed comics. The Pro-Laugh Club taught me to play Apples to Apples, a card game based on cleverly matching adjective and nouns, which I played with a classroom of seventh graders last month. I spent a few minutes explaining the game, but as soon as I told
them the winner received a chocolate prize, they eagerly began playing. I used the fundamentals of acting I learned from professor Lesley Delmenico to coach a duet acting scene; they were both tickled by the tongue twisters I taught them, which were especially hard since English was their second language. And my years on student staff have helped me work with the students in the boarding department. The Anatolia dorm isn't ready for self-governance yet, though-many of the kids, both young and old, still need to be told when to wake up, eat, study, and sleep. I hope that Emily and I have upheld Grinnell Corps' ideals of social justice and responsibility in working with these kids from different countries and cultures, helping them get the most out of Anatolia College.
Beyond the good reasons for the Grinnell Corps program in Greece, there is a point why I personally am here in Greece. After four years of intensive studying and socializing, I think Thessaloniki is just what I needed. One of the few Greek words I managed to pick up this year is "hallara," which loosely translates to a soft but imperative "relax." It's what you would say to someone who is fretting over something that is worrying but impermanent, like not having the requisite residence permit after living in Greece for eight months, or misplacing your passport in a recycling bin. (Both of these examples are based on true stories.) Hallara. It's a reassuring word; everything will work out. Thanks to two things I adore, my parents and Grinnell, I am far more tightly wound than the people I have met in Greece. If you stroll down the waterfront promenade in Thessaloniki, you will see people in cushy chairs, nursing iced coffee and conversations for hours. I have learned a lot from these people.
I have had more direct educational opportunities in Thessaloniki, as well. Working at Anatolia allowed Emily and me to enroll at the American College of Thessaloniki, and I have taken two semesters of journalism. I've learned a lot of the technical elements of writing news stories that I didn't have access to at Grinnell, even through working at the Scarlet and Black. Studying journalism in a classroom has only increased my desire to make it my future profession. A year in Thessaloniki has also given me plenty of material to create a podcast. Almost every week since November, I have produced a short, mostly factual audio report covering topics ranging from Greek food to Greek sports to Greek museums. Coupled with my massive consumption of National Public Radio programs-I feel more connected with American news and This American Life than at any time in the past four years-I feel that I'm ready for another low paying job, this time at a newspaper or radio station.
I have also picked up some broader lessons in Greece. When I unpacked my bags in Thessaloniki, I saw a card from my parents. (They slip cards in my luggage whenever I travel-I make sure to leave my duffel unattended for a few minutes.) On it my dad wrote "Have a wonderful time! Hope you learn a lot about life." On paper, this sounds cliché, but I knew he was serious. Over the months, I learned a thing or two, including some Greek words I don't want to define for you. I was put to the test in April, when my parents and grandmother came to the Balkans to see me and my sister, who works in Belgrade. She showed them Belgrade and Sarajevo, both of which have recovered, superficially, from the wars of the 1990s. I the tour guide for Thessaloniki, Delphi, and Athens. Our schedule was bursting and we almost missed a bus; nevertheless they got to see some of the highlights of the country I've called home this year. On the morning they left for the States, my mom said that my grandmother and I now have a
different relationship. I'm no longer the boy who won't eat anything green, which I proved the first time I had spanakopita. In her eyes, I am now an adult, all grown up, showing them my home.
I want to use my last few words to thank the people that have made my year in Greece possible, manageable, and enjoyable. The other members of the boarding department, Emily, Zizis, Eleftheria, Mrs. Dara, Mrs. Platidou, and Mr. Antoniou, have been first people I've turned to for help, commiseration, and shift changes. Dr. Phil Holland, the head of the English department, has offered sage advice since before I even came to Greece, and gave me the chance to have fun with kids in English classrooms. Will Stroebel, my Grinnell Corps predecessor, has been both a wonderful guide to Thessaloniki and inspiration to continue learning after college. Doug Cutchins first got me excited about Greece, and has continued to motivate me and occasionally scare me with emails about the bird flu. Above all, I want to thank the 74 students in the Anatolia College dorm. Without them, I wouldn't have work to do. They aren't perfect little angels, but they are funny little people that have made me smile just about every shift
I've worked. Dr. White, the Anatolia president, correctly articulated the relationship I've had with these young men and women in a letter he wrote to his father in 1896: "The hope of any people is in its young men. We Americans are inevitably foreigners. But the relation of teacher and pupil is one of the closest that can exist. Our young men often disappoint us, yet quite as often on the favorable as on the unfavorable side, and work for them and with them certainly pays well."
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