From Sept. 25 to Oct. 5, students from the Italian program hosted exchange students from Udine, Italy. They attended classes with their host students, and on their time off, had a tightly packed schedule filled with sightseeing around the Bay Area. The students from Italy, who had been preparing for the trip for about a year, were excited at the opportunity to come to Burlingame and immerse themselves in American culture.

“I was really excited to be in a new country, to make new friends, and to learn about the new school system,” Italian student Margherita Zorzi said.

Included in the itinerary were places such as Oracle Park, the Exploratorium, and the University of California, Berkeley. Burlingame students also coordinated weekend activities for their exchange students to further expose them to American culture—taking their students to places such as Japantown, Stanford Shopping Center, and different neighborhoods in San Francisco.

“I took [my students] to the city, we spent a day in the city, and I took them to Stanford Mall in Palo Alto,” junior Sara Balach said. “It was really fun, I got to make new friends and show them our culture.”

From their time in the Bay Area, the Italian students said they noticed major differences between American and Italian culture, including a friendlier social environment.

“I think people are more friendly, when you go into a shop they say ‘hi’ to you,” Zorzi said. “In Italy, they barely say ‘hi’ to you. That was cool because I did not expect it to be different.”

Fellow Italian student Chiara Stefanutti couldn’t help but notice different social norms between schools in Italy and Burlingame.

“In Italy, it’s more straightforward. You go to school, you go home, you have to study,” Stefanutti said. “But in America, you make relationships, you talk to teachers, you have family, but you also learn a lot too.”

For host students, bonding with their Italian guests and being exposed to a new culture was an exciting experience.

“It was kind of a slow start, it took a couple days for [my student and I] to get used to each other,” junior Sebastian Lamb said. “But once we were comfortable, [my student] was like my brother. He came with me to a couple of my rehearsals for the musical, and he thought they were cool.”

Lamb also emphasized how hosting a student improved his own Italian language skills.

“I was not super confident in my Italian, and I wanted to find ways to improve it, and it definitely did [improve],” Lamb said. “When I was around [my student] and other exchange students, they spoke to each other in Italian, so I would force myself to understand it.”

Italian teacher and event organizer Céline Perry and event organizer Maria Salis had a lot to plan for the trip, but the smaller group of Italian students compared to last time made it easier to manage.

“One key difference is that we have fewer people,” Perry said. “Because we have a smaller group to work with, I’m hoping the experience can feel a little more intimate and the group can be more cohesive.”

Perry hopes the Italian students enjoy the diversity and excitement of the Bay Area.

“I hope our friends from Udine get to see this part of California that is diverse, that is progressive, that has a very forward-looking industry,” Perry said. “These are students who come from a more STEM-focused faculty in their high school, so I hope [these experiences] inspire them.”

While the Italian students last came two years ago, Perry and Salis plan for them to travel to Burlingame annually in the future.

“It’s very much engraved in our culture of our schools to exchange abroad,” Salis said. “It’s a very powerful cultural experience for them.”